*^K
my ■%.
MONTANA
Its Story and Biography
A HISTORY OF ABORIGINAL AND TERRITORIAL MONTANA
AND THREE DECADES OF STATEHOOD
UNDER THE EDITORIAL SUPERVISION
TOM STOUT
VOLUME II
THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY
CHICAGO AND NEW YORK
I92I
Copyright, 1921
BY
AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY
1193841
HISTORY OF MONTANA
r\
Gen. Charles S. Warren is one of the few sur-
vivors of the group of pioneers who made the heroic
and constructive period of Montana's early history.
For over half a century he has lived on terms of
intimacy with miner and prospector, mine operator,
' capitalist, statesman, has had his share in big con-
structive movements, and perhaps no one in Mon-
tana today is better informed and could describe
from his own experience and knowledge the real
forces that have shaped and foimed the political
and industrial fabric of the state.
Charles S. Warren was born in sight of the his-
' toric Starved Rock near Utica, LaSalle County,
Illinois, November 20, 1846, and is of colonial
American stock. His mother, Hannah Brown, was
born at Germantown, near Philadelphia, Pennsyl- .
vania, and she was a member of the Keyser fam-
ily of Philadelphia of nearly a hundred years ago,
and at that time her ancestor, Charles Keyser, was
the president of Girard College. Her ancestors
came over with William Penn among the early set-
tlers of Philadelphia. She was member of a prom-
inent Quaker family of Pennsylvania.
General Warren's father was Sylvanus B. War-
ren, who was born in Philipstown, a suburb of
Peekskill, New York, November 27, 1813. The War-
rens were well known throughout New England and
New York before the Revolution, and took a prom-
inent part in that struggle for independence. Gen-
eral Warren's ancestors built the first house in the
vicinity of Cold Springs, opposite West Point, New
York, prior to the Revolution.
The Warrens were early settlers in central Illi-
nois, in the Illinois Valley, and Charles S. Warren
was reared in practically a pioneer home, but one
of substantial New England and Quaker ideals. He
was a farmer boy when the Civil war broke out,
and served through the war for the Union and had
two honorable discharges from the United States
army. In 1866 he drove a bull team across the
plains to Virginia City, Montana, where he grad-
uated as a bull whacker on August 20, 1866. Dur-
ing the winter of 1867-6S he taught school in Deer
Lodge Valley at Hartley's Ranch near the mouth of
Dry Cottonwood, about fifteen miles south of Deer
Lodge. During the summer he followed placer min-
ing, and for seven years operated in the placer
diggings of Alder Gulch, Last Chance, French
Gulch, German Gulch, Silver Bow, Butte and else-
where in Montana. In fact for over half a century
he has been more or less closely identified with the
mining industry as well as with every other industry
that has helped develop the resources and build up
the territory and state. General Warren reached
Butte November 24, 1866, and spent the following
winter at Silver Bow, then the largest town in this
part of Montana. In a business way his name has
become associated with a number of groups compris-
ing men of power and leadership in the develop-
ment of the resources of the Northwest. He was
one of the incorporators of the Inter Mountain
Publishing Company, of the Comanche Mining
Company, the Charles S. Warren Realty and Min-
ing Company and numerous other corporations.
General Warren has been a republican since he
cast his first vote, and while he has never made
politics a profession, few politicians have been more
frequently honored with the responsibilities and
duties of public ofiice. He served as deputy sheriff,
under sheriff and sheriff of Deer Lodge County
from 1869 to 1875. That county then comprised
everything from the* Big Hole River on the south
to the British possessions on the north, there being
only two counties in Montana west of the Rocky
Mountains, Deer Lodge and Missoula. He was the
first police magistrate of Butte when the city was
organized in 1880, and twenty-six years later was
again elected police judge of the city. In terri-
torial days he served for five years as clerk o_f the
United States District Court of Silver Bow Co'unty,
under Hon. William J. Galbraith, presiding judge.
General Warren was elected a member of the State
Constitutional Convention which met at Helena
July 4, 1889, and framed the constitution of the
state. Upon roll call he voted aye for woman suf-
frage, and has never failed to give his support and
influence to the political emancipation of women.
He was a member of the National Republican Com-
mittee four years when Mathew S. Quay was chair-
man, resulting in the election of Benjamin Harri-
son to the presidency in 1888. He served as a mem-
ber of most of the territorial and state conventions
for forty-five years, and as presidential elector was
appointed to the duty of carrying the Montana vote
to Washington and casting it for William H. Taft
in 1908.
With rank from major to brigadier general, he
served on the staffs of J. Schuyler Crosby, Samuel
T. Hauser, Preston H. Leslie and B. F. White as
territorial governors. He was adjutant of the Mon-
tana Battalion during the Nez Perce Indian war of
1877, and raised a company and tendered its services
to Governor Potts early in July, 1876. upon receiv-
ing news of the Custer massacre, this service be-
ing declined by the governor. He was also instru-
mental in organizing the militia of the Territory
of Montana.
General Warren helped organize and is past com-
mander of Lincoln Post No. 2, Grand Army of the
Republic. The first department commander of the
Grand Army of the Republic in Montana was Capt.
Thomas P. Fuller, who was succeeded in that
office in 1886 by General Warren. The death of
Captain Fuller leaves General Warren as the rank-
ing department commander of the Grand Army of
the Republic of Montana. He is also a member of
the board of managers of the State Soldiers Home
at Columbia Falls.
General Warren served as president of the Society
of Montana Pioneers in 1907-08. He helped or-
ganize the Silver Bow Club as a charter member
and was president of the club in 1888, being sue-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ceeded in that office by F. E. Sargent. Some years
ago General Warren was made a life member of
the club.
He is a past master of Butte Lodge, Ancient Free
and .-Vccepted Masons, a Knight Templar Mason,
belongs to the thirty-second degree of the Scottish
Rite and Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine. He
is a charter member of Butte Lodge of Masons,
and served as its secretary for the first six years.
He was a charter member and first secretary of
Fidelity Lodge No. 8, Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows, a charter member of Damon Lodge No. 2,
Knights of Pvthias, a charter member of Silverbow
Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, but has since severed his active connection
with the Odd Fellows, Knights of Pythias and Elks.
November 15. 1871, General Warren married
Mittie Avery. They were married at what was
then known as Silver Valley Station, now known as
the "Hump," about six miles below Sdver Bow and
on the road betwen Butte and Gregson Springs.
Mrs Warren was born at Saco, Maine, September i,
l8;4. Their two living children are: Wesley W.
Warren, a resident of Sacramento, California: and
Mary Warren Murphey, wife o'f John Milton Mur-
phey. living at 221 North Excelsior Avenue, in
Butte.
Joseph Moore Dixon. The present Governor of
Montana was elected at the 1920 election to serve
for the term beginning January 3, 1921, and ending
January I, 1925.
While his home and interests as a lawyer have
been at Missoula for more than a quarter of a
century, Joseph Moore Dixon is a really national
figure not only on account of his service in the
United States House of Representatives and Senate,
but more particularly because he was called, on ac-
count of his demonstrated qualifications, by Theo-
dore Roosevelt to lead the progressive party m the
national campaign of 1912.
Governor Dixon was born at Snow Camp, Ala-
mance County, North Carolina, July 31, 1867, a son
of Hugh W. and Flora (Murchison) Dixon. His
people were Friends or Quakers. After attending
common schools he was sent to the leading Quaker
institution of higher learning in the Middle West,
Earlham College at Richmond, Indiana. Later he
was schooled in Guilford College, North Carolina,
where he graduated in 1889, with his A. B. degree.
Mr. Dixon came to Missoula in 1891. During the
following year he studied in the law office of Woody
& Webster, and was admitted to the bar in 1892. He
practiced in partnership with I. G. Denny until 1894,
when he was elected county attorney, having pre-
viously served as assistant prosecuting attorney. He
filled that office from 1895 to 1897. In 1900 he was
elected to represent Missoula County in the Legisla-
ture and his abilities as a lawyer and legislator and
his influence with a great mass of the republican
voters soon brought him to leadership in cementing
the factions of the republican party in Montana. In
1902 he received a substantial majority in the elec-
tion for congressman-at-Iarge to the Fifty-eighth
Congress, taking his seat in 1903. In 1904 he was re-
elected by a still larger majority. His leadership at
home and his work in the Congress those four years
made him the logical candidate to succeed W. A.
Clark in the United States Senate. Mr. Dixon's
term as United States senator was from 1907 to 1913.
In 1912 the late Colonel Roosevelt selected him as
chairman of the Progressive National Committee,
and he was largely instrumental in organizing and
rolling up the immense popular vote credited to the
progressive candidates of that year.
In 1900 Mr. Dixon acquired and reorganized the
Daily Missoulian, one of the oldest and influential
republican daily newspapers of the state. On his
retirement from the Senate, in 1913, he assumed
editorial control of the newspaper in person and
continued as such until he disposed of the same
in 1917.
Governor Dixon has always been a stalwart re-
publican with progressive tendencies. He was dele-
gate-at-large to the national conventions of 1904
and 1916.
March 12, 1896, Mr. Dixon married Carrie M.
Worden of Missoula, daughter of Frank L. Worden.
one of the founders of Missoula. They have an
interesting family of six -daughters.
McCoRMicK OF Montana. This is a variation
from the ordinary title at the head of individual
articles in this publication, and of itself it is signifi-
cant, and its significance is one readily recognized
all over the state. Business men. farmers and grain
growers in particular, know McCormick of Montana
as a business man whose success has been a valuable
asset to the state, and as proprietor of McCormick
of Montana Seed House, the largest concern of the
kind in the state. There are many McCormicks in
and around Billings, but the postoffice department
and citizens generally do not need the initial letters
W. H. to identify McCormick of Montana.
Personally he has been identified with business
■ affairs in Montana for over a quarter of a centur.v.
He is a nephew of "the grand old man of Montana"
Paul McCormick, distinguished as a Montana settler
of 1866, a pioneer farmer, freighter, Indian fighter,
rancher and one of the notable business builders of
Billings.
McCormick of Montana was born at Hancock,
Wisconsin, August 2, 1871. The McCormicks have
been noted for a high degree of commercial enter-
prise and likewise for prominence in all walks of life.
His grandfather, James McCormick. was born in
Cork, Ireland, in 1791, and on coming to .America
settled in Steuben County, New York. Though a
farmer he became very influential in civic affairs
and acquired a large amount of property. He died
at Rexville in Steuben County in 1886.
Hugh McCormick, father of McCormick of Mon-
tana, was born at Greenwood in Steuben County.
New York, in 1826. In 1858 he moved to Wisconsin,
developed a large farm in that state, and lived there
until his death at Hancock on June 16, 1871. He
liad the reputation of being progressive and ener-
getic, and was one of the wealthiest men of his
locality. He was successful in business and equally
useful in the promotion of many worthy enterprises
in his community. He was a republican in politics
and a member of the Catholic Church. Hugh Mc-
Cormick married Mary Raj-, who was born in New
York in 1834 and died at Hancock. Wisconsin, in
1889. W. H. McCormick was the sixth and youngest
child of his parents and was born after his father's
death. The other members of the family were:
Charles, who died at Rexville in Steuben County.
New York, at the age of twelve years; Fred, who
has for many j-ears been a resident of Montana, was
formerly a miner, and is now a farmer and stock
man at Finch in Rosebud County ; Louise, unmarried,
is a property owner at Tacoma, Washington :
Theresa, wife of John Milne, a farmer and stock-
man at Rothamay in Fergus County, Montana ; Cora,
unmarried, owner of considerable property at Bit-
lings and principal of the McKinley School in that
city.
As a boy McCormick of Montana was sent to New
York State, and was educated in the Canisteo Acad-
emv at Canisteo. and tlie Christian Brothers' St.
Joseph College at Buffalo. Leaving school at the
/C(I(3m.cc
MCCORMICK or MONTANA
icXj
HISTORY OF MONTANA
age of sixteen, he taught one year at Jasper in
Steuben County, and in 1890 came to Billings, Mon-
tana. For twelve years he was manager of the gro-
cery and hardware firm of Donovan and Spear. In
igoj he organized the McCormick Mercantile Com-
pany at Billings, his principal associate being his
uncle, Paul McCormick. This partnership was con-
tinued for three years and was then superseded by
the Donovan-McCormick Company, operating a de-
partment store.
The McCormick of ilontana Seed House was
established in 1907. This business might well be
entitled to a lengthy description. The headquarters
are at 2500 Minnesota Avenue. It is a business that
has been developed to most extensive proportions
by Mr. McCormick, and has undisputed claim to the
position of being the largest seed house in Montana.
The firm handles hay, grain and seeds in carload
lots, also poultry supplies, and specializes as bean
dealers, jobbers and shippers. In the handling, pick-
ing and grading of beans, a separate department by
itself, seventy-five people are employed. Fifteen per-
sons work in the seed house and office, and twenty-
five make up the staff of the hay baling department.
The handling of hay is a big business in itself. Im-
mense quantities are pressed and shipped by this firm
to eastern markets. This is the house that has given
Montana grown alfalfa seed a justified fame
throughout the United States.
As something of an auxiliary to the seed house is
operated a 3.00G acre stock farm in Rosebud County.
Part of this farm is devoted to the culture of pure
seeds as well as pure bred livestock. The trial
grounds for the seed house are on this ranch, and
all the seeds marketed are submitted to tests to prove
their high germination qualities as well as their
adaptability to varying conditions of soil and climate.
McCormick of Montana also built and owns the
McCormick Hotel at J500 Montana Avenue, and his
own home is the noted old McCormick Lo* Cabin
property, the early residence of his uncle, Paul Mc-
Cormick, and one of the interesting landmarks of
Billings.
His initiative and enterprise are sufificiently dis-
played in the above brief record. His friends and
associates appreciate even more his integrity, and the
great persistence that marked his early struggles
with fortune. Some of his intimate frfends know
that when he finished school and took up life as a
business man he was $700 in debt. Out of his early
earnings he paid off every dollar of his obligations
and then undoubtedly thereby established a credit
which has remained steadily with him to the present
time.
A bit of military history also belongs in the record
of McCormick of Montana. He was a member of
Troop A of Billings of the Montana National Guard,
which volunteered during tlie Spanish-American war
as Troop M of the Third United States Volunteer
Cavalry of Rough Riders. This troop was in service
seven months and was mustered out in September,
1898, at the close of the war.
Mr. McCormick is a member of the Billings Mid-
land Club, is a republican, is affiliated with the
Catholic Church, is a third degree Knight of Colum-
bus, having membership in Billings Council, and
is a member of the Billings Lodge of Elks. He also
belongs to the Country Club, is treasurer and a di-
rector of the Midland Empire Fair .\ssociation, and
a director and former president of the Rosebud
Lake Association.
In 1905, at Missoula, he married Miss Frances J.
Murphy. She died at Billings in 191 5, the mother
of one daughter, Eloise, born March 9, 1913.
WiLFORD J. Johnson. It is not usual to call a
man a veteran while still in his early forties, but
if any banker in Montana has claim to a veteran
experience it is Wilford J. Johnson of Lewistown,
president of the First National Bank. This is due
to the fact that he began banking experience when
most boys are in school, and has pursued the busi-
ness uninterruptedly and with steadily advancing
influence and responsibility for nearly thirty years.
He was born at Sutton, Nebraska, November 10,
1876, a son of Joseph W. and Mary A. (Bagley)
Johnson. His parents .are both natives of Iowa
and are still living. Joseph W. Johnson, who has
lived retired since 1909, was for many years in
the newspaper business in Nebraska, and also be-
came prominent in politics and for eight or ten
years held the position of state railway commis-
sioner. He is a republican and a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church.
Wilford J. Johnson was the oldest of five sons.
He attended public schools only to the age of four-
teen, and since then has acquired a broad educa-
tion without resort to the formal training of the
schoolroom. In 1890, at the age of fourteen, he
went to work for the State Bank of Curtis, Ne-
braska, as a clerk. Such were his abilities and
value that he was promoted to the post of cashier
when only seventeen years of age. Doubtless he
was the youngest cashier in the country at that
time. Mr. Johnson came to Montana in 1897, when
only twenty-one years of age, and was associated
with the First National Bank of Butte as teller
until 1907. In that year he removed to Lewistown;
and served the First National Bank as cashier and
since 1916 as president. He is vice president of the
Montana State Bankers Association. Mr. Johnson
is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and
Shriner. September 21, 1905, he married Elizabeth
G. Gaylord. She is a native of Connecticut.
Charles O'Donnell. During an active and en-
ergetic career extending over a period of a quar-
ter of a century Charles O'Donnell, of Billings, has
forged steadily to the forefront among successful
stockmen and ranchers, among whom he now holds
pre-eminent position. His career has been one ex-
emplifying self-made manhood, for he started his
independent life with a self-gained education and
without financial assistant or influential friends, and
each step upward has been achieved only after the
exercise of his own energy and resource. In addi-
tion to being president of the Montana Live Stock
and Loan Company, and connected with various
other prominent enterprises he is a large landholder.
Mr. O'Donnell was born at Saginaw, Michigan,
April 6, 1874, a son of Daniel O'Donnell, who died
at Midland, Michigan. His opportunities for at-
tending school were not numerous in his youth,
but he made the most of his opportunities, and
through self-teaching, keen observation and much
reading has become a well-educated man. He be-
gan to be self-supporting when he was eighteen
years of age. He came to Billings in 1890, and
was employed by the Montana-Minnesota Land and
Improvement Company for one year in building
the irrigation ditch for that concern. Following
this he rented a ranch, which started him upon
his successful career, for he soon became a ranch
owner and stockman and yearly has increased his
holdings and extended the scope of his operations.
His home ranch is situated fourteen miles east
of Billings, and is a tract of 1,250 acres of irri-
gated land. In addition to this he owns 10,000 acres
in Yellowstone County and a half interest in a
ranch of 1,700 acres in Custer County. As one of
Montana's leading stockmen, in August, 1915, he
HISTORY OF MONTANA
became the leading factor in the organization of
the Montana Live Stock and Loan Company, a
concern which buys and sells livestock and loans
money thereon in addition to shipping all over the
United States. The offices of this company are situ-
is also president of the Cold Springs Livestock
ated at 2719 First Avenue, and the officials are:
Charles O'Donnell, president; Wallace Huidokoper,
vice president; Frank O'Donnell, secretary and
treasurer; and F. B. Bair. manager. Mr. O'Donnell
Corporation at Forsyth, Rosebud County, Alontana,
a ranch and livestock corporation capitalized at
$150,000, in which Mr. O'Donnell owns one-quarter
of the stock. This corporation feeds 8,000 sheep
every winter, as well as horses and cattle, and has a
3,180-acre ranch, of which 2,000 acres are irrigated.
Mr. O'Donnell's pleasant modern residence is sit-
uated at 24 Yellowstone Avenue, Billings. In his
political views he is a democrat, with independent
inclinations. With his family he belongs to the
Roman Catholic Church, and is a third degree knight
and member of Billings Council No. 1259, Knights
of Columbus. He is a life member of Billings
Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, and holds membership also in the Billings Club
and the Billings Golf and Country Club.
In November. 1897, Mr. O'Donnell was married
at Billings to Miss Katherine Riordon, who was
born at Boston, Massachusetts, and was brought
as a babe to Billings, where she received a high
school education. Mr. and Mrs. O'Donnell are the
parents of two children : Charles Everett, born
August 10, 1903, who is a senior in the Billings
High School ; and Lawrence Donald, born Decem-
ber 10, 1909, attending the parochial school.
Leo G. Zeidler. The career of Leo G. Zeidler in
Plentywood began with the start of the permanent
builders and has continued prominent in its business
life throughout its annals.
Mr. Zeidler arrived in the community of Plenty-
wood in 1909, and in August of that year became a
clerk for the Johnson-Riba Hardware Company, Ijut
a few months later embarked in business for him-
self as a hardware merchant and erected the first
business house of the new town. The Zeidler store
was for a short time a lonesome one, being the only
one along the main business street, but in a short
time it was joined by all of the old town, the parties
moving over in the spring of 1910, including the
Johnson-Riba Hardware Company, the Riba Bank,
the Riba Lumber Yard, Ring & Sommers Restaurant,
the J. A. Ford mercantile business, Fishbeck & Jar-
vis, the State Bank of Plentywood, the Chad. Robin-
son Livery, , the Peter Diedrick feed mill, the Anson
Kranzer blacksmith, the C. S. Nelson Herald office,
Albert Chapman, land commissioner, Severt Olson
Hotd and George E. Bolster, postmaster and hotel
proprietor. And by this time several other business
enterprises had sprung up, including the Rogers
Lumber Company, St. Anthony Lumber Company,
Kullass Lumber Company, the Tanna & Best Mer-
cantile Company, and with the coming of the railroad
the Farmers Elevator and the Montana-Dakota Ele-
vators were built.
Mr. Zeidler in all these years has continued his
hardware business, it having first opened its doors
to the public in February, 1910, and he has come
to be known as one of the old and reliable business
men of the town. He has also taken an active inter-
est in the agricultural . development of the locality.
In 1907 he filed on a homestead in McClain County,
North Dakota, proved it up with the usual tempo-
rary improvements and farmed the land while he
was acquiring title. In 1913 he became identified
with the farming interests of Sheridan County, lo-
cating his claim near the county seat, and has become
well known as a grain raiser. During the seven
years he has planted crops here he has harvested
something each year, although in 1919, his poorest
year, his yield after cutting and threshing did not
quite equal the seed wheat he sowed. He has now
under cultivation and improvement 500 acres of the
almost 1,000-acre tract which he owns, and the im-
provements which he has placed on the land include
fencing and the granaries.
Mr. Zeidler was born in Jeflferson County, Wis-
consin, November 3, 1882, and he spent his early
life there. His father, John Zeidler, of Lake Mills,
Wisconsin, is a shoemaker still at his bench at the
advanced age of seventy-two years. He was also
born in Jeflferson County, and has spent his life
there. His father, also named John, a German, was
sent into Wisconsin as a pioneer and helped build
the first wagon road from the Hill Church to Rock
River. He was actively engaged in clearing away
the timber and in time developed a farm in the
woods, and he now lies buried in the soil of that
locality. Four of his children reached years of
maturity, namely : John ; Charles, who died in 1919,
at Mallard, Iowa; Christian, of Rockwell, Iowa;
and Mary, who became the wife of George Troeger
and died at Jeflferson in 1919. John Zeidler, the
son, married Christina Troeger, whose father came
from his native land of Germany to the United
States and was first a farmer and afterward a tan-
ner at Jeflferson, Wisconsin. Mrs. Zeidler was born
in the City of Jeflferson in 1851, and was married
February 24, 1870, the following children being born
of the union: Edward, who is a resident of Rock-
ford, Illinois ; Erney and George, both living at Fort
Atkinson, Wisconsin ; Leo G., tlie Plentywood mer-
chant; and Elsa, the wife of Jesse Calvert, of Mil-
waukee, Wisconsin.
Leo G. Zeidler was nineteen years of age when
he left home to begin life on his own account. Going
to Rockwell, Iowa, he was employed by an uncle in
a hardware store for seven years, there gaining his
early knowledge of the business. From Iowa he re-
moved to North Dakota, where he secured his claim,
as above noted, and from there came to Montana
and cast his lot with the embryo Town of Plenty-
wood. His public service in an official capacity has
been as clerk of the Plentywood School District, but
his service to the community as a citizen has been
of far greater importance. During the country's
participation in the World war he served as a mem-
ber of the Home Guards, took an active part in the
drives made for funds for Red Cross and other
auxiliary work, and has always been active in the
public welfare. His political support has been given
to the republican party, and he cast his first presi-
dential vote for Colonel Roosevelt in Iowa in 1904.
At Rockwell, Iowa, June 21, 1909, Mr. Zeidler
married Miss Jennie A. Gibson, who was born in
that city in October, 1885, a daughter of Robert and
Susie (McDowell) Gibson, both of whom were born
in Pennsylvania. The father is a Civil war vet-
eran. He served with the Army of the Potomac
as a member of the Sixty-second Pennsylvania In-
fantry, and took part in the heavy fighting of the
war in Virginia and other parts of the South. After
the war he migrated westward, stopping for a time
in Illinois, and finally locating in Rockwell, Iowa,
where he was engaged in the poultry, produce and
meat business until he retired from a business life.
He has been active in Grand Army circles, is a re-
publican in politics and is a member of the Methodist
Church. Mr. and Mrs. Gibson have five daughters
and one son, and Mrs. Zeidler is the only repre-
sentative of the family in Montana. After grad-
uating from the high school at Rockwell, Iowa, she
HISTORY OF MONTANA
became a high school teacher there. She is now a
member of the School Board of Plentyvvood, this
being one of the first instances where women have
acted in a like official capacity. She has served in
the position two years, and one other woman and
three men are her colleagues on the board. She
exercises her right of franchise with the republican
party, and her first presidential ballot was cast in
1916. Three sons have been born to Mr. and Mrs.
Zeidler, Gibson, Robert and Barr.
Lewis O. Evans, of Butte, has for over twenty
years been recognized as one of the ablest corpo-
ration lawyers in Montana, and his ability, gained
through a wide and varied experience in legal prac-
tice, and particularly in connection with questions
of corporation and mining law, is well recognized.
Born at Utica, New York, on August 31, 1871,
he came to Montana with his parents, Owen and
Emily J. (Church) Evans, in 1883, and has since
resided in this state. On coming to Montana his
father, Owen Evans, engaged in mercantile pur-
suits, and was prominently identified with the civic
and business life of Helena for a number of years.
His parents subsequently removed to Anaconda.
He began his education in the public schools of
his native city, and graduated from the Helena
High School when fifteen years of age. For a short
period he attended the Cazenovia Seminary in New
York, and later, after his return to Helena, studied
law with the firms of Word and Smith and Word,
Smith and Word. He was admitted to the bar
while employed in their office in 1894, and has re-
cently rounded out a quarter of a century of active
practice.
In December, 1895, Mr. Evans removed to Butte
and entered the office of John F. Forbis, one of
the most eminent practitioners that Montana has pro-
duced. A year later the partnership of Forbis
and Evans was formed, and was engaged in gen-
eral practice until the retirement of Mr. Forbis
January i, 1910. This firm was constantly employed
in handling important litigation and was prominent
in what is known as the "Heinze-Amalgamated"
litigation from early in the year 1897 until its set-
tlement in 1906. This was probably the most ex-
tensive and bitterly fought litigation recorded in
legal history. Most of Mr. Evans' practice has
been devoted to the business of many of the large
corporations which have their headquarters at Butte,
and which in 1910 were merged into the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company. In 1912 he became, and
has since been, chief counsel for that company. He
is also chief counsel for the Montana Power Com-
pany and its subsidiary companies, and other cor-
porations of less magnitude.
Mr. Evans has taken an important part in the
trials of many causes celebre in Montana, among
them the "Michael Devitt," "Pennsylvania," "Drum
Lummon," "Larkin" and "Minnie Healy" mining
cases. Mr. C. F. Kelley and Mr. Evans handled
with entire success for the mining companies the
celebrated "Smoke Case" between the farmers of
the Deer Lodge Valley and the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company and Washoe Copper Company.
Mr. Evans is a member of the Montana State
Bar Association and of the Silver Bow Bar Asso-
ciation, and has served as president of the latter
organization.
In politics Mr. Evans is and at all times has been
an ardent republican. He is a member of Silver
Bow Lodge No. 48, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, and Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine,
and other Masonic organizations, the Butte Lodge
of Elks, Rocky Mountain Club of New York, the
Montana Club, and the Silver Bow Club of Butte,
and served three terms as president of the Silver
Bow Club. He has at all times taken an active part
in civic and other matters of community interest.
In November, 1903, he married at Butte Miss
Martha Nichols, daughter of Judge Erastus A. and
Sarah Elizabeth (Warren) Nichols. Her father was
for many years identified with the business life of
Butte and later removed to Missoula. Mr. and Mrs.
Evans have three children : Lewis Nichols, born
October 12, 1904, Richard Orvis, born August. 22,
1907, and Elizabeth Warren, born May 2, 1913.
James Eugene Lane is a man of exceptional busi-
ness capacity, possessing ^ great deal of driving
power in business and in everything he undertakes,
and for a number of years has held vital and sig-
nificant relations with the community of Lewistown.
He is head of the Montana Lumber Company, which
has nineteen places of business in the state. Mr.
Lane held the rank of major in the American Red
Cross overseas service during the late war.
He was born at Whitehall, Illinois, September 8,
1871, a son of James S. and Nancy J. (Baker) Lane.
His father was a native of Wisconsin and his mother
of Kentucky. His mother is still living at the age
of eighty-one. James S. Lane received his early
education in Wisconsin, and as a young man en-
listed at the beginning of the Civil war and served
in many battles and campaigns until the close. After
the war he located at Whitehall, Illinois, and engaged
in farming and stock raising until his death in 1872.
He was a member of the Grand Army of the Re-
public and a republican in politics.
James E. Lane was educated in Illinois and Ne-
braska, and in early life learned the business of car-
penter and millwright. He came to Montana in the
spring of 1893. His first location was at Billings.
Later he was engaged in building the Jaw Bone
Railway as superintendent of building and construc-
tion under Richard Harlow from 1897 to 1900. They
built the road from Summit to Harlowton. Sub-
sequently Mr. Lane resumed the building and con-
tracting business at Martinsdale, Two Dot and Har-
lowton. He organized and operated the Midlen Coal
and Lumber Company until 1903, when he sold out
and then established his home at Lewistown. Here
he organized the Montana Lumber Company, and
remained as its general manager until 1909, since
which date he has been president. This is one of
the largest retail lumber concerns in the State of
Montana. He is also director of the Bank of Fergus
County, president of the Montana Home Building
Company, and vice president of the Lewistown Brick
and Tile Company. In February, 1919, a deal was
consummated whereby the Montana Hardware Com-
pany was consolidated with the Montana Lumber
Company, and Mr. Lane is now the directing head
of the newly merged concern. He was elected a
member of the State Senate in 1914, and served one
term of four years.
In May, 1917, Mr. Lane assumed some heavy re-
sponsibilities in the local and state organization of
the American Red Cross. He took the post of or-
ganizer and chairman of the Fergus County Chapter
and as a member of the state executive board. Not
content with what he could do for the organization
in this country, he enlisted for the overseas work
in May, 1918, and in June of the same year was
sent to France. His headquarters were at Paris,
where he was chief of hospital supplies with the
rank of major. On different occasions he visited
the front, and saw the great battlegrounds of the
Argonne Forest and St. Mihiel and other points
HISTORY OF MONTANA
under actual war conditions. He was on leave of
absence at Paris when the armistice was signed
and soon afterward he returned home. All this
service was given without a cent of remuneration.
Mr. Lane is a charter member of the Judith Club
and is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 34,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Lewistown
Chapter No. 13, Royal Arch Masons, Lewistown
Commanderv No. 14, Knights Templar, with the
Scottish Rite Consistorv and with Algeria Temple
of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is a democrat
in politics.
May 17, 1900, Mr. Lane married Rose Wiley.
She was born near Peoria, Illinois. They have two
daughters: Edith, wife of D. W. Auenbaugh, liv-
ing in California; and Newell, wife of Capt. F. M.
Hawks, stationed at San' Antonio, Texas.
Hunter L. Richmonp, a resident of Montana since
1893, is vice president of the First Alortgage Loan
Com'panv of Great Falls.
He came to Montana when a child, having been
born on his father's farm in Macon County, Mis-
souri, June 30, 1888. His father, the late Samuel
T. Richmond, was born in Missouri, where he fol-
lowed farming and stock raising, and in 1893
brought his family to Montana, settling m Cascade
County. Here he engaged in ranching on a large
scale, owning atout 700 acres of land. He special-
ized in the better grades of livestock, running from
50 to 150 head of cattle and breeding Shire and
Percheron horses. In 191 1 he retired, and his death
occurred in March, 1914, at the age of fifty-two.
He was several times honored with township offices
and was a democrat, a Presbyterian and a member
of the Woodmen of the World. Samuel T. Rich-
mond married Mollie M. Gorham, also a native of
Missouri, and who had come to Montana at the
age of fourteen with her father, R. T. Gorham, who
was a pioneer miner in this state. Mrs. Samuel
Richmond is still living at the age of fifty-nine.
She was the mother of seven children, Hunter L.
being the third, and three daughters and two sons
still survive.
Hunter L. Richmond acquired his early education
in the schools of Great Falls and at BircJ Creek in
Cascade County, and lived on his father's farrn until
he was seventeen. He then clerked for a time in
a clothing store at Great Falls, following which he
proved up a homestead in Teton County. In 1914
he became associated with the First Mortgage Loan
Company of Great Falls, and since 1918 has held
the post of vice president in that business. In the
fall of 1919 he helped organize the Northern Na-
tional Bank of Great Falls. Mr. Richmond is a
democrat and is affiliated with the Knights of Co-
lumbus.
February 15, 1912, he married Mary Ellen Ryan.
They have three children, Hunter E., Virginia Ann
and Helen Marie.
Francis K. Armstrong, for many years an emi-
nent figure in the Montana territorial and state bar,
former judge of the Ninth Judicial Circuit, has been
a resident of Bozeman forty years, and since retiring
from the bench has given up law practice and con-
cerns himself only with some incidental public duties
and the handling of his extensive ranch properties.
Judge Armstrong was born at Rockford in Surry
County, North Carolina, March 6, 1849. His father,
Francis K. Armstrong, Sr„ was born in the same
county March 28, 1802, and was prominent as a
planter, hotel man and merchant until some financial
disasters overtook him. A short time before the out-
break of the Civil war he left North Carolina and
removed his family to St. Joseph, Missouri, and
also bought land at Iowa Point in Northeastern Kan-
sas. His home was in Doniphan County, Kansas, but
he died while on a business trip in Missouri in the
fall of 1861. In North Carolina he served as clerk
in the District Court, and several terms represented
Surry County in the Legislature. In the early days
he was a whig. He was also a member of the
Masonic fraternity and was a colonel of the militia
in North Carolina. In Iredell County he married
Miss Jerusha Belt, who was born in Iredell County,
near Statesville, North Carolina, in 1807, and died
in Doniphan County, Kansas, in 1891. They w-ere
the parents of seven children : Thomas J., who
was a farmer and spent his last years employed in
a bank at Highland, Kansas, where he died at the
age of seventy-two ; Elizabeth, who died near St.
Joseph, Missouri, at the age of thirty-five; Eliza,
who died at the age of fourteen ; Mary, who died at
Butte, Montana, aged sixty-nine; Sarah, wife of
James E. Martin, president of the National Bank
of Gallatin Valley at Bozeman ; Rebecca, living at
.\tchison, Kansas, widow of Junius E. Moore, who
was a merchant ; and Judge Francis K.
Judge Armstrong received his early training in the
rural schools of his native county in North Carolina,
also attended school in Doniphan County, Kansas.
He was a student in Highland University at High-
land, Kansas, until taken ill during his senior year.
Some years later, when he received his law degree.
Highland University conferred upon him the Master
of Arts degree as an appropriate recognition of the
work he had all but completed. He began the study
of law at Atchison, Kansas, under Gen. W. W.
Guthrie and attended the law school of the Uni-
versity of Missouri at Columbia, wliere he graduated
LL. B. in 1875. Judge Armstrong is a Phi Beta
Kappa, an honorary college fraternity to which only
men and women of exceptional scholarship records
are eligible. Judge Armstrong was admitted to the
bar at St. Joseph, Missouri, in 1875, remained ther.e
six months, and then practiced in Doniphan County,
Kansas, at Troy, with Judge Webb until 1879. He
first entered politics in 1876 as democratic candidate
for the office of county attorney. That was the year
of the famous Hayes-Tilden national campaign.
Doniphan County, Kansas, was strongly republican,
gave Hayes a majority of 800 over Tilden, but
on account of his popularity, recognized ability and
vigorous election campaign. Judge .'\rmstrong was
chosen bv a substantial maiority.
The following extract from the Troy Bulletin
of Doniphan County, is an expression of the esteem
in which Judge Armstrong was held on leaving
there: "F. K. Armstrong, Esq., has closed his of-
ficial course with the people of Doniphan County
and steps down and out. It is but due him as a
man and citizen to say that he has shown by his
conduct for the past two years as a public official
that he has been worthy the confidence and trust
given him by the people. Doniphan County never
had a more capable or efficient county attorney and
the court records will stand proof of the assertion.
He is a young man yet, but he is a thoroughly posted
lawyer — was while reading and is yet a close stu-
dent. Having read with one of the ablest lawyers
in the state and graduated at law school with high
honors, he has thoroughly prepared himself forthe
practice of his profession. -•Xdded to this he is a
young man of strict honesty, excellent moral char-
acter, and such genial social qualities that all who
know him at once become his friends. Life to him
certainly should be encouraging, and now that we
are to lose him as a citizen from our midst we
have no doubt but the people of the whole county
will unite with the Bulletin in tendering him their
HISTORY OF MONTANA
warmest regards for his future success and wel-
fare, and we trust that the mountain home he seeks
in Montana will be fully up to his expectations and
that he may soon take that position in his profes-
sion and society there that he has so deservedly
won here. He expects to leave for Montana the
coming week."
Soon after the close of his term as county attorney
he came to Bozeman in 1879 and practiced with
Col. Ira Pierce until the death of Colonel Pierce,
then with Judge L, A. Luce and later with Charles
S. Hartman. Montana was a territory when Judge
Armstrong located at Bozeman. In the fall of
1S80 he was elected district attorney for the First
District, which embraced all of Southern Montana
from Dillon to Glendive. There were only three
districts in the state at this time. In the fall of
1884 he was elected a member of the Territorial
Council, representing Gallatin County, and was
chosen president of the council. Two years later
he was elected a member of the Lower House and
was speaker of the House. In 1891 upon the crea-
tion of the Ninth Judicial Circuit, Governor Joseph
K. Toole appointed Judge Armstrong as the first
incumbent of the office of judge, and he was regu-
larlv elected to that office in 1904 and again in
1908.
Upon retiring from the bench in 1913 Judge Arm-
strong made no effort to resume his law practice.
He was formerly a member of the County and
State and American Bar associations. In 1904 he
was one of the organizers of the National Bank
of Gallatin Valley, and is still a director and stock-
holder. He owns a number of ranches in Gallatin
County, aggregating about 5,000 acres. He also
has six dwelling houses in the city and his own
home is at 302 South Central Avenue.
Soon after leaving the bench Governor Norris
appointed Judge Armstrong a member of the com-
mission for the purchase of the Warm Springs
property in Deer Lodge County, Montana. He was
chairman of the commission and handled the ne-
gotiations by which that property was transferred
to the state. On this ground are now located the
buildings of the state insane asylum. The trans-
action was one involving over $600,000.
Judge Armstrong has always been a stanch demo-
crat in politics. He is a citizen of irreproachable
character and is still regarded as one of the strong
men upon whom the state can rely when it needs
the services of counsellors. He is affiliated with
the Masonic fraternity and is a member of Boze-
man Lodge No. 46.1 of the Elks.
December 27, 1881, at Bozeman, Judge Arm-
strong married Miss Lora Lamme, a native of St.
Joseph, Missouri, and a daughter of Dr. A. and
Elizabeth J. (Oliver) Lamme, Her father came
to Montana about the close of the Civil war, was
an able physician, but having little to do in a pro-
fessional capacity he took up merchandising and
at the time of his death was one of the chief mer-
chants of Montana. Judge and Mrs. Armstrong
have had three daughters. Mabel died at the age
of six years. Lena is a graduate of the LaSelle
Seminary near Boston, Massachusetts, and is the
wife of R. E. Brown, member of the Brown Broth-
ers Lumber Company at Helena, their home being
at Bozeman. Edith, who is a graduate of the Na-
tional Park Seminary at Washington, D. C, is the
wife of R. B. Oliver, of Bozeman. Mr. Oliver is
associated with Judge Armstrong in managing the
latter's ranch properties and was formerly a travel-
ing salesman for the Deer-Weber Company.
Burton Kendall Wheeler, who Jiecame United
States attorney for the District of Montana on
October 30, 1913, began the practice of law in 1906.
Throughout the period of the World war he was
the official representative of the Federal Depart-
ment of Justice in Montana.
Mr. Wheeler was born at Hudson, Massachu-
setts, February 27, 1882, a son of Asa L. and Mary
Elizabeth (Tyler) Wheeler. His people have been
in Massachusetts for several generations. The
Wheelers were Quakers and established their home
at Sudbury. Massachusetts, before the Revolution-
ary war. The Tylers were English people, also early
settlers in Massachusetts. The mother of Mary
Elizabeth Tyler was a Kendall.
Burton Kendall Wheeler attended the public
schools of his native town, graduating from the
Hudson High School in 1900, and for some time
was employed in office work at Boston. He re-
ceived his law degree from the University of Mich-
igan with the class of 1905, and soon afterward came
to Montana and began practice at Butte on January
IS, igo6. His abilities soon procured for him a fa-
vorable position in the local bar and he also became
interested in politics, being elected and serving as
a member of the Twelfth Legislature. He was
democratic candidate for attorney general in the
convention at Great Falls, and on the seventh bal-
lot was defeated by Daniel M. Kelley by the narrow
margin of iH votes. His nomination for United
States attorney for Montana was among the first
sent to the Senate by President Wilson.
Mr. Wheeler is the owner of the Wheeler Block
in Butte. He is a director in the Deaconess Hos-
pital, is a member of the Masonic Order and Mystic
Shrine, the Silver Bow Club, is a Methodist, and
a member of the Montana Bar Association.
At Albany, Illinois, September 7, 1907, he mar-
ried Miss Lulu M. White, daugliter of John and
Elizabeth White. Mrs. Wheeler grew up on a farm
in Illinois, graduated from the Fulton Normal
School of that state, and studied music in Oberlin
College Conservatory in Oberlin, Ohio. For sev-
eral years before her marriage she was a teacher
of music in the public schools. Mr. and Mrs.
Wheeler have five children : John Leonard, Eliza-
beth Hale, Edward Kendall, Francis L. and Richard.
James M. Weldon. Now living retired at Lewis-
town, James M. Weldon is one of the few sur-
vivors among those who saw and knew Montana
in the early and romantic days of the '60s. His
name belongs with that notable list, greatly abbre-
viated by time and circumstance, of the pioneers
of 1862. The following is only a brief sketch of
his career, but it suggests many vital points at which
his own life has come in touch with Montana.
He was born at Addison, Steuben County, New
York, September 4, 1832. At the age of twenty-
one, in 1853 he made the first stage of his. migra-
tions which eventually brought him nearly across
the continent. For about nine years he lived at
Mazomanie in Dane County, Wisconsin, some
twenty-five miles from the capital of the state at
Madison. The date of his eventful first journey
to Montana was May 4, 1862, when he joined a
party comprising eleven teams for the purpose of
crossing the plains to Florence, Idaho. They drove
horses, making rapid progress, traveling from
twenty to thirty miles, and occasionally forty miles
a day. The Missouri River was crossed at Coun-
cil Bluffs and Omaha, and thence the route fol-
lowed the North Platte to Fort Laramie, thence
to Sweetwater and South Pass, by Fort Bridger and
Soda Springs, crossing Snake River at old Fort
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Hall. From there they went on to Salmon City,
Idaho. At Birch Creek some 200 wagons were
encamped, further progress being barred by the
report that wagons could not get through. Many
of the people in this camp were from Pike's Peak
and many states. John Jacobs volunteered to lead
the party through to the MuUan Trail and to Walla
Walla, and the Weldon party went on with Jacobs,
striking the Mullan Trail at Deer Lodge. At that
time there was no one at Deer Lodge but John
Grant, John Powell, for whom the county and
mountain have since been named, and some half
breeds. John Grant had quite a herd of cattle and
horses. He told the party if they wanted fresh
meat to kill a beef "in welcome," but as there was
plenty of fish and game the invitation was not ac-
cepted. .
August I, 1862, the day after their arrival at Deer
Lodge, the party went down to Gold Creek, eighteen
miles below, reaching there at noon. A trading
store was kept there by James and Granville Stuart,
historic characters in Montana. On August 2d they
prospected in Pioneer Gulch, sinking a hole some
three feet in depth; the water tame in and they
only got some "colors" which a couple of forty-
niners from California said was "no good," and
advised them to go on to something better. August
3rd the journey was resumed, passing through Hell
Gate Canyon. About half the party went by way
of the Lolo Trail to Elk City, Idaho, while Mr.
Weldon and the rest followed the Mullan Trail to
Walla Walla, where they arrived August 25, 1862.
Mr. Weldon spent about two months in the Blue
Mountains, most of the time making shingles at
$10 a 1,000. He could easily make 1,000 or more
per day, and Jie made the shingles used for the
roof of the Wells Fargo & Company Express
office. In October, with six or seven others, he
started back with saddle and pack horses for Boise.
At Auburn, having lost the saddle and pack horses,
they purchased two yoke of broncho steers and a
wagon. A man soon joined them with a yoke of
"broke" steers, which were put on as leaders, and
thus equipped they went on to the Payette River
and Boise Basin. The road being very rough they
dropped the front wheels and made a cart with
heavy tongue. Meeting some packers, they asked
about the road ahead and were told that "if you
are pilgrims you can go clear in, if not, only within
ten miles." They "went in" to Boise Basin and to
Idaho City. At the latter place Mr. Weldon met
the late Clarence M. Goodell and his father. The
latter was splitting shingles and the son was pil-
ing them. This was about December 16, 1862. Mr.
Weldon spent three years around Idaho City,
Placerville, Centerville, Pioneer and Hoggem. This
latter place received its name from the fact that
some of the early miners tried to "hog" all the best
•claims.
Mr. -Weldon did more or less placer mining for
three years, coming back to Deer Lodge in 1865.
On the trip over he met W. A. Clark. Both men
were horseback. Mr. Clark asked the price of to-
bacco and was told it was one dollar per pound.
It is a matter of history that Mr. Clark bought
all the tobacco he could get at a dollar a pound
and more after the price was raised on him. He
freighted it over into Montana and sold it for six
or seven dollars per pound.
Then followed a succession of pioneer experiences
for Mr. Weldon. The ranch he took up in Deer
Lodge Valley he sold, and in 1866 moved to Galla-
tin Valley, and after being there a while was eaten
out by grasshoppers. In 1867 he went to Lemhi,
Idaho; in 1868 to Sweetwater, Wyoming; and in
1869 to Green River, being there when the Union
Pacific Railroad was built. After some eight or
nine years of eventful experience he returned to
Wisconsin and Northern Michigan, and for eleven
years was identified with the great lumber industry.
Mr. Weldon has been a permanent resident of
Montana since 1882. His first location was at Fort
Maginnis, and he took up a ranch on the East Fork
of Spring Creek, about twelve miles from Lewis-
town, and was busily engaged in ranching until he
sold his place in 1912 and made his home in Lewis-
town.
In 1871 Mr. Weldon married for his first wife
Susan Dyke. On October 15, 1878, he married
Mrs. Rosetta (Elsworth) Downing. By the lat-
ter marriage he has one daughter, Marian E., who
is the wife of Ray S. Conger, of Lewistown. Mr.
Conger is a son of Judge Everton J. Conger, an
early member of the bench and bar of Montana
and now a resident of Honolulu.
Mr. Weldon recalls a number of experiences
connected with his pioneer journey to the great
Northwest. A few of these incidents are repeated.
The ferry across Snake River used by the Wel-
don party had been in operation only a few days.
Some 200 wagons had congregated awaiting an
opportunity to cross. An effort had been made
without success to stretch a hemp cable across the
river. One party, under the leadership of Judge
M. H. Lott, had contained a man of considerable
experience in that line. Judge Lott informed the
proprietor of the ferry that he had a man who
could fix the cable for them. They seemed re-
luctant to avail themselves of his services. After
repeated failures they hunted up the judge and
his man and after some negotiations the latter
was asked how much he would charge. That mat-
ter, it was decided, should be determined by Mr.
Lott. Judge Lott said when the cable was placed
right his party was to be taken over first and free
of charge. This proposition was accepted, the
cable was adjusted and the Lott party inaugurated
the successful operation of the ferry.
.^fter passing through Hell Gate, Mr. Weldon
recalls the party went on to French Town, com-
posed of Canadian French and half breeds. The
firm of Higgins & Worden kept a trading post
at Hell Gate, and at Fort Owen, now Stevens-
ville, the principal trader was Maj. John Owen.
At French Town one of the wagons broke down,
and a delay was occasioned until a new axle tree
could be made of green fir. The rest of the party
went on, passing several good camping places;
finally night coming on they found themselves in
heavy timber, and then arose a discussion whether
they should advance or turn back. Two going
ahead a short distance found a trail turning off
to a fine park with grass and water, making an
excellent camping place. Next day most of the
party went on, but Mr. Weldon and companion
stayed to wait the coming of the delayed wagon
and also rest their horses and air their blankets.
Soon a mounted Indian appeared, who watched
them a few moments and disappeared. This
alarmed the two men and thev decided at once to
break camp and follow the advance party. While they
were hitching to the wagon the Indian reappeared
and tendered them a mess of ripe wild plums. The
plums were accepted and in return they gave the
visitor some bread, but still they thought it best
to move on lest they fall into some trap. After
traveling all day they did not catch up with the
advance party, so they camped alone. The follow-
ing day they caught up with those ahead and the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
party with the repaired wagon also reunited with
them.
The journey brought them near the Coeur d'Alene
Mission, the principal building there having been
erected without a nail, nothing but wooden pegs
to hold the timbers together. The Indians seemed
friendly and wanted the whites to join in friendly
sports. First they had a wrestling match. One
of the whites, John Bainbridge, finally consented
to wrestle with a husky Indian and was thrown
by the latter. There was only the one fall. The
Indian was ready for other challengers but none
cared to enter the list. Then a horse race was
arranged. A horse for which Mr. Weldon had
"traded" at French Town, and ridden by Mr. Wel-
don's partner, won the race. The partner, John
Argell. was quite full of fun, a good singer, and
having won the horse race was considered quite a
hero. Later he won a foot race. He was now a
great favorite with the Indians, who wanted him
to stay with them, offering him a lot of furs and
his choice of two comely squaws — offers that were
not accepted. While at the Mission about 5,000
bushels of grain were cut with knives and threshed
•with flails.
Mr. Weldon recalls several instances of _ the
friendly attitude of the northwestern Indians.
When their party reached the Spokane River he
and a companion thought they would fish along
the stream. The trail seemed to follow down the
river, and they went along thinking they would
come to a ferry. They soon came to where the
whites had left" the road and taken to the river.
The water was quite wide and rather swift. Mr.
Weldon cut a stout stick of good length and size
he could handle and successfully crossed. His
companion, though able to swim, followed him
only with great reluctance. Soon as they pro-
ceeded towards the camp they met an Indian on
horseback. Riding up to Mr. Weldon he turned
his horse around and invited him to ride behind.
He had probably seen the two men at the ford
and singled out "Mr. Weldon as the more aggres-
sive of the two. Mr. Weldon accepted the in-
vitation, riding into camp, while his companion
walked. There they found that the men with the
wagons had met this Indian at the ford and for a
present of tobacco he had piloted them over the
river, thus saving quite a bill for ferrying a few
miles below.
Fr.\nk B. Connelly, one of the oldest and solid-
est business men of Billings, has been a resident of
that city over thirty years, coming here after an
experience in the wholesale hardware business in
Chicago. He has used his early training and his
ability to promote and build up one of the largest
wholesale establishments in the Northwest, con-
ducted under the title of F. B. Connelly Company, of
which he is sole owner.
Mr. Connelly, who is also a member of the Mon-
tana State Senate, was born at Middletown, Iowa,
September 5, 1862. His great-grandfather Connelly
came from the north of Ireland to Pennsylvania in
colonial times. His father, Samuel J. Connelly,
who was born at Mingo, near Pittsburg, Pennsyl-
vania, in 1831, was reared and married at Mingo,
was a graduate of Washington College in South-
western Pennsylvania, and soon after marriage
moved to Middletown, Iowa, and in 1866 settled
at Galva, Illinois. He spent two years as a farmer
there and then moved to Toulon, Illinois, where he
was in the livestock and butchering business. He
died at Galva in 1904. During the Civil war he
served as a member of the State Guards, was a
republican always and an active member of the
Presbyterian Church. Fraternally he was affiliated
with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
Samuel J. Connelly married Mary Johnson, who
was born near Pittsburg in 1833 and died at Mid-
dletown, Iowa, in 1865. She was the mother of five
children, Frank B. being the youngest. The oldest,
Alice Anna, lives at Galesburg, Illinois, widow of
George P. Flint, who was a farmer and stock
shipper. Thomas J. died in September, 1915, at his
farm twelve miles west of Billings. F. L. Connelly
was in the insurance business and died at Lewis,
Iowa, in 1913. William, the other child, died in
infancy. Samuel J. Connelly married for his second
wife Eliza J. Kennedy, who was born in Pennsyl-
vania and died near Pittsburg. She was the mother
of two children, one of whom died in infancy. Her
surviving daughter is Mrs. Nannie M. Flannigan,
wife of a carpenter and building contractor at San
Diego, California.
Frank B. Connelly acquired his education at
Toulon, Illinois, leaving high school at the age of
eighteen. In the meantime he had learned the trade
of cheese maker. When nineteen years old he went
to Chicago and for four years was connected with
one of the large wholesale hardware firms of that
city and acquired a thorough knowledge of the busi-
ness in every detail.
On coming to Montana in 188= Mr. Connelly be-
came connected with the hardware and implement
house of Babcock & Miles at Billings. In 1894 the
business was changed to the A. L. Babcock Hard-
ware Company and Mr. Connelly was one of the
active ofiicials of the concern until August i, 1904.
He served as secretary and manager. During 1904
he was cashier of the Yellowstone National Bank,
but in August of that year started his independent
enterprise as a wholesale implement dealer. The
business has since been known as the F. B. Connelly
Company. This company is the distributing agency
for some of the best known automobile and ma-
chinerv houses in America. They handle the Holt
Caterp"illar engines and Combined Harvester for
Montana and Wyoming, the Austin and Western
lines of contractors and road building machinery
the Marion Steam Shovel Company wares, the Gar-
ford motor trucks and Troy trailers, the Ford cars
and trucks for Billings and vicinity, and the Ford-
son tractor. The plant and ofiices of the F. B. Con-
nelly Company are at 423 North Broadway.
It is a familiar truth that the business man is
often the most useful citizen of any community.
Mr. Connelly was twice elected an alderman in
Billings. He was elected to serve as a member of
the House of Representatives during the eleventh
session in 1909, and during that session was a mem-
ber of the ways and means, banks and banking,
towns and counties committees, and he introduced a
bill requiring the railroads to maintain a bulletin at
the depots for the reporting of the arrivals and
departures of trains. He was also instrumental in
amending the drainage law of that session. Mr.
Connelly was elected a member of the State Senate
in November, 1918, and during the 1919 session was
chairman of the compensation committee in the
Senate, chairman of the joint compensation commit-
tee, and a member of the finance and claims, insur-
ance and highways committees. The bill providing
for the location of a State Normal School at Bil-
lings was one that received his active and special
support. Mr. Connelly, at his own expense, circu-
lated the petition among the members of the House
and the Senate to the governor to call an extra
session to devise ways and means to use Montana
stone instead of Indiana limestone in public building
HISTORY OF MONTANA
construction in Montana. The session was called
and Mr. Connelly was successful in carrying the
measure through. He was a member of the Re-
publican National Convention that nominated Wil-
liam H. Taft for president.
Mr. Connelly is a republican in politics. He is
affiliated with Ashlar Lodge of Masons, Billings
Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, Billings Commandery,
Knights Templar. Billings Consistory of the Scottish
Rite, and Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Butte. He is a charter member of Billings Lodge
of Elks and was the third exalted ruler of the lodge.
He has been prominent in the Billings Midland
Club, which incorporates the Chamber of Commerce,
serving as president of the latter body in 1918, and
as president of the Midland Club in iqig. In every
way possible Mr. Connelly has exerted his influence
in behalf of war auxiliary movements, and is presi-
dent of the \yar Chest Fund of Billings. One of
his sons was in the war as an officer.
Mr. Connelly married at Burke, Wisconsin, De-
cember I, i88s. Miss Flora E. Hart, a daughter of
Rev. J. C. and Faithful (Holmes) . Hart, both now
deceased. Her father was a Baptist minister. The
living children of Mr. and Mrs. Connelly are noted
briefly as follows : Frank G., who received a high
school education at Billings and is associated with
his father in business; Lieutenant Kenneth A., who
attended high school and was a student in Beaver
Dam Academy at Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, when
the war came on, and went with the National Army
to France, serving with the rank of lieutenant until
mustered out in February, 1919, and is now con-
nected with his father's business ; Lenora D., a
graduate of the Polytechnic Institute at Billings and
wife of Homer L. Guiler, connected with the F. B.
Connelly Company ; Glenn Hart, a student in the
Billings High School ; and Dean, a grammar school
pupil.
Gforge W. Eastm.^n. It is not from hearsay
evidence but from actual experience that George
W. Eastman, now living retired at Lewistown, can
speak of the life and affairs of Montana over forty
years ago. He was a freighter, stockman, buffalo
hunter, miner, and prospector and public official in
the early days of the state, and was almost in daily
contact with men good and bad, conditions favor-
able and adverse.
Mr. Eastman has lived much of his life on the
western frontier. He was born at Calais, Maine,
April 19, 1855, a son of John and Mary A. (Han-
son) Eastman. His father was a native of East-
port. Maine, and his mother of St. Andrews, New
Brunswick. About the close of the Civil war the
Eastman family came west to Minneapolis, Minne-
sota. John Eastman was a lumberman, an indus-
try to which he was trained in Maine. He was
employed as a timber cruiser and a contractor in
getting out logs, and followed that industry both
in Minnesota and Wisconsin. He died in Min-
neapolis at the age of sixty-four, and his wife
passed away at the same age. George W. East-
man was the sixth of twelve children, eight of
whom are still living. His father was a whig and
republican and a member of the Methodist Church.
George W. Eastman received his early educa-
tion in Maine, later attended school in Minnesota,
and acquired a practical knowledge of the lumber
business in the great woods of the Northwest, at
first under his father and then as an employe of
the saw milling firm of Eastman, Bovee & DeLait.
For several years he was employed as an edger
in a sawmill.
He and his brother formed a partnership and
on April 18, 1877, left Minneapolis by rail for Bis-
marck, Dakota, and thence by the steamer Batche-
lor came up the Missouri River to Fort Benton and
thence proceeded up the Yellowstone twenty miles.
There they took a contract cutting coidwood for
the Government. August 2, 1877, they reached Miles
City,^ Montana, where they contracted with Smith
& O'Toole in getting out timber to build the Post
Sutler Building for the Government. The trees
were cut and hewed from eight to sixteen miles
above Miles City and then floated down the river
to that point. Some 8,000 or 9,000 logs were han-
dled by the Eastman brothers. In the fall of 1877
Mr. Eastman began freighting between Bismarck
and Miles City. The summer of the following
year he helped put up hay for the Government and
in the fall of that year began hunting buffalo.
These buffalo hunts were conducted chiefly for the
hides. During the fall he also prospected as a
miner and in the winter of 1879 engaged in the
stampede to the Panther Mountains. During the
seasons he continued hunting buffalo until Novem-
ber 9, 1882, when he returned to Miles City and
the following spring came overland to that por-
tion of Meagher County that is now Fergus Coun-
ty. He was thus one of the pioneers of Fergus,
(bounty, He contracted with the Collar Mining
Company at Maiden to get out 600 cords of wood,
and also did teaming for that company. During
the summer of 1885 Mr. Eastman was placer min-'
ing in the Little Rockies for Davis & Hamilton.
Along about that time he pre-empted land on Warm
Spring Creek and took up a homestead and desert
claim, and that brought him to the business which
he followed successfully for over twenty years,
stock raising and farming. Mr. Eastman sold his
ranch in 1912 and then located near Lewistown,
where he was in the grocery business until 1916, at
which time he formally retired from business re-
sponsibilities.
Mr. Eastman was brought into contact with the
public affairs of this city by his appointment as
deputy sheriff of Miles City in 1882. He served
a short time and then resigned. He and his brother
had much experience with the criminal element of
lost over $18,000 in stock, buffalo hides and other
material, taken from them by the Indians and
white outlaws. One time he made a trip to the
head of Powder River and over it into the Black
Hills, returning by way of Fort Custer and at
Sheridan had a bru.sh with the Indians, but failed
to regain any of his lost stock. It is the testi-
mony of Mr. Eastman that the bad white men
were much more dangerous than the Indians, and
most of the trouble was caused by white outlaws,
who frequently incited the Indians to mischief,
knowing that the blame could be easily shifted to
the Red Men. Mr. Eastman has been through much
hard and dangerous experience, but has retained
his kindness of heart through all, and enjoys a
host of friends in many parts of the state. In
politics he has affiliated with the republican party.
On April 10, 1902, Mr. Eastman married Minnie
A. Maciies. She died November 4, 1902. On March
24, 1908, he married Mary A. Dye.
William Berkin. Recently a Montana paper
published an interesting sketch of one of the oldest
living pioneers of the state, William Berkin, who
is now in the shadow of his ninetieth year and
has spent nearly sixty years in Montana Territory
and State. A great deal of Montana history is
briefly sketched in the newspaper article and por-
tions of it are properly quoted.
William Berkin was the pioneer transportatioii
magnate of Montana. He came up the Mi
HISTORY OF MONTANA
11
River nearly sixty years ago, and from a modest
start of pack horses built up the Diamond R trans-
portation organization which took first rank in the
territory and served a wide stretch of country. He
figured in many adventures, fought Indians, part-
nered with Senator W. A. Clark, employed Col.
Charles A. Broadwater and Sam Pepin as bull-
whackers, shipped the first ore out of Butte by
bull team to Corinne, Utah, by rail to San Fran-
cisco and then to Swansea, Wales, made and lost
fortunes, passed up opportunities to make millions,
and now in the ninetieth-odd year old winter of
his life is peacefully passing his declining years
on a stock ranch in Meagher County.
The broad highways that now traverse the state
and make automobile riding comfortable were buf-
falo trails when Berkin came to Montana. He
brought with him a stock of goods and herd of
pack animals, shipping his outfit from St. Louis
to Fort Benton by steamboat. He built his own
roads from Fort Benton to Bannack and Virginia
City and other mining camps, blazing his way across
the trackless prairie land and through mountain
fastnesses, and founded the little Town of Boulder,
capital -of Jefferson County, just because the grass
of the Boulder Valley was succulent and sweet, the
place afforded sustenance and shelter for his live
stock and it was on the road from Fort Benton
to the placer mines.
But he did not keep his pack train long. Gold
on the bed rock of many Montana streams was
bringing thousands of argonauts into Montana, and
he could not pack goods into the camps fast enough,
so he effected the transportation organization which
afterward became the famous Diamond R freight-
ing outfit. This concern grew with the country,
and in a short time Berkin found himself at the
head of sixty bull teams. Each team consisted
of twelve yoke, or twenty-four head, of oxen,
with three wagons to the team.
Charles A. Broadwater, who afterward became
a famous empire builder and famed all over the
West, found his first employment as one of Berkin's
bull-whackers, and Sam Pepin, who was later to
be associated with Broadwater in enterprises of
magnitude in Northern Montana, was employed
by Berkin in a similar capacity. Each of these
men had charge of one of Berkin's bull teams.
In all he had about 2,000 head of work cattle, and
employed about 100 men, bull-whackers and station
tenders.
He and his men had many battles with the Indians,
the country in the 400 miles that his teams traversed
from Fort Benton to the gold camps being infested
with hostile red skins. Every time a man started
from Fort Benton in charge of one of Berkin's
bull teams he took his life in his hands, but such
was the spirit of the men of those days that he
could always find plenty of men willing to go with
him on the venture.
The business grew and prospered with the de-
velopment of the country, the population of which
was increasing by leaps and bounds. Berkin, in
an effort to maintain his supremacy in transpor-
tation, decided to establish what "became known
later as the "Diamond R Fast Freight," operating
between the gold camps and Salt Lake City. This
consisted of units of ten mule teams, each team
hauhng three wagons. He organized his equip-
ments so that one of these teams left Salt Lake
City on one end of the line and Helena on the other,
every day, with stations for relays and change of
animals all along the several hundred miles that
stretch between the two points. The undertaking
was very successful from the start. It necessi-
tated the maintenance of an immense equipment
of horses, mules, and a small army of drivers, but
it speeded up the delivery of freight in a manner
that was very satisfactory to the mercantile estab-
lishments in the mining camps, which depended
on the Diamond R to keep their stocks replenished.
Freight rates were high, but everyone was making
money, and there was no haggling as to prices. The
man who was taking out $100 in gold dust every
day was not inclined to be stingy, and bought luxu-
ries at fabulous prices.
Berkin continued in the freighting business until
the '70s. In the meantime he had brought his fam-
ily to Boulder, where he made his home, and had
become interested in mining. He had acquired
some placer property near Boulder, and in 1868
put in a ditch, at considerable cost, to bring wa-
ter to these placers. The venture proved fairly
successful. About the same time he became inter-
ested in the quartz possibilities of Butte. With W.
A. Clark and Captain M. Wall, president of the
Diamond R, he owned the Mountain Chief Mine
on the Butte Hill. Ore from this property he
hauled by bull team to Corinne and shipped it to
San Francisco by rail, and from San Francisco by
boat around the Horn to Swansea, Wales, for treat-
ment. Even with the enormous cost of shipping
the ore it proved profitable, but he considered it
too slow, and sold his interest in the property for
$3,700. It is now worth $25,000,000 or more. If
he had held on to his Butte realty it would have
made him fabulously wealthy. He bought the lot
at the corner of Park and Main Street, on which
the Rialto Theater stands, now worth perhaps $2,500
a front foot, for twenty dollars.
He was very much interested in the Vigilante
movement, which rid the territory of Henry Plum-
mer and his band of cutthroats. He had had
enough experience with these men on the road and
in the lonesome places to appreciate the good that
would come to the territory by their elimination,
and made a special trip to Virginia City to be ini-
tiated into the Vigilantes. Once in he became one
of the right hand men of X. Beidler and Neil
Howie, executives of the Vigilantes. His courage
and fighting prowess were such that when Mon-
tana was admitted to statehood he was named as
the first United States marshal of the district, an
oftice that it took a brave man to fill.
William Berkin was born in England in 1830
and learned the machinist's trade there. In 1856
he married Sarah Jane Hall, also a native of Eng-
land. Their first three children were born in the
old country, one of whom died. Fannie and John
came with them to America. William Berkin came
to this country in i860, and followed his trade
at various cities and while at St. Louis was an
employe of the American Fur Company. In 1862
he came up the Missouri River to Montana, land-
ing at Fort Benton. He brought his wife and chil-
dren from England, and they arrived in the ter-
ritory of Montana in June, 1865. Five other chil-
dren were born to them in Montana : William A.,
who died at the age of twenty-eight; Thomas A.;
Sarah; Elizabeth, deceased; and Hattie.
Thomas A. Berkin, a son of the veteran Mon-
tana pioneer and Indian fighter William Berkin,
is one of the oldest native sons of this state, and
for his part has played a busy career as a stock
man and farmer and is also one of the well known
public officials of Fergus County.
Mr. Berkin was born at Boulder in Jefferson
County, Montana, March 2^, 1869, son of William
and Sarah Jane (Hall) Berkin. The career of
12
HISTORY OF MONTANA
his father is sketched on other pages. Mr. Berkin at-
tended the public schools of Boulder and his first em-
ployment was on a cattle ranch and later, in 1882, he
located at Lewistown and learned the carpenter's
trade. In 1885 he returned to Boulder and became
a contractor and builder. For fourteen years he was
also engaged in the mining business. His ranch
location was on Smith River up to 1907. He had
a large tract of land devoted to horses, cattle and
sheep. In 1907 he became proprietor of the Day
Hotel at Lewistown, and opei'ated that well known
hostelry for two years. He then resumed his asso-
ciation with ranching and since 1910 has been en-
gaged in ranching and farming in the eastern part
of Fergus County, near Flat Willow, which is his
postoffice. He owns one of the most complete farms
in the county, having 480 acres thoroughly devel-
oped. He cuts three crops of alfalfa every sea-
son and also large crops of corn and other grain.
He also runs about 100 head of livestock.
Mr. Berkin has for several years been deputy
sheriff of Fergus County, and he is also a game
warden of the state. His official home is at Lewis-
town, though he spends much of his time at his
farm.
Mr. Berkin is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Po-
litically he is a democrat. May 8, 1894, he mar-
ried Mabel L. Coburn, a native of Iowa.
Walter Mansur Bickford came to Montana in
1884, a young lawyer, after several years of practice
in the East. He at once became prominent in ter-
ritorial politics, served as a member of the last
Territorial Council, was a member of the State
Constitutional Convention and of the State Capitol
Commission. At the first state election he was an
unsuccessful candidate for justice of the Supreme
Court of Montana.
Mr. Bickford, whose home is at Missoula and
for many years practiced with offices at Butte, was
born at Newburg, Maine, February 25, 1852. He
was educated in the Maine Central Institute at Pitts-
field and in 1878 was admitted to the Pennsylvania
bar. Judge Bickford enjoys high rank as a cor-
poration lawyer and is vice president of the Mis-
soula Light and Water Company, the Missoula Street
Railway Company and the Western Lumber Com-
pany. He represented Montana as executive com-
missioner at' the World's Columbian Exposition in
Chicago in 1893. He is a democrat in politics.
October 16, 1878, he married Emma W. Woodford,
of Jamestown, New York. She died June 17, 191S.
leaving one daughter, Edith M., now the wife of
W. L. Murphy, who is associated with Judge Bick-
ford in practice. On September 25. 1916, Judge
Bickford married Zelma M. Nash, of Missoula, who
died July i, 1917.
C.^RL C. NissLER, city engineer of Lewistown, and
a man of wide and varied experience in engineer-
ing and other business affairs, was absent from his
official position in Lewistown the greater part of
1918 serving in the Engineer Corps of the National
army, with the rank of first lieutenant.
Mr. Nissler represents a pioneer family of Mon-
tana and was born at Silver Bow. Silver Bow
County. August 6, 1884. His father, Christian Niss-
ler, was born in Sindlefingen, Wuertemberg, Ger-
many, in 1836 and spent the first sixteen years of
his life in his native country. Coming to America,
he soon went to Philadelphia and learned the trade
of baker and confectioner. In 1856 he went to
San Francisco around the Isthmus, worked at his
trade in Sacramento County, and prospected for
gold in California, Oregon and Idaho, and finally
located in the silver mining district of Virginia
City, Nevada, where he learned the brewing trade.
In 1865 he left Nevada bound for Montana. He
traveled by trail to Salt Lake City and thence by
pack horse, being twenty days on the road and
tramping at night with no protection except his
blanket. He has some varied experiences in the
mining camps of Montana, his most successful claim
being in Bear Gulch. He invested the profits of
this claim in a brewery at German Gulch and in
1871 moved to Silver Bow. He brought the logs
from a building at Butte City to Silver Bow and
set it up as his brewery and some years later erected
a complete plant. He spent the rest of his life
in Silver Bow, where he died in November, 1901.
He was a democrat in politics and became a mem-
ber of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows in
California in i860. In 1878 he married Miss Chris-
tiana Konzelman, also a native of Wuertemberg,
Germany. She died in 1892. They were the parents
of ten children, eight of whom are still living.
Carl C. Nissler was the first son and fifth child
in his father's family and received his education
in the public schools of Silver Bow, in All Hallows
College at Salt Lake, in Notre Dame University at
South Bend, Indiana, and in the Bishop Scott Mili-
tary Academy at Portland, Oregon. He took his
engineering work in the University of Michigan,
graduating in 1908. On returning to Montana he
was in the city engineer's office of Butte, Montana,
for two years and then engaged in professional
practice for himself at Great Falls and Lewistown.
In 1912 Mr. Nissler organized the Lewistown Com-
mission Company, wholesale fruits and produce,
but sold his interest in 1916. He then took charge
of the Domestic Steam Laundry, and in 191 7 began
his duties as assistant city engineer of Lewistown
and was appointed city engineer in January, igi8.
Mr. Nissler had been in office only a few months
when on May 7. 1918, he was commissioned first
lieutenant in the Engineers Reserve Corps. He was
called to active duty on the 12th of May, being
sent to Camp Lee for training. June 13th he was
assigned to the 605th Engineers at Camp Forrest,
Georgia, and was made camp exchange officer. He
organized the engineers sub. depot and was com-
manding officer of the 474th Engineers Depot De-
tachment. He was also assigned as officer of camp
morale. After nearly nine months of active service
for his country he received an honorable discharge
February 10, 1919, and at once returned to Lewis-
town and resumed his responsibilities as city engi-
neer. He is a man of thorough qualifications in his
profession, and is a member of the Society of Mu-
nicipal Engineers. He is also a member of the
Rotary Club at Lewistown and is a past master
of Lewistown Lodge No. 2:7- Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, and in politics is a republican.
Mr. Nissler married Miss Lillian Vivian, daughter
of Joseph and Clara Bell (Labram) Vivian. Her
parents were both born in Michigan and are now-
living at Butte, Montana. Mrs. Nissler, who is the
oldest of four children, has one son, Carl Chris-
tian, Jr. «
W. P. Smith, M. D., located at Columbus, Mon-
tana, in 1910, and took up the work of his profes-
sion as a physician and surgeon with well trained
abilities and is regarded as one of the most capable
medical men in Stillwater County. He has acquired,
has developed and owns some extensive ranch prop-
erties near Columbus.
Doctor Smith was born at St. Louis, Missouri,
June 6, 1881. His father, .'\ndrew P. Smith, was
:v^^-
^^
7ha^ 7^f,£oc4ftn4
HISTORY OF MONTANA
13
born in Scotland in 1849, a"d came to the United
States about 1869. For many years he was a mer-
chant at St. Louis, Missouri. He was married at
London, Ontario, Canada, to Meurissa Baker, who
was born in London, Ontario, in 1857. She died
at Chicago, Illinois, in 1904 while Andrew P. Smith
died while visiting in Billings, Montana, in 1916.
He was a republican and a very devout Presby-
terian. The children were: John E., who resides
at Los Angeles and is Pacific Coast representative
of Marshall Field & Company at Chicago; Dr. W.
P. ; and M. A. Smith, who is also a representative
of Marshall Field & Company and lives at Port-
land, Oregon.
Dr. W. P. Smith attended public school at Chi-
cago, graduating from a high school in that city
in 1902. He then spent two years in the preparatory
department of the University of Illinois, and in
1909 graduated with the M. D. degree from the
Medical Department of that University. He is a
member of the Phi Rho Sigma medical fraternity
and the Alpha Omega Alpha honorary medical fra-
ternity. From 1908 to 1910 Doctor Smith served
as assistant to one of Chicago's most eminent physi-
cians and surgeons. Dr. Alexander Hugh Ferguson.
Since 1910 he has been engaged in a general medical
and surgical practice at Columbus, his offices being
in the Columbus State Bank Building. At least
twice a vear he keeps in touch with advanced ideas
and practices of his profession, attending clinics
and lectures in Chicago and Rochester, Minnesota.
He specializes as a surgeon. He is a member of
the Stillwater County and State Medical Societies
and the American Medical Association, and has
served as County Health Officer.
Doctor Smith owns 1,500 acres ten miles south
of Columbus, a large part of it irrigated land and
devoted to crops and livestock. He also has a
modern home in Columbus. Doctor Smith is a
republican, a member of the Presbyterian Church,
is affiliated with Chicago Lodge of Masons, Bill-
ings Chapter No. 5, Royal Arch Masons, Aldemar
Commandery No. 9. Knights Templar, at Billings,
Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena,
Columbus Lodge of Odd Fellows, and Billings Lodge
No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
He married Miss Grace Peterson, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Paul Peterson, of Helena, at Colum-
bus in May, 1913. They have one son, W. P., Jr.,
born June 18, 1915.
Rev. Frank Bradley Lewis, A. M. The subject
cf this review enjoys distinctive prestige among
tlie citizens of Bozeman, where he now lives in
honorable retirement after a life of ceaseless in-
dustry in the cause of Christ and humanity, and
which was crowned with success. As a neighbor
and citizen he is highly esteemed by all who know
him, for in every relation of life, religious, political
or civic, his voice and his influence have been on
the side of right as he has seen and understood the
right.
The Lewis family from which the subject of
this sketch is descended is of rugged old Welsh
stock, the family home having been on the border
of Wales, whence came Benjamin Lewis to the
shores of America in 1635. He first settled in
Massachusetts, but soon afterwards located perma-
nently in Connecticut, where the family has been
established for many generations. The subject's
grandfather, Cyrus Lew'is, was born in 1783 in Hunt-
irigton, Connecticut, where he spent his entire life,
his death occurring there in 1864. He was a farmer
and because of his extended military service was
called captain. He married Alice Hawley, also a
native of Huntington. Among their children was
the subject's father, George Thomas Lewis, who
was born at Huntington, Connecticut, in 1814. He
was a carriagemaker by trade, spent his entire life
in his native state, and died at Stratford on August
18, 1897. He was a democrat in politics and a
member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
He was a member and active supporter of the
Protestant Episcopal Church.
George Thomas Lewis was twice married, first to
Eleanor Banks, a native of Connecticut, and who
died at Fairfield, that state. To them was born
one child, Eleanor, who died at Trumbull, Connec-
ticut, in 1918, and who had been the wife of David
B. Curtis, a farmer and who also is deceased. After
the death of his first wife, George T. Lewis mar-
ried Mary Bradley, who was born in 1820 in Fair-
field, Connecticut, and who died at Stratford, Con-
necticut, in February, 1903. To them were born
three children, namely: Frank B., the immediate
subject of this review; Alice, who died at New
Haven, Connecticut, and George Fred, who gradu-
ated from Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut,
and from the medical department of Yale College,
and is now a leading physician and surgeon in Strat-
ford, Connecticut.
Frank Bradley Lewis was born at Fairfield, Con-
necticut, on July 25, 1844- He received his elemen-
tary education in the public schools of Bridgeport,
Connecticut, and then attended Fairfield Academy,
in Herkimer County, New York, where he prepared
for college. He then entered Yale College, where
he was graduated with the class of 1868, with the
degree of Bachelor of Arts. In 1871 he received
from his alma mater the degree of Master of Arts.
During the following two years he was a senior
tutor in St. Mark's School at Southboro, Massa-
chusetts. He then entered the Berkeley Divinity
School, at Middletown, Connecticut, from which
he was graduated in 1871 and was ordained as a
minister of the Protestant Episcopal Church. He was
assistant to the rector of St. Andrew's Church, Meri-
den, Connecticut, for one year, and then for about
the same length of time he served as rector of St.
Paul's Church at Brookfield, Connecticut, relin-
quishing this church to become principal of Oxford
Academy at Oxford, Chenango County, New York,
where he remained for seven years. In 1879 Mr.
Lewis came to Bozeman as rector of St. James
Church, and thus began a period of service which
lasted for more than three decades, the relation of
rector to the church being maintained for thirty-
two years actively and since 1911 as rector emeri-
tus. He is now practically retired from active, labor,
though he still maintains general oversight of two
missions, at Belgrade and Manhattan. During the
period of his active labors here, Mr. Lewis proved
a tower of strength for the forces of righteousness
and ever stood ready to support and encourage
every movement looking to the advancement of
the best interests of the city and community. An
effective speaker and able sermonizer, his pulpit
service was characterized by earnestness and power,
and during all the years of his identification with
the church life of Bozeman he stood among the
spiritual leaders of the people.
Politically Mr. Lewis supports the democratic
party. Fraternally he is a member of Bozeman
Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons :
Zona Chapter No. 12, Royal Arch Masons; St.
John Commandery No. 12, Knights Templar, of
which three bodies he is secretary; Butte Con-
sistory of the Scottish Rite (thirty-second degree),
and of Bagdad Temple, Ancient Arabic Order
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. In 1919 he served as
14
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Grand Captain General of the Grand Commandery
of Knights Templar of Montana.
On June 6, 1871, at Nichols, Connecticut, Frank
B. Lewis was married to Georgia Frances Ambler,
the daughter of Charles and Mary (Curtiss) Am-
bler, both of whom are now deceased. Mr. Ambler
was a maker of saddle trees and prior to the Civil
-war enjoved a large business. To the subject and
his wife have been born the following children:
Arthur Franklin was graduated from the Hopkins
Grammar School in New Haven, Connecticut where
"he took preparatory work for college. He was grad-
uated from the college department of Yale Uni-
versity in 1894, with the degree of Bachelor of
Arts. ' In 1898 he was graduated from the General
Theological Seminary, New York City, and was
ordained a minister of the Protestant Episcopal
Church. He is now rector of the Episcopal Church
at North Haven, Connecticut. Alice Elizabeth be-
came the wife of Iremaeus Kneeland Wisner, who
died on his farm near Bozeman in 1911, since which
time she has lived at home with her parents. She
was o-raduated from the Bozeman High School, and
then attended the State Normal School, at New
Haven Connecticut, after which she taught school
in Bozeman for several years. Mary Curtiss gradu-
ated from the Bozeman High School, attended the
State Normal School at Dillon, Montana, and is
now a teacher in the Bozeman schools.
Andrew P. Stephenson. The men of this coun-
try are developing vision and initiative and learning
to look forward in the establishment and expansion
of their business concerns. Those of them who are
succeeding upon a broad scale are the ones who
recognize that conditions are in a transition period
that requires careful planning not only to meet
present day demands, but to provide for future
possible shortages in raw materials and man power.
This is an era of extraordinary conditions far out-
classing any other in the history of the world, and
to meet them and compete with others in the same
line requires sagacitv and practical knowledge ot
no mean order. One of the men who is proving in
his everydav conduct of his large business that he
is the right man in the right place is Andrew P.
Stephenson, proprietor of the Stephenson Lumber
Company of Butte, Montana.
Andrew P. Stephenson was born at Dallas, Texas
on Februarv 26, 1875. and belongs to a very old
American familv, which was founded here during
the seventeenth 'century by his ancestors that came
here from England. For some generations
the
family was well represented in that part of the
country now included in West Virgmia, and
Charles B. Stephenson, father of Andrew P. Stephen-
son, was born at Harper's Ferry, West Virginia
in i8'9 and he was there reared and educated and
imbued with a love of the South which made him
espouse its cause in the conflict between that section
and the north, and he served as a brave soldier in
the Confederate array. With the end of the war he
found conditions in his native region so discourag-
ing that he decided to migrate to the west, and came
to Montana in 1866. For a time he was one of the
pioneer merchants of Helena, and was also interested
in mining and freighting, the same qualities which
made him a good soldier aiding him in business
life. He was interested in the "Only Chance" Mine
at Highland City, Montana, one of the first gold
mines to be developed in the state. In 1872 his at-
tention was attracted by the successful experiments
in cotton production in Texas, and he removed to
Dallas, Texas, where he spent the remainder of his
life, although his death occurred at Chicago,
Illinois, where he had gone on a visit in 1905. A
strong democrat, he never wavered in his support
of the principles and candidates of that party. For
many years he was a consistent member of the
Episcopal Church. His fraternal connections were
those he maintained with the Knights of Pythias.
His wife, who bore the maiden name of Virginia
Mitchell, was born at Richmond. Virginia, in 1840.
and there they were married. Her death occurred
at Dallas, Texas, in 1890. Of their six children,
two were born at Helena, Montana, and the other
four at Dallas, Texas. These children were as
follows : Ella, who married P. P. Tucker, an in-
surance broker of Dallas, Texas ; Caroline, who
married S. W. Wolfe, a clothing merchant of New
York City, New York, died in that city, as did her
husband! Charles, who is deceased, was in the ex-
press business at Dallas, Texas ; Elizabeth, who is
the widow of Dr. C. C. Fite, a physician and surgeon,
is a resident of New York City. New York ; Roberta
Lee, who is the widow of Dr. W. T. Blythe, a
physician and surgeon of Dallas, Texas, where Mrs.
Blythe is now residing; and Andrew P., who was
the youngest.
After attending the public schools of Dallas,
Texas, Andrew P. Stephenson was a student in the
Agricultural and Mechanical College at Bryan,
Texas, for two years. Leaving college he went to
Chicago, Illinois, and was employed in a wholesale
shoe house for a number of years. He then went
to northern Michigan and worked in the iron mines
of that region for quite a long period, and then,
still maintaining his connection with the iron in-
terests, he returned to Chicago, Illinois. In 1899
he went to British Columbia and formed connections
with a large saw-mill outfit, which developed into
a lumber business that he operated in Canada until
1908, and in July of that year he came to Butte. In
order to gain a practical working knowledge of the
lumber situation in Silver Bow County and its
neighborhood he entered the employ of the Largey
Lumber Company, and remained with it until the
summer of 1913. when he resigned his position as
manager, for he had risen to be in charge of its
affairs, and founded the Stephenson Lumber Com-
pany, with plant and offices at Nos. 90 to 100 East
Front Street, Butte. This company is incorporated,
the officers being as follows : Eleanor Stephenson
president, and Andrew P. Stephenson, secretary and
treasurer. The company owns the plant and offices
and the ground on which they stand. This is one
of the largest lumber concerns in Butte, and handles
lumber, building material and fuel, and does an im-
mense business. In addition to his other interests
Mr. Stephenson owns his modern residence at No.
1923 Argyle Street. In politics he is a republican,
but has not cared to enter public life, his business
absorbing his time and attention. In the teachings
of Christian Science Mr. Stephenson finds expres-
sion for his religious convictions.
Andrew P. Stephenson was married at McLeod.
Alberta. Canada, to Miss Eleanor Patterson, a
daughter of J. L. and Eleanor Patterson. Mr. Pat-
terson was a successful pioneer rancher of the
Bozeman district in Montana, and is now living in
retirement at Bozeman. his wife having died some
years ago. Mrs. Stephenson was graduated from
the Milwaukee Normal College at Milwaukee. Wis-
consin. Mr. and Mrs. Stephenson have two chil-
dren, namely : Eleanor, who was born August 20,
1904, and Ann, who was born November 9, 1905.
Mr. Stephenson has not only attained to a material
success, but he has won and holds the confidence
HISTORY OF MONTANA
15
of his fellow citizens. As a sound, dependable busi-
ness man, he has few equals, and his knowledge of
the lumber business is intimate and was acquired
from personal experience at the source of supply.
As a citizen he measures up to high standards, and
ivhile he has not desired political preferment, he
has always shown an intelligent interest in the de-
velopment of the community and a proper pride
in civic matters.
Clement J. Baldwin. One of the most distin-
guished men of his part of the state is Hon. Clement
J. Baldwin of Bridger, representative from Carbon
County in the State Assembly, and a man whose
progressive spirit has animated his associates and
section for some years. He is a man who reaches
the heart of things, and, understanding the needs
of his people, seeks the most effective manner of
relieving them and building up new defences against
the inside foes every state has to fight. During his
long and arduous service as a legislator he has
fathered and supported a number of very construc-
tive measures, and the people of Montana owe him
a heavy debt for what he has accomplished and for
the campaign of education he has started to bring
about other changes and reforms.
Clement J. Baldwin comes of one of the old fami-
lies of this country, representatives of the Baldwin
family having emigrated from Scotland to the
American Colonies long prior to the Revolution.' He
was born at Willmar, Minnesota, May 2, 1878, a son
of Corydon Josiah Baldwin, born in Farmington,
New York, in 1849, who is a resident of Seattle,
Washington, .\fter attaining to manhood's estate
in his native place C. J. Baldwin became a pioneer
of Willmar, Minnesota, and for many years was
a railroad engineer on the Great Northern Railroad,
but is now retired. The Episcopal Church holds his
membership. He is a republican, but not very active
in his party. Mr. Baldwin belongs to the Ancient
Order of United Workmen and Woodmen of the
World. C. J. Baldwin was married to Anna John-
son, born in Christiania, Norway, in 1853, and she
died at Willmar in 1899, having been reared and '
educated in Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. C. J. Baldwin
had the following children : .Albert N., who is a
railroad engineer for the Great Northern Railroad,
lives at Minneapolis, Minnesota; Edward, who is
also a railroad engineer for the Great Northern Rail-
road, lives at Watertown, South Dakota; Clement
J., who is the third in order of birth; Clara
Josephine, who married Elmer C. Culp, a farmer re-
siding in the vicinity of Billings, Montana; Anna
Evelyn, who married Charles .Arthur Gibson, a civil
engineer by trade, resides at Seattle, Washington.
Clement J. Baldwin attended the public schools of
Willmar, Minnesota, and then took a business course
in the Willmar Seminary, which he completed at the
age of eighteen years, going to work for the whole-
sale cigar firm of Winecke & Doerr of Minneapolis,
Minnesota, with which he remained for seven years
and then, in May, 1902, located at Bridger and estab-
lished the Baldwin Lumber Company, Incorporated,
of which he is president. The main yards are at
Bridger, on Main Street, and the company has
branches at Fromberg and Belfry. Montana. In
addition to his large interests in his lumber company
Mr. Baldwin owns his residence at Bridger, the yards
and offices occupied by the lumber companv, and 665
acres of irrigated land on Dry Creek, Carbon
County, Montana.
Mr. Baldwin has been very active in politics, work-
ing always as a republican. Elected to the Bridger
City Council, his record in that bodv made him the
Vol. II— 2
logical candidate of his party for mayor, and he was
elected to that office by a very gratifying majority,
and he was returned for a second term. There
were so many measures before the public that needed
a strong man to push them that Mr. Baldwin was
selected for assemblyman, and has been re-elected
twice, having served continuously as the representa-
tive from Carbon County from 1914. During his
service in the Legislature he has been chairman of
the committee on banks and banking, and a member
of the committees of ways and means, railroads and
transportation and trades and commerce, and was
vice chairman of the ways and means committee.
He introduced and had passed the bill which divided
the high school funds equally among all the high
schools in the county according to the number of
students, which previously had all been given to
the county high school; the bill which exempted real
estate and chattel mortgages from ta.xation by the
state, and these bills are now on the statute books.
Mr. Baldwin has always served the best interests
of his constituents, and that they appreciate his abili-
ties and willingness to devote himself to the good of
his district is practically demonstrated by his reten-
tion in office.
In 1900 Mr. Baldwin was united in marriage at
Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Miss Mary Bertha
Moore, born at Janesville, Minnesota, who was
graduated from the Manning School of Oratory
and Dramatic Art at Minneapolis. There are no
children. Mr. Baldwin is a Christian Scientist. He
belongs to Golden Fleece Lodge No. 66, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons ; Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of
Helena, Montana ; the Helena Consistory, in which
he has been raised to the thirty-second degree ; Red
Lodge Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, of Red Lodge,
Montana ; Red Lodge Lodge, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks ; and Montana Council, United
Commercial Travelers. He is a director of the
American National Bank of Bridger, and is in-
terested in a public-spirited way in the growth of all
of the business concerns of Carbon County, for he is
thoroughly imbued with the spirit of the West and
believes in encouraging legitimate expansion and the
development of natural resources. Such a man as
Mr. Baldwin has a great future before him, and the
people he represents are certain of receiving scrupu-
lous and efficient service and a whole-souled appre-
ciation of them in every action.
Charles Wiper. Just as there are no rules for
building character, so are there no fixed rules for
achieving success. The individual who can arise
from mediocrity to a position of recognized emi-
nence is he who can recognize and utilize the op-
portunities that appear before him. The es-
sential conditions of human existence are ever the
same; the surroundings of individuals differ but
slightly, and when on the highway leading to the
goal of prosperity one man passes others who per-
haps started out before him, it is because he pos-
sesses the power to use advantageously the oppor-
tunities which are given to all. Of the men of
Lewistowfi who in their careers have made the
most of the chances which have been given them,
Charles Wiper, cashier of the Empire Bank and
Trust Company, is an excellent example.
Mr. Wiper was born at Forman, the county seat
of Sargent County, North Dakota, October 31,
1885, a son of Robert and Mary (Coleman) Wiper.
His father, who was born in Scotland and came
to the United States in young manhood, was origi-
nally a coal miner, but eventually developed into
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a prosperous wheat raiser and stockman of North
Dakota, where both he and his wife, who was a
native of Pennsylvania, passed away. Mr. Wiper
was a republican and a member of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows. Of the twelve children
in the family eleven are living, and Charles was
the eleventh in order of birth.
Charles Wiper received good educational advan-
tages in his youth, first attending the little public
schpol at Forman and then being sent to the North
Dakota Agricultural College at Fargo. His first
position was with the Ransom County State Bank
at Sheldon, North Dakota, where he acted as book-
keeper and subsequently held a like position at Bow-
bells, that state, with the First National Bank.
From the latter position he went to the Citizens
State Bank of Ryder, of which institution he was
for seven years cashier, and then removed to Win-
nett, Montana, where he became one of the organ-
izers of the Winnett State Bank. Mr. Wiper re-
mained as cashier of the latter bank until January,
1018, when he was called to his jjresent position as
cashier of the Empi.e Bank and Trust Company
at Lewistown. Mr. Wiper has impressed his abil-
ity not only upon his associates, but on the public
in general, and his personal popularity has con-
tributed toward the success of the institution which
he represents and which has a high standing among
the finanical concerns of Fergus County. Mr.
Wiper is a member of Jerusalem Lodge No. 115,
.\ncient Free and .\ccepted Masons, at Winnett,
having been first past master of this lodge; Hiram
Chapter No. i?. Royal Arch Masons; Lewistown
Commandery No. 14, Knights Templar; Algeria
Temple, Ancient Araljic Order Nobles of the Mys-
tic Shrine; and Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks. In politics he is
a republican.
Mr. Wiper was married June 19, 1915, to Miss
Elsa Baldwin, and they are the parents of one son,
Thomas.
Ray a. Lathom is a native son of Montana. He
was born in Livingston January 30, 1891. He is
one of the progressive young leaders in politics in
Stillwater County and he is now in his second term
of service as county clerk.
His father, George D. Lathom, is an old timer
of Montana, and has lived in the state nearly forty
years. He was born at Gallatin, Missouri, in i860,
son of John D. Lathom, a Missouri pioneer and a
farmer, who spent his last years in that state.
George D. Lathom came to Montana in 1882 and for
a dozen years rode the cattle range as a cowboy.
Most of his work was done in Yellowstone Valley
near Livingston. In 1894 he homesteaded 160 acres
in what is now Stillwater County, and that quarter
section is part of the present ranch and farm of
230 acres. This farm is in the irrigated section
and is highly productive both as a grain and stock
ranch. George D. Lathom is a democrat in politics.
His home is on Stillwater River, six miles south-
west of Columbus. He married Mary L. Denny,
who was born in 1869. Ray is the oldest of their
children. Myrtle is the wife of Stanley Milan,
a farmer, machinist and automobile expert living,
at Great Falls. Mattie is a teacher in Stillwater
County. Earl is on the home farm, while Lemuel
and Lyle live with their brother Ray and attend
school at Columbus.
Ray Lathom was educated in the rural schools of
Stillwater County, in the high school at Columbus,
and was in the Abbott Business College at Billings
until 1908. The next four years his time was em-
ployed chiefly in surveying in what is now Still-
water County and at Lander, Wyoming. During
1912 and until March 24, 1913, he was a driver of
automobiles. Upon the organization of the county
government of Stillwater County he became deputy
county clerk, and in 1916 was elected chief of that
office and re-elected in 1918.
Mr. Lathom has had six years of experience in
the National Guard. He enlisted in Company K
of the Montana National Guard in 1907 and served
a full period of three years. In 191 1 he enlisted in
Company B of the Wyoming National Guards at
Lander and again served three years. He went in
as first rank and duty sergeant, and was promoted
to top sergeant and later to acting second lieutenant.
Mr. Lathom is a republican, is afiiliated with
Stillwater Lodge No. 62, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, at Columbus, Billings Lodge No.
394 of the Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, Columbus Camp No. 842, Woodmen of the
World, and is an active member of the Stillwater
Commercial Club.
Mr. Lathom has a modern home at the corner
of A Street and Third Avenue, North, in Columbus.
He married Miss Birdie F. Hunter, of Missoula,
July 6. 1915. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. W. E.
Hunter, reside at Missoula, where her father is
foreman in the stockyards of the Northern Pacific
Railway.
Harold Frederick Forsyth, chief draughtsman of
the .'\naconda Copper Mining Company, has been
advanced to positions of added responsibility and
dignity because of his ability and fitness for the
discharge of their duties. He was born at Ham-
mond. New Brunswick, Canada. September 25. 1882.
a son of R. W. Forsyth, also born at Hammond, in
1845. He died at Port Townsend. Washington, in
1912, to which he went in 1889, and was there en-
gaged in contracting and building. .'Kt Hammond he
had owned and operated a sawmill, and been suc-
cessful with it. After coming to the United States
and securing his citizen's papers he espoused the
principles of the republican party. A member of
■ the Episcopal Church, he actively supported it. A
brother of his. David Forsyth, is an archdeacon
of the church in New Brunswick, Canada. R. W.
Forsyth was a Mason, and well known in his order.
The maiden name of his wife was .^nnie M. Drum-
mond, and she was born in Upham, New Brunswick.
Canada, in 1855. She survives him and makes her
home at Anaconda. Harold F. Forsyth is the only
living child of his parents.
But a child when his father moved to Port
Townsend, Washington. Harold F. Forsyth was
reared there and attended its public schools, and
was graduated from its high school in 1809. For
the subsequent two years he worked on the daily
paper there, and then for three years was in the
employ of the government in the construction
work of coast defense fortifications, in the engineer-
ing department, as draughtsman and instrument
man. Realizing the need of technical training, 'Mr.
Forsvth then entered the State LTniversity at Seattle.
Washington, and completed the iunior year in the
engineering course, after which he returned to the
government service and remained in it for three
and one-half years, being employed on the con-
struction of the Grav's Harbor Jetty at Aberdeen.
Washington. Mr. Forsyth then went with the
Washington State Highway Department and for two
years was occupied with the construction of high-
way bridges, and for one vear was construction
engineer for Charles C. Moore & Companv of
San Francisco. California, during that period being
occupied on the construction of a power plant at
HISTORY OF MONTANA
17
Vancouver. British Columbia. In 1912 he was with
the American Smeking & Refining Company as de-
signer at their smeher at Tacoma. Washington.
His work in these connections brought him to the
notice of the Seattle Port Commission and his serv-
ices were secured as district engineer for the con-
struction of large docks and water terminals on
the water front of Seattle. In 1916 Mr. Forsyth
came to the American Smelting & Refining Com-
pany again, as a designer at their smelter at Salt
Lake City, Utah. During February, 1917, Mr.
Forsyth formed his connections with the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company, first being a de-
signer in the general offices, but was soon advanced
to be construction superintendent, and then chief
draughtsman, which position is commensurate with
his ability and varied experience. He has under
his supervision twenty-four draughtsmen, with
offices in the general office building of the Washoe
Reduction Works, two miles east of Anaconda. Mr.
Forsyth is an independent republican. He belongs
to the Episcopal Church and is a Mason, a member
of Acacia Lodge No. 33, .Ancient Free and .'\ccepted
Masons of Anaconda. The Anaconda Club, the
.'\naconda Country Club, and the Greek letter col-
lege fraternity. Phi Gamma Delta, hold his member-
ship and interest. Mr. Forsyth resides at No. 602
Maple Street, Anaconda. He is unmarried.
Herm.^n Caul Pagenkopf, manager of the Stone,
Ordean, Wells Company, is one of the enterprising
men of Butte who has risen to his present position
through business merit and personal aptitude. He
was born near Belgard, Pommerania, Germany, on
April 7, 1877, a son of Albert H. Pagenkopf, born
in 1851 in Pommerania, Germany, where he was
reared, educated and married. By trade he was a
flour miller, and came to the LTnited States in 1887,
locating at Hastings, Nebraska, where he still re-
sides, being now retired, although after coming to
this country he was engaged as a general workman.
He is a democrat and a member of the Lutheran
Church. With all young men in Germany, Albert
H. Pagenkopf received a training in the German
army during his obligatory military service. His
wife bore the maiden name of .'Augusta Boehlke,
and she was born in Germany on October I. 18.^4.
They became the parents of the following children:
Herman Carl, whose name heads this review ; Paul
E., who is a rancher and lives at Hamilton, Mon-
tana, is specializing in the production of White Leg-
hort] chickens, and was for fourteen years an em-
ploye of the Butte Street Railway Company as con-
ductor ; Emma, who rnarried J. .\lbert Van Schoik,
Jr.. a dairyman, proprietor of the White Clover
Dairy Farm of Red Bank, New Jersey; Alma, who
married Roy Schuflfeberger, of Moorfield, Nebraska,
a rancher, died at Hastings. Nebraska, on May 10.
igig; Emil who is city salesman for the Capitol
Commission Company of Helena. Butte and Great
Falls, Montana, is a resident of Butte; Minnie, who
married Roy C. Roote. a teamster' of Springfield,
Massachusetts ; Otto, who is a veteran of the World
war, resides at Davenport, Iowa, where he is an
electrician: William O., who is also a veteran of the
World war. was in the Officers Training Camp at
Camp Taylor. Louisville, Kentucky, and is now
associated with his brother-in-law. J. A. Van Schoik,
Jr., in the dairy business at Red Bank, New Jersey;
Fred C. wlio is now on his homestead near Man-
ville. Wyoming, has recently been mustered out of
the United Statt-s army after eighteen months over-
seas during the World war ; and .\nna, who is living
with her parents.
Herman Carl Pagenkopf was educated in the pub-
lic schools of Hastings, Nebraska, and was graduated
from its high school in 1895, and until 1901 was a
clerk in a grocery at Hastings, Nebraska, leaving
that city for Butte, which he reached on May 3, 1901.
For the following four years he clerked for Lutey
Brothers, and then became a salesman for the
National Biscuit Company, covering Butte and
western Montana, and leaving that corporation to
occupy the same position for the Bozeman Milling
Company, with headquarters at Butte, although his
territory included western Montana and southern
Idaho, with which he remained until July I, 1914.
He then became, manager for the Butte branch of
the Stone, Ordean, Wells Company, with offices at
the corner of Wyoming and Iron Streets, Butte.
Mr. Pagenkopf's territory covers both Helena and
Butte and extends from Wolf Creek on the north to
the Idaho line on the south, and from Logan, Mon-
tana, on the east, to Deer Lodge, Montana, on the
west.
In his political affiliations Mr. Pagenkopf is an
independent voter, but his business responsibilities
have 'been too onerous for his assumption of a pub-
lic character. Both by inheritance and conviction he
is a member of the Lutheran Church. Mr. Pagen-
kopf belongs to Mount Moriah Lodge, No. 24,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ; Deer Lodge
Chapter No. 3, Royal .^rch Masons ; Zabud Council
No. 2, Royal and Select Masters ; and Butte Council
No. 106, United Commercial Travelers. He owns a
modern residence at No. 1820 South Gaylord Ave-
nue, Butte, and real estate in Salt Lake City, Utah.
On September 26, igo6, Mr. Pagenkopf was united
in marriage at Butte to Miss Mabel Genevieve Davis,
a daughter of Charles E. and Eliza Jane (McTucker)
Davis. A sound, reliable and dependable business
man, Mr. Pagenkopf has proved his value to his
company and his community and is held in the high-
est esteem by all who know him. During the period
he was on the road he learned the needs of patrons,
and so is able to order the aflfairs of his present
concern much more intelligently than if he had not
acquired his knowledge by practical experience and
first hand contact with those with whom the com-
pany is carrying on business. Having made Butte
his headquarters for so many years, Mr. Pagenkopf
is naturally very much interested in its present and
future, and willing and anxious to do everything
that lies within his power to bring about a normal
and healthy expansion of business. Such men as
he are valuable additions to any community, and
deserve the consideration they generally command.
W. L. A. Calder, attorney-at-law, is engaged in
a civil practice at Laurel. He was born at Ottawa
City, Province of Ontario, Canada, April 12, 1875, a
son of W. G. Calder. now a resident of Inkster,
North Dakota. The Calder family originated in the
Highlands of Scotland, but members of it came in
an early day to Canada, and W. G. Calder was born
in County Glengarry in 1839, but was married in
County S'tormont, Canada, and thereafter until 1891
lived in the City of Ottawa, Canada, or the near
vicinity, where he carried on a business as a car-
penter and contractor. In 1891 he came to the
United States and spent some years at Forest River,
North Dakota, leaving them in 1899 for Inkster, that
state, where he is still working actively at his trade.
In 1918 he came to Laurel to erect an apartment
house and a number of private residences for his
son, W. L. A. Calder, and when the contract was
completed, returned to Inkster. He is a republican,
but while living in Canada was one of the original
Orange Men. The Methodist Episcopal Church
holds his membership. Fraternally he is an Odd
18
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Fellow. W. G. Calder was married to Dorothy
Logan, born in County Stormont, Canada. Her
father, who was born at sea, became a surgeon and
served with the British forces in India and Australia,
and on board an ocean steamer plying up the St.
Lawrence River to Quebec before he settled in the
Province of Ontario, Canada, becoming one of the
pioneer physicians and surgeons of that region, and
oftentimes riding for a radius of lOO miles to see
his patients. The children born to W. G. Calder
and his wife were as follows; Margaret, who mar-
ried W. T. Saunders, a ranchman, and resides at
Laurel, Montana ; Lucy, who married W. E. Cham-
berlin, a merchant and extensively interested in farm
lands in Yellowstone County, Montana, and North
Dakota, resides at Laurel ; W. L. A., whose name
heads this review ; Mary, who married Harry Parker,
resides at Livingston, Montana ; Dorothy, who mar-
ried L. G. Gemmill, a ranchman, resides near Laurel ;
and Lilly, who married a Mr. P. E. Sorensen, a
banker, resides at Wheaton, Minnesota.
W. L. A. Calder attended the public schools of
Eastern Ontario, Canada, and the University of
North Dakota, being graduated from the normal de-
partment in 1899 and from the law department in
1905. In the latter year he began the practice of
his profession at Grand Forks, North Dakota, leav-
ing there in 1909 for Laurel, where he has since re-
mained. His offices are located in the Spencer-
McCauley Block. Mr. Calder is an able lawyer and
his practice is a large and valuable one. He has
demonstrated his faith in the future of Laurel and
Yellowstone County by investing quite heavily in
its realty, owning a modern residence at the corner
of Fifth Street and Fifth Avenue, an apartment
house and four bungalows at Laurel and a ranch of
160 acres outside the city. Both by inheritance and
conviction he is a republican. Fraternally he belongs
to Grand Forks Lodge No. 255, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, of Grand Forks, North
Dakota ; Grand Forks Camp, Modern Woodmen of
America; Manvel Lodge, Brotherhood of American
Yeomen; and the Grand Forks Lodge of United
Order of Foresters. He maintains membership pro-
fessionally with the Yellowstone County Bar .Asso-
ciation and the Montana State Bar Association.
In 1900 Mr. Calder was married at Grand Forks,
North Dakota, to Miss Louise McDonald, a daughter
of James and Catherine (Wickam) McDonald. Mr.
McDonald, who is now deceased, was at one time
a ranchman of Grand Forks County, North Da-
kota. Mr. and Mrs. Calder have two children, Cath-
erine, who was born December 24, 1907, and W. L.
A., who was born February 7, 1911.
DAVin HiLGER. A life of larger and broader serv-
ice to his home state of Montana it would be
difficult to conceive than that of David Hilger of
Lewistown. Mr. Hilger has lived in Montana over
fifty years, his father was a distinguished charac-
ter at Helena, and the son has been even more
prominent in the making of history at Lewistown.
His has been fundamental activities. They have
been concerned with the improvement and devel-
opment of land, the opening of new resources, the
establishment of important industries and institu-
tions, and the working out of an enlightened pro-
gram of improvement affecting not only Lewis-
town but the state at large.
Some reference should be made at the beginning
to his father, the late Nicholas Hilger. Nicholas
Hilger was born in the Duchy of Luxemburg, Octo-
ber 28. 1831, a son of Daniel and Susanna (Evert)
Hilger. In 1847 the entire family came to America,
first locating at Buffalo, New York. In 1854 Nicho-
las Hilger went to St. Paul,. Minnesota, and soon
afterwards settled at Henderson in that territory.
He became prominent in the early affairs of Min-
nesota Territory, serving as justice of the peace,
holding a position in the United States Land Office,
helped take the census of Minnesota preparatory
to statehood and was elected county auditor, an
office he held from 1857 to 1864. He also held a
commission as captain of a regiment in the state
militia.
He first came to Montana in 1864 as a member
of the Sully Expedition, which arrived at Helena
September 2-j, 1864. While in Montana he was
appointed the first deputy recorder for Edgerton
County. On June i, 1865, he started east to get
his family, but was delayed in Minnesota, for some
time by his business interests and did not return
until 1867. He developed a large farm and ranch
on the Missouri River and was active in public
affairs as justice of the peace and probate judge.
Nicholas Hilger married in 1857 Susanna Moerseh,
of Minnesota.
David Hilger was born in Minnesota, January i,
1858, the oldest of the ten children of his parents.
He was old enough to enjoy and appreciate the
excitement and the constantly unfolding wonders
of the three months' journey overland to Montana.
The Hilger family was part of a large colony of
si.xty families and 300 single men. one of the lar.g-
est and most important additions to the citizen-
ship of the territory. David Hilger grew up at
Helena, finished his education there, and became a
cattle and sheep raiser in Lewis and Clarke County.
His interests increasing and demanding a larger
scope of range, he moved in 1881 to Dog Creek
in the northern part of Fergus County, a date that
identifies him with the very early pioneer settle-
ment of that part of the state. He began with a
small flock of sheep and meager equipment, but
in the course of twelve years had become one of
the dominant men in the sheep industry of Mon-
tana.
Mr. Hilger is properly credited with being one
of the men most influential in the upbuilding and
promotion of Lewistown as a commercial city.
Gradually as his ranch holdings were sold off he
concentrated his interests at Lewistown. He and
George W. Cook became associated in the real
estate business, and in course of time out of this
grew the Hilger Loan & Realty Company, one of
the largest concerns of its kind in the state, with
Mr. Hilger as president. He and other business
men organized the Judith Hardware Company in
1890, a business that has drawn to itself some
of the most capable men in that section of the
state. Mr. Hilger was long president of the com-
pany. For seventeen years he served as vice presi-
dent and as president of the First National Bank
of Lewistown, resigning the latter office on Janu-
ary 9, 1917. He has since been chairman of the
board of directors of the bank. In .iXpril, iqio, he
organized the Flat Willow Ranch Company, own-
ing 3,500 acres of land, and is president of the
company. On December 27, 1910, he organized the
Fergus County Land and Irrigation Company, of
which he is president. These are important proj-
ects for the irrigation and reclamation of targe
bodies of land in Fergus County.
There is hardly a man of more versatile abili-
ties and accomplishments than David Hilger in the
State of Montana. For years his has been a dis-
tinguished name in the democratic party, but his
prominence in politics is due primarily to the dis-
interested work he has accomplished in behalf of
the public welfare. Politics with- him is incidental
HISTORY OF MONTANA
19
to a genuine and sincere public spirit and public
service. In the spring of 1894 he was appointed
register of the United States Land Ofhce at Lewis-
town, and at that time made his home in the city.
He served four years. He was selected to pre-
side over the first County Democratic Convention
held in Fergus County, and was chairman of the
first County Central Committee, and also chairman
of the first Democratic Municipal Convention in
Lewistown. At considerable sacrifice of his pri-
vate interests he served as a member of the Eighth
Legislature in 1903-04, participating in the two ex-
tra sessions of that assembly, one to appropriate
money for a Montana exhibit at St. Louis in the
Louisiana Purchase Exposition, and the other to
consider the Fair Trial Bill which was made a law.
This recalls a more recent service when by ap-
pointment of Governor Stewart he was made chair-
man of the Montana Commission of the Panama-
Pacific Exposition at San Francisco in 191 5. This
commission had in charge the expenditure of a sum
of $78,000, $50,000 having been appropriated by the
Legislature and $28,000 subscribed by the citizens.
The record of Montana in the Panama-Pacific Ex-
position is a notable one and is described in detail
in the general history of that exposition.
May 14, 1917, Governor Stewart appointed Mr.
Hilger a member of the State Tax and License
Commission for a term of two years. On April
21, iqi6, he was elected a delegate to the National
Democratic Convention in St. Louis. Of the four-
teen candidates he received the largest number of
votes.
Mr. Hilger was one of the Lewistown citizens
who brought about the establishment of a county
high school and served as chairman of the board
of trustees while the high school building was
under construction. He was also a member of the
board of trustees of the Carnegie Library when it
was built and for a number of years afterward.
By appointment of Governor Norris he was a
member of the Commission on the Conservation of
Our Natural Resources and the drafting of the pres-
ent laws governing the state lands of Montana.
Mr. Hilger is one of Montana's prominent mem-
bers of the Order of Elks, his local affiliation being
with Lewistown Lodge No. 456, of which he is a
past exalted ruler. He was district deputy in 1906
and has been a delegate to the Grand Lodge of
Denver in 1905. Los .'\ngeles in 1915, Baltimore
in 1916, Boston in 1917 and .'\tlantic City in 1918.
October 20, 1884, Mr. Hilger married Miss Chris-
tina H. Fergus, daughter of William Fergus and a
niece of James Fergus, the distinguished pioneer
for whom Fergus County was named. Mr. and
Mrs. Hilger had five children, two daughters dy-
ing in infancy. The oldest daughter. Maude H.,
is the wife of George H. Osborne, a rancher in
Fergus County, and they have a daughter, Chris-
tine. David J., the only son of Mr. Hilger, is as-
sistant cashier of the Montana State Bank at Geral-
dine and married Mary Dowd. The youngest,
daughter, Christina L., is a student in the Fergus
County High School.
William L. Lawson. Possessing undoubted ex-
ecutive and business ability and judgment, William
L. Lawson, who is prominently associated with the
industrial afifairs of Billings as assistant to the
president of the Great Western Sugar Company,
and as general manager of the concern, has been
an important factor in advancing the growth and
expansion of the company's interests in Montana,
and very influential in furthering the success of the
vast enterprise.
The Great Western Sugar Company, founded in
1902, was organized in the State of New Jersey,
and is now capitalized at $30,000,000. Beginning
on a rather modest scale, with its first factory at
Loveland, Colorado, its business increased with sur-
prising rapidity, and it now has ten factories in
Colorado, three in Nebraska, two in Montana and
one in Wyoming. The factory at Billings, situated
about six miles south of the city limits, was built
in 1905, the plant consisting of five individual brick
structures, including the main building, the office
building, the warehouse, the lime kiln, and the
power house. The officers of the Billings plant are
as follows : W. L. Lawson, assistant to the presi-
dent, and general manager ; Joseph Maudru, general
superintendent ; F. H. Ballou, assistant chief en-
gineer; C. F. Ridley, cashier; C. S. Milhiser, agri-
cultural superintendent ; and H. S. Barringer, factory
superintendent. This plant has a capacity of 2,000
tons per day. The company's other Montana plant,
located at Missoula, has a capacity of 1,000 tons
a day. Its four officers are F. A. Wilson, local
manager; E. E. Durmin, factory superintendent; R.
M. Barr, agricultural superintendent of that district ;
and H. Towner, cashier, assistant to W. L. Law-
son, who has general supervision over the Missoula
territory.
A native of Canada, W. L. Lawson was born at
Hamilton, Ontario, September 28, 1870, of Scotch
parentage. His father, the late William Lawson,
was born in 1830, in Fifeshire, Scotland, and was
there reared and married. Brought up to seafaring
pursuits, he was engaged in the merchant marine
service during his earlier life. Emigrating to .Amer-
ica, he settled permanently in Canada, living first
in Hamilton, but spending his later years in Toronto,
where his death occurred in 1912. He married
Jessie Kerr, who was born in Edinboro, Scotland,
in 1838, and died in Toronto, Canada, in 1917,
having survived him five years. Jessie Kerr Law-
son became a well known writer of Scottish stories
and verses.
Scholarly in his ambitions and attainments, W. L.
Lawson was graduated from the University of Tor-
onto in 1893, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts
and Science, and for four years thereafter remained
in that institution as assistant professor of chem-
istry. Accepting a position then as chemist for
the -Alvarado Sugar Company, at Alvarado, Cali-
fornia, he held it for four years, after which he
was technical man for the Idaho-Utah Sugar Com-
pany for a year. Becoming associated with the
Great Western Sugar Company in 1905, Mr. Lawson
was superintendent of the factory at Eaton, Colo-
rado, for a year, and was then transferred to
Sterling, Colorado, as manager of the plant there.
Making good in that capacity, he was eventually
given charge of two other Colorado factories, one
at Brush and the other at Fort Morgan. In May,
191 5, he was promoted to his present position of
assistant to the president of the company, and gen-
eral manager of the Montana division of the Great
Western Sugar Company, an office of great respon-
sibility which he is filling with credit to himself
and to the satisfaction of the firm.
Politically Mr. Lawson is a republican, but takes
no active part in the management of public affairs.
He is a member of the Society of Chemical In-
dustry, an international organization in which he
takes much interest. Sociallv he belongs to both
the Billings Club and the Billings Midland and
Empire Club. Prominently identified with the Ma-
sons, Mr. Lawson is a member of Eaton Lodge,
Ancient Free and -Accepted Order of Masons, of
Eaton, Colorado ; of Denver Chapter, Royal Arch
20
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Masons ; of Denver Commandery, Knights Templar ;
of Denver Consistory, being a thirty-second degree
Mason; and of El Jebel Temple, Ancient Arabic
Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at Denver.
Mr. Lawson is a brother of A. C. Lawson, pro-
fessor of geology in the University of California,
and of A. A. Lawson, professor of botany in the
University of Sidney, Australia. He is also a brother
of James Kerr Lawson, the artist of London, Eng-
land, who has been commissioned by the Canadian
Government to paint some of the European battle-
fields where the Canadian armies fought.
James K. Murphy, assistant superintendent of
the Washoe Reduction Works of the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company, is one of the alert and
energetic young men connected with this corpora-
tion who are proving their worth as practical engi-
neers and citizens. He was born at Butte, Montana,
July 6, i88q, a son of James W. Murphy, and grand-
son of Jeremiah J. Murphy, who was born in Ire-
land in 1815, and died at Butte, Montana, in 1890.
Coming to the United States in young manhood,
he remained for a time in New Jersey, and then
came as far west as Iowa, about the time of the
war between the states, there being a pioneer farmer.
In 1880 he extended his travels to Salt Lake City,
Utah, and in 1885 reached Butte, Montana, where
he lived in retirement until his death. His wife
was a Miss Kane, born in Ireland, but brought to
the United States in girlhood. Her father at one
time owned a hunting lodge in Ireland that was
patronized by the royalty of England. Mrs. Jere-
miah J. Murphy died at Butte, Montana.
James W. Murphy was born in New Jersey in
1859, and was reared in that state and Iowa, and
came to Butte, Montana, in 1884, being then unmar-
ried. Interested in real estate transactions, he
formed a partnership with a Mr. Cannon under the
firm style of Murphy & Cannon, and it was the
pioneer one of its kind at Butte. James W. Mur-
phy played an important part in the early develop-
ment of Bntte, both as a realty dealer and citizen,
but left that city for Portland, Oregon, in 1912,
and has since then been living retired. He is a
democrat. Born and reared in the Roman Catho-
lic Church, he is a devout member of that faith.
His wife was Miss Jessie Callahan before her mar-
riage, and she was born at Norwopd, Ontario, Can-
ada in 1863, and died at Butte, Montana, in 1898.
Their children were as follows : Rosalba, who mar-
ried Frederick Laist, a sketch of whom appears
elsewhere in this work; James K., whose name heads
this review ; and Clinton, who died at Seattle,
Washington, in 1918, when twenty-eight years of
age.
James K. Murphy was graduated from the Butte
High School in 1907, following which he entered
the School of Mines of Butte, from which he was
also graduated in 1911, with the degree of Engineer
of Mines. In June, 191 1, he came to Anaconda
to engage with the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany as assistant testing engineer, and was pro-
moted to be one of the chemists in the laboratory,
and then chief chemist. Still later he was made
superintendent of the roasting plants, and subse-
quently the supervision of the Cottrell treaters was
accorded him. Finally he became assistant su-
perintendent of the Washoe Reduction Works of
the company, with offices in the Chemical Build-
ing, two miles east of Anaconda. Like his father,
he is a democrat and Catholic. He belongs to Ana-
conda Council No. 882, Knights of Columbus, in
which he is a Fourth Degree Knight, to the
Anaconda Club and to the .'\naconda Country Club.
He holds membership in the American Institute
of Mining Engineers.
In 1910 Mr. Murphy was married to Miss Emma
Reeves, a daughter of Mrs. Roy Alley Reeves of
Spokane, Washington, but formerly a resident of
Butte, Montana. Mr. and Mrs. Murphy have the
following children : Marion, who was born February
17, 1912, and his twin sister, Frances. The family
reside at the Montana Hotel. Both Mr. and Mrs.
Murphy are very prominent socially, and are held
in the highest esteem by their wide circle of friends.
Henning Russell Boden. Success in life comes
to the deserving. It is an axiom demonstrated by all
human experience that a man gets out of life what
he puts into it, plus a reasonable interest on the in-
vestment. The individual who inherits a large estate
and adds nothing to his fortune cannot be called a
successful man. He who falls heir to a large fortune
and increases its value is successful in proportion to
the amount he adds to his possession. But the man
who starts in the world unaided and by sheer force
of will, controlled by correct principles, forges ahead
and at length reaches a position of honor among his
fellow citizens achieves success such as represen-
tatives of the two former classes can neither under-
stand nor appreciate. To a considerable extent,
Henning R. Boden. chief clerk to the Superintendent
of the Northern Pacific Railway Company, at Mis-
soula, is a creditable representative of the class last
named, a class which has furnished much of the
bone and sinew of the country and added to the
stability of our government and its institutions.
Henning Russell Boden was born at Lake City,
Minnesota, on the 2nd day of August, 1883. His
father, Anders Boden, was a native of the Scandi-
navian Peninsula, where he w'as born in 1835, and
his death occurred at St. Paul, Minnesota, in 191 1.
In 1882 he came to the United States, settling in
Lake City, Minnesota, of which locality he was a
pioneer. In 1887 he moved to St. Paul, where he
lived until his death. His wife, whose maiden name
was Sophia Saline, and who now resides at North
St. Paul, was also born on the Scandinavian Penin-
sula. To Mr. and Mrs. Boden were born eight
children, two daughters and si,x sons.
Helming R. Boden, the seventh child and the fifth
son. was educated in the public schools of St. Paul,
Minnesota. In 1897, he entered the employ of a
furniture factory at North St. Paul, and literally
learned every detail of the mechanical end of its
business. He began in the lumber yard, from whence
he went into the the wood-working machine de-
partment ; thence to the finishing machine shop ;
thence to the cabinet-making department ; thence
to the paint shop and packing or shipping room. Mr.
Boden next entered the employ of an organ and
piano factory at North St. Paul, where he fired a
battery of stationary boilers ; worked in the machine
shop and in the "action" making department. Leav-
ing here, he next ' entered the employ of a street
railway as a laborer and then as a carpenter. He
then fired a traction boiler in a threshing outfit
operating near the Twin Cities, and also had some
experience as a locomotive fireman on one of the
railroads leading out of St. Paul. Later he was
employed by a table company at North St. Paul as
a cabinet maker. These incidents of his various
employments covered the period from 1897 to 1902.
During this period he, through persistent night
study, completed a high school course, also a course
in shorthand and bookkeeping at one of the leading
business colleges in the Twin Cities. He then
entered the service of one of the great rail systems
operating between St. Paul and Chicago, and later
HISTORY OF MONTANA
21
on was connected with one of the transcontinental
systems radiating from St. Paul. He was next em-
ployed by a road making machine concern as a
bookkeeper and stenographer. After recovering
from a severe illness Mr. Boden entered the service
of the Northern Pacific Railway Company's engi-
neering department, and at the same time took up the
study of civil engineering, in which he finished a
regular course, including mathematics, geometry,
trigonometry, surveying, topography, electricity,
dynamo and motor work. Then, finding many
knotty legal problems constantly arising in the rail-
road work, he finished a law course, at the end of
which, in June, 1916, he was admitted to the bar of
Montana.
Mr. Boden has now served nearly twelve years as
the head of the Superintendent's offices at Glendive
and Missoula, and has, by his accuracy, expediency
and thoroughness, made himself practically indis-
pensable. He possesses a practical and original turn
of mind.
Mr. Boden first came to Glendive as head of the
Superintendent's office there in June, 1908, and in
April, 1915, came to Missoula in the same position
and has continued in that capacity since.
Politically Mr. Boden gives his support to the
Republican Party, though not in any sense an as-
pirant for public office.
On January 29, 1907, at Stillwater, Minnesota, Mr.
Boden was married to Margaret Anderson, the
daughter of Hector and Margaret (Whalen) Ander-
son, and to them have been born two children, Robert
Hector, born November 14, 1910, at Glendive, and
Jane Margaret, born May 20, 1915, at Missoula.
Hector Anderson was born in 1844 in Inverness,
Scotland, where he was reared and educated. He
came to the United States in young manhood and
located at Stillwater, Minnesota, where he engaged
in lumbering. At Stillwater he was married to
Margaret Whalen, born in New Brunswick, Canada,
coming to Minnesota at the age of five years. She
now resides at St. Paul, Minnesota. They became
the parents of eight children, of whom Margaret was
the youngest.
John O. Hich.\m. For many years it has been
claimed by sailors and pleasure travelers that once
a person became embued with the spirit of the Orient
it was impossible for him to live elsewhere, and this
statement appears to be equally true of the West.
Time and again have those who traveled toward
the setting sun in this great ct)untry, purposing to
make their stay a temporary one, sought to resume
their former life in communities further to the east,
but in vain, and they were drawn back to the "land
of opportunity," the "places of broad vision" and
eventually they have become a part of the won-
derful commonwealths which are going ahead by
leaps and bounds. John O. Higham, banker and
ranchman of Belfry, Montana, is one of these
cases in question, and his present prosperity proves
that the West has been a good foster mother, while
what he has accomplished shows that he is a valuable
addition to the family.
John O. Higham was born at Lanesboro, Minne-
sota, February 22, 1872. His father, Andrew
Higham, having also been possessed with the pioneer
spirit, which sought adventure and led him to leave
his native land of Norway, where he was born
in 1828, and come to the United States in 1854, and
after a short stay at Rushford, Minnesota, home-
stead at Lanesboro, Minnesota, where he was one of
the first settlers. He resided on this homestead
until 1909, when he sold it and retired, dying at
Lanesboro in October, 1918. In politics he was a
republican. The Lutheran Church of Lanesboro held
his membership and he was very active in church
work. His wife, Ingeberth Sherdall, was born in
Norway in 1827, but she was reared in Minnesota.
Her death occurred at Lanesboro in January, 1919.
She and her husband had the following children:
Caroline, who married Ed Brekke, a farmer of
Lanesboro, Minnesota; and John O., whose name
heads this review.
John O. Higham attended the public schools of
Lanesboro and the high school of Grand Forks,
North Dakota, and until he was seventeen years old
made himself useful on his father's farm. At that
age he went to Grand Forks, North Dakota, and a
year later, m 1890, came to Montana, where for two
years he was employed in construction work on
the Great Northern Railroad at Fort Assiniboine
at the time this road was entering Mbntana. In
1892 Mr. Higham went to Sacramento, California,
and for two years was there engaged in farming.
Returning to Montana, for two years he was em-
ployed as a cow boy and rode the range on the
present site of Castle. Going back to his birthplace,
for two years he was engaged as a clerk in one
of Its mercantile establishments, but the call of the
West brought him back, and in 1900 he reached
Absarokee, ^Montana, where for three years he was
a member of the sales force of one of the general
stores of that place, and at the same time he was
gaining a practical knowledge of the needs of the
people. Seeing the possibilities of sheep farming, he
was engaged in that line for eighteen months near
Joliet, in Carbon County, and then purchased a store
at Joliet and for two years was engaged in a mer-
cantile business. Selling it at a profit, he spent a
year in California, and then, in 1906, he established
himself at Belfr/ Montana, and organized the Bank
of Belfry in conjunction with W. F. Meyer, of Red
Lodge, and John W. Chapman, also of Red Lodge.
From the first Mr. Higham has been cashier, his
fellow officials being John W. Chapman, president,
and F. H. Alden, vice president, both of these gentle-
men being prominent men of Red Lodge, Montana,
so that the active management of the bank devolves
on Mr. Higham. The capital of the bank is
$20,000 and the surplus is $5,000. This stable in-
stitution is located on Broadway. This bank is a
vender of state-wide credit, and through alliance
with great financial institutions of other communities
its officials are able to provide customers with exact
and confidential information essential to their ex-
pansion and the carrying on of ordinary business
affairs, while at the same time it transacts the usual
functions of a banking house, the men connected
with it being a guarantee of its reliability and con-
servative policies.
Mr. Higham is also a director of the First National
Bank of Bridger, a director and vice president of
the Gibson Culver Company of Fromberg, Montana.
He owns a ranch one-half mile south of Belfry, con-
taining 160 acres of irrigated land, where he main-
tains his residence, and he also owns 1,200 acres
in the Pryor Agency, Big Horn County, Montana.
Politically he is a republican. He affiliates with the
Presbyterian Church. Very prominent in Masonic
circles, he belongs to the Star in the West Lodge,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of Red Lodge ;
Billings Chapter No. 6, Royal Arch Masons; Aide-
mar Commandery No. 5, Knights Templar; Algeria
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine, of Helena, Montana ; and to Helena Con-
sistory, in which the thirty-second degree has been
conferred upon him. Mr. Higham is also a member
of Bear Tooth Lodge, Benevolent and Protective
22
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Order of Elks, of Red Lodge; and Johet Camp,
Modern Woodmen of America. ,
In igos Mr. Higham was married at Bilhngs,
Montana, to Miss Jennie M. Wight, a daughter of
James and Mary (Ettien) Wight, both of whom are
now deceased. Mr. Wight was a rancher and stock-
man in the Judith Basin of Montana, arrivmg there
in 1884 and later became a pioneer of Johet, Mon-
tana. Mrs. Higham is a graduate of the State
Agricultural College at Bozeman, Montana, and a
cultivated lady of considerable attainments. Mr. and
Mrs. Higham have four children, namely: Jack W.,
who was born December 14, 1907; Weldon O., who
was born August 20, 1909 ; Robert X., who was born
August 30, 1914; and Elizabeth U., who was born
April 30, 1917. Mr. Higham's prosperity has come
to him not by the royal road, but through the
medium of hard work and intelligent foresight. He
has known how to make good investments and his
excellent judgment in this respect makes him an
ideal banker, his customers feeling that one who had
been able to multiply his own belongings so ad-
vantageously could add to their material prosperity
equally well. Although his various duties have not
permitted his entering public life, he takes an in-
telligent and effective interest in civic matters, and
has the welfare of Belfry at heart.
Henry H. Wilson, M. D. A boy soldier in the
Union army during the Civil war. Doctor Wilson
took up the study of medicine when he returned to
civil life and has been actively engaged as a physi-
cian and surgeon for over half a century. Doctor
Wilson practiced many years in Missouri and for
the past twenty years his home has been at Lewis-
town, where he still looks after jn extensive busi-
ness in his profession.
Doctor Wilson was born at Langdon in Sulli-
van County, New Hampshire, June 3, 1846, a son
of Willard and Mary Ann (Hardy) Wilson, both
natives of New York State. His father, who was
born in 1812, was a California forty-niner, going
to the Pacific Coast around the Horn and return-
ing by way of the Isthmus of Panama. On reach-
ing the Atlantic side of the Isthmus he took pas-
sage on a Government warship commanded by
Captain, afterward Admiral, Porter. This vessel
before reaching the United States put into port at
Havana, Cuba. For several years Willard Wilson
continued farming in New Hampshire, and in 1856
left the bleak New England hills and moved to
Illinois, locating at Astoria in Fulton County. Some
years later, during the Civil war, he returned to
New Hampshire, and died in that state in 1863. He
was a whig in politics.
Doctor Wilson was the second of three children,
two of whom are still living. He was only six-
teen years old when on September 2, 1862, he vol-
unteered in Company H of the Eighty-Fifth Illinois
Infantry. He saw much arduous service with his
command, and was in the war until mustered out
at Camp Butler, Illinois. June 19, 1865. He began
the study of medicine with Drs. W. T. and B. C.
Toler, and finished his course in the medical de-
partment of the University of Iowa at Keokuk,
graduating in 1867. Doctor Wilson first practiced
at Lindley in Grundy County, Missouri, and in 1886
moved to Humphreys in the same state, and shortly
afterward to Trenton, where he was in practice
until May, 1899. Since that date his home has been
at Lewistown, and his offices as physician and sur-
geon are in the First National Bank Building.
Doctor Wilson has devoted the best years of his
life to the practice of his profession and has won
an enviable esteem in every community he has
served. He is an independent in politics.
In April, 1868, he married Miss Esther Green.
Five children were born to their marriage : Min-
nie N., Emma, H. K., Lionel and Ernest. Ernest
died at the age of four years. Emma is an accom-
plished business woman and is at the head of one
of the important departments of the Chicago de-
partment store of Carson, Pirie & Company. The
son, H. K., is a graduate of the Northwestern Uni-
versity Medical Department of Chicago with the
class of 1904, and is one of the leading physicians
and surgeons of Lewistown. The son Lionel was
a railway engineer with the Chicago, Rock Island
road at Canton, Missouri, and died at the age of
twenty-eight.
George J. Kobelin, a prosperous rancher and busi-
ness man of Pompey's Pillar, represents the third
generation of the family that has played a useful
part in American citizenship and industry. The
residence of the family for many years has been
in the Central West, in Illinois and Indiana.
Mr. George J. Kobelin was born in Kankakee
County, Illinois, September 15, 1867. His grand-
father, George Kobelin, was born in Germany in
1783, and came to the United States with his family
when past middle age. He lived for many years
at LaPorte, Indiana, where he died in 1881, when
ninety-eight years of age. William Kobelin, father
of the Montana rancher, was born in Germany in
1836, and was six years old when he came to the
United States with his parents in 1842. The
family settled at LaPorte, where he grew up
and married. He spent all his life as a farmer,
and after his marriage moved to Kankakee County,
Illinois, and in 1873 returned to Indiana and settled
in Lake County, where he lived until his death in
January, 1915, in Lowell. He was prominent in
public affairs in Lake County, serving as township
trustee four years and county commissioner six
years. He was a republican and Mason. William
Kobelin. who was of German ancestors, married a
French girl. Margaret Paquin, who was born in
Paris in 1844. She died at Lowell, Indiana, in Sep-
tember, 1908. They had a large family of children,
nine in number, mentioned briefly as follows:
Amelia, who is the wife of Frank Stark, a farmer
at St. Johns, Indiana ; Helen, wife of Albert Maack,
a banker at Crown Point, Indiana ; George J. ;
Laura, who married James Robinson, and resides at
Hebron, Indiana ; Minnie, wife of Arthur Pattee,
an attorney-at-law at Denver, Colorado ; William,
connected with the Standard Oil Company at Croivn
Point, Indiana ; Frank, who has no settled place
of residence; John, of Everett, Washington; and
Carrie, unmarried.
George J. Kobelin grew up and received his edu-
cation in Indiana, living on his father's farm until
he was twenty-two years of age. He had to start
life without special advantages or capital and was
a farm hand in Lake County, Indiana, for a number
of years. Seeing the opportunities of the far West
he came to Billings in 1903, spending one year with
Yegen Brothers, following which he engaged in
the stock and merchandise business. In 1915 Mr.
Kobelin turned all his resources to ranching, and
has been an active factor in Pompey's Pillar. He
owns eighty acres of valuable irrigated land, he-
sides 640 acres of dry farm and grazing land, and
does an extensive business in raising stock. He is
also vice president of the First National Bank of
Pompey's Pillar.
Mr. Kobelin is a republican and a member of the
Masonic fraternity. On December 2, 1889, at Crown
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Point, Indiana, he married Martha L. Smith, a
daughter of Levi and Lydia (Hayden) Smith. Her
father died in Lake County, Indiana, in 1876. He
was a farmer. Her mother is now living at Hunt-
ley, Montana. Mrs. Kobelin, who died February
13, 1919, was the mother of seven children. Their
names in order of birth are Murray William, Guy,
Eileen, Ruby, Jules. Elliott and Alberta. They are
still with their father. Ruby and Jules are high
school students, while Elliott and Alberta are still
in grammar school. Murray is engaged in ranch-
ing, and Guy, upon his return from the service,
entered the employ of a Billings bank as teller.
Ch.\rles L Emerson, cashier for the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company, and one of the solid, re-
liable men of this great corporation, was born at
St. Paul, Minnesota, July 27, 1S71. He is a son of
Horace E. Emerson, and grandson of Horace
Emory Emerson, a native of Maine, where he
spent his entire life, and where for many years
he was engaged in work as a millwright. The
Emerson family came from England in the days
prior to the American Revolution and became sub-
stantial citizens of Maine. On his mother's side
Charles I. Emerson comes of Irish stock.
Horace E. Emerson was born at Bangor, Maine,
in 1839, and died at St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1913.
During his boyhood and youth he lived at Bangor,
but soon after reaching his majority went to Port-
age, Wisconsin, and from there enlisted to serve in
the Union Army during the war between the states
in 1861, as a member of the Second Wisconsin
Volunteer Infantry, and among other engagements
was at the battle of Antietam. After the close of
the war he returned to Portage, Wisconsin, and was
engaged in railroading, first with the Chicago, Mil-
waukee & St. Paul Railroad, and later with the
Great Northern Railroad, making St. Paul his head-
quarters. In all of his railroad work he was a
locomotive engineer. Always a strong republican,
he gave his party his vigorous support. He was
a Mason and a member of the Grand Army of the
Republic. Horace E. Emerson was married to
Emma C. Kittredge, born at Detroit, Michigan, in
1848. She survives him and makes her home at
St. Paul, Minnesota. Their children were as fol-
lows : Horace E., Jr., who is a grain buydr for the
Thompson Elevator Company of Duluth, Minne-
sota ; George H., who went to Siberia as colonel
of 300 railroad men to take charge of -the Siberian
Railroad during the great war, is a resident of St.
Paul, Minnesota ; and Charles I., whose name heads
this review.
Charles I. Emerson attended the schools of St.
Paul, until he was fourteen years old, when he left
school and began learning the stereotyper's trade,
and followed it for four years and then for four
years was with Fairbanks & Morse, scale manu-
facturers. In 1896 Mr. Emerson came to Anaconda
to engage with the Anaconda, Butte & Pacific Rail-
road as wiper, being soon promoted to master me-
chanic's clerk, then timekeeper, and finally cashier,
with offices in the general office building of the
Washoe Reduction Works, two miles east of Ana-
conda. Like his father, Mr. Emerson is stanch in his '
support of the republican party, and has been elected
to two terms in the City Council of Anaconda. He
is a member of the Anaconda Lodge No. 239,
Benevolent Protective Order of Elks and of the
.Anaconda Country Club. The modern residence at
105 Pine Street occupied by (he Emersons is owned
by them.
In 1897 Mr. Emerson was married at Anaconda to
Miss ."Mice B. Penniman, a daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. E. P. Penniman of St. Paul, Minnesota, he
bemg foreman m the jobbing department of the
Staats Zeitung newspaper. Mr. and Mrs. Emerson
became the parents of the following children-
Georgia Lucille married C. O. Prest, who lives at
Venice, California, and is an aviator, and she is a
graduate of the Anaconda High School ; Edna Vir-
gmia, who is in the training school for nurses
connected with the Murray Hospital at Butte, Mon-
tana; Emily, who is attending the Anaconda High
School, lives at home; and Alice Amelia, who °is
also attending the same high school as her sister
These daughters are all very intelligent and the
younger ones give promise of attaining to the schol-
arship of their elders. During his association with
his present company Mr. Emerson has exhibited
such sterling characteristics that those in authority
have had no hesitancy in advancing him and will
doubtless put additional responsibilities upon him in
asking him to assume still higher positions, for he
is worthy of their confidence and they appreciate
his work. In his civic life Mr. Emerson has proven
himself a good citizen, and his work in the council
gives him a record as a public official of which he
has every reason to be proud. He and his family
are very popular socially, and their pleasant home
is the scene of many gatherings, their friends en-
joying the gracious and hearty hospitality there
dispensed.
Fred C. Stoddard, whose name is numbered among
the pioneer citizens of Missoula, was born in Jack-
son County, Michigan, August 18, 1857- His Stod-
dard ancestors were English and Colonial settlers
in Massachusetts. His father. Dr. Samson Stoddard
was born in Vienna, Oneida County, New York!
February 6, 1806, was reared there, and when a
young man moved to Jackson, Michigan. He was a
pioneer physician and surgeon in Jackson County,
and one of the first members of his profession in
southern Michigan. He returned to Oneida County
for his bride in 1831, returning to Jackson, practic-
ing his profession for some years, and later moved
to a farm twelve miles west of Jackson City in
Concord Township, developing property of 640
acres. This farm he afterward divided among his
children, and in 1875 retired to Albion, Michigan,
where he died August 26, 1876. He was one of
the original republicans in Michigan, in which state
the republican party was first organized. He held
several township offices. Doctor Stoddard was
twice married. His second wife was Mrs. Emily
CThayer) Lathrop, a native of the State of New
York, who died at Stevensville, Montana. Fred C.
Stoddard is the older of her two children. Mary L.
is the wife of William Baggs, connected with a mer-
cantile establishment at Stevensville, Montana.
Fred C. Stoddard attended public schools at
Albion, Michigan, graduating from high school in
1875. Soon afterward he became assistant book-
keeper and cashier with the J. K. Armsby Company
of Chicago. He came to Montana in 1880. The first
two years he was a rancher in the Bitter Root Valley
on Skalkaho Creek. Mr. Stoddard has been a resi-
dent of Missoula since the fall of 1881. Here for
five years he resumed his vocation as bookkeeper
for the pioneer establishment of Worden and Hig-
gins, and for five years was bookkeeper and assistant
cashier in the Missoula National Bank, now the
First National Bank of Missoula, the oldest National
Bank in Montana. In 1890, he engaged in the real
estate and insurance business, dealing principally in
Missoula city property, and built up a business that
covered all of Western Montana. In 191 1 he sold
his insurance business, continuing the real estate line
2i
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and later adding the insurance business, witli offices
in the Higgins Block.
Mr. Stoddard married Miss Minnie A. Freeman,
" April i6, 1884, daughter of Avery and Amanda Free-
man of Fort Wayne, Indiana, and they have four
children: Bessie Louise at home; F. Thayer, whose
career is sketched in later paragraphs ; Helen Friend,
who is a student and employed in the registrar's
offices of the State University at Missoula; and Ida
Freeman, also a student in the State University.
The home is at 336 South Fifth Street.
Mr. Stoddard served one term in the City Coun-
cil of Missoula. He is a member of the Episcopal
Church and is a charter member of the Laurel Lodge
No. II of the Knights of Pythias and of Hell Gate
Lodge No. 383 of the Elks.
Mr. Stoddard during his long residence at Mis-
soula, has had an active part in forwarding every
interest of the State University. He was a member
of the local building commission that had charge of
the construction of the three original buildings on
the university campus, and also the laying out of Uv.
grounds, and was later a member of the commission
which put up the fourth building. These buildings
are the University Hall, Science Hall, Gymnasium
and Ladies' Dormitory, and all of them are still used
for their original purpose.
F. Thayer Stoddard, present county surveyor of
Missoula County, is a highly trained engineer. He
was born at Missoula January 28, 1888, was educated
in the local public schools, graduating from high
school in 1906, and is a graduate of the State Uni-
versity with_ the class of 1910, with the degree
Bachelor of Science in Mineralogy and Geology. In
university he was a member of the Sigma Chi and
Theta Nu Epsilon fraternities, and is now a stock-
holder in the Sigma Chi Alumni Building Associa-
tion. After graduating until the spring of 191 1 he
was on the engineering staff of the Chicago, Milwau-
kee and St. Paul Railway. Following that he was
assistant to Robert Sibley, a well known Missoula
engineer. In 1912, and for two years afterward he
was with C. W. Swearinger, a municipal and civil
engineer in Western Montana. Mr. Stoddard was
elected county surveyor in 1914, and is now in his
third consecutive term. He is a member of Laurel
Lodge No. II, Knights of Pythias, a member of the
Grand Lodge of that order, and of Hell Gate Lodge
No. 383, of the Elks, and Harmony Lodge No. 49
of the Masons. He also belongs to the Rotary Club,
is a member of the American Legion and of the
Missoula Chamber of Commerce, is a republican and
a member of the Church of the Holy Spirit, Episco-
pal. Mr. Stoddard is unmarried. He owns a mod-
ern home at 336 South Fifth Street, East.
John M. Howland is president of the How-
land & Maser Security Company at Lewistown.
This is one of the leading firms of investment
agents in the state, and recently they negotiated
with eastern capital for the largest loan on record
in Montana, involving about $150,000 made on the
noted Dengle brothers ranch properties near Grass
Range, the securities being in the form of a bond
issue. This is only one of many successful trans-
actions carried out by Mr. Howland, who is an
unusually keen financier and during a comparatively
brief residence in Montana achieved the striking
success which earlier experiences in North Dakota
and Minnesota seemed to assure for him.
Mr. Howland has come to success after a long
road through a youth of poverty and struggle, has
educated himself and has made himself what he
is. He was born on a farm near Kilkenny, Le-
Sueur County, Minnesota, September 9, 1874, son
of Edwin and Mary (Fitzgerald) Howland. His
father was a native Irishman, while his mother
was a granddaughter of the last Lord Edward
Fitzgerald, representing one of the most power-
ful families of Ireland but originally of Norman
stock that settled in England about the time of
the Conquest. John il. Howland was twelve years
old when his father died. His widowed mother
had four small children and struggled along with
adverse circumstances several years until her death.
The children managed the farm as best they could,
and John M. Howland during tliat period of his
life had no advantages beyond a few terms in com-
mon school, sufficient to give him a knowledge of
reading and writing only.
At the age of sixteen he was requested by a local
school board to take the place of his sister, ill with
typhoid fever, and do what he could to keep her
school running. So satisfactorily did he discharge
his duties as an impromptu teacher that he finished
out the term for four months, and then received a
teacher's certificate. The following winter he
taught a five months' term of school in LeSueur
County, and for several years taught school in the
winter and helped run the farm in the summer.
The next important incident of his early life came
at the age of twenty, when, after turning over his
interest in the homestead to the other children,
he opened a store at Mulford Station with another
man as partner. The partnership continued about
a year. They were doing a fair business, largely
on the exchange plan, selling dry goods and gro-
ceries and accepting butter, eggs and cordwood in
payment. They also bought grain for the James
Quirk Milling Company. When the partnership
was dissolved the arrangement was that the partner
should collect all the bills due and pay all the
debts. Meanwhile Mr. Howland was teaching
school at Porter in Lincoln County, Minnesota.
While there he was notified that the accounts of
the firm had been collected but no debts paid. Here
was a crisis, which Mr. Howland converted into
an opportunity. The measures he took then has
been significant and typical of all his subsequent
business career. He paid all the accounts he could
with funds at hand amounting to about $1,500, and
gave his notes to his largest creditors, a grocery
house at. St. Paul, and at the end of several years
had every obligation discharged.
In the meantime he was getting a better educa-
tion for himself, attending the Winona High School
one year, followed by one term of teaching at Red-
wood Falls, and then two years as student in the
Mankato State Normal. He paid his way through
the Normal by driving a delivery wagon in the
summer and in school months worked in a lawyer's
office. All the heavy work he carried in and out
of school did not prevent him from making a rec-
ord for himself as a football player and debater.
While he was at Mankato Normal the Spanish-
American war broke out and he enlisted in Com-
pany M of the Fifiteenth Minnesota Volunteers,
serving as corporal until the regiment was mus-
tered out a year later, in the spring of 1899. He
contributed a number of articles on army life to
newspapers.
After the war he clerked in a large department
store at Minneapolis and for the Northwestern
Telephone Company and then settled at Kenmare,
North Dakota. His first work there was teaching
tlje town school. In August, 1901, he engaged in
the land business, and in a few years was at the
head of a complete organization handling real estate
and farm loans. Mr. Howland also had some time
for politics while in North Dakota. He served as
HISTORY OF MONTANA
25
deputy sheriff of Ward County, and police magis-
trate and city justice in Kenmare and clerk of the
local school board.
In 1914 Mr. Rowland transferred his home and
business interests to Montana, locating at Great
Falls, where he assisted in organizing the First
Mortgage L.oan Company of Montana. This com-
pany issued $500,000 worth of stock, and Mr. How-
land personally sold $200,000 of that stock, most of
it in Western Montana. No purchaser ever had rea-
son to regret buying the stock, since it has paid not
less than seven per cent dividends. In June, 191 S,
Mr. Howland came to Lewistown, and opened an
offic: in the Imislund Block. Associated with Al-
fred Blaisdell, former secretary of the State of
North Dakota, he formed the Blaisdell-Howland
Agencv, acting as investment agents of the North-
western Trust Company of St. Paul. This is the
largest trust company west of Chicago. On May
5, 191 7, Mr. Blaisdell entered the Officers Training
camp at Cale.xico, California, and on being rejected
for a place in the Regular Army joined the Intelli-
gence department. During his absence Mr. How-
land had full charge of the business.
Mr. Howland is affiliated with the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, Knights of Pythias and
Independent Order of Foresters. Besides handling
large sums of money for other individuals and
corporations he individually owns much real estate
and farm and ranch property in a number of north-
western states. ,
January 15, 1902, he married Miss Anna R. Wil-
son, of Kilkenny, Minnesota, his own native town.
They are the parents of five children, John Wilson,
James Martin, Anna Ruth, Vivian Margaret and
Evelyn Agnes.
The Parish of Lewistown. In the fall of 187S
during a visit among the halfbreed Cree, Chippewa
and Assiniboine Indians in the Milk River country.
Rev. Father Lestan from St. Boniface, Winnipeg,
made arrangements for the building of a log church
so that religious instruction could be given and
the Mass celebrated for the rather large settlement
of these halfbreeds. The following winter Rev.
Father J. B. Gene came from Canada and the half-
breeds built a log church 20 by 40, at a point five
miles below Fort Belknap. A short time later the
halfbreeds were induced to send a delegation to
the Spring Creek country.
In the spring of 1879 a French Canadian by
the name of Janeaux visited this country and find-
ing good land and game in abundance took up a
homestead. In August of that year, old man Ouel-
lette, another halfbreed. came with his family to
this country as a government scout, and about the
same time another half breed by the name of Isaie
Berger took up a homestead at the fork of the
road leading to Grass Range and Gilt Edge, about
five miles east of Lewistown. In the fall of the
same year Father Damiani visited this part of the
country from St. Peter's Mission to administer the
last sacraments to a dying halfbreed, who was
camped at the foot of the Judith Mountains, and
found about twenty-eight Catholic families living
in that immediate vicinity. All these people had
originally come from St. Joseph and Walla Halla,
North Dakota, and had drifted west and north
to the Missouri River hunting the buffalo. For
several years thereafter Father Damiani and Father
Schuler visited these halfbreeds, spending several
weeks with them at the time, and when the present
Lewistown began to grow said Mass occasionally
in the house of F. A. Janeaux, at the northwest
corner of Main and High Streets. On several
other occasions Mass was also celebrated in the
school building which was at that time located
on the south side of Main Street, between Fifth
and Sixth avenues.
On Sunday, October 10, 1886, a meeting of the
Catholic citizens of Lewistown and vicinity was
held at the schoolhouse to take steps toward raising
money to erect a church. Mr. Brereton called
the meeting to order. Mr. H. P. Brooks was
elected chairman and Doctor Lapalme, secretary.
Mr. D. Brereton was elected treasurer. On mo-
tion of D. M. Crowley a committee of five, con-
sisting of the following named persons, was ap-
pointed to collect subscriptions: L. Belanger, C.
J. McNamara, Michael Brass, D. M. Crowley and
H. P. Brooks. Thomas Morgan and Michael Gur-
nett were appointed as solicitors. F. A. Janeaux,
D. M. Crowley, and Oliver Pichette were elected
directors by acclamation. It was resolved that in
soliciting subscriptions cash or notes at ten per
cent interest be accepted.
A whole city block known as Block No. 2 of
Janeaux Addition No. I was donated by Mr. Jane-
aux, and in 1887 a frame church, 24 by 60, was
erected and blessed by Bishop Brondel on Sep-
tember 23, 1888. Lewistown being then the ;)rin-
cipal center of the county became the seat of the
new county called Fergus in 1885. At that time
the nearest priest was living at St. Peter's Mission,
a distance of more than 140 miles. At intervals
the priest stationed at Fort Benton would visit
the place and later also the priest stationed at
Great Falls. The first record to be found in the
archives of the church is signed by the Rev. J.
van den Heuvel recording the baptism on July
10, 1893, of George Ouellette, 'who was born on
January 14 of the same year. In September of
the same year Father Dols, stationed at Great
Falls, visited this place for several days. Father
van den Heuvel remained in Lewistown as resident
pastor until some time in October, 1895, and during
his pastorate the records of the church show that
124 people were baptized, three buried and twelve
couples married. In April, 1895, lot 3 block 3.
Janeaux Addition No. I, on which a little house
was standing, was secured as a residence for the
priest From that time up to March, 1896, the place
was attended by Rev. C. G. Follett, then stationed
at Fort Benton, and some time in March, 1896.
Rev. Father E. Demanez was appointed as second
resident pastor of St. Leo's Church, and continued
in that capacitv until he was killed in a railroad
wreck between Great Falls and Fort Benton in De-
cember, 1898. From November, 1895. to December 9,
1898, a few davs before Father Demanez' death,
160 baptisms are recorded, twelve funerals and fifteen
marriages. In the month of August, 1897. Rev. Father
H. Schuler, S. J., visited the halfbreeds living around
Fort Maginnis, a military post located about twenty
miles from Lewistown. In January. 1899. Rev. Jo-
seph C. Pudenz, assistant to Rev. Father Dols, of
Great Falls, paid Lewistown a short visit. On
March 22, 1899, about two acres of land were do-
nated by the scout Ouellette to be used as a Cath-
olic cemetery, together with a sixty-foot roadway
leading to it from the city limits. , . ,
In June. 1899, the parish was again placed in charge
of a resident priest by the name of Father J. Ver-
maat. Another priest, however, had been appointed
to the place, but died on his way to Lewistown. His
name was Rev. Father Werner. By this time Lewis-
town had grown to such an extent that an addition
had to be erected to increase the seating capacity of
the church, thereby making room for about 200
people. From January 19, 1899, until October 28,
26
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1904, 246 baptisms are on record, 16 funerals and
38 marriages.
In the fall of 1904 Rev. Father Vermaat was
transferred to Red Lodge, and in December, 1904,
Rev. Father Van Clarenbeek succeeded him, and in
February, 1906, was given an assistant in the person
of Rev. J. J. O'Carroll, an evidence of the growth
of the church' in this part of the state. In Novem-
ber, 1906, Father Van Clarenbeek left for Oregon
and was succeeded by Rev. Father V. J. van den
Broeck. During Father Van Clarenbeek's adminis-
tration 117 baptisms are recorded, 33 funerals and
15 marriages. Besides the Rev. J. J. O'Carroll at
different periods Rev. Fathers Rocque, Leahy, Moly-
neux and Mueller acted as assistants in St. Leo's
Church.
With the coming of the new transcontinental line
of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul in the year
1907 remarkable developments took place in Fergus
County and new towns were springing up in all
directions along its lines, as also along the new line
of the Burlington, which made its appearance shortly
afterward. In accordance with this wide develop-
ment of territory a number of parcels of property
were secured by Rev. Father van den Broeck, includ-
ing lots at Moore, Roundup, Philbrook, now known
as Hobson, Hilger, Winifred, Brooks, Stanford,
Grass Range, Danvers and Kolin.
April 3. 1913, approximately nine lots were se-
cured in Lewistown between Broadway and Wash-
ington streets on Second .Avenue, right in the heart
of the city, with a large frontage on Washington
Street, and other frontage on Second Avenue and
Broadway. On this location building operations
were started in the last week of July, 1915, and
the building completed by the ist of October, 1916,
at a total cost of about $50,000. The first services
were held on October 15th, and the church dedi-
cated by the Rt. Rev. M. C. Lenihan on Sunday,
November 12th. A five class room school was estab-
lished in the large basement, with an average at-
tendance of 140 pupils under the able direction of
the Daughters of Jesus. These sisters, who are
French exiles, arrived in Lewistown on August 27,
1903, and shortly after their arrival opened a school
located on lot 2. block 3, Janeau.x Addition No. i,
ne.xt door to the priest's residence, where they con-
tinued to teach until moving to the new location.
For about four years they also conducted a small
hospital at the corner of Miller and Watson streets,
and in 1907 they erected what was eventually des-
tined to be the best and largest hospital in Central
Montana. In the summer of 1907 Father van den
Broeck, having secured some property in Moore,
erected thereon a church at a cost of $2,500, which
by the 2nd of February, 1908, was ready for public
worship and the first Mass was said by Rev. A.
Mueller. The church was dedicated on October 27th
by the Rt. Rev. M. C. Lenihan, of Great Falls. In
1914 a church was built at Hobson at a cost of about
$3,000, and one at Stanford at the same cost. In
1916 one was built in Danvers and in 1917 one was
built in Hilger at a cost of $5,000.
In .^gust, 1908 the Catholic population had grown
sufficiently large to justify Bishop Lenihan in mak-
ing a division and appointing a resident pastor at
Roundup, with charge over all the territory on the
Milwaukee line east of Meagher County and west
of Rosebud and as far north as the Snowy Moun-
tains, In September, 1916, another division was
made with a resident priest at Moore, having
charge of all the places on the Milwaukee south
of Glengarry, and all the places on the main line
of the Burlington in Fergus County. Before the
completion of the church in Danvers, in the fall
of 1916, a third division of the parish was made,
and a priest appointed to Denton with charge over
all the places along the Milwaukee line between
Ware and Great Falls. Other parishes which must
eventually be established include Hilger, to serve a
large Catholic population in the territory north and
northeast of Lewistown, and another at Grass Range
in the center of a good farming district. With these
various divisions and extensions St. Leo's Church at
Lewistown may truly be called the mother church
of Fergus County, being entirely surrounded with
churches which have been built during the past
twelve years.
Rev. Victor J. van den Broeck, who has zeal-
ously labored in the interest of the Catholic Church
in Montana for more than thirty-two years, has
since 1906 been pastor of St. Leo's at Lewistown.
As told in the history of that parish on other
pages, his administration has been a thoroughly con-
structive and progressive one, and has made St.
Leo's the mother church of Fergus County.
He was born in Belgium, October 16, 1863, son
of John and Adeline (Crame) van den Broeck. His
father died in Belgium, April 21, 1902, at the age
of seventy-two, and his mother on September 7,
1912, at the age of seventy-six. Of their eight
children five are still living, four daughters and one
son.
Father van den Broeck attended the common
schools to the age of thirteen, then the College of
Mechlin in Belgium, and was a student of philosophy
under the famous Cardinal Mercier. He graduated
in 1887 from the University of Louvain and was
ordained a priest, June 24, 1887. On the 27th of
.August of that year he sailed for New York City
and on the 15th of September arrived in Helena,
Montana, where he remained until September, 1888,
as assistant priest at the Cathedral. He was then
assistant priest of St. Patrick's in Butte until Sep-
tember, 1891, when he was appoined pastor at Miles
City in charge of the Sacred Heart Church. In
September, 1898, he was transferred to St. Rose de
Lima Church at Dillon. He was engaged in the
heavy labors incident to these charges for five
consecutive years. In September, 1903, on account
of ill health, he removed to St. Peter's Mission,
and on December 31, 1905, left for Europe, visit-
ing Rome. He returned to Great Falls in March,
1906, but after about one month secured a leave
of absence and returned to Europe, where he re-
mained until October, 1906. Soon afer his return
to Montana he was appointed resident pastor of St.
Leo's Church at Lewistown and began his duties
there November 2, 1906. From the date of the
beginning of his pastorate until 1918 the records
of the parish show 1,067 persons baptized, 273
persons buried, 290 couples married, and 308 per-
sons confirmed.
Ralph E. Bodley, supervisor of the Gallatin
Forest at Bozeman, has made a splendid record in
the forestry service of the government. He pre-
pared himself for this great work and profession
while in university, and was advanced more rap-
idly from the first grade of the work to the post
of supervisor than any other man in the history
of the service.
Mr. Bodley was born in Wahoo, Nebraska, No-
vember 26, 1887. His father, Eli Bodley, is now
living at Los Angeles. Eli Bodley was born in Bed-
fordshire, England, in 1854, was reared and married
in England, and is a graduate of Oxford University
and a man of very cultured mind and came of a
family of good social standing in England. He had
HISTORY OF MONTANA
27
some training in militarj' duty while in his native
country. In 1884 he brought his family to the
United States and became a farmer and stock
rancher at Wahoo, Nebraska. He acquired a large
amount of land and was a successful business man in
that vicinity for many years. In 191 1 he left his
ranch and moved to Wahoo«and since 1917 has been
a resident of Los Angeles. Most of his ranch
holdings have been sold, but he still retains a place
of 200 acres a mile north of Wahoo. Mr. Eli
Bodley is independent in politics, a very active mem-
ber of the Methodist Church and one of the leaders
in that denomination at Wahoo. His wife was Mary
Hobbs, who w-as born in Bedfordshire, England,
in 1857, and died at Wahoo, Nebraska, in 1896.
She was the mother of five children, Ralph E. being
the youngest. Annie M., the oldest, is the wife of
O. M. Templeton, a farmer at Malmo, Nebraska ;
Herbert J. is a farmer at Colon, Nebraska; while
Rupert H. and George B. are both on the old home-
stead at Wahoo.
Ralph E. Bodley attended the rural schools of
Saunders County, Nebraska, and graduated from
the high school at Wahoo in 1908, following which
he spent four months traveling in Europe, and dur-
ing this time he visited England, Scotland. Switzer-
land, France and Germany. In the fall of 1908 he
entered the University of Nebraska at Lincoln and
received his Bachelor of Science degree in 1912.
He is a Phi Beta Kappa honor graduate of the
University of Nebraska. The following year he
spent in post graduate work, giving all his time
to forestry, and received his Master's degree in that
subject in 1913. He' is also a member of the Alpha
Zeta agricultural honorary fraternity.
On July I, 1913, he reported for duty as forest
assistant at Sheridan, Montana. For nine months
he was on the Madison Forest in Madison County,
Montana, and three months as deputy forest super-
visor at Missoula. July 16, 1914, a year and two
weeks after he entered the forestry service, he was
made siu'ervisor of the Gallatin Forest and began
his work at Bozeman on that date, with offices in
the Federal Building.
Mr. Bodley is an independent in politics and a
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Lin-
coln, Nebraska. His home is a modern residence
at 601 South Sixth Avenue. At Kearny, Nebraska,
December 27, 1915, he married Miss Bernice A.
Birch. Her mother, Mrs. Clara Birch, lives at Lin-
coln. Mrs. Bodley is a graduate of the Lincoln
High School and spent two years in the University
of Nebraska. They have two sons, Russell Ralph,
born November 15, 1916, and Donald Claire, born
August 17, 1919.
Tom Hirst has had a veteran's experience and
service with the Montana State Penitentiary at Deer
Lodge. He is deputy warden, a position he has filled
for the past ten vears.
Mr. Hirst was 'born at Sheffield, Yorkshire, Eng-
land, February 7, 1866, and has been a resident of
Montana for over thirty years. His father, George
Henry Hirst, was born in 1837 and died in 1899,
spending all his life in Yorkshire, being a mechanic
and machinist in some of the famous factories of
Sheffield. He was liberal in politics and a member
of the Established Church in England. George H.
Hirst married Mary Lodge, who was born in York-
shire in 1837 and died at Sheffield in 1900. Tom is
"the oldest of their three children. His sister Harriet
is unmarried and living at Sheffield, being a seam-
stress by occupation : Mabel, the other sister, is the
wife of William Hollus, proprietor of a millinerv
store at Sheffield.
Tom Hirst attended public school in Sheffield up
to the age of thirteen. He then served a five years'
apprenticeship at the machinists' trade. He left
England and came to America when he was about
nineteen years of age. At that time a well known
firm of ranchers just east of Deer Lodge was Lodge
& Beaumont, the senior partner. Joseph Lodge, be-
ing an uncle of Tom Hirst. The latter came to
Montana to join his uncle, reaching Deer Lodge on
May 12, 1885, and was a ranch hand for the firm
of Lodge & Beaumont until September, 1893. That
was the date of his first service at the State Peni-
tentiary. Then and for some years later Conlev &
McTague were the contract wardens who had charge
of the penitentiary. Mr. Hirst began as a guard,
and in 1909, while away from Montana visiting in
New York City, he was appointed deputy warden,
the office he fills today. He is a member of the In-
ternational Society for Identification, and is the of-
ficial in charge of the finger prints and Bertillon
measurements of the State Penitentiary.
Mr. Hirst served two terms representing the First
Ward in the City Council of Deer Lodge. He is a
republican, has served as vestryman in the Episco-
pal Church, and is very prominent in the Knights
of Pythias, being past chancellor commander of
Valley Lodge No. 6, for the past twenty-one years
has been keeper of records and seals, and has the
Veteran's Jewel for a continuous membership of
twenty-five years in good standing. He is also a
member of the Grand Lodge of the Knights of
Pythias in Montana.
Mr. Hirst, who with his family resides at 706
Fourth Street, married at Deer Lodge in 1896 Miss
Emma Larsen. They have two sons : Edward
Lodge, born June 12, 1897, is in the junior class of
the Montana State University at Missoula, and dur-
ing the summer of 1919 was' with a surveying party
under the government on the Blackfeet National
Forest Reserve ; George Niel, the younger son, was
born October 29, 1900, was in the Powell County
High School into his senior year, and in 1918 joined
the Students' Army Training Corps at Missoula.
He is now employed by the O'Neill Garage at Deer
Lodge.
Mr. Hirst's paternal grandfather was a native of
Holland, moving from that country to Yorkshire,
England. For a number of years he was employed
in woolen mills and was also an English soldier in
the Crimean war.
Mrs. Hirst is a daughter of Niel Larsen, a native
of Denmark, one of the earliest settlers in Montana,
coming to the territory in the early sixties. He was
a pioneer. at Deer Lodge, buying a farm a mile and
a half east of that town. He died soon after set- '
tling there. The old homestead is now owned by
his heirs, and his daughter Miss Mary lives on the
farm and manages it. Mrs. Hirst is a member of
the Sons and Daughters of Pioneers of Montana.
Her two sisters, Mary and Annie, both came to
Montana prior to 1866 and are therefore members
of the Pioneers of Montana Society. Mrs. Hirst
was born at Council Bluffs, Iowa, while her parents
were visiting in the east, and only for that incident
does not possess the same qualifications as a pioneer
as her sisters. Her sister Annie lives at Deer Lodge,
widow of M. J. Padden, who was a conductor for
the Milwaukee Railroad.
James Craig, M. D. Doctor Craig had practiced
medicine and surgery nearly forty years before he re-
tired from active service in 1911. He was the third
physician to locate at Columbus, came to Montana
nearly thirty years ago, and has been one of the
28
HISTORY OF MONTANA
men who has conferred dignity upon the medical
profession in Montana.
He comes of an old family of the State of Maine
and was born at Dixmont in Penobscot County April
28, 1850. His great-grandfather emigrated from Scot-
land and was a colonial settler on the Kennebec
River in Maine. His father, James S. Craig, was
born in Maine in 1806, spent his life there as a
farmer, and died at Dixmont in 1854. His wife was
Margaret L. Tasker, who was born in Maine in
iS-ii and died at Dixmont in the spring of 1861.
Doctor Craig was therefore a small boy when his
parents died. He was the youngest of their chil-
Albert, who served the last year of the Civil war
and then reenlisted in the regular army and died in
1867 at Brownsville, Texas; Margaret, who died at
dren, those older than himself being: Sanford, a
farmer, who died at Dixmont; Mary, who died at
Dixmont; Benjamin, who spent his life as a farmer
at Dixmont ; Wilford, who was also a lifelong
Dixmont in 1916, the wife of Nathan White, a
farmer still living at Dixmont.
Doctor Craig attended public school at Dixmont,
also the Dummer Preparatory School in the parish
of Bytield, Massachusetts, and in 1872 entered the
Maine Medical School at Brunswick, the medical de-
partment of Bowdoin College. He received his de-
gree Doctor of Medicine in 1876, and during the next
fifteen years was busily engaged in a general prac-
tice at Unity in Waldo County in his native state.
Doctor Craig came to Montana in April, 1801.
The following eight years he lived at White Sul-
phur Springs, and in December, 1898, located at
Columbus as the third physician in the town. He
has served as health officer of Stillwater County and
the City of Columbus, and while at White Sulphur
Springs was county physician of Meagher County.
He has been mayor of Columbus one term, during
1910-1911, and though retired from his profession
he employed his professional services as a patriotic
duty during the World war, serving as examining
physician of the local exemption board.
Doctor Craig owns a modern home in Columbus,
a ranch of 280 acres, operated by a tenant, located
a mile north of Columbus, and is secretary of the
Columbus Irrigation District. He is an independent
republican in politics. He is past master of Still-
water Lodge No. 62, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, a member of Billings Chapter No. 6, Royal
Arch Masons, of Aldemar Commandery No. 5,
Knight Templars, at Billings, and of Algeria Temple
of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is also past
grand of Castle Mountain Lodge No. 16, of the In-
dependent Order of Odd Fellows, at White Sulphur
■ Springs and a present member of Yellowstone Lodge
No. 85, at Columbus, and a former member of the
encampment.
To the enviable position he enjoys Mrs. Craig has
contributed through her various activities and benev-
olent character. Doctor Craig married at China,
Maine, in 1885, Lizzie S. Gould. Her father was
related to the same Gould family that produced
the great financier Jay Gould. She is also directly
descended from one of three Chase brothers who
came from England and were colonial settlers in the
State of Maine. Her father, John Gould, was born
at Sandwich, New Hampshire, in 1815 and spent
many years of his active career as a farmer at
China, Maine, where he died in 1889. He was a
republican and was a very influential member of the
Friends Church. He married Mary T. Jones, who
was born at LTnity, Maine, in 1829, and spent her
last years in Montana, passing away at Columbus
in 1912. Mrs. Craig was the third of three children.
Her brother, Charles E., died at China, Maine, at
the age of twenty-two months, and her sister, Ella
M., died at China at the age of twenty-one. Mrs.
Craig was educated in the public schools of China,
Maine, attended an academy there, and a boarding
school at Vassalboro, Maine, also the Preparatory
School of Colby College at Waterville, Maine. Be-
fore her marriage she 'taught eleven years in her
home state, and four years after her marriage was
identified with the schools of White Sulphur Springs,
Montana. She is an active member of the Friends
Church. She is also past matron of Martha Chapter
No. II of the Eastern Star at White Sulphur
Springs, and a member of Treasure State Lodge
No. 85 of the Rebekahs.
Edgar W. Mettler. In a conspicuous place on
the roll of Fergus County's successful members
of the legal profession is found the name of Edgar
W. Mettler, an excellent type of the alert, pro-
gressive and public-spirited citizen whose record
is an indication that success is ambition's answer.
During the period of his prominent connection with
cases of important legal jurisprudence he has be-
come more or less a familiar figure in the courts
of the county, and especially in his home commu-
nity of Lewistown, and no lawyer of the city has a
better record for high and straightforward pro-
fessional conduct or for success earned with honor
and without animosity.
Mr. Mettler was born on his father's farm in
Ogle County, Illinois, April IS, 1876, a son of Wil-
liam J. and Selina H. (Roberts) Mettler. His
father, born in New York State, died when seventy-
nine years of age; and his mother, a native of Con-
necticut, reached the age of seventy-seven years.
They were the parents of two children: Minnie
B.. the wife of O. N. Phelps, and Edgar W. The
Mettler family were pioneers of Illinois, and Wil-
liam J. Mettler was a mere child when he accom-
panied his parents from New York State to Winne-
bago County, in that community the family settling
on United States Government land near what is
now the thriving City of Rockford. There William
J. Mettler grew to manhood, working on the home-
stead and securing his education in the public
schools and subsequently moved to Ogle County,
Illinois, where he passed the remainder of his life
as a farmer and stockraiser. He took a prominent
part in democratic politics during his day, and for
several terms was a member of the board of com-
missioners of Ogle County.
Edgar W. Mettler attended the public schools of
Ogle County and in his youth assisted his father
in the work of the home farm. It was not his in-
tention, however, to lead an agricultural life, for
he had become imbued with a desire for a career
in the law, and, as he had not the means where-
with to pursue his studies, at the age of eighteen
years he left the parental roof and secured em-
ployment in the Chicago general offices of the
Chicago & Northwestern Railway. Later he was
employed by the First National Bank of Engle-
wood at Chicago, and with the money earned in
these positions paid his way through a course in
Power & Orr's Business College and the Valparaiso
(Indiana) University. Continuing to work at what-
ever employment of an honorable character pre-
sented itself, he managed to put himself through
the law department of the University of Michigan,
from which he was graduated with his cherished
degree in 1903. At this time Mr. Mettler's funds •
were exhausted completely. Nearly every young
lawyer must go through a probationary period
while he is awaiting the business that will give his
start in professional life, but Mr. Mettler was com-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
pelled to do something to pay for his living. Mak-
ing his way to Chicago, after much anxious search-
ing he came to an agreement with a firm to look
after some of its legal business at Houston, Texas,
to which city the young lawyer accordingly made
his way. He had been admitted to the Michigan
bar in March, 1903 and in the same year received
permission to practice in Texas, where he remained
for about two years. His business there satis-
factorily concluded, January 3, 1905, he came to
Helena. Montana, where he passed the examina-
tion for entrance to practice and was accepted.
Subsequently he came to Lewistown, where he soon
became associated in practice with H. Leonard
DeKalb. under the firm name of DeKalb & Mettler,
an association which continued until .'\ugust, IQII.
Mr. Mettler then practiced alone until 1015, when
he formed a partnership with Jack Briscoe, as
Mettler & Briscoe, but this was terminated in No-
vember, 1918, and Mr. Mettler has since practiced
alone. He maintains offices in the Empire Bank
Building, and his practice is large and important
and constantly growing. He is a member of the
county and state associations of his profession, in
the ranks of which he is regarded as a skilled and
thoroughly informed lawyer, and one who respects
the ethics of the calling. He has served as police
judge of Lewistown for a number of years, an
office in which he has ever administered justice
in an impartial manner according to the legal status
of each case. Fraternally he is affiliated with Lewis-
town Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Or-
der of Elks, and Lewistown Lodge No. 3, Knights
of Pythias. He exercises his right of franchise
as a democrat.
Judge Mettler was married December 31, 1905,
to Miss Faith Oldes, the sixth child in a family
Oil six daughters and two sons born to B. C. and
Editha (Hoagland) Oldes, the latter of whom died
when she was forty years of age. B. C. Oldes, who
was a native of Iowa, and died in September, 1917,
at the age of seventy-four years, fought as a sol-
dier during the Civil war. He was a member of the
Sixteenth Regiment, Iowa Volunteer Infantry, and
was under the command of General Sherman when
captured by the enemy and confined in the notori--
ou? Andersonville Prison, where he was held for
nme months. Later, his military career finished,
he took up farming in Missouri and then returned
to Iowa, but finally settled in Montana as a pioneer
farmer of Meagher (now Fergus) County, where
he spent the final days of his life. Mr. and Mrs.
Mettler are the parents of two children, namely:
Frank and Ruth R., both attending school.
■ Emil Heikkil.\ has had a varied experience along
the northern boundary line of the United States
since leaving school at Duluth, has been identified
with several mercantile corporations in Montana
and IS now general manager of the Roberts Ele-
vator Company at Roberts.
His people were pioneers in the great mining dis-
trict of Northern Michigan and Northern Minne-
sota, and he was born at Calumet in the former
state November 16, 1881. His father, Andrew Heik-
kila, was born in Finland in 1834. He became a
nimer at Calumet, Michigan, and was later one of
the pioneers who opened the great iron range in
Aorthern Minnesota. While opening up that range
he had his home chiefly at Tower, Minnesota. In
1899 he moved to Cromwell, Minnesota, where
for the past twenty years he has been identified
with farming and is now retired with a comfort-
able competence. He is a republican, a member
of the Lutheran Church and a stanch American
citizen. He married Lizzie Mattonan, who was
born in Finland in 1836, in which country they
were married. Their children are four in num-
ber, Emil being the youngest. The oldest. Matt,
is a farmer at Cromwell, Minnesota; Hannah, living
at Spokane, Washington, is the widow of Gust
Sundman, who was a diamond driller in the mines;
Andrew, whose present residence is in Alaska.
Emil Heikkila attended public school at Tower
and Duluth, Minnesota, graduating from the school
in the latter city in 1896. The following two years
he spent as an employe of the Northern Pacific
and the Duluth & Iron' Range Railways. The next
ten years he engaged in merchandising in Black
Hills. South Dakota. Mr. Heikkila located at Red
Lodge, Montana, in 191 2. and the following six
years he was manager of the Kaleva Cooperative
Mercantile Association. In January, 1918, he bought
an interest in the Roberts Elevator Company at
Roberts, and has since been its general manager
and a director of the company. In the meantime
he has also acquired some* extensive and valuable
ranching interests, owning a property of 160 acres
in Butte County. South Dakota, and a ranch of
420 acres in Carleton County, Minnesota. His home
in Roberts is a modern and complete residence.
Mr. Heikkila is a republican, is affiliated with
Star in the West Lodge No. 40, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Carbon Chapter No. 20, Royal
Arch Masons, Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534 of the
Elks, all at Red Lodge, and Gold Run Camp No.
1217 of the Modern Woodmen of America at Lead,
South Dakota.
He married at Lead, South Dakota, in 1905, Miss
Ellen Silfven, daughter of John and Elizabeth (Sep-
panen) Silfven. Her parents live at Sturgis, South
Dakota, her father being a retired farmer and was
one of the pioneers of that state. Mr. and Mrs.
Heikkila have two children, Alfred, born February
27, 1906, and Ercel Dean, born January 7, 191 1.
Laverne K. Pence when a young man familiarized
himself with all details of the automobile, both
from the business and the technical and mechanical
standpoint. Some years ago he located at Bozeman.
and in a comparatively short time has built up the
leading garage and one of the chief automobile
sales agencies in Southern Montana. The business
is known as L. K. Pence & Co.
Mr. Pence was born at Fairfield, Washington, .
September 14. 1892. His father, Charles F. Pence,
was born in Illinois in i86g. was reared in his native
state, and when a young maji joined an emigrant
train going overland to California. From California
he moved to Washington, where he married, and
he spent some time as a prospector in the Coeur
D'Alene country. He also lived at Fairfield, and is
now a resident of Spokane, where for several years
he was an attorney and a real estate broker, but
is now retired. He is a democrat in politics.
Charles F. Pence married Mary Beatrice Koontz,
who was born in Missouri in 1872. Laverne K.
is the oldest of their children. Grace is the wife
of Leslie Francis, a wholesale produce merchant
at Spokane ; Irlene Winifred is a student in the
LTniversity of Washington at Seattle. Roy is hi the
Spokane High School and Carl is a pupil in the
grade schools of Spokane.
Laverne K. Pence received his early education at
Spokane, attended high school there, and at the
age of eighteen left his studies to become a mechanic
for F. A. Williams, the Ford agent at Spokane.
For several years he had no other enthusiasm than
the automobile, and he was soon pronounced an
expert in tlie business. In August. 1916, he was
HISTORY OF MONTANA
appointed traveling representative for the Ford
Motor Company, and until October of the same
year traveled over the States of Montana, Idaho and
Washington. In October, 1917, he established his
present business at Bozeman, his partner being
his former employer, F. A. Williams, of Spokane,
until 1920. The firm of L. K. Pence & Company is
now owrned entirely by Mr. Pence. The garage and
offices are at the corner of Babcock Street and Black
Avenue. Mr. Pence handles automobile accessories,
and is local agent at Bozeman and Gallatin County
for the Ford cars, tractors and farm implements.
He does business all over Gallatin County and as
far as Willow Creek, Harrison and Pony.
Mr. Pence is still interested in mining in Alaska,
Montana and Idaho. He is independent in politics
and a member of Bozeman Lodge No. 463 of the
Elks. His home is in the Clark Apartments at 616
South Third Avenue. Mr. Pence married in Spo-
kane September 8, 1916, Miss Florence Jones, a
daughter of W. C. and Rosa (Marvin) Jones, resi-
dents of Spokane. Her "father is a practicing attor-
ney. Mrs. Pence is a graduate of the South Central
High School of Spokane. They have one daughter,
Jane Marvin, born September 24, 1918.
Dan M. Kelly, ex-attorney general and counsel
for the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, is one
of the distinguished men and eminent attorneys of
Montana, now a resident of Butte. He was born
at Waterloo, Iowa, on August 19, 1880, a son of P.
D. Kelly, now a resident of Waterloo, Iowa. P. D.
Kelly was born in County Cork, Ireland, in 1837,
and in 1847 his mother brought the family to the
United States and settlement was made in Wiscon-
sin. A boy of ten at the time of the family immi-
gration, P. D. Kelly was reared and educated at
New Diggings, Wisconsin, and there he was mar-
ried. During his active years he devoted himself
to farming, and still owns two valuable farm prop-
erties and is now living retired, being in comfort-
able circumstances. He is a democrat politically,
and a Roman Catholic in his religious belief. The
maiden name of his wife was Catherine Barry, and
she was born at London, England, in 1850. Their
children were as follows : Mary, who is unmarried,
teaches in the public schools of Boulder, Montana ;
T. F.. who died at the age of forty years at White-
hall, Montana, having been killed in a railroad ac-
■ cident at that point, and at that time was a Short-
horn cattle breeder at Seneca, South Dakota; Tom,
who is a rancher of Seneca, South Dakota: John,
who lives at Elkton, South Dakota, has farming in-
terests there; J. E., who lives at Boulder, Montana,
is now serving as county attorney of JelJerson
County;^ Dan M., who was the sixth in order of
birth ; Kathryn, who married Doctor Martin Hagen,
a physician and surgeon of Wichita, Kansas; Nell,
who married William Cavanaugh, a farmer of Hud-
son, Iowa; William F., who was killed at the age
of twenty-six years in the same railroad accident
in which his brother, T. F. lost his life; Raymond,
who is on the home farm near Waterloo, Iowa;
Leo, who is on his ranch near Whitehall, Montana;
and Clem, who is on a farm near Waterloo, Iowa,
of nineteen years he immigrated to the United States,
Dan M. Kelly was reared and educated in Black
Hawk County, Iowa, and was graduated from the
Til ford .\cademy at Vinton, Iowa, in 1900, follow-
ing which he entered the University of Iowa and
was graduated from its law department in 1905,
with the degree of Bachelor of Law. He is a
member of the Hammond Law Senate, a literary
society of his university. In the meanwhile, during
1902, Mr. Kelly came to Montana and taught school
in Madison County, Montana, for two years. After
obtaining his degree in 1905 he came to Whitehall,
Montana, and was engaged there in an active prac-
tice until January i, 1907, when he was inducted
into the office of county attorney of Jeflferson County
at Boulder, Montana, and held it for four years,
and this is the office which is now held by his
brother J. E. Kelly. _ After the expiration of his
term of office Mr. Kelly was engaged in practice
at Boulder for two years, and then in the fall of
1912 he was elected attorney general of the state
of Montana and moved to Helena. After being in
office for two years and five months Mr. Kelly re-
signed to become counsel for the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, and still holds this responsible
position. He is a democrat, and in the fall of 1918
was elected to the State Assembly on his party ticket,
serving during the session of 1919. During this
important epoch in the history of Montana Mr.
Kelly was on the judiciary committee, the commit-
tee on ways and means, and other important ones,
and did his full part in transacting the business
which came before the assembly for the securing of
proper legislation for the reconstruction period after
the great war.
A Catholic by inheritance and conviction, Mr.
Kelly is very active in church circles, and belongs
to Butte Council No. 668, Knights of Columbus, in
which he has been made a fourth degree knight;
to Helena Lodge No. 193, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks; to the Silver Bow Club; the Butte
Country Club, both of Butte; the Montana Club
of Helena, Montana; and the Rocky Mountain Club
of New York City, New York. Professionally he
maintains membership in the county, state and na-
tional bar associations. He owns a modern resi-
dence at 1260 West Platinum Avenue, Butte.
In June, 1908, Mr. Kelly was married to Miss
Lillian Wade, of Boulder, Montana, who died on
July 26, 1917, at Butte, without issue. On Decem-
ber 21, 1919, Mr. Kelly was married at St. Paul.
Minnesota, to Miss Helen Meagher, a daughter of
Dan J. and Elizabeth (Ryan) Meagher, who live
at Helena, Montana, Mr. Meagher being engaged
in the jewelry business in that city, and he was a
pioneer of Montana.
Mr. Kelly is one of the sound and highly trained
corporation lawyers of the state, whose knowledge
of corporate and state laws is profound. His prom-
inence throughout Montana is unquestioned, and his
acquaintanceship reaches to all classes and condi-
tions of men. Both as an official and in private
life he has commanded confidence and respect, and
the people of Butte are proud to number a man of
liis caliber among their fellow citizens.
James E. Kelly, who is a brother of Dan M.
Kelly, former attorney general of Montana and now
a prominent lawyer at Butte, one of the counsel of
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, was for
several years associated with his brother in busi-
ness at Boulder, where he still resides. James E.
' Kelly has served eight years as county attorney of
JefTerson County.
He was born in Black Hawk County, Iowa, near
Waterloo, November 6, 1878. He was educated in
the rural schools of that county, graduated in 1902
from Tilford Collegiate Academy at Vinton, Ohio,
and took his law course in the University of Iowa
at Iowa City. He received his LL. B. degree in
1906, and in the fall of that year came to Montana
and opened his law office at Whitehall. After one
year he removed to Boulder and became associated
HISTORY OF MONTANA
31
with his brother Dan. They were law partners un-
til Dan Kelly was elected attorney general in 1912.
Mr. James E. Kelly has enjoyed a large general
civil and criminal practice at Boulder in addition
to his duties as county attorney. He was appointed
to this office January I, 1912, to succeed Judge Show-
ers, and has been regularly elected every two years,
beginning in the fall of 1912. Mr. Kelly is also a
member of the partnership of Kelly Brothers, own-
ers of a large ranch near Whitehall.
He is a democrat in politics, a member of the
Catholic Church, is a third degree Knight of Colum-
bus, being affiliated with Marquette Council No.
842, is a member of Butte Lodge No. 240 of the
Elks, and Basin Aerie of the Fraternal Order of
Eagles at Basin, Montana.
Mr. Kelly owns a modern home in Boulder. He
married there June 7, 1916, Miss Corinne De Celles,
daughter of Edward and Caroline (Baril) De Celles.
Her parents live at Boulder, and her father was a
pioneer meat merchant there, but is now retired from
business. Mrs. Kelly is a graduate of the Jefferson
County High School. They have two children :
James Leo, born July 30, 1917; and Mary Ruth,
born December 4, 1918.
J.\MEs Patrick L.welle. present postmaster of
Columbus, grew up in that town, son of the pioneer
Montanan, the late Patrick Lavelle, and has been
active in business and political affairs for a numbei
of years.
He was born at Titusville, Pennsylvania, April 12,
1881. His paternal ancestors came from Ireland and
settled in New York in colonial times. The father,
Patrick Lavelle, was born in Seneca Falls, New
York, in 1839, grew up there, and served two years,
from 1861 to 1863, with the One Hundred and
Twenty-first New York Infantry in the Civil war.
Among the battles in which he participated were
those of Shiloh, Hanover Courthouse and Gettys-
burg. He was once taken prisoner by the Con-
federates. After being mustered out he went to
Titusville, Pennsylvania, then the center of the great
oil industry of America. He was employed for
several years as a well shooter in the oil district
of Western Pennsylvania, and he also married while
in Titusville. Later he was a farmer in Pennsyl-
vania until 1886, and then came to Montana, living
at Billings and for two years being an employee of
the Northern Pacific Railway. He located at
Columbus in 1888, being one of the pioneers in what
is now the county seat of Stillwater County. He
bought land tliat was platted and sold as the Lavelle
Addition to the townsite of Columbus. He also
built the Lavelle Hotel, the first institution of its
kind in Columbus, and was its genial proprietor for
fifteen years. After that he retired and died at
Columbus in March, 1912. He was prominent in
local affairs, serving two terms as a county com-
missioner of Yellowstone County and was once can-
didate for the State Senate. He was a democrat in
politics and a member of the Catholic Church.
Patrick Lavelle married Margaret O'Brien, who was
born in County Clare, Ireland, in 1848. She is still
living in Columbus at the age of seventy-one. Her
Dakota; Grand Forks Camp, Modern Woodmen of
children are seven in number. Mary is the wife
of H. J. Calhoun, manager of the American Garage
at Columbus; Maggie is the wife of W. P. Adams,
who is in the livery and implement business at
Columbus ; Ambrose, a traveling salesman living at
Omaha, Nebraska; James Patrick; Celia, wife of
H. I. Grant, a hardware and grocery merchant at
Columbus ; Nellie, assistant postmaster at Columbus ;
Vol. II— 3
and Agnes, wife of N. W. Holt, owner of a ranch
in the Lake Basin and residing at Columbus.
James Patrick Lavelle was seven years old when
his father located at Columbus, and he acquired
his education in the local public schools. During
1899- 1900 he attended a business college at Val-
paraiso, Indiana. For seven years he was engaged
in the livestock business at Columbus, and then
served two terms, four years, as under sheriff of
Yellowstone County. For two years he was a mem-
ber of the police force at Billings, and in May,
1913, received appointment as postmaster at Colum-
bus and has had active charge of that office for
six years. He was reappointed for a second term
in May, 1918.
Mr. Lavelle is a member of the Columbus Com-
mercial Club, is owner of some local city property,
is active in the ranks of the democratic party, is a
member of the Catholic Church, and is a third degree
Knight of Columbus, being affiliated with Council
No. 1259 of that order, and also a member of
Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks. Mr. Lavelle is unmarried.
Elbert F. Allen has spent practically all his life
in Montana, though he was born in Fayette, Mis-
souri, August 31, 1880. For the past fifteen years
he has been busily engaged in handling a growing
and influential law practice at Livingston. He is
the present city attorney of Livingston.
Mr. Allen represents an old American family
settled in North Carolina in colonial times. His
grandfather, George J. Allen, was a native of
North Carolina, and was an early settler in Mis-
souri, where he followed farming. He died in
Henry County of that state in 1852. George J.
Allen married Esther Mitchell, a native of Wash-
ington County, Tennessee, and a granddaughter
of Samuel Doak, founder of Washington College,
the first institution of higher learning west of the
Allegheny Mountains.
George J. Allen, Jr., father of the Livingston
lawyer, was born in Henry County, Missouri, in
1844, was reared there and made his first visit to
Montana in 1863, being attracted to the then cen-
ter of activities in this part of the Northwest, Vir-
ginia City. In 1864 he took up a claim at Virginia
City, but left the country in 1866 and returned to
Missouri. He was married in Howard County of
that state, lived as a farmer in Henry County and in
June, 1880, again came to Montana for the pur-
pose of making that state his permanent home.
His family followed him a short time later and
settled on his homestead of 160 acres near Living-
ston. He occupied that homestead until 1914. and
sold it only in IQ19. He was a democrat and a
member of the Congregational Church. He mar-
ried Elizabeth J. Fisher, who was born in Howard
County, Missouri, in 1852. Elbert F. is the only
son of two living children. The daughter, Carrie E.,
is the wife of J. L. Anderson, a truck gardener at
Livingston. Mr. Alien died May 26, 1919.
Elbert F. Allen was educated in the public schools
of Livingston, attended high school in that city,
received his Bachelor of Science degrees, from the
Montana State College at Bozeman in 1903, and
spent one year in the University of Missouri, in the
law department, at Columbia. He also studied law
privately and was admitted to the bar in Decem-
ber. 1905. Since that date he has had both civil and
criminal practice and his offices are in the Thomp-
son Block at Livingston. He served one term of
four years as city attorney, from 1913 to 1917,
and in 1919 was again appointed to the same office.
Mr. Allen is a republican, was master of Living-
32
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, during 1919, a member of Livingston Lodge
No. 7, Royal Arch Masons, St. Bernard Com-
mandery No. 6, Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is also
affiliated with Zephyr Camp No. 151, Woodmen
of the World, Silver Tip Camp, Modern Wood-
men of America, Tourist Homestead, Brotherhood
of American Yeomen, and is a member of the State
and American Bar associations and the Livingston
Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Allen and family reside at 513 West Geyser
Street. He married at Bozeman, January I, 1907,
Miss Faith L. Jackson, a daughter of Thomas and
Emma (Gordon) Jackson. Her parents are now
deceased. Her father was a pioneer in the Madi-
son Valley in Montana, going there in 1866. He
developed a ranch and was also a teacher. Mrs.
Allen is a graduate of the preparatory department
of the Montana State College at Bozeman and also
took a course there in domestic science and busi-
ness. Mr. and Mrs. Allen have two children, George,
born October 6, 1908, and Ernest, born July 26,
1912.
George W. Pierson is distinguished among the
lawyecs of Montana as a former judge of the
Thirteenth Judicial District, has been a member
of the bar of the state for a quarter of a century,
and since the beginning of his term as a judge has
lived at Billings.
He was born in Genesee County, Michigan, May
21, 1869, son of Joseph and Hannah (Davenport)
Pierson. The Pierson family came from England
to New York in colonial times. The grandfather,
John K. Pierson, was born in New York in 1817,
after his marriage spent a short time in Canada,
and then pioneered on a farm in Michigan, and
lived in Genesee County until his death in 1890.
Judge Pierson's maternal grandfather, Robert
Davenport, was born in Pennsylvania in 1819 and
was also a Michigan pioneer, being a blacksmith
and farmer. He died at Hadley in that state in
1889. His wife, Miss Margaret Earl, a native of
Pennsylvania, also died in Michigan. The Daven-
ports came originally from Holland,- Pennsylvania,
and Hannah Davenport's great uncle, Robert Da-
venport, was one of the three men who escaped
from the Wyoming and Cherry Valley massacre
during the Revolutionary war.
Joseph Pierson was born in Ontario, Canada, in
1835, but grew up in Genesee County, Michigan,
and spent many years there as a farmer. Later
he moved to LaPeer County and farmed until his
death at Hadley in 1895. He was an independent
republican, served a term as councilman at Had-
ley, and was affiliated with the Baptist Church. His
wife was born at Hadley, Michigan, in 1840 and
died there in 1895. Their children were: Robert
J., a farmer at Hadley, Michigan ; Nettie, wife of
Frank Nowlin, in the jewelry business at Gaylord.
Michigan; Roby, wife of A. B. Hubbard, a farmer
at Clarkston, Michigan ; George W. ; Lewis, a me-
chanic living at Flint, Michigan ; and Dewey C, a
farmer and stock man at Hadley.
Judge Pierson attended the rural schools of La-
Peer County. Michigan, graduating from the Had-
ley High School in 1887 and for two years was
a teacher in LaPeer County. In 1889 he entered
the law school of the University of Michigan, tak-
ing his LL. B. degree in 1891 and his LL. M. de-
gree in 1892. The following two years he had a
law office in Chicago and in the spring of 1894
came to Montana and practiced at Red Lodge un-
til 191 1. He served as city attorney of Red Lodge
in 1894-95 and again in 1904-06, and was county
attorney of Carbon County from 1895 to 1897. He
was appointed district judge of the Thirteenth Dis-
trict in 191 1, and then removed to Billings, filling
with enviable distinction the office of judge until
1917. Since retiring from the bench he has handled
a general civil and criminal practice, his offices be-
ing in the Electric Building.
Judge Pierson is a democrat, is affiliated with
Star in the West Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, at Red Lodge, Carbon Chapter, Royal Arch
Masons, Aldemar Commandery No. 5 of the Knights
Templar at Billings, and Billings Lodge No. 394 of
the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. He
is a member of the Billings Midland Club.
October 27, 1892, at Hadley, Michigan, he mar-
ried Loretta Mann, daughter of Ernest and Clara
(Shippey) Mann. Her father was a farmer in La-
Peer and Oakland counties, Michigan. Judge and
Mrs. Pierson have one daughter, Helen, a senior in
the Billings High School.
Fletcher Webster Appleton, register of the
United States Land Office at Bozeman. is a civil
engineer by profession, and has had a widely diver-
sified experience as an engineer, operator of min-
ing properties and in general business aff^airs.
Mr. Appleton is member of a prominent American
family and one of peculiarly American and Yankee
traditions. On both sides of his house is pure
English descent. The .'\ppletons came from Eng-
land and settled in Massachusetts in early colonial
days. His grandfather was named Samuel Apple-
ton Appleton, and spent all his life in New England.
He was identified with cotton manufacture at Low-
ell, Massachusetts, and died at Boston. Samuel
Appleton Appleton married the only daughter of
Daniel Webster. Fletcher Webster Appleton is
therefore a great-grandson of the great American
statesman and orator, and his given name was be-
stowed in honor of Daniel Webster's only son, Col.
Fletcher Webster, who was a colonel in the Union
army during the Civil war. A daughter of Samuel
A. Appleton, Carrie Appleton, became the wife of
Jerome Bonaparte, a brother of Charles Bonaparte,
who was a member of President Roosevelt's cabinet.
Samuel Appleton, father of Fletcher W. Appleton,
has had a distinguished career. He was born in
Massachusetts in 1841, was graduated from Yale
College with his law degree in 1861, and the same
year joined the Twelfth Massachusetts Infantry
and was all through the war. He practiced law in
Massachusetts several years and was a member of
the Legislature of that state one term. In the early
'70s he moved to Chicago and was a lawyer in that
city, but since 1887 his home has been at St. Paul,
Minnesota. He practiced law in the twin cities, but
eventually his services were availed by the West
Publishing Company, the largest law publishing con-
cern in the world. He has been with this company
for over thirty years and is editor in chief of its
publication. Samuel Appleton is a republican. He
married Miss Anna Jones, who was born in Massa-
chusetts in 1843 and died at St. Paul in 1888.
Fletcher W. is the oldest of their children. Esther
is the wife of Col. Wilson G. Heaton, with home at
Fort Douglas, Arizona. Colonel Heaton served in
the Spanish-American war, holds the rank of colonel
in the regular army, and was with Pershing both on
the Mexican border and in the World war. Anna S.
Appleton is the wife of John E. Seabury, head of
Seabury & Company, an important wholesale gro-
cery house in St. Paul. Robert E., the youngest of
the family, lives on the Island of Hayti, was former
Jb.^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
33
United States Consul but is now secretan- to the
Consul" there.
Fletcher Webster Appleton was born in Chicago
October 8, 1873. but received most of his educa-
tion in Minnesota. He attended the public schools
of St. Paul, graduated in 189J from the Shattuck
Military Academy at Faribault, and for a year and
a half pursued the civil engineering course in the
University of Minnesota. For two years he was
connected with the West Publishing Company at
St. Paul, and then followed his profession as civil
engineer at Colorado Springs and Cripple Creek
until 1897, and at Cincinnati until 1898. On July
25, 1898, during the Spanish-American war, he
enlisted in the Fourteenth Minnesota Regiment.
He was in training at Chickamauga Park, was a
first sergeant with his command, and spent two
months at Leech Lake. Minnesota, during the Indian
outbreak. In that service he was under the com-
mand of General Bacon. He received his discharge
November 18, 1898.
Soon afterward Mr. .\ppleton came to Montana,
locating first at Livingston, and soon afterward
became superintendent of the McGinnis Gold Min-
ing Company at Cook City. He was the executive
of that company until 1905. He then resumed his
engineering practice at Livingston and became
owner of a half interest in the Livingston Land S:
.Abstract Company. Since 191 1 Mr. .\ppleton has
been receiver for the Yellowstone Portland Cement
Company. His home has been at Bozeman 'since
.'^pril 13. 1913. .-Vs register of the Lhiited States
Land Oflice he has his headquarters in the Federal
Building and is responsible for all the records in
connection with government lands in the Bozeman
district.
Mr. Appleton is a democrat in politics. While at
Livingston he was city clerk. He is a vestryman
of the Episcopal Church at Bozeman, is affiiiated
with Bozeman Lodge Xo. 18, .\ncient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Livingston Lodge No. 246, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks, and is a member
of the Bozeman Chamber of Commerce. He has
some mining interests in Montana and owns a
dwelling house on Eighth Street in Livingston.
In June, 1904, at Livingston, he married Miss
•Mberta Graves, a native of Kentucky. They have
one daughter, Grace Fletcher, born November 28,
1905.
H.-kRRV Edsox .Arnold is a veteran railroad man,
has been a locomotive fireman or engineer for twenty
years, and is one of the best known men of his
craft in the state, due to the fact that he is gen-
eral chairman of the Brotherhood of Locomotive
Firemen and Engine Men on the Puget Sound Lines
of the Milwaukee System.
Mr. Arnold was 'born at New Albany, Floyd
CoHnty, Indiana. June 14, 1882, a son of William
and Laura J. (Forsyth) .Arnold. His father was
born in 1844, and for many years has been a resi-
dent of New -Mbany, where his mother died in No-
vember, 1882. They had three children, John David,
Florence and Harry Edson. John is also a railroad
man, being a switchman at New Albany.
Harry E. .\rnoId attended the public schools at
Seymour, Indiana, graduating from high school in
1899. Almost immediately thereafter he entered the
service of the Baltimore & Ohio Railway Company,
beginning as a fireman, and has been a railroad fire-
man in nearly every state of the Union. He came to
Montana in 1908, and was a fireman with the North-
ern Pacific Railway with headquarters at Missoula,
and in 1909 joined tlie Chicago, Milwaukee & St.
Paul Railway, with headquarters at Deer Lodge.
In 1912 he was promoted to engineer and now holds
seniority rights as engineer on his division. He was
chosen general chairman of the Brotherhood of
Locomotive Firemen and Engine Men for the Mil-
waukee System on the Puget Sound Lines in igu,
and has been delegated with those responsibilities
now for over nine years. Mr. .Arnold casts his vote
in politics independently. He is affiliated with Deer
Lodge No. 14, .Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Valley Chapter No. 4, Royal .'^irch Masons, Zabud
Council No. 2, Royal and Scottish Masons, Ivanhoe
Commandery No. 16 of the Knights Templar, East-
ern Montana Consistory No. i, and Algeria Temple
•of the Mystic Shrine.
At Benton, Illinois, December 28, 1910, Mr. Arnold
married Miss Ruth Steves, daughter of Henry L.
and Amelia (Reeder) Steves, the latter a resident of
Boston, Massachusetts. Her father was a Metho-
dist minister and died at Benton, Illinois. Mr. and
Mrs. Arnold have two daughters, Mary, born Sep-
tember 2, 1913, and Ruth Jane, born October 16,
1916.
WiLLi.\M Witt came to Montana in 191 1, was a
homesteader and rancher for several years, has been
very active in civic alifairs in Stillwater County since
it was organized, and is cashier of the First National
Bank of Columbus.
He was born in Scott County, Iowa, February
5, 1881. His father, Chris Witt, was born in Ger-
many in 1855 and came to the United States at the
age of nineteen, settling in Scott County, Iowa. He
was married there, and has followed farming as an
occupation. He and his wife now reside at Holstein
in Ida County, Iowa, and he is retired with a good
competence for his remaining years. Politically he
is a democrat. His wife was Anna Steflfen, who was
born in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, in 1857. Of
their children, Herman, the oldest, is a farmer at
Kingsley, Iowa ; the second is William ; Henry, the
third, is a farmer at Columbus, Montana, as is
also the ne.xt, Adolph ; Alma is the wife of Frank
E. Ewoldt, a contractor at Holstein, Iowa ; while
Ella, the youngest, is still at home with her parents.
William Witt attended public school at Holstein
and completed the sophomore year in the high school
there. He was in the Dennison Normal and Busi-
ness School at Dennison, Iowa, during 1900-01, and
on leaving there worked in a store at Holstein a
year, for two years was in the Leader Department
Store at Appleton, Minnesota, continued his mer-
cantile experience at Graceville, Minnesota, and
while there became bookkeeper in the First National
Bank of Graceville, and before coming to Montana
was promoted to assistant cashier.
Mr. Witt came to Columbus in 191 1 and home-
steaded 160 acres. He has been identified with the
First National Bank of Columbus as cashier since
1913. The bank was established under a national
charter in 1909. Its financial position is a most
substantial one. The capital is $25,000 and the sur-
plus $25,000. The officers of the bank are J. L.
Eraser, president; Grant S. Irwin, vice president;
and William Witt, cashier and a director.
Mr. Witt has been public administrator for Still-
water County since the county was organized in 1913,
serving his third term. He was the first secretary
of the Stillwater Club, is a democrat, and is affiliated
with Stillwater Lodge No. 62, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons. Mr. Witt owns ranch lands to the
extent of 1,700 acres in Stillwater County. He is
also a director in the Old Faithful Oil and Gas
Company.
In 1915, at Columbus, he married Miss Emma Lou
34
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Briggs, daughter of D. F. and Katie (Woodson)
Briggs. Her mother lives at New London, Missouri,
and her father, now deceased, was a Missouri
farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Witt have one son, William
Briggs, known as "Billy," born October i8, igi?-
Mrs. Witt finished her education in a seminary in
Missouri.
H. J. Reese, county clerk of Park County, has
been, a resident of this northwest country for nearly
twenty years, having come here soon after he left
the army as a volunteer soldier in the Spanish-
American war.
Mr. Reese was born at Maryville, Missouri, No-
vember 17, 1879. His remote ancestry was Ger- •
man. His great-grandfather was a native of Hesse,
Germany. Mr. Reese's paternal grandmother was a
member of the Evans family and was a Daugh-
ter of the American Revolution. Joseph Reese,
father of the county clerk, was born at Port Ma-
tilda, Pennsylvania, in 1855, was reared and mar-
ried there, and in 1878 moved to Maryville, Mis-
souri, where he is still living, now practically re-
tired. Until 1918 he held the office of county sur-
veyor for six years. He is a republican and a mem-
ber of the Masonic fraternity. Joseph Reese mar-
ried Nancy E. Woodring, who was born at Port
Matilda, Pennsylvania, in 1857 and died at Mary-
ville, Missouri, in 1899. H. J. Reese is the oldest
of their children. Allen, the second in age, is sta-
tion agent for the Ogden Short Line Railway at
Meridian, Idaho. Nancy is the wife of Dr. G. A.
Windsor, proprietor of the Park Hospital at Liv-
ingston, Montana.
H. J. Reese was educated in the public schools
of his native town, graduating from high school
in 1897. In April of the following year he en-
listed in Company E of the Fourth Missouri Volun-
teers for the Spanish-American war. With his
command he spent his time in Camp Alger, Camp
Mead and finally Camp Weatherill, at Greenville,
South Carolina. He was mustered out February
10, 1899. Early in the following year he arrived
at Phillipsburg, Montana, and spent two years with
the Granite Bi-Metallic Consolidated Mining Com-
pany. In 1902 he came to Livingston, and was in
the service of the Northern Pacific Railway Com-
pany until 1915 as clerk in the freight department.
In the latter year he was appointed city clerk of
Livingston, filling that office until January I, 1919.
Withf a growing popularity as a citizen and with
exceptional qualifications for the office, he was
chosen county clerk in November, 1918. and began
his duties for a term of two years January i. I9I9.
Mr. Reese is a republican and is affiliated with
Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Livingston Camp of the United
Spanish War Veterans, Livingston Chamber of
Commerce and is a member of the Gateway City
Band, his instrument being the clarionet. He re-
sides at 219 South Seventh Street.
Mr. Reese married Miss Delia McCreary at Phil-
lipsburg, Montana, in 1901. Her mother, Mrs. Wil-
bert McCreary, lives at Salt Lake City, Utah. Mr.
and Mrs. Reese have three children: Edith, born
May 16, 1903, a freshman in the Park County High
School; Mildred, born December 26, 1907, and Jo-
seph, born August 22, 1910, both in the public schools
■of Livingston.
Thomas C. Ingham is well known in several
communities both in Montana and Minnesota as a
grain dealer, and is manager of the Occidental Ele-
vator Company at Roberts, where he has lived sev-
eral years.
He was born at Bradford in Yorkshire, England,
April 16, 1891. His father is Arthur Ingham, who
was born at Knersborough, Yorkshire, in 1863.
There is a record of members of the Ingham family
running back 400 years showing that every genera-
tion has contributed members to the business of
contracting and building. Thomas Clayton Ingham's
grandfather, Thomas Ingham, was a contractor
and railroad builder. He was born at Tickhill,
Lancashire, England, and died at Bradford. Arthur
Ingham grew up and married in England, learned
the trade of contractor and builder, and on com-
ing to the United States in 1883 located at Minne-
apolis. He has been back to England several times,
though calling Minneapolis his home. He is a re-
publican and a member of the Episcopal Church,
belongs to the Sons of St. George, and for eight
years was an English soldier.
The mother of Thomas C. Ingham was Ann
Clayton, who was born in Yorkshire in 1866 and
died there in 1891, soon after the birth of her only
son and child, Thomas Clayton. Arthur Ingham
afterward married Louisa Surr, who was born in
Yorkshire. Their children are: Marjorie, wife of
Herbert Welcome, of Minneapolis, who served as
an electrician in the American army with the ex-
peditionary forces in France ; Irene, who is mar-
ried and lives at St. Paul, Minnesota, where her
husband is a Government employe; Lois and Emily
both with their parents.
Thomas C. Ingham remained in England after
his mother's death, attended the public schools of
Bradford and a technical college through a four
years' course. He graduated in 1908, and in that
year came to Minneapolis, where he followed the
building trade until 191 1. He then engaged in the
grain business at Leeds, North Dakota. He started
in at the very bottom, learning the industry by ex-
perience. His first employers were the Cullen Ele-
vator Company. Later he was appointed their
manager at Cooley, North Dakota, was then sent
to Norwich, North Dakota, as manager for the
Norwich Farmers Elevator Company two years,
subsequently transferred his headquarters to Wil-
ton, North Dakota, and had charge of three ele-
vators for a period of two years. In the fall of
1917 he came to Roberts as manager of the Occi-
dental Elevator Company.
Mr. Ingham is a republican, a member of the
Episcopal Church, is affiliated with the Sons of St.
George and is a member of Star in the West Lodge
No. 40, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
In 1915, at Minneapolis, he married Miss Gretchen
Vogl. They have one son, Robert James, born
March 5, 1918. Mrs. Ingham was born at Farm-
ington, Minnesota, was educated in the public schools
there, is a graduate of the Minneapolis High School
and attended the University of Minnesota. Before
her marriage she was a teacher of music. She is
one of the active workers in the Episcopal Church
at Roberts.
Mrs. Ingham's father is Otto Vogl, who was
born in New York State in 1855, a son of Franz
Vogl, who was a native of Bavaria, Germany, and
after coming to the United States established his
permanent home in Wisconsin, where he was in
business and died at Columbus in that state in 1896.
Otto Vogl was reared in Wisconsin, came to Min-
nesota when a young man, and conducted a cloth-
ing store at Faribault, where he married, and at other
places in Minnesota. Since 1893 he has made his
home at Minneapolis. At present he is a sales-
man with the Finch, Van Slyke, McConville whole-
sale dry goods house of St. Paul. He is a republi-
can and an Odd Fellow. Otto Vogl married Laura
HISTORY OF MONTANA
11S3841
35
McKune, who was born at Morris'town, Minnesota,
a daughter of Lewis McKune. The McKunes came
to Massachusetts about 1630 from England. Mrs.
Ingham is descended through her mother's ances-
tors from a Revohitionary soldier named Lewis.
Her maternal grandfather. Lewis McKune. was
captain of Company G of the First Minnesota In-
fantry, enlisting in 1861, and was killed at the
Second Battle of Bull Run. He was a native of
Pennsylvania and a pioneer farmer and merchant
at Morristown, Minnesota. He was also one of
the first members of the State Senate of Minne-
sota. Captain McKune married Laura Corse, a
native of Pennsylvania, who died at Morristown,
Minnesota. The children of Otto Vogl and wife
are three in number: Frances, wife of M. J. Cul-
lem, a resident of Leeds, North Dakota, and a
grain buyer; Harry, a traveling salesman living at
Minneapolis, who married Marguerite Close ; and
Mrs. Ingham.
C. C. Jameson is a Montana merchant, well known
both at Livingston and Bozcman, and has been a
factor in the management and development of the
noted Golden Rule Syndicate of stores, represented
in eleven stores in M'ontana towns and cities. Mr.
Jameson is now a partner in the McCracken &
Jameson Company, Incorporated, owning the Me-
Cracken-Jameson store at Bozeman.
He was born at Marshfield, Webster County,
^fissouri, April 25, 1882. His ancestors came
from Scotland, and were colonial settlers in Georgia.
His grandfather, Milton Jameson, was born in 1819,
served as a Confederate soldier, and spent his active
life in Southern Missouri. He died in Webster
County, that state, in 1895. B. C. Jameson, father
of the Bozeman merchant, was born in Georgia in
:862, and when he was five years of age his parents
moved to Webster County, Missouri, where he
spent the rest of his active life as a merchant.
Since 1917 he has lived retired at Springfield, Mis-
souri. B. C. Jameson is a republican and a mem-
ber of the Baptist Church. He married Mary E.
Britton, who was born in Missouri in 1861. W. R.
Jameson, their oldest child, is connected with the
Springfield Creamery Company at Springfield, Mis-
souri, being general road man for this corporation,
a $200,000 company. J. E. Jameson is connected with
the Upham-Gordon wholesale shoe house in Spring-
field. The next is C. C. Jameson. Mary is the wife
of Charles W. Dyer, a farmer of Springfield, Mis-
souri, while Mabel and Bessie, the youngest of the
family, are still at home, the former being employed
in a wholesale silk and millinery house and the
latter a stenographer.
C. C. Jameson attended rural schools in Webster
County, Missouri, and spent two years in the high
school at Marshfield. Since leaving school his ex-
perience has been entirely in commercial lines. For
three years he worked in a dry goods store, and in
1902 completed a business course in the Draughan
Business College at Springfield. The next two
years he covered an extensive territory in Kansas,
Oklahoma and Texas, representing the Martin
Manufacturing Company, makers of work clothing.
He then took charge of 'the clothing store of W. W.
Moore at Bolivar, Missouri, for a year and a half,
and on severing his Missouri connections he joined
the Golden Rule Syndicate at Livingston. For
three months he was assistant manager of one of
the stores at Bozeman, and then for two years was
manager of A. Braton's women's ready to wear
store. After that he was general manager and
buyer for the Golden Rule department store at
Livingston until June I, 1919. He returned to Boze-
man as manager and one-third owner of the Boze-
man department store.
Mr. Jameson is a republican, a member of the
Baptist Church, and still retains his fraternal
affiliations with Bolivar Lodge No. 56, Knights
of Pythias, in Missouri.
January 3, 1917, at Billings, Mr. Jameson mar-
ried Miss Lois Skinker, daughter of Judge C. H.
and Minnie (Gravely) Skinker of Bolivar, Missouri.
Her father is a distinguished Missouri jurist who
for the past fifteen years has served as judge of
the Eighteenth Judicial District, being first appointed
by Governor Hadley of Missouri. Two of the most
noted criminal trials in the Middle West in recent
years came before him. One was the Stanley
Ketchel murder case and the other the Keet baby
kidnapping case. Mrs. Jameson attended the Mis-
souri State University at Columbia two years and
another year at Drury College, Springfield, Missouri.
J. Ralph Scovil. The name of Scovil is one of
the best known ones in industrial circles not only at
Butte, but throughout Western Montana, this promi-
nence having been given it by the united activities
of J. Ralph Scovil and his father, John Scovil, both
of whom are excellent and very successful business
men, J. Ralph Scovil is proprietor of the Unique
Cleaning and Tailoring Company, and his father is
connected with a number of large concerns at Butte
and other cities, and is recognized as the leading
laundryman of Montana.
J. Ralph Scovil was born at Anaconda, Montana,
on November 15, 1892. a son of John Scovil, and
grandson of L. N. Scovil. the latter a native of Mid-
dletown, Connecticut, where he was born in 1809.
He died at Springville, Utah, in 1890. The Scovil
family was founded in the American colonies prior
to the Revolution, coming here from England, and
becoming prominent in the New England settle-
ments.
L. N. Scovil went first to Ohio and later to Provo,
Utah, and during the war between the states he
returned to the land of his forefathers, and for a
time was connected with the London "Times." He
became a republican, and until his death voted the
ticket of that party. In the creed of the Mormons
he found expression for his religious faith, and was
one of the leading members of the Mormon colony
at Springville, where he made his home in later
years. The grandmother of J. Ralph Scovil bore
the maiden name of Hannah Marsden, and she was
born near Liverpool, England, in 1839, and died at
Springville. Utah, in July, 1907. Her father was
William Marsden, also a native of England, and he
died at Parawan, Utah, in 1887. to Which place he
came from Bfirlington, Iowa, and he was both a
farmer and merchant and a very successful man.
The following children were born to L. N. Scovil
and his wife, Hannah (Marsden) Scovil: John, who
became the father of J. Ralph Scovil; S. S., of Salt
Lake City, Utah ; Sylvia, who is the widow of John
Roylance, lives at Springville, Utah; Mina, who is
Mrs. E. J. Wignal, of Salt Lake City, Utah ; Clara,
who is Mrs. Eugene W. Raymond, of Salt Lake City,
Utah; and Jennie, who is Mrs. Walter R. Dusen-
berry, of Salt Lake City, Utah.
John Scovil, father of J. Ralph Scovil, was born
at Provo, Utah, on January 30, 1863, and until he
was thirteen years old attended the public schools of
Springville, Utah, but then began to be self-support-
ing, working first as a teamster. In 1884 he came
to Anaconda, Montana, and for a time was con-
nected with the LTpper Works as watchman and
later timekeeper, and still later became manager
36
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of the milk ranch in the vicinity of Anaconda. All
this time he was looking for work suited to his
capabilities, and entered upon what was to be a re-
markably successful business career when he be-
came a driver for the Anaconda Laundry Company.
After gaining some knowledge of the laundry busi-
ness through this connection he established a laun-
dry of his own under the name of the Montana
Laundry at Anaconda, and conducted it so success-
fully that in 1899 he sold it at a good profit and
came to Butte. From the time he became a resi-
dent of Butte to the present day Mr. Scovil's opera-
tions have been so remarkably successful as to chal-
lenge admiration and stimulate emulation. Begin-
ning with the purchase of the pioneer Union Laun-
dry, Mr. Scovil forged ahead, acquiring possession
in part or as sole owner of the C. O. D. Laundry,
the Troy Laundry, the Palace Laundry and the
Taylor Laundry, in time so consolidating them that
he is now operating them under the names of the
C. O. D. Laundry, capitalized at $200,000, and giv-
ing employment to 100 persons, and the Taylor
Laundry, capitalized at $150,000, and giving employ-
ment to seventy-five persons, the former being the
largest laundry in Montana. In addition to his im-
mense laundry interests John Scovil is president of
the Unique Cleaning and Tailoring Company of
Butte; president of the Scovil Realty Company, In-
corporated, of Butte: and president of the Ward-
robe Cleaning and Tailoring Company of Great
Falls, Montana. He owns his own residence at
Butte, an apartment house, the Lennox Hotel, two
brick blocks, the building occupied by the Unique
Cleaning and Tailoring Company, the site of the
Speedway Stables, twelve dwellings and a farm, all
at Butte; the building occupied by the Wardrobe
Cleaning and Tailoring Company at Great Falls,
Montana; an apartment house of fourteen apart-
ments, a business block and a modern brick dwelling
at Salt Lake City, Utah, and a dwelling at Spring-
ville, Utah. John Scovil is a republican. He be-
longs to the Butte Chamber of Commerce, the
Rotary Club, the Silver Bow Club and the Country
Club, and is a Knight of Pythias.
In 1891 Mr. Scovil was married at Anaconda,
Montana, to Miss Mary J. Keith, a daughter of Mrs.
Jane Keith, who died at Anaconda in 1901. Mrs,
Scovil was born at Corinne, Utah, in 1873, and died
at Anaconda on May 30, 1900, leaving one son, J.
Ralph, whose name heads this review. On June 12,
1901, Mr. Scovil was married to Miss Lalia G.
Walton, a daughter of John and Henrietta (Smith)
Walton, of Butte. Mr. Scovil has no children by
his second marriage.
After completing the eighth grade of the Butte
Public Schools, J. Ralph Scovil eiltered Shattuck
Military Academy at Faribault, Minnesota, where
he completed the junior year, and he completed his
collegiate work at the Princeton Preparatory School
in 1912. Following this he entered the University
of Pennsylvania, and left it in 1913. Mr. Scovil
then took a business course at the Wharton School
of Finance and Commerce, and was graduated there-
from in 1914. He belongs to the Greek Letter Fra-
ternity Phi Sigma Kappa.
In 1914 Mr. Scovil returned to Butte and took
charge of the Unique Cleaning and Tailoring Com-
pany, Incorporated, the leading business of its kind
in Butte, with premises at No. 128 West Granite
Street. This company was incorporated in 1908, and
Mr. Scovil's father is its president.
J. Ralph Scovil is a republican like his father
and grandfather before him. He affiliates with the
Episcopal Church. The American Legion, the Rotary
Club, the Good Roads Association, the Rocky Moun-
tain Rifle Club, the Butte Country Club, the Silver
Bow Club and the Areo Club of America all have
his membership. At present Mr. Scovil lives in the
Werner Apartments on South Clark Street, although
he did own a modern residence at No. 637 Colorado
Street, but sold it when he enlisted for service dur-
ing the great war.
On October 15. 1917, J- Ralph Scovil enlisted and
was sent to Berkeley, California, to the government
school of aviation, from whence he went to the
North Island Flying Field at San Diego, California,
and was mustered out as a flying sergeant of the
first class and was in line for a commission at the
time of the signing of the Armistice, when he would
have been transferred to Riverside. California. The
date of his discharge papers is March i, 1919.
On April 7, 1916, Mr. Scovil was niarried at Butte
to Miss Frances McDonald, a daughter of Doctor
H. J. and Caroline (Le Mere) McDonald, residents
of i?utte, where Doctor McDonald is engaged in a
successful practice. Mrs. Scovil attended the Haver-
gal School for Girls at Toronto, Canada, for two
years.
WiLLi,\M P. Adams, an implement dealer at
Columbus, is a Montana pioneer, and thirty years
ago was riding the range for various stock outfits
in the Yellowstone Valley. He is one of the old
timers at Columbus, and has had much to do with
that town's progress and upbuilding.
Mr. Adams was born in Meigs County, Ohio,
October 3, 1865. He belongs to the old Massachu-
setts Adams family. His grandfather, John Adams,
was born in Pennsylvania in 1782, and was an early
settler in Meigs County. Ohio, where he followed
the milling business. He died in Meigs County in
1875. John Quincy Adams, father of the Quincy
merchant, was born in Pennsylvania, in 1829, and was
a young boy when his parents moved to Meigs
County, Ohio. He spent all his life in that county,
from his father learned the trade of milling and
engaged in that industry for many years. He died
in Meigs County in 1899. He served as a member
of an Ohio Regiment of Infantry during the Civil
war, and in politics was a democrat. John Q.
Adams married Emeline Peoples, who was born in
Ohio in 1833 and died in Meigs County. Their chil-
dren were : Mark A., who operates the old home
flouring mill at Keno, in Meigs County ; Joseph,
who was a blacksmith, came to Montana in 1899
and died at Terry in 1914; Addison, who was a
structural iron worker and died at Portland, Oregon,
in 1914; William P., who is fourth in age; Emeline,
wife of Mr. Brown, of Meigs County, Ohio; and
Sybil, who is the wife of a Meigs County farmer.
William P. Adams grew up in the rural districts
of Meigs County, attending country schools, and
at the age of sixteen left home and went to Kansas,
where he spent four years on a stock farm in Coffey
County, From there in 1888 he came to Montana,
and in that year became acquainted with the little
hamlet of Stillwater, now the City of Columbus.
As a cowboy he rode the range all over this dis-
trict for twelve years. He then established the
first livery and feed stable of any consequence at
Columbus, and was active in that business until
April, 1918. He still owns the stables, but now gives
all his time to the implement business. He has a
well equipped store on Pike Avenue, owns the
building in which his business is conducted, and
has many other property interests, including a
modern home, two dwelling houses, and an interest
in a ranch of 480 acres seven miles north of
Columbus.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
37
Mr. Adams is well known in public affairs, having
served as sheriff of Yellowstone County during 1906-
07. He is a republican, and is affiliated with Billings
Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
At Columbus in 1896 he married Miss Maggie
Lavelle, daughter of that splendid old pioneer of
Columbus, Patrick Lavelle, concerning whom special
mention is made on other pages of this publication.
Mr. and Mrs. Adams have four children : Willie,
born July n, 1899, a graduate of the Columbus
High School, and an employee of H. L Grant's
merchandise business at Columbus ; Patrick, born
November 11, 1900, now engaged on the County
Survey ; Dorothy, who has completed the first year
of the high school; and Harold, a grammar school
student.
O. T. Ragl.'^nd during the past five years has
become known as one of the most useful, ener-
getic and public spirited citizens of Livingston,
where he is serving as police magistrate and has
built up a large and prosperous insurance agency.
Mr. Ragland came to Montana following the ex-
ample of other members of his family, who re-
sorted here as a matter of health and climate.
His business career for many years centered in
Southern Illinois and he is a native of Kentucky,
born in Ballard County, April 19, 1855.
The paternal branch of his family goes back to
England, and included th^ noted Lord Ragland.
The Raglands were colonial settlers in Virginia.
Mr. Ragland's grandfather, Robert Ragland, was
born in Virginia in 1790 and was a Kentucky pio-
neer, first living on a farm in Henry County and
later in Ballard County, where he died in 1863.
Edmond Ragland, father of Judge Ragland, was
born in Henry County, Kentucky, in 1814. From
Henry County after his marriage he moved to Bal-
lard County and began farming there soon after
President Jackson had bought the land from the
Indians. He was an able business man and con-
ducted his farm with a high degree of success.
He died in Ballard County in IQ02. As a demo-
crat he served as deputy county clerk of Ballard
County and was also postmaster of Woodville. He
was an active supporter and deacon in the Baptist
Church, and as a Mason the first Masonic Lodge
in Ballard County was organized in his home. Ed-
mond Ragland married Mary Gains, who was born
in Bovle Countv, Kentucky, in 1816 and died in
Ballard County "in 1882. The fifth in a family of
six children, Oscar T. Ragland is the only one to
come to Montana and the only one to find a per-
manent home and occupation outside of Ballard
County. The others have all been Ballard County
farmers. The two oldest, Sam B. and James W!,
were farmers and the former died at the age of
sixty-seven and the latter at thirty-three. George
L.. the third in age. is a farmer and tobacco buyer
of Ballard County. Bettie is the wife of George
F. Reesor. a Ballard County farmer, and Edmond
T., the youngest, is also in Ballard County.
Oscar T. Ragland acquired his early education in
the rural schools of his home county, walking a
distance of three miles between his father's home
and the schoolhouse. He lived at home to the age
of twenty-five and then went to Southern Illinois
and spent two years working in a flour mill at
New Columbia in Massac County. For five years
he was engaged in the flour milling business at
Metropolis. Illinois. Then came his first public
honor when elected constable. After serving one
year he moved to his farm in Illinois and energeti-
cally prosecuted his business as an agriculturist until
1896. That year he engaged in the life insurance
business, and for three years his headquarters and
home were at Mound City, Pulaski County, Illinois.
He returned to Metropolis in 1900 and continued
successfully in the insurance business until 1915. In
the meantime his daughter Goldie May, now deputy
county clerk at Livingston, had come to Montana
in 1912. In 1914 she induced her mother to seek
the benefits of the wonderful climate of Montana,
and Mrs. Ragland with her younger son came to
the Northwest in that year. In 1915 Mr. Ragland,
having disposed of his Illinois business, joined
the family in Livingston and has since been engaged
in the insurance business. In 1916 he was elected
justice of the peace and was re-elected in 1918. He
was chosen police magistrate in April, 1919. His
business offices are at 108 East Callender street.
He also owns a complete modern home at 314 South
Second Street.
Judge Ragland is a republican, a member and
deacon of the Baptist Church, is past grand of
Park Lodge No. 17, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and represented his lodge in the Grand
Lodge at Helena in 1917. He is secretary of his
home lodge and is a member of Egyptian Encamp-
ment of the Odd Fellows. He also belongs to the
Livingston Chamber of Commerce.
In 1879, at New Columbia, Illinois, Mr. Rag-
land married Miss Alice Nutty, daughter of Gale
and Sallie Nutty. Her father was a soldier in both
Mexican and Civil wars, was a farmer and is now
deceased. Her mother lives at Samoth, Illinois.
The oldest child of Mr. and Mrs. Ragland is Ophia,
wife of E. W. Brady, head bookkeeper for the A.
W. Miles Company of Livingston. Richard Frank,
the second in age, has made a notable record as
a soldier and his present home is at Washington,
District of Columbia, where he still holds the rank
of captain. He was commissioned second lieu-
tenant in June. 1917, and spent fourteen months in
France with the American Expeditionary Forces.
He was promoted to first lieutenant of the Twelfth
Railroad Engineers Corps. In September, 1918, he
was returned to this country, and stationed at Camp
Humphreys, Virginia, for the purpose of organizing
and training new recruits, for the Engineer Corps.
.After the armistice he was ordered to Washington
and was assigned the interesting task of rewriting
the book on Railroad Engineers previously compiled
in 1912, and he is now bringing the record to date
with particular reference to the services of this
famous organization in France. .Alfred F. Ragland,
the third child, enlisted in June, 1917, was first
trained at Camp Lewis, Washington, and afterward
transferred to Camp Kearney, California, and most
of his time was spent as sergeant in the Base
Hospital. The fourth of the family, Goldie May,
has already been mentioned. Paul L., the youngest,
is in the freshman class of the Park County High
School.
Howard P. McPherson is postmaster and pub-
lisher and the source of a variety of wholesonie
influence and enterprise for the new town of Rapelje
in Stillwater County.
Mr. McPherson, who has been a printer and news-
paper man throughout his active life, was born at
Clarinda, Iowa, July 23, 1884. As his name indi-
cates, he is of Scotch ancestry. His grandfather,
Angus McPherson, was born in Scotland in 1822,
and was a ship carpenter for many years. He im-
migrated to Nova Scotia and in the latter period
of his life moved far inland to Marshalltown, Iowa,
where he ceased working at his trade and took up
farming. He finally settled near .-Mexandria, South
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Dakota, where he died in 1889. He married Cather-
ine Vaughn, who was a native of Scotland, where
they were married. She also died near Alexandria.
James W. McPherson, father of the Rapelje post-
master, was born in Nova Scotia in 1846, and was
reared and educated in that Canadian province.
He was a young man when he went to Marshall-
town, Iowa, and followed the trade of carpenter
and builder for a number of years. In 1880 he
moved to Clarinda, Iowa, and in 1884 became a
pioneer in Dakota Territory, locating at what is
now Alexandria, South Dakota. He homesteaded a
claim on the prairie, developed it into a farm, and
occupied it until his death. While visiting he died
at Lincoln, Nebraska, in September, 191 1. He was
a democrat and a member of the Ancient Order
of United Workmen. At Marshalltown, Iowa, he
married Catherine Pershing, who was born in Ohio
in 1852 and is a cousin of General Pershing. Since
1914 she has made her home at Irene, South Da-
kota. She is the mother of seven children : Harry,
a general merchant at Irene; Roy. a printer living
at Lincoln, Nebraska: Ethel, wife of S. W. Jenkins,
who is connected with the Duplex printing press
factory of Battle Creek, Michigan; Howard P.;
Harold, who d ed at the age of seventeen ; Wil-
lard, a baker living at Detroit, Michigan; and Mary,
a teacher at Irene. South Dakota.
Howard P. McPherson was educated in the pub-
lic schools of Alexandria, South Dakota, gradu-
ating from high school in 1902. While a school
boy he learned to set type and the other intrica-
cies of a printing office, and after leaving high school
he went to Battle Creek, Michigan, and was in the
job printing business for about ten years. He
then returned to Irene, South Dakota, and bought
the Tri-County News, which he edited until 1917.
Soon after the founding of the new Town of
Rapelje Mr. McPherson arrived on the scene in
September, 1917, and established The Advocate.
The first issue of this paper was printed January
I, 1918, and it was the first local journal in the new
town. It serves as the chief medium of news for
that locality and its circulation is over Stillwater
and Yellowstone counties. Mr. McPherson erected
a new building and installed a modern plant, fully
equipped for all the needs of his paper and for
general printing. He owns his place of business and
also his residence on Main Street. Mr. McPher-
son and his paper are independent in politics
"Mr. McPherson was appointed postmaster in April,
1919- He is also stockholder in the Farmers Ele-
vator at Rapelje, is secretary of the Rapleje Com-
mercial Club and a member of the Methodist Church.
He married at Battle Creek, Michigan, in 1907,
Miss Ethel Durkee, daughter of Frank and Mary
(Wakeman) Durkee. Her parents are residents of
Alexandria, South Dakota, her father being a re-
tired real estate dealer. Mr. and Mrs. McPherson
have five children: Glenneda, born in 191 1 ; Donald,
born in 1912; Robert, born in 1915; Ethel Mary,
born in 1916; and Wilma, born in 1918.
Franklin Leonard Stone, cashier of the Sales-
ville State Bank, is one of the younger men in the
financial affairs of his native state and has devoted
his time and talents steadily to banking since he
left college five years ago.
He bears the name of his grandfather, who was
a prominent pioneer in the Gallatin Vallev of Mon-
tana. The grandfather of Franklin Leonard Stone
was born in New England in 1812, lived for many
years in Illinois, and in 1865 came to the Gallatin
Valley of Montana, where he was a farmer and
cattleman. He died near Old Gallatin in 1884. His
wife was Sarah Barber, a native of Illinois.
D. P. Stone, father of the Salesville banker, was
born at Onarga, Illinois, in 1862, and was three
years old when the family made the journey up the
Missouri River to Fort Benton in 18115. He grew
up in Gallatin County and for many years has
lived on his ranch at Central Park. He owns 480
acres of fine land in that community. He is a demo-
crat, and is a very active member and has served
as elder in the Presbyterian Church. He married
Susie Smith, who was born in Tyrone County,
Pennsylvania, in 1873. Franklin Leonard is the
oldest of their children and was born at Central
Park in Gallatin County, March 20, 1894. Parker,
the second in age, is living on the ranch with his
father, attended the Montana State College and in
April, 1918, enlisted in the United States navy, was
a bugler and was mustered out in January, 1919.
Louise is a student in the Montana State College
at Bozeman, Lillian is in the Gallatin County High
School, and Lula, the youngest, is in grammar
school at Bozeman.
Franklin Leonard Stone received his early educa-
tion at Central Park and completed his junior year
in the Montana State College. On leaving college
in 1914 he accepted the post of collection clerk in
the First National Bank at Bozeman. He looked
upon this as an opportunity to learn banking rather
than merely as a means of earning money, and
was from time to time promoted to larger responsi-
bilities. He was made bookkeeper, later receiving
teller, and in December, 1918, he came to Sales- .
ville as cashier of the state bank of that town. The
Salesville State Bank was established in October,
1911, under a state charter. Charles L. Anceney is
president, C. W. Overstreet is vice president, and
Mr. Jones, cashier. The bank is capitalized at
$25,000, and has surplus and profits of $75,000.
Mr. Stone is an independent voter and a member
of the Presbyterian Church. He is affiliated with
Salesville Lodge No. 69 of the Odd Fellows and
with Bozeman Lodge No. 463 of the Elks.
Bert S. Hind. One of the largest hydro-electric
plants developed in Montana during the last decade
is at Thompson Falls, at the western edge of the
state. This plant is operated by the Thompson Falls
Power Company, the superintendent of which is a
prominent young electrical engineer, Bert S. Hind.
He has been in charge as superintendent of the plant
since November, 1916. This plant, which utilizes
the power resources of Clark's Fork of the Colum-
bia River, developes an enormous amount of horse
power, which is distributed to the Coeur d'Alene
Mines in Idaho, furnishes the electric current for
the operation of the Milwaukee Railway over the
Rocky Mountain Division, and also current for do-
mestic purposes in Thompson Falls, Plains and other
adjoining towns.
Bert S. Hind was born at Austin. Texas, April
30, 1882. but has lived the greater part of his life
in Montana. His parents were T. D. and Maggie
(Reed) Hind. His father was born in England in
1853 and his mother in Scotland in i857- They were
married in England, and the first of their three chil-
dren was born in that country. T. D. Hind brought
his family to the United States in 1881, and for a
short time was a merchant at .\ustin, Texas. In
1885 he moved to Kansas, and for several years
conducted a store at Earned in that state. In 1889
he came to Butte, Montana, and was manager of
the Wilson Brothers store at Centerville, a suburb
of Butte. In 1892 he established a business of his
^pI. /^^-^^>^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
own at Whitehall, and on selling this in 1908 moved
to Vancouver, British Columbia, where he lived on
a ranch until his death in January, 1918. He was
a member of the Episcopal Church and affiliated
with the Knights of Pythias and Independent Or-
der of Odd Fellows, the Maccabees and the Ma-
sonic fraternity. His wife died in the same year,
1918. at Chicago. The oldest of their children was
Ethel, now living on her ranch near Norris, Mon-
tana, widow of Peter Carmichael. Bert was the
second in age,' and the youngest, Clarence, is a
farmer at Constantine, Michigan.
Bert S. Hind received his early education in the
public schools of Earned, Kansas. He came to
Montana in 1894, and completed the studies of the
eighth grade at Whitehall. He worked there at
different occupations for a year or so, and gained
his first experience in the electrical industry in
1900, when he went to work for the Montana Power
Company at Norris. He was with that concern un-
til 1904. In the meantime he took two corre-
spondence courses in electrical engineering, and has
diplomas from the International Correspondence
School at Scranton and the American School of
Correspondence at Chicago. Subsequently he at-
tended the Montana State College at Bozeman, and
graduated with the Bachelor of Science degree in
1909. After leaving college Mr. Hind resumed
his connection with the Montana Power Company
at Norris as foreman until November, 1916, when
Tie came to Thompson Falls. His home is at the
plant of that company.
Mr. Hind took an active and patriotic part in all
war measures in his community. He assisted in
getting all campaigns for subscriptions to Liberty
Loans and other objects fulfilled, and for the past
three years has been chairman of the local Red
Cross Chapter. He is also scout master at Thomp-
son Falls, and is a man of wholesome and sincere
interests in the welfare of his community. Politi-
cally he votes independent.
In April, 1910, at Norris, Montana, he married
Miss Gertrude Mitchell, daughter of Charles and
Nora (Robins) Mitchell, the latter still a resident
of Norris. Her father, deceased, was one of the
first hoisting engineers at Butte. Mrs. Hind at-
tended the Academy of the Sacred Heart at Mis-
soula. They had two children : Bert S., who died
at the age of seven days ; and Charles Herbert,
born January 3, 1916.
Alfred L. Thomas. This is a name that signifies
to old timers in Montana the sheep industry at its
highest and on its most magnificent scale. Mr.
Thomas is no longer an active factor in the sheep
business, but he made his fortune through the in-
dustry, and at one time his flocks grazed over liter-
ally "a thousand hills." In any list of men who
through their individual and co-operative eflforts
have done most to develop the natural resources
of Montana the name of .Alfred L. Thomas would
properly appear.
He comes of a sturdy race of farmers and sea-
faring people and was born at Bear River, Nova
Scotia, May 18, 1863. His great-grandfather was
an English sea captain and helped colonize Nova
Scotia. Joseph Thomas, grandfather of Alfred L.,
spent all his life in Nova Scotia and was a farmer.
He married a Miss Marr, of Scotch descent. They
both died at Bloomfield, Nova Scotia. J. V. Thomas,
father of -Mfred, was born at Bear River, Nova
Scotia, in 183.S and died there in 1910. The eflforts
of his active lifetime were spent partly in farmint;
and partly in the lumber industry. For many years
he was president of the Agricultural Society of
his county. He was also a great temperance worker
and was a liberal in Canadian politics. His wife
was a Miss Trevoi, who was born in 1837 and died
in 1873, spending her life at Bear River. Their
children were : Sarah Emret, who died in 1907,
the wife of Rupert Harris, who is a farmer and
lumber man at Bear River, Nova Scotia ; Anna
Delle Maretta, who died at Bear River at the age
of twelve years: Welcome Curtiss, who occupies
the old homestead in Nova Scotia; Alfred L. ; Mrs.
Arthur P. Dunn, whose husband is a shoe manu-
facturer at Boston, Massachusetts; and Aletha Cor-
lina, wife of Fred Hoyt, who is in the automobile
business at Seattle, Washington. A. L. Thomas has
a brother at Egar, Montana, in the mercantile busi-
ness.
Alfred L. Thomas spent his boyhood in his native
town, and at the age of seventeen left school and
began to satisfy his tastes and ambitions for a prac-
tical business career. After five years in partner-
ship with Balcom Brothers in Nova Scotia he came
out to the western states. He visited in Seattle dur-
ing the winter of 1886 and in the following spring
arrived in Montana. From Big Timber he soon
removed to Martinsdale and spent two years on a
sheep ranch. That was his introduction to the
sheep business, and he then started a sheep ranch
of his own, and gradually increasing his operations
he had at diflferent times some of the largest flocks
and some of the largest holdings devoted to the
business in Montana. He owned 73,000 acres of
land in one block in the Lake Basin country. Fre-
quently his flocks reached the imposing total of
50,000 head. Altogether Mr. Thomas was a sheep
man for thirty years, and in spite of many vicissi-
tudes he shared with other sheep men he made a
fortune.
Mr. Thomas removed to Columbus in 1912, im-
proving some property he had previously acquired.
In 1917 Mr. Thoma.'; traded some of his Montana
lands for an apartment house in Chicago, covering
a whole block on Forty-second Street and Grand
Boulevard. This is one of the modern high-class
apartment houses of that city and the investment
represents a fortune in itself. Mr. Thomas, however,
still has extensive interests at Columbus, including
the State Bank Building, a large garage, the court-
house, a laundry, three dwellings, a modern office
building on Pike Avenue, but has disposed of all
his ranch lands. He' is president of the Old Faithful
Oil Company of Wyoming, and for years was presi-
dent of the Stillwater Irrigation Company and was
the man responsible for the maintenance of the
large ditch that supplies Columbus and surrounding
country with irrigation. He was also president and
owner for ten years of the Columbus State Bank
and he is now interested in a large sugar plantation
of 2,700 acres in Cuba. His interests and his busi-
ness associations are truly those of a cosmopolitan
variety and such as only a man of wealth and great
enterprise could handle.
Mr. Thomas is a republican, is identified with the
Commercial Club at Columbus, and is a thoroughly
loval and public spirited citizen of his adopted
state.
In 1918, at Livingston, Montana, he married Miss
Marian Otto, daughter of F. W. and Minerva (Der-
mont) Otto. Her father is engaged in the real
estate business at Columbus. Her mother was acci-
dentally killed in an automobile accident at Billings
in 1918. Mrs. Thomas had two years of special
training as a nurse. She and Mr. Thomas have one
child, Bernard Alfred, born November I, 1918.
40
HISTORY OF MONTANA
V/iLLiAM Stryker, D. O. Doctor Stryker is one
of the leading representatives of osteopathy in
Montana, has practiced within the borders of the
state since 1910, and has a splendid clientage in his
present home City of Livingston.
He was born at Washington, Iowa, June 5, 1888.
The Stryker family is Scotch-Irish in ancestry and
were early settlers, in Pennsylvania. His grand-
father, W. A. Stryker, was born in Indiana in
1824 and was a physician and surgeon and also a
Methodist minister. He settled in Muscatine
County, Iowa, in 1855, and died at Victor in that
state in 1900. W. R. Stryker, father of Doctor
Stryker, was born in Sullivan County, Indiana, in
1851 and was reared in Iowa and for many years
preached as a member of the Iowa Conference in
the southeastern corner of the state. Since 1904
he has been superannuated and is now living retired
at Washington, Iowa. He is a republican and a
member of the Masonic fraternity. At Pella, Iowa,
he married Metta Shaw, who was born at Alleghany,
New York, in 1858. Veda, the oldest of their chil-
dren, is a teacher at Washington, Iowa, Doctor
William is second. Charles N., whose home is
at Iowa City, is an osteopathic graduate but is not
practicing. He is general sales manager for the
Freezeout Fire Extinguishing Company of Chicago
and travels over the territory between Chicago and
Des Moines. Paul J., who is traveling representative
for the Freezeout Company, enlisted in November,
1917, at Billings, Montana, vi'ith the regular army,
was sent overseas in January, 1918, in the Big Gun
Corps, and spent seven months with the American
artillery forces around Verdun. He was severely
gassed in August, 1918, and was mustered out in
March, 1919.
William Stryker received his earlv education in
the public schools of Iowa, including the high school
at Washington, and until 1905 attended the Wash-
ington Academy. In 1907 he entered the American
School of Osteopathy at Kirksville, Missouri, and
was graduated D. O.. in 1910. The same year he
began practice at Missoula, remained there two
years, and then practiced at other points in the
state until he removed to Livingston in April, 1917.
He has many of the leading families of Livingston
among his patients. His offices are in the Veit
Building.
Doctor Stryker has also identified himself with
community affairs, is a member of the Chamber of
Commerce, is secretary of the Rotary Club, and
a director in the Livingston Club, He has served
as city health officer. He is independent in politics.
He is a member of the Methodist Church and is
affiliated with Livingston Lodge No. 599, Loyal
Order of Moose.
May 20, 1917, at Butte, he married Miss Mabel
Garrmgton, daughter of J. J. and Ellen Garrington
Her mother resides with Doctor and Mrs. Stryker.
Her father, deceased, was a railroad contractor
did some early work in that line in Oregon and
settled at Missoula in 1899. Mrs. Stryker is a
graduate of the high school at Missoula and of the
Montana State University. They have a son born
September 12, 1918, named William G.
L. G. Bradbrook. Later generations will always
have a pardonable interest in the founders and
makers and builders of new communities and towns.
A town of Montana whose history is comprised
withm the last two years is Rapelje, and the main
actors in its upbuilding are still on the scene. One
of them is L. G. Bradbrook, who is a partner in
the chief hardware and lumber business there and
is connected with other business enterprises.
Mr. Bradbrook is a young man and most of his
mature years have been spent in the lumber and
hardware business. He was born at Red Cloud,
Nebraska, July 28, 1887. His grandfather was an
Englishman who immigrated to America and be-
came a farmer near Sandusky, Ohio, where he died.
Fred Bradbrook, father of L. G. Bradbrook, was
born in Ohio in 1853, and when a young man went
out to the western frontier of Nebraska, settling
at Red Cloud. He was a photographer and opened
the first regular studio to furnish ' photographs to
the people of the Red Cloud community. He after-
ward lived retired and died at Red Cloud in 1905.
He was a republican and was affiliated with the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows and Knights of
Pythias. Fred Bradbrook married Theressa Ak-
hofer, who is still living at Red Cloud. She was
born in Germany in 1856, but was reared in Neb-
raska. L. G. Bradbrook is the older of two sons.
His brother, G. L. Bradbrook, is also a partner
in the lumber business, being located at the Hysham
plant of the Bradbrook-Saunders Lumber and Hard-
ware Company.
L. G. Bradbrook acquired his education at Red
Cloud, graduating from the high school in 1905.
Soon after leaving school he entered the lumber
business at Bruning, Nebraska, where the Brad-
brook-Saunders Lumber and Hardware Company
first started. The present headquarters of this
flourishing business are at Hysham, Montana, and
branches are in Rapelje, Wheat Basin and Myers.
The largest individual plant is at Rapelje. A fine
new brick building was erected in 1918 to house
the hardware store, and in the rear is the lumber
yard, both departments being equipped with every
staple commodity needed for a new and growing
town and vicinity. The officers of this business
are: D. E. Saunders, of Billings, president: W. B.
Saunders, of Billings, vice president; and L. G.
Bradbrook, secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Bradbrook is president of the Rapelje Com-
mercial Club, a director of the First National Bank,
is president of the Rapelje Telephone Company,
and owns some extensive ranch lands at Hysham.
Mr. Bradbrook is unmarried, is independent in poli-
tics and is affiliated with the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows.
J. A. Shadoan. Deeds are thoughts crystallized,
and according to their brilliancy do we judge the
worth of a man to the country which produced
him, and in his works we expect to find the true
index to his character. The 5tudy of the life of the
representative American never fails to offer much
of pleasing interest and valuable instruction, de-
veloping a mastering of expedients which has
brought about most wonderful results. The subject
of this review is a worthy representative of that
type of American character and of that progressive
spirit which promotes public good in advancing
individual prosperity and conserving popular inter-
ests.
J. A. Shadoan, president and general manager
of the Salesville Mercantile Company, one of the
most important enterprises in the Gallatin Valley,
was born in Somerset, Pulaski County, Kentuckj',
on November 25, 1881. He is the son of J. T. and
Bethada (Bales) Shadoan, who are still living in
their old Kentucky home. J. T. Shadoan was born
in Somerset, Kentuck>', in 1859, and his entire life
has been devoted to agricultural pursuits. He is
a republican in politics, and his religious affiliation
is with the Christian Church. His wife, Bethada,
was also born in Pulaski County, Kentuckj', in
1859. and she bore her husband the following chil-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
41
dren : John, who is a railroad conductor, residing
at Mart, Texas ; Joseph, who died in Pulaski Coun-
ty. Kentucky, at the age of twenty-five years ; the
subject of this sketch is the next in order of birth;
Stella, who is the wife of William Cover, a ranch-
man at Manhattan, Montana ; Clarence lives in
Manhattan, Montana, where he is employed in a
garage; L. D., who also lives in Manhattan, oper-
ates a ranch near there ; Frank is his father's as-
sistant on the home farm in Kentucky ; Hobart
is a rancher at Manhattan; May is the wife of a
Mr. Burns, an electrician by trade and foreman
in the railroad shops at Somerset, Kentucky.
J. A. Shadoan received his educational training
in the rural schools of his native community, where
he lived until seventeen years of age. In 1898,
ambitions for a larger field of labor and oppor-
tunities for advancement, Mr. Shadoan came to
Manhattan, Montana, and entered the employ of
Thomas Gibson as a farm hand, with whom he
remained for two years. He then rented a ranch,
which he operated on his own account for three
years. In igog he bought 240 acres of fine irri-
gated land situated two miles west of Salesville,
and to the improvement and cultivation of that
place he devoted himself for a year. He still owns
this place, though now residing in Salesville. In
1910 Mr. Shadoan bought the controlling interest
in the Salesville Mercantile Company, of Salesville,
which he incorporated and to which he has since
indefatigably devoted himself. The company has
been incorporated and the present official personnel
of the corporation is as follows : President and
general manager, J. A. Shadoan ; secretary, F. C.
Roberts ; treasurer, W. H. Bradley. The company
operates a fully organized department store, the
departments including farm implements, hardware,
groceries, dry goods and other lines demanded by
the local trade. The policy of the company has
always been to so select their stock as to meet the
needs of their patrons, and this fact, coupled with
courteous treatment and prompt service, has gained
for them a well deserved popularity throughout the
Gallatin Valley. Mr. Shadoan devotes himself un-
remittingly to the management of the business, and
to his good business judgment is due the splendid
success which the company enjoys.
Politically Mr. Shadoan is a stanch republican,
though not an aspirant for public office. He is a
member of the Christian Church and also belongs
to Salesville Lodge No. 69, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows.
In 1904, at Bozeman, Montana, Mr. Shadoan was
married to Alma Wright, the daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. J. E. Wright. Her father, who is deceased,
was county judge of Wayne County, Kentucky;
his widow now resides in Los Angeles, California.
To Mr. and Mrs. Shadoan have been born two
children, namely: Raymond, born August 12, 1905,
and Lawrence, born April 18, igoS. In every phase
of life's activities Mr. Shadoan has been true to
his duties and his opportunities and has so ordered
his actions as to merit the high regard in which he
is today held by those who know him.
Edwin Leonard Johnson came to Plains, Mon-
tana, in 1906, and has been continuously associated
with the First National Bank of Plains, and as its
cashier has helped promote its prosperity and its
strength as one of the leading banking institutions
of Sanders County^
Mr, Johnson was born at Center City, Minnesota,
January 24, 1885. His people were pioneers in Min-
nesota, where his grandfather. Jonas Johnson,
homesteaded a farm more than half a century ago.
Jonas Johnson was born at Smoland. Sweden, in
1827, and after his marriage brought his family to
this country and settled in Center City, Minnesota.
He was an industrious and successful farmer in
that locality until his death in 1917. C. J. Johnson,
father of the Plains banker, was born at Center
City, Minnesota, in 1862, and is still living there.
He has spent his active career as a dairy farmer.
He is a republican and a member of the Lutheran
Church. C. J. Johnson married Mary Moline, who
was also born at Center City, in 1863. They have
a large family of children, and several of the sons
were soldiers and officers in the World War. Henry
A., the oldest, is cashier of the Scandia State Bank
at Scandia, Minnesota. Edwin L. is the second in
age. William, the third, died at the age of four
years. J. Arthur, at home with his parents, en-
tered the first officers' training camp, was commis-
sioned second lieutenant at Fort Snelling, and after-
ward promoted to first lieutenant, and was in serv-
ice at Houston, Texas, and in New Mexico until
mustered out in the spring of 1919. Oscar R., an
electrician living at Minneapolis, also enlisted at
the outbreak of the war, was in an officers' train-
ing camp and commissioned a second lieutenant,
and served until discharged in May, 1919. Theodore,
at home, attended a training school at Pittsburg,
Pennsylvania, and was mustered out in January.
1919. Paul, the seventh child, helps on his father's
farm. Esther T. is the wife of a farmer at Marine
on the St. Croix River in Minnesota. The two
younger children are Oliver and Elmer, twins, both
at home.
Edwin Leonard Johnson was educated in the pub-
lic schools of Center City, including the high school,
and for two years was a student in the famous
Gustavus Adolphus College at St. Peter, Minnesota.
Leaving college in 1905, he spent the following year
before coming to Montana in the employ of Wy-
man, Partridge & Company, wholesale dry goods
of Minneapolis. He entered the First National
Bank of Plains in 1906 as bookkeeper and stenog-
rapher, was promoted to assistant cashier in 1908,
and since 1910 has been cashier.
The First National Bank of Plains was estab-
lished in 1904 under a national charter. It operates
on a capital of $25,000, surplus and profits of $12.-
000, and enjoys aggregate deposits of $300,000. J.
M. Keith, of Missoula, is president of the bank.
C. H. Rittenour, of Plains, is vice president, with
Mr. Johnson, cashier.
Mr. Johnson has identified himself with Plains
as a citizen and home owner and has a modern
residence here. He has served as mayor, is a re-
publican voter, a member of the Community Church
and is a past master of Ponemah Lodge No. 63,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. He is also a
member of the Montana and the American Bankers
Association.
In 1910, at Plains, he married Miss Louise Jack-
son, a daughter of P. B. and Mamie (Glenn) Jack-
son, residents of Gate, Washington. Her father
is now a retired minister of the Congregational
Church. He first came to Montana in 1892. and
for five years was pastor of the Congregational
Church at Billings, later had pastorates at Sprague.
Washington, Little Rock, Arkansas, North Yakima,
Washington, and from 1901 to igog was pastor
at Plains. Mr. and Mrs. Johnson have two chil-
dren: Charles Glenn, born November 17, 191 1; and
Robert Brooks, born March 8, 1913.
John Rowley. A number of Montana and western
pioneers have their home at Lewistown, including
John Rowley, whose experiences in the West cover
42
HISTORY OF MONTANA
more than forty years, though practically all his
life has been spent in a western environment.
He was born at Salt Lake City, February l8, 1858.
His parents, John and Isabel (Slater) Rowley, were
only temporarily residents at Salt Lake. They were
natives of England, and came to this country with
six of their children in 1849. They were eight
weeks in crossing the ocean on a sailing vessel and
from New York City went out to the then extreme
frontier, Nebraska City, Nebraska. From that point
John Rowley, Sr., engaged in freighting over the
plains with ox teams. His family made several trips
with him, and for one winter, 1858, the family home
was at Salt Lake City. John Rowley, Sr., continued
in the freighting business until his death. He was
the father of nine children, five sons and four
daughters, and four are still living, including John
Rowley, the youngest child.
The'latter spent most of his boyhood at Nebraska
City and attended the public schools. At the age
of thirteen he became a cowboy with Crawford,
Thompson & Company, and not long afterward
reached Deer Lodge, Montana, where he was con-
nected with a prominent cattle outfit. Later he
was with the Horse Shoe Outfit, and for
about twenty-five years was associated with N. J.
Dovenspeck. He then engaged in the sheep and
cattle business for himself, and at the present time
owns a fine ranch fifty miles east of Lewiston.
He is a republican, but has never had any aspira-
tions to hold office.
His life has been one long and eventful experience
in the western country. He made seven successful
trips between Montana and Cheyenne, Wyoming,
the latter being the shipping point for many years.
The first trip was made with a bunch of cattle in
1876. In crossing Green River one of the young
men of the party was drowned. His companions re-
covered the body, rolled it in a blanket and gave him
as decent a burial as possible. At another time
Mr. Rowley and his companions were crossing Wind
River where Lander, Wyoming, now stands. Indians
appeared, stole their horses, but the cowboys gave
chase and overhauled the Indians about seventy miles
distant. There ensued a skirmish in which the stolen
stock was recovered. One man was left to guard
the stock while the others, bent upon vengeance, fol-
lowed the Indians. Going about fifteen miles they
came up and had a skirmish. One of the men,
named John McCullum, was wounded in the fight,
and the white men decided they had sufficient Indian
encounter for the time. They started back, but on
reaching the spot where the horses had been left
discovered they had again been driven away by the
Indians, and they then made their way back as best
they could, carrying the wounded man to Lander.
Mr. Rowley recalls an amusing incident in 1879
that happened at Pine Bluff, Wyoming, showing how
the West was looked upon by a certain class of
eastern people. There were seventeen different herds
waiting shipment at the point with the full com-
plement of cowboy attendants. About 100 yards
from the station was a saloon crowded with cowboys
when the westbound train pulled in for a stop of
about ten minutes. It was a cold winter day and
blowing hard ; and a passenger dressed in eastern
style and holding on to a derby hat jumped off the
train and ran over to the saloon. He pushed his
head in the door and said, "I don't want to buy
anything but just want to see the interior of a
Western saloon." One of the cowboys for a joke
pulled out his gun and shouted "Kill the son of a
gun." Immediately they all pulled their guns and
began shooting through the roof. The passenger
yelled with terror and made a wild break for the
train, breaking all speed limits and records in getting
there, and no doubt since has told the tale many
times of how he escaped death from a crowd of
bloodthirsty ruffians chasing him over the country.
Such incidents were common in the old days, and
the old timers have had many hearty laughs since
that time about them.
At Lewistown October 6, 1889, Mr. Rowley mar-
ried Miss Martha Josephine Skaggs. She is a daugh-
ter of Cyrus and Anna Caroline (Moser) Skaggs.
Her father was born in Missouri and died at the
age of seventy-eight and her mother was a native
of North Carolina and died at the age of fifty-
eight. Mrs. Rowley was the oldest of seven chil-
dren, four sons and three daughters, si.x of whom
are living. Mr. and Mrs. Rowley have three chil-
dren : John Harvey, the oldest, enlisted December
7, 1917, in the Aviation Corps and was in service
at Kelley Field, later at Camp McArthur, Texas, sub-
sequently at Newport News, and received a commis-
sion. Lancelot Charles, the second son, is a civil
engineer with home at Philadelphia. Hyacinth, the
only daughter, is completing her education in the
University of Wisconsin at Madison.
Frank Bender came to Montana more than thirty-
eight years ago, has had a varied experience as a
rancher, printer, merchant and public official, and
is now at the head of one of the leading real estate
businesses in Southern Montana, at Livingston.
Mr. Bender was born in New York City March
9, i860. His father, John Adam Bender, was born
in 1824 and died in 1869, spending all his life
in New York City, a shoe merchant, manufacturer
and leather dealer. After the formation of that
party he became an ardent republican. 'He was a
member of the Lutheran Church. His wife, Rosie
Bender, was born in 1826 and died in 1866. Of
their children the oldest, Charles, enlisted in the
One Hundred and Forty-Ninth New York Infantry,
was wounded in battle and died from the effects
of the wounds after the close of the war. Philip,
the second son, was a farmer and died at Sparta,
Wisconsin. Emil E., died in Dakota Territory.
Frank is the fourth in age. while John A., the young-
est, is a miner now at Anchorage, Alaska.
Frank Bender graduated from high school in
New York City in 1876. For two years he worked
with the Hatch Lithograph Company in his native
city and spent one year in the Jones Foundry Com-
pany at Brooklyn. On leaving the East he went
to a farm near Sparta, Wisconsin, and afterward
spent two and a half years with the job printing
firm of Johnson, Smith & Harrison at Minneapolis.
Mr. Bender came to Montana in 1881, first locat-
ing at Glendive, soon afterward, going to Miles
City, and for about six months was employed as
purchasing agent for the contractors who were
working down the Cheyenne Bluffs along the river
between Miles City and Rosebud. Mr. Bender then
had some business relations speculating in ranch
properties around Bozeman and in March, 1883,
came to Livingston and was associated with his
brother John A., as a farmer and stockman. In
1884, leaving their stock on the range, they moved
to Cook City and during the winter of 1885-86
Mr. Bender was at Fridley, now known as Emigrant.
March i, 1886, he started on a visit to California,
but returned in May and resumed his activities
as a stock raiser. In 1898 he sold out his ranching
interests and returning to Livingston spent two
years as a merchant. Then followed a long period
of official service, including four years as constable
of Livingston Township, and since then continu-
ously as a justice of the peace. He also served
HISTORY OF MONTANA
43
a term as alderman, and twelve years as police
judge. Since 1909 Mr. Bender has been in the real
estate business, and has developed a complete
organization with a service covering city and ranch
properties all over Southern Montana. His offices
are in the Thompson Block.
Mr. Bender is one of the prominent Odd Fellows
of Montana. He is affiliated with all branches of
Odd Fellowship, being a past grand of Park Lodge
No. 17, past chief patriarch of Columbian Encamp-
ment 204, past captain of Garfield Canton, and was
major of the Second Battalion of the Patriarchs
Militant for a number of years and has been a
delegate to the Grand Lodge, representing all the
branches on a number of occasions. He is also
past venerable consul of Silver Tip Camp No. 5675,
Modern Woodmen of America and past exalted
ruler of Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks and
was a representative to the Grand Lodge in 1906
at Denver Colorado. For a number of years Mr.
Bender has served as secretary of the Livingston
Fire Department which was organized in 1886 and
of which he is one of the oldest living members.
He is also secretary of the Park County Pioneers,
an association which was organized in 1918. He
is a democrat in politics.
His home is at 320 South Third Street. He mar-
ried at Livingston in 1892 Miss Ollie V. Cole,
daughter of Alfred and Mary Ann (Freeman) Cole.
Her parents are deceased, her father having been a
pioneer Montana farmer at Glendive.
Will J. Soderlind, who was prominently identi-
fied with the establishment of the pioneer banking
institution of Rapelje, is a banker by profession,
since he has been connected with banks during the
greater part of his active lifetime and all his ex-
perience has been in commercial lines. Mr. Soder-
lind has a wide acquaintance with the northwestern
country, not only Montana but several adjoining
states and in Canada.
He was born at Ludington, Michigan, May 23,
1885. His father, Alfred Soderlind, was born in
Sweden in 1857, was reared in that country to the
age of eighteen, and on coming to the United States
located at Ludington, Michigan. In 1886 he moved
to Lake Benton, Minnesota, where he bought a
farm. From farming he formed connections with
the financial community and established the Farm-
ers State Bank of Lake Benton and since 1906 has
been its cashier. He is still living at Lake Ben-
ton. He also served as register of deeds of Lin-
coln County, Minnesota. He is an independent
democrat and is affiliated with the Knights of
Pythias and the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. Alfred Soderlind married Emily Johnson.
She was born in Sweden in 1861 and was reared
from childhood in Michigan ; Will J. is the oldest
of their children. Charles is assistant cashier in
the Farmers State Bank at Lake Benton, Minne-
sota; Alma is the wife of Hans Lyngaard, a farmer
in Lincoln County, Minnesota; Alice is still at
home; Grace is the wife of Roy Martie, who has
a lieutenant's commission in the National army;
and Walter, the youngest, is with the home circle.
Will J. Soderlind acquired his early education in
the public schools of Lake Benton, to which com-
munity he was taken when about a year old. He
finished his sophomore year in the high school, and
in 1903 attended the Minneapolis School of Busi-
ness. His banking experience began as bookkeeper
with the National Citizens Bank of Lake Benton.
He was iH years in that work, then spent two
years as assistant cashier, and two years as cashier,
of the Securities State Bank of Seaforth, Minne-
sota. On leaving that position he acquired a some-
what different experience in banking. As an em-
ploye of the J. I. Case Threshing Machine Com-
pany he was in their Minneapolis office for 1%
years and then for one year represented the com-
pany at Winnipeg, Canada, and in 191 1 the same
company sent him to their Billings headquarters,
where he remained as bookkeeper and cashier for
two years, and then for two years was assistant
collector and another two years were spent as gen-
eral collector covering Montana and Wyoming.
Mr. Soderlind left the Case Company in 1917 to
identify himself with the new Town of Rapelje
at the time the First National Bank was established.
This bank has a capital of $25,000, and its surplus
is $2,500. The officers are : Roy J. Covert, of Bill-
ings, president ; Albert E. Platz, of Billings, vice
president; Will J. Soderlind, cashier; and J. Herbert
Jones, assistant cashier.
Mr. Soderlind is also secretary and treasurer of
the Rapelje Telephone Company and is agent for
the Rapelje Townsite Company. He owns his home
in the town and a farm north of Rapelje. Mr.
Soderlind is an independent in politics, a member
of the Episcopal Church, belongs to the Commer-
cial Club of Rapelje and is affiliated with Rapelje
Lodge No. 122, Ancient Free and .Accepted Masons.
In 1910, at Seaforth, Minnesota, he married Miss
Florence Longbottom, daughter of John and Eliza-
beth (Johnston) Longbottom, resident of Seaforth,
her father being a retired merchant, farmer and
banker. Mr. and Mrs. Soderlind have two children :
Jay, born August 24, 1912, and Shirley, born July 7,
1916.
Prof. J. H. Holst since 1913 has been principal
of secondary education and director of the sum-
mer season of the Montana State College at Boze-
man. A notable achievement as a teacher and school
leader preceded his coming to Bozeman, where
during the past half dozen years he has been able
to influence for the better the large number of young
men and women preparing _for work in the educa-
tional profession.
Professor Hoist was born at Gravois Mills, Mis-
souri, March 2, 1873. His father was N. J. Hoist
and his grandfather was Nicholas Hoist, and both
were natives of the Province of Schleswig Hol-
stein, when that province was part of the King-
dom of Denmark. The family are of Danish an-
cestry. Nicholas Hoist was born in 1815, had
served his time in the Danish army and in 1859
brought his family to America and settled in Mor-
gan County, Missouri. He was one of the early
farmers in that section and lived there the rest of
his life. He died at Gravois Mills in 1898, at the
advanced age of eighty-three. N. J. Hoist, his son,
is still living at Eldon, Missouri. He was born in
Schleswig Holstein in 1849, and was ten years of
age when brought to the United States. He grew
up in Morgan County, Missouri, and has spent his
active life as a farmer. Since 191 1 he has lived
retired at Eldon, but still owns a small farm, his
original place being owned by his sons. He is a
democrat, an active worker in' the Christian Church
and is affiliated with the Masonic Order. His wife, .
Rachel Jane James, was born at Gravois Mills,
Missouri, in 1850. Professor Hoist is the oldest
of their six children. Letreciam, the second in age,
is the wife of C. F. Rastorfer, a farmer at Bar-
netts, Missouri ; Thomas R. lives on a farm at Mar-
vin, Missouri; J. D. is a farmer at Eldon; Hiram
operates a grain elevator in Colorado ; and Ola, the
youngest, is unmarried and living with her parents.
Receiving his first advantages in the rural schools
44
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of Morgan County, J. H. Hoist afterwards at-
tended an academy at Versailles in his native state,
and in 1898 graduated from the Hooper Institute
at Clarksburg, Missouri. In the meantime for two
years he had practical experience as a newspaper
man, one year of which was with the St. Louis
Chronicle. " For two years he was associate presi-
dent, but as a matter of fact was the actual head
of the Hooper Institute. Professor Hoist began
his career as a Montana educator in 1900, when he
located at Dillon and worked a year with the Dillon
Tribune. He then became principal of schools at
Gibbonsville, Idaho, held that post three years and
for three years was also interested in mining opera-
tions in Idaho.
In 1908 Professor Hoist returned to Montana an.d
organized at Victor the first consolidated school
in the state. He was its superintendent six years.
What he did there is best reviewed in the words
of the leading editorial contained in the Journal of
Education of Boston in the issue of October 25, 1917.
"Professor J. H. Hoist," says the editorial, "now
of the State College of Agriculture at Bozeiran,
Montana, is one of the best demonstrations we know
of a man's giving himself more than state-wide
recognition by intensified service in a small com-
munity. Victor is a little place in the Bitter Root
Valley of Montana. It has never had more than
a hundred fifty population. Mr. Hoist went there
nine years ago this September. The school en-
rollment was one hundred thirty-seven, or nearly
equal to the entire population of the village. Of
course the district lines were much larger than
the village boundaries." The editorial then enume-
rates a long list of progressive achievements under-
taken through and as a result of Mr. Hoist, in-
cluding the increase in number of teachers, better
salary schedule for their services, the teaching of
agriculture on scientific principles, the organization
of a Parents-Teachers Association and a District
Teachers .Association, the establishment of a school
savings bank, the first in the state, the organization
of the first County Interscholastic League, and the
making of the periodic events of debating and liter-
ary contests, athletic meets, the principal gala oc-
casions for the entire community. In 1912 Mr.
Hoist, after having added a high school course
and greatly increased the facilities of the Victor
school and the building of a splendid schoolhouse
for the district, secured the consolidation of five
school districts, thus bringing about the first con-
solidated school in Montana.
The editorial in the Journal of Education closes
with the following sentences : "When the Agricul-
tural College elected him to a position in the faculty
in 1913 the school district voted to, make his salary
equal to any that the state would pay. The banquet
to Mr. and Mrs. Hoist with the gifts of a gold watch
for him and of a silver service for Mrs. Hoist was
an event never to be forgotten in the Bitter Root
country. More than four hundred were seated
at the tables. Professor J. H. Hoist not only made
Victor famous for Victor, but famous for more
first things in progressive education than any other
city in the state."
While Professor Hoist has been able to broaden
the effectiveness of his influence and educational
ideals through his present work at Montana State
College, he doubtless regards his experience at
Victor as one of the most stimulating and happy
of his entire career. In 1918 the degree of Master
of .Arts was conferred upon him by Montana Uni-
versity. Professor Hoist owns a farm in the Bitter
Root country in Ravalli County, and therefore has
a direct personal interest in ^lontana agriculture.
He and his family reside at the Barracks. He is
independent in politics, is a vestryman in the Epis-
copal Church, served two years as master of his
Masonic lodge at Victor and is a member of Boze-
man Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, and is affiliated with, the Lily of the Valley
Chapter No. 6 of the Eastern Star. He is a member
of the National Education Association.
In 1910, at Poison, Montana, he married Miss
Laura C. Maynard. Her father. Judge A. D. May-
nard, is a large property owner at Poison, where
he resides, and is also engaged in the lumber busi-
ness at Pablo in Flathead County. Mrs. Hoist is a
graduate of Montana State Normal College at Dillon
and before her marriage was a teacher in the schools
at Victor for three years. Mr. and Mrs. Hoist
have two children, Rachel Edith, born January 31,
1912; and Jane Maynard, born February 11, 1914.
C. C. Mills is a laiVyer by profession, but since
coming to Montana has given his chief time and
abilities to newspaper work. He is now manager
and editor of the Sanders County Ledger at Thomp-
son Falls.
Mr. Mills was born at Redfield, Iowa, September
28, 1872. His paternal ancestors came from Eng-
land, and the family lived for many years in the
southern states. Grandfather Milton Mills was
born in Tennessee in 1816. He became one of the
pioneer farmers in the vicinity of Redfield. Iowa.
Later he took up merchandising, and he died at
Redfield in 1890. His wife was Matilda Locke,
also a native of Tennessee. She died at Redfield,
Iowa. John H. Mills, father of the Montana
editor, was born in Indiana in 1846, and was a
small child when his parents moved to the State
of Iowa. He was reared and married near Red-
field, and for many years was a farmer and later
engaged in the newspaper business. He is still
living at Redfield and is now connected with the
oil inspection department of the state government.
He is a veteran Union soldier, having enlisted in
1863, when only seventeen years of age. He was
a private in Company H of the Thirty-ninth Iowa
Infantry, and served until the close of the war.
He participated in the march to the sea under
Sherman. He has long been an active member of
the Grand Army of the Republic and in 1918 was
department commander of the Iowa State Grand
.Army of the Republic. He is a republican and is
affiliated with the Masons and Knights of Pythias.
John H. Mills married Sarah A. Duck, who was
born in Indiana in 1846. They had four children:
R. R.. a farmer at Redfield, Iowa; C. C. A-Iills ;
Jvlilton L., of Lowerville, Iowa; and R. C, a veter-
inarian at Redfield.
C. C. Mills secured his early advantages in the
rural schools of Dallas County, Iowa, graduated
from the high school at Redfield in 1893, and in
1896 received his Bachelor of Science degree from
Iowa State College at Ames. He taught a number
of terms to defray the expenses of his college
education. Mr. Mills prepared for the legal pro-
fession in the law school of the University of Wis-
consin, where he graduated LL. B. in 1904. For
one year he practiced at Westfield, Wisconsin, and
for eight or nine years had a law ofiice and pub-
lished a newspaper at Scranton, North Dakota.
From 1913 to the spring of 1919 Mr. Mills published
the Montana Idea at Dodson. After some weeks
of travel he located at Thompson Falls, where he
is editor and manager of the Sanders County Ledger.
The Ledger is one of the oldest papers in western
Montana, having been established in 1884. It en-
joys a substantial circulation and influence through-
Oy/^^^^^^<^C cf. v^^ ,7>f-<) ^a
(^.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
45
out Sanders and surrounding counties, and is re-
publican in politics.
Mr. Mills is himself a republican voter. He is
affiliated with Liberty Lodge No. 99. Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, at Dodson, being past senior
warden. He is also a member of Helena Con-
sistory of the Scottish Rite. In 1896, at Redfield,
Iowa, he married Miss Sabra Welker, daughter of
A. J. and .\nna B. (Park) Welker, now residents
of Great Falls, Montana, where her father is a
retired farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Mills have three
children : Clarence L., born October 20, 1897 ; Don-
ovan, born December 7, 1901 ; and Sabra Helen,
born June 27, 1910. The son Clarence enlisted De-
cember 7, 1917, and was sent overseas March 27,
1918. Eleven months of overseas service is credited
to the young soldier. He participated in several
of the chief offensives in which the American forces
had a part, including the St. Mihiel, Argonne and
Verdun. He was mustered out in March, 1919.
Frederick F. Attix, M. D., who is one of the
two Fellows of the American College of Surgeons
represented in Lewistown, came to this state as
surgeon for a mining company, and for the past
eighteen years has been busily engaged in the work
of his profession at Lewistown, where he founded
and has developed one of the finest private hospitals
in the Northwest.
Doctor Attix was born at Buffalo Prairie, near De-
troit, Minnesota, August 8, 1878, a son of Henry
S. and Mary H. (Knowles) Attix. His father was
born in Illinois in 1854 and his mother in Michigan
in 1858. Doctor Attix is the oldest of six children,
four sons and two daughters, all still living. His fa-
ther was a farmer until 1890, when he removed to
Colorado and engaged in gold and silver mining. He
was appointed postmaster at Mentor, Minnesota,
in 1886, and in politics has been a sturdy democrat
for many years. Both the father and mother are
now residents of Oakland, California.
Doctor Attix acquired his early high school educa-
tion at Glenwood Springs, Colorado, attended St.
John's College at Denver in 1891 and 1892, and took
his medical work in the University of Pennsylvania
at Philadelphia. He finished his four years' course in
1900. Returning to Denver, he was employed for
eight months as company surgeon for the Colorado
Southern Railway. In JJanuary, 1901, he came by
stage coach into the Judith Basin of Montana, and
for about eight months served the Gilt Edge Mining
Company as its surgeon. In August, 1901, he opened
his offices at Lewistown, and has kept his work
pretty exclusively confined to general surgery. Dur-
ing 1916-17 he built what is known as the Attix
Clinic Building, which is in every way representa-
tive of the most advanced ideas in hospilal con-
struction. He has fitted it with every appliance for
diagnostic clinical work. There is a large operating
room, X-Ray apparatus, electric sterilizing outfit
of his own design, and every other facility that can
be found in modern hospitals. Doctor Attix is a
member of the Fergus County Medical Society, the
Silver Bow County Medical Society, the Montana
State Medical Society and the American Medical
Association. He was elected a member of the
American College of Surgeons in 1914, and has
since been chosen to a Fellowship in that body.
Politically he is a republican.
Doctor Attix married, March 24, 1903, Ruth Cre-
sap. She was born near Kansas City, Missouri. Mrs.
Attix is a member of the Daughters of the American
Revolution. They have two daughters, Zelda and
Julia.
Clark W. Allen. With no important interrup-
tions Clark W. Allen has been engaged in the lumber
or grain business ever since he arrived at years
of discretion and manhood. His interests and home
have been at Big Timber for a number of years,
where he is manager of the Thompson Yards, In-
corporated.
He was born at Aylmer in the Province of
Ontario, Canada, June 21, 1882. His paternal
ancestors originally came from Holland and were
colonial settlers in New York. Mr. Allen's great-
great-grandfather was probably what is described
as a United Empire Loyalist, since he removed
his family to Canada at the time of the Revolu-
tionary war. The grandfather of Mr. Allen was
Clark Allen, a native of New York State, but spent
most of his life on a farm at Aylmer, Ontario,
where he died in 1888. Robert Allen, father of
Clark W., was born at Aylmer in 1850, was reared
and married and followed farming there for several
years, and in 1883 went as a pioneer to Watertown,
South Dakota, where he homesteaded a 160 acres
and also took a timber claim. He proved and
operated his farm until 1003, at which date he retired
to Minneapolis, where he died in 1917. He was
a republican after coming to the United States, was
a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church and
affiliated with the Ancient Order of United Work-
men. His wife was Sarah E. Warnock, who was
born at Aylmer. Canada, in 1854, and died at Min-
rpeapolis, in 1917. Clark W., is the third of their
four children. Ethel L., the oldest, is a teacher
in the public schools of Minneapolis. Jessie I., is the
wife of George E. Davis, secretary of a grain com-
pany at Warren, Minnesota, while Jennie is the
wife of John A. Shaw, engineer for a construction
company at Fargo, North Dakota.
Clark W. Allen was graduated from the high
school at Watertown, South Dakota, in 1900. He
has no rnemories of his birthplace in Ontario, since
the family left there when he was about a year
old. All his life has been spent in the northwestern
country. He had his first experience in the lum-
ber business at Watertown as bookkeeper with the
S. H. Bowman Lumber Company, later in 1903, was
promoted to manager of the yard of the same com-
pany at Revillo. South Dakota, and was there two
years. The following year he interrupted his busi-
ness career to improve his educational advantages,
attending the University of Minnesota at Minnea-
polis. When he resumed his business it was in
the general office of the Imperial Elevator Company
at Minneapolis for about a year. He then super-
vised the establishment of a lumber yard at Plaza,
North Dakota, for the Bovey Shute Lumber Com-
pany and remained as its manager until 1910.
Mr. Allen on coming to Big Timber in 1910 be-
came the manager for the H. M. Allen & Company.
Eight years later the local business and other yards
were purchased by the Thompson Yards, Inc., and
Mr. Allen has continued as manager at the old
stand.
He regards himself as a fixture in the citizenship
of Big Timber and owns a modern home on Seventh
Avenue. He served as city councilman four years
and was president of the council throughout that
term. He is a republican, a trustee of the Con-
gregational Church, and is affiliated with Big Tim-
ber Lodge No. 25, Knights of Pythias, Big Timber
Camp, Modern Woodmen of America, and Livings-
ton Camp, Woodmen of the World.
On October 25, 1910, at Plaza. North Dakota, he
married Miss Stella Hagen. Her mother is de-
ceased. Her father, S. H. Hagen, is a merchant at
Plaza. Mrs. Allen is a graduate of the Northwood
46
HISTORY OF MONTANA
High School in North Dakota, and for two years
was a student in the University of North Dakota.
Mr. and Mrs. Allen have three children: Ethelynn,
born December 31, 191 1; Clark Warnock, born
December 30, 1912; and Jerome, born June 5, 1914-
Axel M. Peterson, the manager of the Farmers
Co-operative Elevator Company at Joliet, is a citi-
zen and business man whose career deserves spe-
cial consideration. He had many handicaps to over-
come, acquired a thorough education though a poor
boy, and has realized every successive advancernent
through the medium of hard work and sound ability.
He was born in Southern Sweden, November 2,
1873. His father was Peter Nelson, who spent all
his life in Sweden, served in the Swedish army
several years and was a shoemaker by trade. The
mother was Ingred Johanson, who was born in
Southern Sweden in 1842. About 1890, after the
death of her husband, she came to the United States
and located at Osage, Iowa, where she lived until
her death in 1907. Her two children were Ingred
and Axel. Ingred lives at Osage, Iowa, widow of
Alfred Swanson, who was a blacksmith in that
town.
Axel M. Peterson attended the Lutheran paro-
chial schools in Sweden until he was confirmed at
the age of thirteen. Then, in 1887, he accompanied
his sister to the United States and for several win-
ters attended school at Osage, Iowa. Every sum-
mer he worked in the fields for neighboring farmers,
and his ambition to secure a good education led him
to deny himself many normal pleasures and he
worked to the limit of his strength. He attended
the Cedar Valley Seminary and finished his junior
year, and his subsequent education has been well
rounded out by reading and observation. ."Ks a young
man he worked in a nursery at Osage, also clerked
in a clothing store, and in 1902 came out to Mon-
tana and took up a homestead of 160 acres at .^b-
sarokee in Stillwater County. He commuted his
homestead rights by the payment of a $1.25 an
acre and lived there two years. He was then back
in Iowa for two years working in a clothing store,
and then resumed his place on his homestead in
Absarokee for two years. Having sold his farm
he rented a ranch on Red Lodge Creek in Carbon
County for two years, and in the spring of 1913
moved to the Joilet community and bought a 160-
acre ranch. To that property he gave five years of
close and uninterrupted management, selling out in
1918, and in that year moving into the town of Joilet,
where he became the well qualified manager of the
Farmers' Cooperative Elevator Company. He is also
secretary and treasurer and a director of this cor-
poration.
Mr. Peterson is a republican, member and deacon
of the Christian Church, is affiliated with Carbon
Lodge No. 6s, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, being worshipful master of the lodge, and
has taken the degrees in the Billings Consistory of
the Scottish Rite.
He married at Carpenter, Iowa, in 1901, Miss Ella
Eddy, daughter of Thomas and Louise (Allanson)
Eddy. Her father was a farmer in Iowa and in
1900 came to Carbon County, Montana. Both her
parents are deceased. Mrs. Peterson is president of
the Board of Education at JoJiet. They have two
young sons, Arnold K., born August 10, 1902, and
Stanley H., born July 25, 1904.
Edward O'Brien. The life of a successful man is
always an interesting study, and all the more so
when results have been won by personal effort in
the face of difficulties. Attention may thus be
called to Edward O'Brien, who is superintendent of
the smelter department at Anaconda for the great
A. C. M. Company, a position of vast responsibility
only properly comprehended by those who under-
stand the potent forces in constant operation in
the mighty furnaces connected with this modern
industry.
Edward O'Brien was born in County Limerick,
Ireland, May 7, 1867, and is a son of Daniel and
Ellen (Redfern) O'Brien, both of whom were born
in County Limerick, the father in 1824 and the
mother in 1839. Daniel O'Brien came with his fam-
ily to the United States in 1865 and was one of
the pioneer settlers in Walworth County, Wisconsin.
He acquired and improved a farm there, and lived
usefully and peacefully until his death, which oc-
cured at Geneva Lake, in Walworth County, in
1884. He was married to Ellen Redfern in Ireland,
and their three children were born there, namely:
William, who died in the City of Chicago in 1917,
was a foreman in railroad shops at Cleveland, Ohio,
for many years ; Thomas, who is a cement con-
tractor at Anaconda, Montana ; and Edward, who
is one of Anaconda's prominent and substantial
citizens aside from his connection with the A. C.
M. Company. Both parents were faithful members
of the Roman Catholic Church.
Edward O'Brien attended the country schools
near his .father's farm in Walworth County as op-
portunity ofltered, but in early youth found farm
tasks somewhat distasteful and determined to event-
ually seek employment for his energies in a direc-
tion that was more congenial. Starting out for
himself practically without capital, he went to Chi-
cago, Illinois, easily made friends there and secured
employment that occupied him for two years. In
1884, on his way westward, he reached Pueblo,
Colorado, and spent one year working there. In
1885 he came to -Anaconda, and was immediately
given employment as furnaceman's helper with the
A. C. M. Company, and has been identified with this
great business enterprise ever since. It has been
a characteristic of Mr. O'Brien that he has never
stood still, and the humble helper soon became shift
boss, then was promoted to be foreman, and sub-
sequently was made superintendent of the entire
smelter department. The offices where he transacts
business are in the Smelter Building, at the Washoe
Reduction Works, two miles east of Anaconda.
Not only in business life has Mr. O'Brien been
successful because of fidelity and dependability,
but his sterling character has been so universally
recognized at Anaconda that his fellow citizens have
twice elected him mayor of the city and have profited
under his firm, judicious administration.
.A.t Helena, Montana, in 1904, Mr. O'Brien was
united in marriage to Miss Mary O'Neil, whose
parents. John and Mary O'Neil, are deceased. John
O'Neil came to Butte, Montana, in 1881 and worked
in a smelter there, but later moved to .'\naconda
and operated a boarding house. Mrs. O'Brien was
educated in a college in Canada. Mr. and Mrs.
O'Brien are members of the Roman Catholic Church.
He belongs to Anaconda Council No. 882, and is a
third degree Knight of Columbus, is a member of
the Catholic Order of Foresters, and belongs al.so to
the .'\naconda Club. Like his father before him,
Mr. O'Brien has always been a strong supporter
of the principles of the democratic party. He
owns a valuable piece of real estate here, his hand-
some, modern residence that stands on Maple Street,
Anaconda.
Griffith Alexander W^illiams was busily en-
gaged as a teacher and school superintendent for
/C /m^^f,,^^--^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
47
several years before coming to Montana, but left
the teaching profession to engage in journalism. He
is now publisher of two newspapers in Sanders
County, and is one of the most widely known resi-
dents of Plains.
Mr. Williams was born at Kirkland in Cumber-
land County, England, May 22, 1882. His branch
of the Williams family has lived in Wales for many
generations, and through his mother is of old Eng-
lish stock. Grandfather Griffith Williams was born
in 1817 and died in 1910, having spent all his life as
a farmer in Carnarvonshire, Wales. Hugh Wil-
liams, father of the Montana newspaper man, was
born in Carnarvonshire, Wales, May 28, 1849. and is
still living at the age of seventy-one, a resident of
Cleator Moor in Cumberland County, England. At
the age of twenty-one he left his native district in
Wales and moved to Kirkland, England, where he
was married and where he worked in the iron ore
mines. In 1891 he transferred his residence to
Cleator Moor, where he was engaged in the in-
surance business and mining until he retired. For
many years he was a lay preacher of the Methodist
Church. He is a Liberal in politics. His wife was
Sarah Twiname, who was born in Cumberland
County, England, in 1862. Griffith A. is the oldest
of their children. Margaret Jane is the wife of
Arthur Hunt, who for four years was a British sol-
dier in the World war, and is now a warden in the
Wormwood Scrubbs Prison at London, England.
Gaunor is the wife of Richard Hughes, also a
warden in the Wormwood Scrubbs Prison. Agnes
Mary is the wife of H. S. Armitage. a rancher at
Briston, Montana. Sarah Elizabeth, unmarried, lives
at Lancashire, England, and took an active part in
war work. Elsie May is married and lives at Lan-
cashire, while the youngest children, still at home,
are Winifred, Arthur, Arnold and Robert.
Griffith -Me.xander Williams was educated in the
public schools of Cleator Moor, graduating from
high school in 1900. He then served as an ap-
prentice school teacher in Cumberland County and
later as assistant principal in Derbyshire until 1905.
Mr. Williams came to Butte, Montana, in October,
1905, and for a short time was a teacher in the
high school department of the Butte Business Col-
lege, for one year was principal of schools at Ennis
and one year superintendent of schools at Wisdom,
Montana. He first entered the newspaper business
associated with John N. Armstrong, proprietor of
the Big Hole Breezes. He bought out the paper
after Mr. .Armstrong's death and continued to edit
it until igi.i. He next became publisher and editor
of the Dixon Herald in Sanders County, and still
directs the policy and management of the Herald,
which was established in 191 1. It is inde-
pendent in politics. In February, 1918, Mr. Wil-
liams bought the Plainsman at Plains from Guy
Stratton. This is one of the older newspapers
in what is now Sanders County, having been estab-
lished in 1899. The Plainsman is also conducted
independently as to political affiliation, and is the
official paper of Sanders County at the time this is
written. The plant and offices are opposite the
Northern Pacific Depot, and there is a modern
equipment operated by electric power for handling
all the work of a standard newspaper. Mr. Wil-
liams' papers circulate and have a large influence
over Sanders and surrounding counties.
Personally Mr. Williams is a republican and was
chairman of the Republican County Central Commit-
tee of Sanders County in 1916. He served as a
member of the school board at Dixon and is affili-
ated with Wisdom Lodge No. 61, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, and is a past grand of Golden
Link Lodge No. 27, Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows, also at Wisdom.
In 1913, at Wisdom, he married Charlotte A.
Wold, daughter of P. M. and Marion Wold, resi-
dents of Minneapolis. Her father is a retired mer-
chant tailor. Mrs. Williams is a graduate of the
Minneapolis High School and is a thoroughly well
qualified musician, especially instrumental. She was
a teacher of music at both Wisdom and Dixon, Mon-
tana. Mr. and Mrs. Williams have three children :
Marion Elizabeth, born October 19. 1914; Agnes
Adelma, born June 20, 1916; and Griffith Hugh, born
December i, 1918.
Harry L. Wilson, who came to Billings in 1901,
is a prominent lawyer, member of the firm Nichols
& Wilson, and is also widely known all over the
State of Montana, having been the republican can-
didate for governor in 1912.
His father, Frank J. Wilson, was a resident of
Miles City, Montana, for a number of years. He
was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, in 1853, son
of E. C. Wilson, also a native of Pennsylvania. E.
C. Wilson spent his life in Pennsylvania but died
in Nebraska in 1909. Frank J. Wilson when a young
man moved to Lanark, Illinois, and married there
Miss Cordelia Miller. She was born in Illinois in
1857 and died at Covina, California, January 18,
1917. Frank J. Wilson for a time was in the paint
and oil business at Lanark, Illinois, was also a
teacher, spent five years as a farmer in Tarna
County, Iowa, another five years as a farmer in
Jewell County, Kansas, and in 1893 moved to Miles
City, Montana, where he was a painting contractor.
From 1901 he was engaged in the ice business. His
death, which occurred October 27, 1903, was the
result of an accident when his team ran away. He
was a democrat, a member of the City Council, and
for many years was affiliated with the Ancient
Order of United Workmen. He was favorably re-
garded at Miles City, and among other tributes the
Yellowstone Journal published an article, one para-
graph of which deserves repetition: "Miles City
has lost from its citizenship in its brief existence
men who have, from one cause or another, been
better or more widely known, but never one of
greater intrinsic worth as a citizen and a man. He
came to us years ago quietly and unostentatiously,
and thus he grew into our life until something over
three years ago the people of his ward chose him
unanimously as their representative in the City
Council, and after two years' service he was again
unanimously chosen to succeed himself, and had he
lived his term of service would only have been
ended by his peremptory refusal to accept re-
election. In his private business his affairs steadily
grew better from the start of some ten years ago,
and the full measure of his prosperity was enjoyed
by his family, whose sustaining prop is now so
rudely plucked away."
The children of Frank J. Wilson and wife were:
Harry L. ; Guy, who died in infancy; Rena May,
wife of Randolph Deivel, a wealthy stockman and
formerly a member of the Legislature in Custer
County, living at Miles City; Lula, wife of J. E
Campbell, who succeeded her father in the ice
business at Miles City; Floyd B., a merchant tailor
at Covina, California; and Richard W., who grad-
uated in June, 1918, from the law department of the
University of California, and is now practicing law at
Covina.
Harry L. Wilson was born at Lanark. Carroll
County, Illinois, June 19, 1879. and acquired his
education in the public schools of Iowa and Kansas.
He graduated from the Miles City High School
48
HISTORY OF MOXTAxNA
June 4, 1897, and on June i, 1899, received his law
degree from the Northern Indiana Normal School
and University at Valparaiso. For eighteen months
he vi'as stenographer and law student with Hon. C.
R. Middleton of Leavenworth, Kansas. Mr. Mid-
dleton formerly was prominent as a lawyer in
Montana. On account of ill health Mr. Wilson
returned to Montana, was employed in several law
offices as a stenographer, an art he had learned in
college, and on January 15, 1901, he came to Billings,
where he went to work for Col. O. F. Goddard
and later for Fred H. Hathhorn, attorneys, spending
three years with those lawyers. He began private
practice in 1904 and in the fall of the same year
was elected county attorney of Yellowstone County,
an office he filled with exceptional ability for three
terms, being reelected in 1906 and 1908. In June.
1910, he formed his partnership with Judge Edmund
Nichols, under the name Nichols & Wilson. This
firm, with offices in the Electric Building, handles
a large general practice, and is regarded as one of
the best law firms in Eastern Montana.
Mr. W'.lson was temporary cnairman of the State
Republican Convention in 1912, and without solicita-
tion on his part or any expectation of the honor he
was placed on the state ticket as candidate for
governor, being brought in as the "dark horse" by
his party. Mr. Wilson is a stockholder and director
of the Rowe Furniture Company and the Highland
Homes Company of Billings. He is prominent
fraternally, being affiliated with Ashlar Lodge, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Chapter
No. 6, Royal Arch Masons, Aldemar Commandery
No. 5, Knights Templar, and Algeria Temple of
the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is past exalted
ruler of Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks, has represented the
lodge in seven national conventions, and is past
district deputy for the State Lodge of Elks.
September 30, 1903, at Dexter, Illinois, Mr. Wilson
married Miss Virginia Baker, daughter of A. W.
and Olive M. (Rippeteau) Baker, who are still
living at Dexter, her father being a retired merchant
and the former postmaster. Mr. and Mrs. Wilson
have two daughters: Winnifred W., born October
31, 1904, and Gladys, born July 26, 1907.
Edmund Nichols, senior member of the law firm
of Nichols and Wilson at Billings, was born in St.
Lawrence County, New York, June 4, i860, son
of Orson K. and Amanda L. (Jones) Nichols. His
first American ancestor, John Nichols, came to
America from England and settled in Massachusetts
in the seventeenth century. Orson K. Nichols was
a member of an artillery regiment during the Civil
war and died while a prisoner of war in 1864.
Edmund Nichols, only child of his parents, at-
tended school in New York arid graduated from the
law department of the University of Iowa in 1883.
He practiced at Adel, Iowa, until 1888, then at
Perry, Iowa, until 1902, and served a term as
prosecuting attorney. He was elected judge of the
Fifth Judicial District of Iowa in 1902, and filled
that office with distinguished ability for two terms.
Judge Nichols came to Billings in January. 191 1,
and has since been associated in practice with Harry
L. Wilson. He is prominent in Masonic orders, is
a republican, and is First Reader in the Christian
Science Church of Billings.
June 17, 1885, Judge Nichols married Miss Doro-
thy I. Stephens, a native of Illinois. They have five
children: Lillian, a graduate of St. Mary's Hall
at Faribault, Minnesota; Dorothy, connected with
the Christian Science Publishing House at Boston
and a graduate of the Billings High School ; Joseph-
ine, wife of Robert Perkins, a farmer; Edmund, a
student at the Montclair Academy, Montclair, New
Jersey; and Elizabeth, attending the public schools.
WiLLi.\M Churchill, though now one of the
recognized leading business men and merchants
of Big Timber, had a hard struggle to acquire a
foothold on the ladder of success, but has always
been a willing and cheerful worker and a man ready
to accept opportunity and recognize it when he
saw it.
He is a native son of Big Timber, born in that
pioneer town as it was thirty-five years ago, Jan-
uary 31, 1884. His paternal ancestors came original-
ly from England. His father, O. F. Churchilh was
born in Oregon in 1858, was married in Oregon
and settled on a homestead of a 160 acres near
Big Timber in 1882. He was a republican and a
Methodist. William Churchill's mother was Alma
Sherrill, who was born in Iowa in 1863, and is
now living with her son William at Big Timber.
William Churchill has one sister, Reno, and she
also lives with her mother. Her mother married
for her second husband Dana W. Cross in 1889.
He was born in Vermont in 185S, came to Montana
about 1883, was a homesteader on Sweetgrass Creek
near Melville, later proved up a farm and home-
stead on Otto Creek, and lived there until 1895.
He died at Lewistown in 1917. To that union were
born four children. Harry, the oldest, is a tailor
at Big Timber. Sarah died at Big Timber in 1912,
the wife of John Watt, a merchant at Columbus,
Montana, and her only child, Alice Watt, is now be-
ing cared for by her grandmother. Carl F. Cross en-
listed from Butte, Montana, in September, 1917, and
went overseas in 1918, with the Three Hundred and
Si.xty-Second Ambulance Company, and was a par-
ticipant in the St. Mihiel drive and in the battle of
the Argonne Forest from September 26th to October
4th, and from October 30th to November nth was
in the Lys-Scheldt offensive. He was mustered
out May 8, 1919, and has since returned to Big
Timber. Fred Cross was accidentally shot and
killed at the age of eleven years.
William Churchill acquired his education in the
public schols of Big Timber. At the age of fourteen
he began working in a printing office, and for two
and a half years he also helped his mother run a
rooming house. He then resumed work as a printer
with the Big Timber Express for three years,
worked on the Yellowstone Leader for W. J.
Hannah two years, and until the fall of 1906 was
with the Big Timber Pioneer. In 1906, as a member
of the National Guard, he went to the coast and
later attended the State Rifle Tournament of New
Jersey. In the fall of 1906 he was back in Montana
at Moore in Fergus County, where he was with the
Inland Empire for two and a half years. In the
meantime he had homesteaded a 160 acres and
proved up his claim, which he sold in 1917. He
also bought another place of 160 acres near
Stamford, and sold this property in 1918. In 1909,
after leaving the Inland Empire, Mr. Churchill be-
came a journeyman printer at Miles City on the
Yellowstone Journal, a daily paper. In 1910 he
returned to Big Timber to look after his cattle,
and after rounding them up he sold out and from
igi2 to the spring of 1915 he was a printer with
the Pioneer at Big Timber. He then abandoned
the printing trade and in association with William
K. Amery bought a stock of general merchandise,
and their partnership has successfully prosecuted
the enterprise until it is one of the leading stores
HISTORY OF MONTANA
49
in the vicinity. They have discontinued all other
lines of merchandise but groceries. Mr. Churchill
is the senior partner.
He ovifus a home in Big Timber. He is unmarried,
he is an alderman of Big Timber, elected in April,
igig. He is a past chancellor commander of Big
Timber Lodge No. 25, Knights of Pythias, a mem-
ber of Sweetgrass Camp No. 10610, Modern Wood-
men of America, is a republican, belongs to the
Chamber of Commerce, the Sweetgrass County
Good Roads Association, the Big Timber Build-
ing and Loan Association, and as a matter of fact
is identified with every progressive and public
spirited movement in his community.
Ernest L. M.arvin is cashier of the Joliet State
Bank, and since identifying himself with that town
has been a leader in its community activities and
has always shown a willingness to do his part as a
public spirited citizen.
Mr. Marvin was born at Bradford, Illinois, Sep-
tember 12, 1888, and apparently has the years of his
greatest usefulness and service still ahead of him.
His father, E. L. Marvin, was of English ancestry
originally settled in Connecticut and was born in
1851, near Ogdensburg, New York, on the Canadian
side of the river. He grew up in New York State,
and then removed to Illinois and spent his active
career at Bradford, where he died in 1904. He was
railroad station agent at Bradford for a number of
years, and the last two years of his life were spent
as a real estate and insurance broker. He is a
republican, was closely identified with the Methodist
Church of his home town, and was a prominent Odd
Fellow. He married in Illinois Cora A. Thomson,
who was born in that state in 186a and is still living
at Lafayette, Illinois. She was the mother of four
children : Guy F... who is court reporter at Boze-
man, Montana ; Ernest L., Pauline, wife of G. E.
Snyder, a farmer at Lafayette, Illinois, and R. W.,
cashier of the Nichols Shepard Company at Billings,
Montana.
Ernest L. Marvin attended public school at Brad-
ford and Lafayette in his native state graduating
from high school in the latter town in 1906. Then
after employment in a local store for a few months
he came to Montana in 1906, and the ne.xt seven years
was an employe of W. R. Westbrook, a banker at
Laurel. He came to Joliet in 1913, and for the past
six years has been cashier of the Joliet State Bank.
Mr. Marvin is active both in politics and fraternal
affairs. He is town clerk of Joliet, clerk of the
school board and republican precinct committeeman.
He is secretary of Carbon Lodge No. 65, Ancient
Free and .'\ccepted Masons ; is past grand and
present secretary of Joliet Lodge No. 77 of the
Odd Fellows, and for two years was patron of
Aloha Chapter No. 41 of the Eastern Star. He is a
member of the Methodist Church. Mr. Marvin owns
his own home in Joliet and some real estate at
Laurel, Montana, his former town.
He married at Belfry, Montana, June 19, 1912,
Miss Janet McLauchlin, a daughter of Donald and
Emma (Harris) McLauchlin. Her parents are farm-
ers at Belfry. They have two children : Alice May,
born April 28, 1^13, and Janet, born .\pril 20, 1915.
Frank F. Tucker. There is a real message of
economy in every show window of Tucker Brothers'
clothing establishment, and the brand of service
rendered by this reliable firm is one which is uni-
versally appreciated. Frank F. Tucker, the senior
member of the firm, is one of the big factors in the
business life of the city and he is a man who knows
how to get for his customers what they want, and
how to meet their requirements in every particular.
He was born at Napanee, Ontario, Canada, June 19,
1879, a son of John R. Tucker. The father was
born at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and died at
Anaconda, Montana, in 191 7. He was reared at
Napanee, Ontario, Canada, and there learned the
brickmaking trade. In 1883 he came to Anaconda and
was for some years engaged in building operations,
being one of the pioneer contractors and builders
of the city. Politically he was a republican. He
married Miss Emma Conger, born in Ontario,
Canada, who died at .Anaconda. Their children
were as follows : Annie, who died at .'\naconda,
was married: Frank F., who was the second in
order of birth ; Earl, who is a member of the firm
of Tucker Brothers, lives at .\naconda ; Elmo, who
lives at Anaconda, enlisted for service during the
great war in 1917, was sent overseas and was
mustered out of the service in May, 1919.
Frank F. Tucker attended the public schools of
Anaconda until he was twelve years of age, and
then became a clerk in a clothing store of Anaconda
and continued to learn this line of business as a
member of the selling force of several establish-
ments until he founded one of his own in 1918.
Although as yet a new undertaking, this clothing
store of Tucker Brothers is one of the leading ones
of its kind in this section of Montana, and is con-
veniently located at No. 207 Main Street. The
members of the firm are Frank F. and his brother
Earl J. Tucker. They handle a high class of cloth-
ing of the latest design and of infinite variety, and
careful dressers have learned that not only can they
secure fashionable and good-fitting garments of
excellent quality here, but also tha't the prices are
extremely reasonable considering the value of the
goods.
Frank F. Tucker is a republican, but has not
sought to come before the public for oflSce. He
belongs to Anaconda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks, and to the .Anaconda
Club and the .'\naconda Country Club. His resi-
dence is in the Alpine .'\partments. In 1911 Frank
F. Tucker was united in marriage with Miss Gladys
Martin, a daughter of Martin Martin, a sketch of
whom appears elsewhere in this work. Mr. and
Mrs. Tucker have no children.
Earl J. Tucker, junior member of the firm of
Tucker Brothers, was born at Napanee, Ontario,
Canada, November 14, 1889. The Tucker family
migrated from England to .America during the
colonial epoch. The maternal grandfather of the
Tucker Brothers was Belayat Conger, and he was
born in Ontario, Canada, and there died in 1888,
having spent his entire life in that province. By
trade he was a plasterer and stone mason, and later
became a contractor. Earl J. Tucker was reared at
-^naconda, and was graduated from its high school
in 1907, following which he went to Butte, Montana,
as timekeeper for the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company, remaining in the employ of this company
for three years. Upon leaving it he was engaged
in an insurance business for seven years, being
state agent for the Massachusetts Bonding and In-
surance Company, and retained his office at Butte
until September, 1919, when he closed it. In 1918
he assisted his brother to establish the clothing
house of Tucker Brothers, which has turned out to
be such a successful enterprise. Like his brother
he is a republican, and he also belongs to the
Anaconda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks, and to the Anaconda Club. He
lives at 1002 West Fourth Street.
In 1908 Earl J. Tucker was united in marriage
50
HISTORY OF MONTANA
with Miss Florence Jennings, a daughter of W. H.
and Minnie (Coddington) Jennings, residents of
Anaconda. Mr. Jennings is superintendent of the
iron warehouse of the foundry department of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company. Mr. and Mrs.
Earl J. Tucker have two children, namely: Jack,
who was born January i, 1909; and Earl J., Jr.,
who was born June 13, 1913.
Arthur J. Davenport. While for a number of
years he has enjoyed a national reputation as a
musician, a leader of bands and orchestra, Mr. Dav-
enport is a stanch lover of the advantages of Mon-
tana and spent several years on a homestead in this
state. He has developed a widely known conserva-
tory and school of music at Hamilton, where he
resides. This conservatory is attended as a musical
finishing school by pupils from all over the western
part of the state.
Mr. Davenport was born in Pawnee City, Ne-
braska, January 4, 1874. His Davenport ancestor
came from England, his grandfather being the first
of the name in this country. His father, J. S.
Davenport, was born in New York State in 1834,
was reared there, and was married in Nebraska. He
lived for a number of years at Pawnee City, where
he conducted an apiary, being in the bee and honey
business on a commercial scale. In 1878 he moved
to Red Bluff, California, where he engaged in mer-
chandising and where he died in 1910. He was a
veteran of the Civil war, having served all through
the struggle. He was taken prisoner and spent nine
months in Andersonville prison. He was a member
of the Grand Army of the Republic, the Masonic
fraternity and a republican in politics. J. S. Dav-
enport married Minnie Taylor, who was born in
1843 and is still living at Spokane, Washington.
Her children were three in number: Louis M., man-
ager of the Davenport Hotel at Spokane; Arthur J.;
and Jessie, wife of Doctor Robbins, a physician and
surgeon at Los Angeles, California.
Arthur J. Davenport received his early education
in the public schools of Red BlufT, California, where
he lived from the age of four years. He graduated
in 1893 from the Cans Crofford College at Red
Bluff, and spent two years in 'the further study of
music at San Francisco. He enlisted as a musician
in the regular army, and served five years. After
that for several years, with headquarters at Chicago,
he traveled all over the country as a band and
orchestra leader, covering all the larger cities in the
United States and Canada. For two years he also
taught brass instruments in the Illinois School of
Music and in the Chicago Seminary, alternating be-
tween those institutions. He spent one year in
Chautauqua Lyceum work.
Coming to Montana, Mr. Davenport farmed on
the Flathead reservation five years. He then re-
moved to the Bitter Root Valley and has since
been teaching, with scholars from Darby, Hamilton
and Corvallis, and has made his home at Hamilton
since 1917. The Davenport Conservatory of Music
is a well appointed and equipped institution, furnish-
ing the best of instruction in all branches of music.
Mr. Davenport personally has charge of the in-
struction in brass and string instruments, while his
wife, who is a graduate of the Columbia School at
Chicago, is teacher of piano and vocal. Their peri-
odical pupil recitals are great events in local mu-
sical circles. The Conservatory is at 214 Main
Street.
Mr. Davenport is a republican, is affiliated with
Ravalli Lodge No. 36, Knights of Pythias ; Ionia
Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
Hamilton Chaper No. 18, Royal Arch Masons; and
Corvallis Lodge of Odd Fellows. He married at
Chicago in 1910 Miss Lula Runkel, a native of
Oconto, Wisconsin.
W. B. Nutting, who came to Montana in 1881,
is an old time cowboy and rancher, has been a
resident of Red Lodge since 1895, and was a charter
member of the Red Lodge State Bank, one of the
most flourishing and prosperous financial institu-
tions in the state.
This bank was organized in 1902, opening for
business on April 2d. Mr. Nutting was its first
president, and held that position until 1910. Mr.
D. G. O'Shea was president of the bank from 1910
to 1917, when Mr. Nutting resumed the executive
direction. E. M. Clark is vice president and A. E.
Logan is cashier. The Red Lodge State Bank has
a capital of $85,000 and surplus of $21,000, and its
deposits in 1919 aggregated more than $1,000,000.
During the past fifteen years the bank has been
managed by the same board of directors, and none
of its stock has changed hands except a small
amount distributed to the employes.
Mr. Nutting was born at Highland in Northeast-
ern Kansas September 3, 1861, son of Lucius Nutting
and descended from John Nutting, whose name ap-
pears as a member of the Massachusetts colony
under date of August 28, 1650, when he married
Sarah, a daughter of Stephen Eggleson (Eggleston).
John Nutting and wife lived at Woburn, Chelms-
ford, now Westford, Massachusetts, and in 1661
removed to Groton, where two years later he was
chosen selectman, and in 1668 constable. He owned
a large amount of land and was prominent in civic
and religious affairs and was killed during an
Indian attack in 1676.
Lucius Nutting, father of W. B. Nutting, was
born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1820, a son of
Bryant Nutting. As a young man he went west
to Illinois, and became a physician and surgeon.
He was attracted to California and went over the
plains in 1849, but soon returned to Illinois and
resumed practice. Later he built and conducted a
saw mill at Crescent City, Iowa, and in 1857 located
in Doniphan County, Kansas, where he pursued
farming and saw milling until 1878. The following
year he removed to Arizona, but afterward returned
to Doniphan County and in 1880 came to Montana
and in the following year homesteaded at Laurel.
He removed to Bozeman in 1895, and lived there
until his death in 1903. He was active as a republi-
can and served as a commissioner of Yellowstone
County six years, and held all the lay offices in the
Presbyterian Church. He married Elizabeth Allison,
who was born in Pennsylvania in 1819 and died at
Bozeman in 1901. Their children were : Julia,
wife of Bryant Cowan, one of the leading authorities
in the Shorthorn cattle industry in America ; Wilder,
a Methodist minister at Three Forks, Montana ;
Lucius A., a Shorthorn breeder at Laurel, Montana ;
William B.; Lillie E., unmarried; and Roy H., of
Eureka, California.
William B. Nutting attended the public schools of
Kansas until he was sixteen years of age and since
then has depended upon his own exertions for his
advancement and success. For a number of years
he was a cowboy both in the Middle West and in
Montana, and he also worked in the mines of
Colorado for a time. He went out to Colorado in
1877. The first of his cowboy experiences was
acquired on the Arkansas River near Fort Las
Animas. That was when the Santa Fe Railroad was
building its through line to the coast. From there
1^/
HISTORY OF MONTANA
51
he removed to Georgetown, Colorado, and subse-
quently was among the first to join in the rush to
the Leadville mining district.
On coming to Montana in 1881 he engaged in
ranching at Laurel. He rode the ranger over the
greater part of Southern Montana and made his
home near Laurel until 1890, when he moved across
the line into Fremont County, Wyoming, and con-
tinued business there as a rancher and stockman.
In 1895 he transferred his home to Red Lodge. He
owns one of the best homes in that city.
Mr. Nutting served as chairman of the County
Commissioners of Carbon County as a republican,
and is affiliated with Red Lodge Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America, and Bear Tooth Lodge No.
534, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Also
Mr. and Mrs. Nutting are pioneers of Eastern
Montana.
April 18, 1887, near Park City, Montana, he mar-
ried Miss Eva Cellers, daughter of Samuel Cellers.
Her father was a pioneer Montanan, coming in 1881,
and was a farmer and stockman until his death.
Mr. and Mrs. Nutting have one son, Roy A., who
is assistant cashier of the Red Lodge State Bank.
He married Miss May B. Grills, of Flint, Michigan,
and they have a daughter, Elizabeth G., only grand-
child of Mr. and Mrs. Nutting.
Charles Thomas Busha has rounded out his
full forty years of residence in Montana, and most
of those years have been spent at Big Timber,
where he was a pioneer business man and still main-
tains a vigorous hold of business as a commission
merchant, rancher and dairyman. Three of Mr.
Busha's sons were with the colors in the World
war.
He was born at Detroit, Michigan, December
3, 1858, and is of French and English ancestry. His
father, Charles Thomas Busha, Sr., was born in
France in 1836, left that country when a young man
and went to Canada, was married at Detroit, Mich-
igan, and spent all his life as a trader. During
the '60s he returned to Canada and died in the
Province of Ontario in 1879. He was a Catholic.
Before he -left France he served the regular time
in the army. He married Helen Clark, who was
born at Detroit in 1839. They had two children,
Hattie and Charles Thomas. The former died in
Detroit as the wife of Lewis Barrett. The mother
married for her second husband Joseph Lemere,
a native of Canada, who died at Westboro, Wis-
consin. Mrs. Lemere died at Detroit, Michigan, in
1912. By her second marriage she had four chil-
dren. The two sons are Alexander, a county official
at Detroit, Michigan, and George, in the garage
business at Chicago.
Charles Thomas Busha acquired his education in
the public schools of Detroit, including high school,
but left his books and studies at the age of sixteen
and began doing for himself. For several years
he was a hotel clerk, and was on duty at hotels
in Stevens Point, Milwaukee and Arcadia, Wiscon-
sin, and at Winona, Minnesota.
On coming to Montana in 1879 Mr. Busha spent
a brief time at Martinsdale on the Musselshell, from
there went to Helena and was employed in the
lumber yard of Sanford & Evans for one year, after
which he went back to the Musselshell River and
engaged in the stock business until 1885. That was
the year of his location at Big Timber, where he
became one of the early merchants, and continued
active in mercantile circles until 1913. Since then he
has specialized in the commission business, buying
wool and other farm products. His irrigated ranch
of 500 acres half a mile east of Big Timber on the
Boulder River is widely known for its dairy cattle,
and Mr. Busha has his home there, a modern resi-
dence, surrounded with a complete equipment of
high class barns and other buildings. His business
offices are on McLeod Street in Big Timber. Mr.
Busha is a republican in politics and is affiliated
with Big Timber Lodge of Masons and Livingston
Lodge No. 246, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks.
Mr. Busha has good reason to be proud of his
family, and besides the three sons who were soldiers
all his children have fitted themselves for positions
of usefulness and honor. He married at Little
Elk in Meagher County, Montana, in 1885 Miss
Ida L. Pound. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Albert
Pound, pioneers in Western Wisconsin in 1854,
are now deceased, the father having been a pioneer
business man of Missoula, a real estate broker.
Mrs. Busha taught in the school at Chippewa Falls,
Wisconsin, and was the first teacher in the school
at Martinsdale on -the Musselshell River. The
oldest of their family of ten children is Beulah,
who finished her education in a girls' seminary at
Petersburg, Virginia, and is the wife of Ernest R.
Paterson, a prominent merchant at Big Timber.
Thad C. Busha, second of the family, was a student
of the Big Timber High School and is receiving
teller in the First National Bank at Mason City,
Iowa. Lenore, a graduate of the Sweetgrass Countj
High School and a student of the State Universif;-
at Missoula, lives at home with her parents. Charles
Thomas, Jr., is the oldest of the three sons who
were in the army. He had completed his junior
year in the law department of the State University
at Missoula when in 1917 he entered the Officers'
Training Camp at the Presidio, California, was com-
missioned a first lieutenant, and went overseas with
Company C of the Three Hundred and Sixty-Fourth
Infantry. Later he was promoted to captain of
Company D of the same regiment and was with
the Expeditionary Forces until he returned to this
country on April 6, 1919. Mabel Busha is a graduate
of the College of Montana at Deer Lodge, and is
the wife of Alfred Johnson, a stock raiser at Hall,
Montana. Helen is a graduate of the County High
School and is stenographer for the Master Mechanic
of the Northern Pacific Railway at Livingston.
Beatrice, a graduate of the County High School, is
assistant cashier in the Commercial Bank and Trust
Company at Big Timber. Willard M., also a high
school graduate, is clerking in a store at Big Tim-
ber. Homer saw his first military service on the
Mexican border, re-enlisted at the beginning of the
war with Germany, and went overseas where he
won his commission as second lieutenant. He was
with the Three Hundred and Fourth Heavy Tank
Service and was a machine gun instructor. He
returned to the United States March 17, 1919.
Theodore C, the youngest of this interesting family,
is a graduate of the County High School. He '
enlisted in February, 1918, was in training for the
aerial service at Waco, Texas, and was mustered
out in April, 1919, and is now on his father's
ranch.
Harry J. Waters was on the ground soon after
the founding of the now thriving town of Rapelje,
entered the general merchandise business, and out
of a wealth of long experience in that line has
promoted and built up one of the most thriving
concerns of its kind in that part of the state.
Mr. Waters was born at Oskaloosa, Iowa, July 20,
1868. His remote ancestors came from Germany,
but for several generations lived in Pennsj'lvania.
His father, Matthew Waters, was born in Pennsyl-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
vania in 1833, and as a young man went back to
Oskaloosa, Iowa, from Ohio, where he was reared.
He was one of the early operators in the lumber
business at Oskaloosa and continued a resident of
that city until his death in 1886. During the Civil
war he was a member of an Iowa home guard and
was called out for service in Northern Missouri
during Price's raid. He was a republican and an
Odd Fellow. Matthew Waters married Lucy Shel-
ton, who was born in Kentucky in 1831 and died at
Oskaloosa in 1879. A brief record of their family of
children is as follows: Henry B., a harness maker
who died at Hastings, Nebraska, in 1910; Medly A.,
a rancher and traveling salesman of Billings, Mon-
tana ; William Irving, a harness maker by trade,
who came to Montana in 1883, followed his business
at Miles City, Helena, Great Falls and Missoula,
became the pioneer in his line at Great Falls and
Missoula, and subsequently moved to Florida, where
he owns and occupies a ranch ; Charles, the fourth
in the family, died in infancy; Cora, who died at
Grand Forks, North Dakota, in 1897, was the wife
of W. P. Welch, now a real estate and insurance
broker at Miles City, Montana, and also a justice of
the peace there; Harry J.; and Fred, who died in
infancy.
Harry J. Waters acquired his early education in
the public schools of Oskaloosa, but his school days
were ended at the age of fourteen, and at that period
of his youth he entered a printing office. Mr. Waters
might qualify as an old time printer. He worked
two years at Oskaloosa, spent three years in a print-
ing office at Washington, Kansas, and for another
three years was assistant postmaster in that town.
In 1892 he went to Belleville, Kansas, and clerked
in a general store there four years. That was his
initial experience in merchandising. The five fol-
lowing years he spent in a general store at Wash-
ington and for four years he traveled over North-
west Kansas selling groceries. For three years he
was connected with the dry goods business at Le.x-
ington, Missouri, and in these places he acquired a
thorough knowledge of general merchandising.
Mr. Waters came to Montana in 1908, first locating
in Billings, where he spent four years with the
Kelley Mercantile Company, then for two years man-
aged the store of the McDaniel Sheep Company,
was for seven months with Hart-Albin Company,
next clerked in Carl Friedman's store and with its
successor, the Cole-Williams Company, for two years.
He came to Rapelje on August i, 1917, and estab-
lished and built one of its two leading general stores
which marked the pioneer business section of the
new town. He was first associated with W. C.
Spalding, but Mr. W. C. Cole, of Edgar, Montana,
bought out Mr. Spalding's interest on March i,
1919, and the firm is now the Waters-Cole Com-
pany. They have a fine store on Main Street.
Mr. Waters also quickly identified hirnself with the
public affairs of his town, and is chairman of the
school board. He is a republican, a member of
Billings Council of the United Commercial Trav-
elers, and was first president of the Commercial
Club of Rapelje, serving in 1917-18.
He married Miss Grace Cropper, of Washington,
Kansas, in 1893. Her parents. W. H. and Helen
Cropper, reside at Nora, Illinois, her father being a
retired miller and stockman. Mr. and Mrs. Waters
have two children : Lucy E. a graduate of the Bill-
ings High School and now a teacher in Stillwater
County, Montana; and Robert M., who is connected
with the Lake Basin State Bank at Rapelje.
Harry M. Johnson, manager of the Public Utili-
ties and Townsite departments of the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company, is a man well qualified
for his position and capable of handling the various
and important problems which are constantly being
presented to him. He was born at Oswego, New
York, June 25, 1883, a son of John J. Johnson, also
born at Oswego, who lived there all his life and
died there in 1884. He married Catherine Brady,
who was born and died at Oswego, passing away in
1890. Harry M. Johnson was the only child of his
parents. At his mother's death the lad was taken
by his aunt, Mrs. Anna J. Hartnett, and reared in
her home.
After attending the public schools of Oswego,
Harry M. Johnson, at the age of sixteen years, left
high school and obtained a position as messenger
boy with the New York Central Railroad. From
the first he exhibited such ability and willingness
to work and learn that he was promoted through
the various positions to be chief clerk in the account-
ant department, with headquarters at Oswego, New
York, remaining there until 1906, when, in Sep-
tember of that year, he came to Anaconda, Montana,
to engage with the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Rail-
road, holding a clerical position for two years. Mr.
Johnson then went with the Anaconda Copper Min-
ing Company and until 1911 handled traffic matters
in the Washoe Reduction Works, but in that year
was transferred to Salt Lake City, where he was
associated with the ore purchasing interests of the
International Refining & Smelting Company for the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company, but in June,
1913, was brought back to Anaconda to take charge
of his present departments, which cover the electric
lighting of Anaconda, the conduct of the water-
works and the street railway. Mr. Johnson has
seventy-five men under his supervision, and has
offices at No. loi Main Street. He is a Roman
Catholic, and belongs to Oswego Council No. 337,
Knights of Columbus, being a Third Degree Knight.
Mr. Johnson also belongs to the Rotary Club, Ana-
conda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, the Anaconda Club and the Anaconda
Country Club. He resides at the Alpine Apart-
ments.
During the great war Mr. Johnson enlisted for
service, and was commissioned captain in the ord-
nance department, being mustered into the service
on October 32, 1917, and was sent overseas on
February 7, 1918, where he was detailed to assist
in the orgainzation of ammunition depots and the
transportation of ammunition on the lines of com-
munication, with his headquarters at Tours, France.
In the discharge of his duties Mr. Johnson traveled
all over France, and was on the firing line in March,
1918. For thirty days he was with the British
command on observation work, rendering during
the period he was in the army a very efficient
service. He was returned to the United States on
December 29, 1918, and was mustered out of the
service on January 4, 1919. Mr. Johnson was cited
by General Pershing for exceptionally meritorious
and conspicuous service while a member of the
American Expeditionary Forces.
In 1912 Mr. Johnson was married at Butte, Mon-
tana, to Miss kathryn Evans, a daughter of Owen
C. and Emily (Church) Evans, both of whom are
now deceased. Mr. Evans was one of the pioneer
merchants of Helena. Montana. Mr. and Mrs.
Johnson have no children. During his period of
activity Mr. Johnson has risen steadily, and entirely
through his own efforts, and his present standing
with his company and community is all the more
creditable on this account.
/7^
tU/. Jtl^J^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
53
Francis McHenry Grafton began his career in
Montana in 1896 in the office of the Anaconda Cop-
per Mining Company at Anaconda. For a number
of years he was in the service of that great cor-
poration, with increasing responsibilities and at dif-
ferent posts. He is now manager of the Interstate
Lumber Company at Hamilton.
Mr. Grafton was born at Cambridge, Iowa, March
5, 1877. He is of an old English family early settled
in Virginia. His great-great-grandfather as an Eng-
lish boy was apprenticed to an employer in Virginia.
Later he became an extensive land holder, planter
and slave owner in Virginia. His slaves were set
free bv the grandfather of Francis McHenry Graf-
ton. The latter's father was Dr. \Nilliam Hill
Grafton, for many years a prominent physician and
a gentleman of cultivated mind and charact.er. Doc-
tor Grafton was born at Baltimore, Maryland, in
1826, was reared and married in that city, and in
1847 was the honor graduate from the medical de-
partment of the University of Maryland. He prac-
ticed at Baltimore a number of years, with an in-
terval at Denver, Colorado, and finally moved to
Cambridge, Iowa, where all his children were born
and reared. After many years of professional labors
he retired and in 1904 moved to Los Angeles, where
he died in 1908. He was a democrat, held various
local offices, and was a particular friend of schools
and education. He was a very ardent Methodist and
a member of the Masonic fraternity. He served rs
a surgeon with the Union army during the Civil war.
He was on the battlefields of Bull Run, Antietam
and Gettysburg, and remained with the medical
department of the army after the war, assisting in
closing up the last five hospitals maintained by the
army, the final work of this nature being done at
Washington. Doctor Grafton married Sarah Liv-
ingston, who was born in Ohio in 1849, and is still
living at Los Angeles. They had the following
children : William D., in the fuel and produce busi-
ness at Anaheim, California; Francis McHenry;
Edward L., a publisher of magazines and books and
manager of the Grafton Publishing Company at
Los Angeles; Albert Kurtz in the real estate and
insurance business at Los Angeles; Eugene Hill, a
printer at Los Angeles; and Mary, wife of R. B.
Newcomb, an orchard owner and orange grower and
also a produce dealer at Santa Ana, California.
Francis McHenry Grafton received his early edu-
cation in the public schools of Cambridge, Iowa,
graduating from high school in 1892. He chose a
commercial career and had his early experience in
several stores in Iowa, including a year at Perry.
He graduated in 1894 in the shorthand and typewrit-
ing course from the Capital City Commercial Col-
lege at Des Moines, following which for a year and
a half he was employed in a law office at Harlan,
Iowa.
In 1896, coming to Montana, he became clerk and
stenographer for the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany. Four years later he was assigned similar du-
ties with this corporation at Belt, Montana, where
he remained a year and a half. For ten years he
was general bookkeeper for the Big Blackfoot Mill-
ing Company at Bonner, though in- the meantime, in
1907, he spent about a year at Los Angeles. In 1911
Mr. Grafton came to Hamilton, and for five years
was with the local plant of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company. In 1916 he accepted his present
interests as manager of the Interstate Lumber Com-
pany, one of the leading corporations of the kind
in western Montana. He is also a stockholder and
director in the Grafton Publishing Corporation of
Los Angeles.
Mr. Grafton is a republican, and at Missoula is
affiliated with Ionic Lodge, No. 38, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, with Hamilton Chapter No.
18, Royal Arch Masons, and is past commander of
St. Omar Commandery No. 9, Knight Templars at
Missoula. He is affiliated with Algeria Temple of
the Mystic Shrine at Helena.
In 1905, at Hamilton, Mr. Grafton married Miss
Mabel M. Markle, daughter of John M. and Celia
(Parish) Markle. Her mother is now deceased.
Her father, living with Mr. and Mrs. Grafton, is a
former superintendent of the Hamilton plant of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company. Mrs. Grafton,
finished her education in a girls' seminary at Spo-
kane, Washington. To their marriage were born
two children : Jean Frances, born in 1908, and Car-
roll B., born in October, 1911.
Eri M. Farr, M. D. One of the skilled and
reliable physicians and surgeons of Billings is Dr.
Eri M. Farr, whose reputation is not merely a local
one, but extends over a wide territory, and he is
oftentimes called into consultation by his brother
practitioners. He was born at Muncy, Pennsylvania,
January 6, 1884, a son of Smith B. Farr. The birth
of Smith B. Farr took place at Moreland, Pennsyl-
vania, in 1838, and his death at Muncy, that state,
in 1902, he having never left it. He devoted his life
to farming. A stanch republican, he always sup-
ported the principles of that party. The Baptist
Church held his membership. The maiden name of
his wife was Anna M. Warn, who was also born at
Moreland, Pennsylvania, in 1847, and survives him,
making her home at Muncy, Pennsylvania. Their
children were as follows: Doctor Farr, who was
the eldest ; Mary, who married Morris D. Worthing-
ton, resides at Curwensville, Pennsylvania, where he
is a stenographer ; and Roy, who is an attorney of
Los Angeles, California. Smith B. Farr was a son
of Richard Barcley Farr, and his father, the great-
grandfather of Doctor Farr, was a Revolutionary
soldier named William Farr, who served in the
Colonial army from Pennsylvania. The Farr family
of this country is of English origin, but has been
in the New World since an early day in the history
of the American Colonies. Richard B. Farr was
born in Pennsylvania, and died at Moreland, that
state, shortly before the birth of Doctor Farr. He
was a lumberman, and never left his native state.
Eri M. Farr attended the grammar and high
schools of Muncy, Pennsylvania, being graduated
from the latter in 1901. For the subsequent three
years he was a student of Bucknell University, and
then attended the Medico-Chirurgical College at
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from which he was
graduated in 1908, with the degree of Doctor of
Medicine. For the following eighteen months he
was an interne at the Robert Packer Hospital at
Sayre, Pennsylvania, specializing in surgery, and
then engaged in a general practice in that city,
remaining there until 1913. In that year he camt
west to Billings, and has remained here, building
up connections which are creditable and profitable as
a physician and surgeon. His offices are at 205-207
Electric Building. Doctor Farr built a comfortable
modern residence at Billings in 1913, and here he
makes his home. Professionally he belongs to the
Yellowstone County Medical Society, the Montana
State Medical Society, the American Medical Asso-
ciation. Well known as a Thirty-second Degree
Mason and Shriner, he belongs to Irem Temple of
Wilkesbarre, Pennsvlvania. He is a member of
Billings Star Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows; the Canton Encampment of the Odd Fellows;
to Billings Lodge, Woodmen of the World; and Bil-
54
HISTORY OF MONTANA
lings Lodge, Knights of Pythias. He also maintains
very pleasant social relations as a member of the
Country Club. Doctor Farr is assistant surgeon for
the Northern Pacific Railroad, and is examiner for
several life insurance companies, having a very large
clientele in this line. He was also a member of the
Medical Advisory Board during the war for the
Fifth District, comprising five counties.
On January 29, 1912, Doctor Farr was married at
Sayre, Pennsylvania, to Mrs. Laura (Reed) Fish,
a native of Iowa, and they have one son, Malcolm,
who was born January 2, 1913. Mrs. Farr vyas
educated in the public schools of Billings, having
come to that city from her birthplace, Manino,
Iowa. She is an Episcopalian, and a strong sup-
porter of her church. Her father, William W. Reed,
died at Manino, Iowa, when she was still a child,
where he was engaged in merchandising and was
postmaster. His wife bore the maiden name of
Sarah Lyons, and she, too, was born in Iowa. The
children in the Reed family were three in number, as
follows : Lydia, who is married ; Mrs. Farr ; and
William. In 1896 Mrs. Farr was first married to
John W. Fish, clerk and treasurer of Yellowstone
County, and a prominent man, who died in 1910,
leaving her with two children, namely : Dorothy
Fish, who was born June 2, 1908; and George Fish,
who was born March 27, 1910. Doctor and Mrs.
Farr are very prominent socially and are admirable
entertainers, enjoying gathering their many friends
about them at their hospitable home. In his pro-
fession Doctor Farr stands deservedly high, being
recognized as one of the able and experienced prac-
titioners of Yellowstone County. Possessing as he
does the characteristics which make for good citizen-
ship, he has always been considered as one of the
best types of American manhood, and can be relied
upon to take a creditable part in all movements
inaugurated to improve civic conditions and bring
about moral reforms. Still in the very prime of
vigorous young manhood, he retains the enthusiasms
of youth, while his experience and knowledge give
weight to his judgments, and the influence he wields
is not inconsiderable.
Christian T. Swenson has been a banker at
Scobey since April, 1914, is a man of wide experi-
ence in financial affairs, and since the age of seven-
teen has been an employe or working official in bank-
ing institutions.
Mr. Swenson is an American by nearly thirty
years of residence, but was born May 19, 1886, at
Frederickshald, one of the larger cities of Norway.
For a time his parents, Thorer and Carolina (Han-
son) Swenson, lived at Christiania, the capital city,
but in 1893 the family sailed for America, landing
at New York, their destination being Crary, North
Dakota. On reaching there the father engaged in
his trade as a painter, and has continued to follow
that occupation ever since. He also proved up a
homestead, has been identified with farming and
land holding, and is now a man of financial inde-
pendence. He early acquired American citizenship
and has voted as a republican. He and his wife
were reared Lutherans but are now members of the
Congregational Church. They reared three sons:
Christian T. ; Stanley P., a banker at Michigan,
North Dakota ; and Lawrence, assistant cashier of
the First National Bank of Crary, North Dakota.
Thus all the sons have chosen banking careers.
Christian T. Swenson was reared at Crary from
the age of seven, and acquired a public school educa-
tion, supplemented later by a commercial college
course at Fargo. His first important business train-
ing was in the capacity of deputy postmaster at
Crary. Then, at the age of seventeen, he went to
work and became a student of banking in the First
National Bank of Crary. He also homesteaded
near Stanley, and lost enough time from hi^ posi-
tion to prove up and secure a title. From the bank
at Crary he went to Williston, North Dakota, and
for a year had charge of the local business of the
well known farm loan corporation of E. J. Lander
& Company.
The First National Bank of Scobey was chartered
in April, 1916, succeeding the State Bank of Scobey,
which opened its doors at old Scobey in October,
1913, being the second banking house in the town.
The state institution was capitalized at $25,000, with
G. A. Fadness president, and from April, 1914, Mr.
Swenson as vice president, while early cashiers were
J. C. Jackson and O. J. Helland. When Mr. Swen-
son became vice president the institution had moved
to the new town and the banking house was located
in the street, while its permanent home was being
erected, this being occupied in the fall of 1914.
When the bank took out a national charter the
officers remained the same until L. V. Hanson be-
came cashier and N. L. Nelson, of Plentywood, be-
came president. The financial statement at the
close of business in 1919 shows capital stock of
$30,000, surplus and undivided profits of $17,321.70
and deposits of $462,415.04.
Mr. Swenson gave his effective personal aid to
the work of. raising funds during the war, though
the cashier of the First National Bank was the offi-
cial spirit of the drive. Mr. Swenson is president
of the Sheridan and Roosevelt County Bankers As-
sociation. Fraternally he is a Mason.
At Casselton, North Dakota, February 4, 1914,
he married Miss Ingleiv Jesten, who was born near
Christiansand, Norway, in March, 1886, and was
three years of age when her parents, Mr. and Mrs.
Andrew Jesten, came to America. The family lived
for a time near Moorhead, Minnesota, and finally
settled at Casselton, North Dakota, where Mrs.
Swenson grew up and was educated. She is a
graduate of the State University of North Dakota
and was a teacher before her marriage. Mrs. Swen-
son is the youngest of three children, the others
being Mrs. A. S. Needles, of Scobey, and Torfin Jes-
ten, a railroad engineer at Breckenridge, Minnesota.
Mr. and Mrs. Swenson have three young children,
Lois, born in 1915, Stanley, born in 1916, and Robert,
born in 1917. The Swenson home is a modern six-
room residence on Main Street, and one of the
centers of hospitality of the town.
Charles James Buzzetti. The senior member of
the leading mercantile firm of Carbon County,
Charles James Buzzetti, is one of the experienced
business men of Fromberg, and since its establish-
ment in 1908 the house of Buzzetti & Emmett has
grown until it occupies its present prosperous as-
pect. Mr. Buzzetti is a native of Genoa, Vernon
County, Wisconsin, where he was born December 23,
1872, a son of John and Delphine (Jambois) Buz-
zetti, and grandson of a Mr. Jambois, who was born
in France, but came to the United States at an early
day, and after stopping for a time in New Orleans,
Louisiana, came up north to Genoa, Wisconsin,
where he died, having been a farmer all his life.
John Buzzetti was born near Genoa, Italy, in 1837,
and he died at Genoa, Wisconsin, in 1882. In young
manhood he left Italy, where he had been reared, and
upon coming to the United States located at Genoa,
Wisconsin. With the outbreak of the Civil war
he espoused the cause of the North, and in 1862
gave practical expression to his preference by en-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
55
listing in the Seventy-First Wisconsin Volunteer
Infantry, and served until the close of the war, when
he returned to Genoa, Wisconsin, and spent the re-
mainder of his life in agricultural pursuits. His
political sentiments made him a republican. From
birth he was a Roman Catholic. John Buzzetti was
married at Genoa, Wisconsin, his wife having been
born at New Orleans, Louisiana, April 21, 1843.
She survives him and lives at Fromberg, Montana.
: Their children were as follows : Peter, who died at
the age of forty years in a boat wreck off the coast
j of Seattle, Washington, was a barber; John, who
I was drowned on the Mississippi River when three
I years old; Jennie, who married Ed Shomers, an
architect, lives at La Crosse, Wisconsin; Charles
James, who is fourth in order of birth ; Tony, who
is proprietor of a cafe at Fromberg; Mayme, who
married Fred Rahrer, a breeder of thoroughbred
horses, resides at Fromberg; Frank J., who is a busi-
ness man of Fromberg, and Emma, who married
M. F. Emmett, the junior member of the firm of
Buzzetti & Emmett, a sketch of whom appears else-
where in this work.
Charles James Buzzetti attended the public schools
of Genoa, Wisconsin, until he was fifteen years old,
and then left school and for the succeeding three
years was engaged in farming. At the age of
eighteen years he began railroading on the Minne-
sota & International Railroad, holding the position
of division operator in Minnesota for eight years,
when, in 1897, he came to Montana and was oper-
ator at Townsend, this state, for the Northern
Pacific Railroad, later being sent to Logan, and still
later to Silesia, remaining with that road for five
years. He was then made agent and operator at
Bridger, and so continued for two years. Mr. Buz-
zetti then came to Fromberg, and in 1905 organized
the Fromberg Co-operative Association for the pur-
pose of conducting a general store, of which he was
secretary and treasurer for two years, severing
these connections in 1908 to found his present busi-
ness, which had its initial opening as a small men's
furnishing store. The two young men soon found
that they were in their right element, and kept on
adding to the lines they carried until now they are
general merchants and their house is the leading
one in this section of the state. Mr. Buzzetti owns
the modern store building on Main Street, occupied
by his firm, which he bought in 1917, as well as his
comfortable modern residence at Fromberg, and a
120-acre ranch of irrigated land at Silesia, Montana.
The firm enjoys a very large and expanding trade
from a radius of twelve miles outside of Fromberg.
On February 9, 1897, Mr. Buzzetti was married at
Brainard, Minnesota, to Miss Elizabeth Collins, a
daughter of Dennis Collins, a pioneer blacksmith of
Brainard, Minnesota, who, with his wife, is now de-
ceased. Mr. and Mrs. Buzzetti have one child. Dona,
who was born June 30, 1903, is now attending
the Fromberg High School, of which she is a bright
pupil, popular alike with her teachers and associates.
Mr. Buzzetti is one of the enterprising men of
Fromberg, and he and his partner are so abreast of
the times that they realize the importance of sup-
porting any legitimate measure that will advance
their city and locality and bring into it outside capi-
tal for investment.
Mackzy F. Emmett, junior member of the mer-
cantile firm of Buzzetti & Emmett, of Fromberg,
Montana, is one of the responsible men and excellent
citizens of his locality, and one whose business pros-
perity is due to his own sagacity and ability. He
was born at Hanging Rock, West Virginia, May 24,
1878, a son of Jacob H. Emmett, and grandson of
.'\ndrew Emmett. The Emmett family was founded
in the New World during colonial days, when four
brothers of that name came to what was afterward
to be the United States of America, one locating at
Emmettsburg, Maryland; one in Kentucky; one at
Hanging Rock, West Virginia, and one in North
Carolina, and from them have descended all of the
Emmetts of this country.
Andrew Emmett, grandfather of Mackzy F. Em-
mett, was born at Hanging Rock, West Virginia,
and died there, his farm in that vicinity being handed
down to his son, Jacob Emmett. The maiden name
of his wife was Elizabeth Pepper, and she, too, was
born, reared and died at Hanging Rock.
Jacob H. Emmett was born at Hanging Rock,
West Virginia, in 1840, and he passed away there
in 1912, having spent his life in West Virginia, and
directed his efforts along agricultural lines. While
he was a life-long democrat, he never aspired to
political honors. A member of the Methodist Epis-
copal Church, South, he was very active in its work,
and contributed generously toward its support. With
the outbreak of the Civil war he cast his lot with
the Confederate States, and fought during the whole
conflict under General Lee, and among other impor-
tant engagements was in the battles of South Moun-
tain and Gettysburg. He married Virginia Heare,
who, surviving him, resides on the old homestead at
Hanging Rock, West Virginia. She was born in
that vicinity in 1848. The children born to her and
her husband were as follows : Delia Lee, who died
at a Texan city in 191 5; Wade Gordon, who is a
banker of Eastern Shore, Virginia ; Evan G., who is
a merchant of Hanging Rock ; Mackzy F., who is the
fourth in order of birth ; Jacob D., who is express
and freight clerk at Graybull, Wyoming; James S.,
who is cashier of the Bridger Coal Company, of
Bridger, Montana; Walker W., who is operating the
Emmett homestead at Hanging Rock ; Lucille Vir-
ginia, who married H. L. Barlow, a retired lumber-
man of Fromberg, died at Fromberg in 1909; Clin-
ton Earley, who served in the United States army
as a member of the American Expeditionary Forces
at Toul, France ; Franklin I., who is serving in the
marine aviation service at Hampton Roads, Vir-
ginia ; Blanche, who is unmarried, lives with her
mother, and Hill, who is an automobile salesman,
resides at Augusta, West Virginia.
Mackzy F. Emmett attended the public schools of
Hanging Rock, being graduated from its high school,
and from Shenandoah College at Shenandoah, Vir-
ginia, in 1902, with the degree of Bachelor of Science.
In 1902 he came to Fromberg, Montana, and for two
years was engaged in teaching school, leaving Car-
bon County at the expiration of that period to spend
two years in gold mining in Idaho. Returning to
Fromberg, he formed a partnership with C. J. Buz-
zetti and they established their present mercantile
business, controlling a very desirable trade and
doing a fine business. Mr. Emmett owns his own
residence at Fromberg.
In 1908 Mr. Emmett was married at Laurel, Mon-
tana, to Miss Emma Buzzetti, a sister of C. J. Buz-
zetti. Mr. and Mrs. Emmett have the following chil-
dren: Virginia, who was born June 6, 1909; Robert,
who was born IDecember 7, 191 1, and Mary, who was
born November 15, 1915. Mr. Emmett is one of the
alert business men of Fromberg who is thoroughly
alive to the opportunities offered the young man in
Western cities of recent establishment. He and his
p-^rtner are typical of the region, and spare no
efforts to give to their trade the benefits of their
connections, which enable them to secure timely mer-
chandise and offer it at prices as low as is con-
sistent with market quotations on goods of their
HISTORY OF MONTANA
class. Their service is excellent, and their customers
remain with them, for they appreciate the fact that
this firm is reliable and trustworthy in every respect,
as well as thoroughly up-to-date in stock and equip-
ment.
Albert C. Roecher. The gentleman whose name
heads this paragraph is widely known as one of the
enterprising merchants of Bozeman, where he has
lived for a number of years and has been prom-
inently identified with the commercial interests of
that locality. His well-directed efforts in the prac-
tical affairs of life, his capable management of his
business interests and his sound judgment have
brought him large rewards for the labor he has
expended, so that today he is numbered among the
representative men of his city.
Albert C. Roecher was born in Pomeroy, Meigs
County, Ohio, on September 3, 1869, and is a son
of J. F. and Magdalena (Rasp) Roecher. J. F.
Roecher was born in 1840 in Allegheny City, now
a part of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where his parents
had settled on their immigration to this country
from Germany. He was reared and educated in
Allegheny, but in young manhood moved to Pome-
roy, Ohio, where he married and where he fol-
lowed his trade, that of a harness-maker. In 1877
he removed to Chester, Ohio, where he continued
his trade and where his death occurred in Novem-
ber, 1918. He was a republican in politics, and
served as township clerk at Chester for the long
period of thirty-five years. He was active in all
the civic and political affairs of his community and
was as popular as he was well known throughout
that section of the state. He was a member of
the Lutheran Church and of the Knights of Pythias.
J. F. Roecher married Magdalena Rasp, who was
born in 1841 at Pomeroy, Ohio, and who died at
Chester in 1899. To this worthy couple were born
the following children, eight in number: Minnie
is the wife of Dr. A. E. Ayler, of Greencastle.
Indiana; Emma, who remained unmarried, died at
the age of thirty years; Albert C. is the next in
order of birth ; Lucy, now deceased, was the wife
of H. Bert Fox, also deceased ; Anna is the wife
of J. B. Heaton, a farmer at Mutual, Ohio ; J. E.
is cashier of the Commercial Bank and Trust Com-
pany at Big Timber, Montana; Clarence is an auto-
mobile dealer at Chester, Ohio ; Elsie is a book-
keeper in the Commercial Trust and Savings Bank
at Big Timber, Montana.
Albert C. Roecher received his elementary edu-
cation in the public schools of Chester, Ohio, after
which he was a student in the academy there. Leav-
ing school at the age of twenty-one years, he took
a course in the Mountain State Business College at
Parkersburg, West Virginia, graduating in 1894.
In the meanwhile he had been clerking in a general
store at Chester, and it is probably owing to the
fact that this store carried a line of drugs that
Mr. Roecher's future vocation was determined. In
1897 he came to Bozeman, Montana, and formed
a partnership with William Alward. They bought
the leading drug store here, giving it the name of
the new firm, Roecher & Alward, and under their
direction it proved to be a good business move.
Mr. Roecher continued his studies in pharmacy
and chemistry, and then went to Minneapolis and
took a full course in the Minnesota Institute of
Pharmacy, receiving, after examination, a license
as a pharmacist in 1903. In 1908 Mr. Alward died,
and Mr. Roecher took over his interest, having been
sole owner since that time. He carries a large and
well selected line of drugs, stationery, cut glass,
hand-painted china, photographic supplies, etc., and
his store is considered the leading drug store of
Gallatin County. He also owns the brick building
in which the store is located, and which also
houses three other stores, and owns a ranch of
160 acres of land, six miles south of Logan, Mon-
tana.
Politically, Mr. Roecher is a stanch supporter of
the republican party, and at one time served as
trustee of school district No. 7, Bozeman. Frat-
ernally he belongs to Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Be-
nevolent and Protective Order of Elks ; Pythagoras
Lodge No. 2, Knights of Pythias; Bridger Camp
No. 62, Woodmen of the World ; Gallatin Castle
No. 82, Royal Highlanders; and to the Retail Drug-
gists Association of Montana.
In 1891, in Meigs County, Ohio, Mr. Roecher was
married to Nora Story, the daughter of Elias and
Lucy (Carper) Story, both of whom are deceased.
The father was a pioneer farmer in Meigs County,
Ohio, came as a pioneer to Virginia City, Montana,
in 1863, and in 1876 returned to Meigs County,
where his death occurred. To them were born the
following children: Rausie, who is a graduate of
the Gallatin County High School, of the Montana
State College, and attended the Milwaukee Downer
School for Girls, is the wife of Selmer H. Solberg,
owner of a gentlemen's furnishing store at Big
Timber, Montana; Chester, who is his father's as-
sistant and who is now taking a course in pharmacy,
graduated from the Gallatin County High School
and was a student in the Montana State University
at Missoula.
A western man in the broad sense of the term,
although a native of the east, Mr. Roecher realized
the wants of the people and, with unerring judgment
and keen discrimination, supplied the demand.
Affable and popular with all classes, he has long
been numbered among the leaders of his community
and is eminently entitled to representation in a work
of the character of this one.
William E. Harris. A native of Montana, Wil-
liam E. Harris began his business career imme-
diately on completing his high school course, and
his experience has been almost entirely in automo-
bile mechanics and the garage business.
Mr. Harris, who is proprietor of one of the lead-
ing garages in southwestern Montana, at Hamilton,
was born at Butte February 28, 1885. His father,
also William E. Harris, was of Welsh ancestry and
was born in Pennsylvania in 1853. He spent his
early life in his native state, and in 1881 located
at Butte, where he followed mining. He owned a
half interest in the St. Lawrence Tunnel at Butte.
He died in that city in 1889. when thirty-six years
of age. He was a republican in politics. At Butte
he married Mary Ann Shearer, who was born in
Ohio in 1855, and is now living at Hamilton. She
was the mother of two sons, William E. and Claud.
Claud enlisted in 1917, trained at Camp Lewis, and
in 1918 went overseas. In the late summer of 1919
he was still in service in France with the grade of
corporal.
William E. Harris attended the public schools of
Butte until 1901, when his mother removed to Ham-
ilton, where he graduated from high school in 1904.
The following year he worked as a foreman on the
Bitter Root Stock Farm, but in 1905 took up the
automobile and garage business, which he learned
thoroughly. He has a special inclination for me-
chanics, and is a master of automobile mechanism.
In 1916 he bought the large garage at 352 Main
street and has floor space 130x40 feet. His business
has grown and prospered until his quarters are far
too small. He maintains a general garage, a repair
HISTORY OF MONTANA
shop, and handles all automobile accessories and
operates a service station.
Mr. Harris is a republican voter, and is a member
of the Brotherhood of American Yeomen. He owns
a modern home on Fourth Street. In 1907, at Mis-
soula, he married Miss Margaret Loretta Morrissey,
daughter of Dan and Mary Morrissey. Her mother
is now deceased. Her father is a retired resident at
Santa Monica, California. Mr. and Mrs. Harris
have three children: Anna, born in November, 1909;
William, born in 1912; and Doloris, born in 1914.
Peter John Van Laken. Many of the most pros-
perous and esteemed citizens of our country have
come from beyond the seas, and into this land of
promise and plenty have brought those habits of in-
dustry and thrift that have won for them places of
prominence in the various walks of life, making
them veritable leaders in the industrial and business
world. Conspicuous among this number now living
in Montana is Peter John Van Laken, of Billings,
president and sole proprietor of the Van Laken
Construction Company. A native of Europe, he
was born December 14, 1881, in Antwerp, Belgium,
where his father, Francis Van Laken, was a life-
long resident. He is descended from an old and
honored Dutch family, the Van Lakens having for-
merly lived in Holland, from whence they emigrated
to Belgium many generations ago.
John Francis Van Laken, orandfather of Peter,
was born in Antwerp in 1820, and as a mason and
builder there spent his years, dying in 1907. His
wife, whose maiden name was Melania Van Damme,
was born, reared and educated in Antwerp, and
there lived until her death.
Francis Van Laken's birth occurred in 1855. Learn-
ing the mason's trade when young, he worked at it
faithfully, becoming skilled in the art, and during
his years of activity was a general contractor as well
as a mason. His wife, whose name before marriage
was Clemence Jacobs, was born in Antwerp, Bel-
gium, in 1856, and is still a resident of that city.
Five children were born of their union, as follows :
-Arthur, a machinist and now owner of a general
machine shop, resides in Antwerp, his birtliplace ;
Melania, who married Joseph Seeldrayers, an Ant-
werp broker, died of the influenza in 1919; Louis
lived but fourteen years; Peter, the special subject
of this brief personal sketch; and Adaline, wife of
Emil T. Felt, of Antwerp, an oiBcer in the Belgian
Army, who participated in iive of the larger battles
of the World war, and has recently been mustered
out.
The boyhood days of Peter John Van Laken were
passed in laying the foundation of his future educa-
tion in the public schools of Antwerp. Possessing
artistic talent, and having a natural aptitude for
mechanics, he subsequently completed a course of
study at the Government Technical School, becom-
ing expert in draughting* and architectural work.
Later, under the instruction of his father, he learned
the mason's trade, which he followed for a time,
being quite successful. In 1903, seized with the wan-
derlust. Mr. Van Laken determined to try life for
himself in .\merica, and immigrating to the United
States located in Chicago, Illinois, where he fol-
lowed his trade four years. Going from there still
farther westward in 1907, he spent a year in Spo-
kane, Washington, but not entirely pleased with his
prospects in that locality he made another move,
settling at Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, where he carried
on a substantial business as contractor and builder
for nine years. In June, 1917, Mr. Van Laken. de-
sirous of broadening his scope of action, came to
Billings, Montana, and in the selection of a favor-
able location has found that he made no mistake.
Immediately establishing the \'an Laken Construc-
tion Company, of which he is president and entire
owner, he has since been constantly employed in the
upbuilding of the city. Some of the most beautiful
commercial buildings have been erected under his
supervision. Among some of his notable achieve-
ments as a contractor and builder is the Hart-Albin
Building, a three-story structure with basement, the
largest in Billings, and one of the largest office
buildings in Montana. He erected the Carlin Build-
ing on Broadway, and others of equal importance,
the work of his hands and brain being very fre-
quently in evidence. He has a pleasant home at
North Thirty-Second Street.
Mr. Van Laken is an adherent of the republican
party, and is a member of the Coeur d'Alene Lodge,
Ancient Free and Accepted Order of Masons; of
the Coeur d'Alene Camp, Modern Woodmen of
America; and of the Billings Midland Club.
In 1901, in Antwerp, Belgium, Mr. Van Laken
married Miss Marie De Buyser, a daughter of
Charles and Frances (Van Eyke) De Buyser. Her
father, a mason and contractor, still resides in Ant-
werp, where the death of her mother occurred a
few years ago. Mr. and Mrs. Van Laken have four
children, namely : Gabriella, born June 19, 1903, now
a senior in the Billings High School, is a gifted
musician, having a very sweet voice, and has sung
with the Glee Club ; Julia, born January 5, 1905, is a
freshman in the Billings High School; Arthur
Francis who died at the age of ten weeks, in Chi-
cago; and Arthur, born on Friday, June 13, 1913.
William C. Ryan, principal of the Sweetgrass
High School at Big 'Timber, is a veteran educator,
and has been in the work more or less continu-
ously for thirty years.
Mr. Ryan, whose ancestors came from Ireland,
was born at Springfield, Ohio, February 12, 1869.
His father, Henry Ryan, was born in Southern
Ohio in 1844 and spent his active life on a farm
near Springfield, where he died in 1916. In politics
he was a democrat, and was affiliated with the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows from the time
he reached his majority until his death. He married
Elizabeth Ryman, who was born in Clark County,
Ohio, in 1844 and died at Springfield in 1015. Wil-
liam C, is the oldest of their children. The second,
Mary, is the wife of Wilbur Trout, a farmer, flour
moulder and successful business man of Springfield,
Ohio. Oscar is superintendent of the annealing
department of the Springfield Malleable Iron Works,
while Charles, the youngest, is also an educator,
being superintendent of schools of several townships
of Clark County, Ohio, and a resident of Spring-
field.
As a boy William C. Ryan attended country
schools near his father's farm, and in 1888 grad-
uated from the Clark County High School. Mr.
Ryan is a man of scholarly tastes and there has
hardly been a year since he left high school when
he has not attended some institution as a student
and accepted every opportunity to advance his abili-
ties and technical training for educational work.
For three years he taught school in Clark County
and two years in Franklin County, Ohio, utilizing
the summer vacations in attending college. He then
entered the Northern Indiana Normal School, now
Valparaiso University, where he spent four quarters
each three years. He graduated with the A. B.
degree in 1896 and he also has the degree Master
of Science and degree Civil Engineer from Val-
paraiso. While there he became affiliated with
Sigma Pi College fraternity. He has attended
HISTORY OF MONTANA
summer schools nearly every year of his teaching
career In 1896 he went to Trenton, Missouri, for
one year was head of the Mathematics Department
in Avalon College, and for two years was principal
of the Trenton High School and then another year
remained as principal of the Normal Department
of Avalon College. During 1899-1900 he was a
student in the University of Chicago, where he
made chemistry his major study. He then returned
to Trenton and was superintendent of city schools
Com'ing to Montana in the fall of 1903, Mr. Ryan
served as principal of the County High School
at Big Timber for seven consecutive years. In
1910 he retired from the teaching profession and
bought a fruit ranch at Spokane, Washington. A
year later he sold that and returned to Montana
and became district manager of the Central Life
Insurance Company of Des Moines, and for six
years represented that company with offices at
Billings, and developed a large business and proved
himself a thoroughly resourceful insurance man.
In 1919 he resumed active connection with educa-
tional affairs when he took a three years contract
as principal of the Sweetgrass County High School
at Big Timber. He has a staff of seven teachers
and an enrollment of 125 scholars in the high
school.
Contrary to the usual run of educators Mr. Kyan
has been successful in business affairs. He owns
a ranch of 280 acres seventeen miles northeast of
Columbus, Montana, and has it under lease. He
also has a modern home at Big Timber and a
dwelling house at Billings. Mr. Ryan is an inde-
pendent republican, and is active in the Christian
Church as a member of the State Board of the
Church. Early in life he became affiliated with
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and has
membership in the Lodge, Encampment and Canton
at Bozeman and is a retired captain of the Uni-
formed Rank. He is also a past chancellor of the
Knights of Pythias.
In May, 1905, at Livingston, he married Miss
Melvetta Jolly. Her mother is Mrs. Mary Jolly,
of Trenton, Missouri. Mrs. Ryan is a graduate
of the Trenton High School and attended Avalon
College through her junior year. She then taught
in the Trenton schools and attended the Missouri
State University several summer sessions. They
have three children: Henry Wallace, born January
8, 1906; Mary, born November 2, 1907; and Helen,
born June 15, 1910.
Edward Bigelow. Continuously devoting his time
and energies to the varied requirements of his busi-
ness, and possessing an abilitv equal to its demands,
Edward Bigelow, of Billings, proprietor of Bigelow's
Mercantile Agency, has won an honored position
among the successful business men of the city. He
was born in Columbus, Ohio, October 24, 1875, a
son of Charles E. Bigelow, and comes of good old
Scotch-Irish stock, his immigrant ancestors on the
paternal side having settled in Massachusetts in colo-
nial days.
A native of Massachusetts, Charles E. Bigelow
was born in 1851, in Spencer, but his youthful days
were spent in Boston, where he acquired his early
education. As a young man he went to Ohio, stop-
ping first in Loveland, Ijut after his marriage remov-
ing to Columbus, and for a time thereafter serving
as a conductor on the Pennsylvania Railroad. In
1882, on the opening of the New York, Chicago and
St. Louis Railroad, he accepted the position of
baggage master at Bellevue. Ohio, where he remained
three years. Going to Buffalo, New York, in 1885,
he was yard master for the same road for two years.
Retiring from the railway service, he has since been
associated with the "Buffalo Express,'' one of the
leading newspapers of that city. He is a republican
in politics, and an ex-member of the Royal Arca-
num. His wife, whose maiden name was Christian
Tigar, was born in Loveland, Ohio, in 1853, and died
in Buffalo, New York, in 1894. Three children were
born to them, as follows: Frederick T., of Buffalo,
New York, is an accountant for the Lehigh Valley
Railroad Company; Edward, of whom we write, and
Burt, of New York City, in the office of the "New
York Times."
As a boy Edward Bigelow attended the public
schools of Cincinnati and Bellevue, Ohio, and of
Buffalo, New York. Then, beginning life as a wage-
earner, he worked for five years in a Buffalo lumber
yard, and subsequently was employed in the Buft'alo
Post Office from 1895 until 1906. Accepting then
a position with the United States Smelting Com-
pany, he held it for eighteen months, being located
at Midvale, Utah, near Salt Lake City. Joining an
engineering corps, he afterward worked for a short
time on the construction of the Consolidated Min-
ing Company's plant at McGill, Nevada.
Desirous of further advancing his education, Mr.
Bigelow entered Mount Hermon Academy, widely
known as Moody's School, near Northfield, Massa-
chusetts. Leaving that institution in 1909, he came
to Montana with an engineering corps, and for six
months assisted in the construction of that branch
of the Northern Pacific Railway that extends from
Livingston to Wilsall. Going then to Salt Lake
City, he remained there as statistician for the Utah
Copper Company until 191 1, when he went to the
Pacific Coast, visiting California and Oregon. Com-
ing to Billings, Montana, in September, 191 1, Mr.
Bigelow was bookkeeper and cashier for a time,
first for W. H. Donovan and later for W. H. Mc-
Cormick. Resuming his duties as a statistician, he
was in Butte with the Butte and Superior Copper
Company for a time, and then at Great Falls, Mon-
tana, with the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.
In April, 1914, Mr. Bigelow returned to Billings,
where he has since resided, his home being at 807
North Thirtieth Street. He is carrying on a substan-
tial business as manager of the Bigelow Mercantile
Agency, and is likewise employed as an accountant.
He is a republican in politics, a member of the Meth-
odist Episcopal Church, and belongs to Erie Lodge
No. 161, Ancient Free and Accepted Order of Ma-
sons.
On November 24, 1910, Mr. Bigelow married, in
Billings, Miss Mabel Johnson, a daughter of Orange
Chapin Johnson. She was born at Rochester, Min-
nesota, and received her education in Iowa, being
graduated from the Lake Mills High School, and
later completing a business course at the Capital
City Commercial College in Des Moines. A member
of the Methodist Episcepal Church, she takes an
active interest in church work, and was general sec-
retary of the Young Women's Christian Association,
a position that she also filled while a resident of
Salt Lake City. At the present time she is vice
president of the Billings Young Women's Christian
Association. Mrs. Bigelow is of English descent.
Her immigrant ancestor, Lawrence Johnson, who
was born in England in 1758, came to America in
1776 with a company of British soldiers, and sub-
sequently surrendered to Washington at Philadel-
phia, and afterwards fought with him for the inde-
pendence of the Colonies. William Meslar Johnson,
Mrs. Bigelow's grandfather, was born in Ithaca,
New York, in 1815, and died January 15, 1871, from
pneumonia. Orange Chapin Johnson was born in
HISTORY OF MONTANA
59
Whitesville, New York, in 1850. Going to Minne-
sota in early life, he was engaged in the lumber
business at Rochester a number of years, and since
coming to Billings in 1907 has been here similarly
employed, being with the Thompson Yards, Incorpo-
rated. He belongs to the Methodist Episcopal
Church, and is a member of the Ancient Free and
Accepted Order of Masons and of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows. His wife, whose maiden
name was Louise McDaniel, was born and reared in
Pennsylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Bigelow have one
child, Donald Edward, born February 16, 1912.
Henry Francis Sears learned the printing trade
when a boy, worked as a printer when he first
came to Bozeman more than thirty years ago, but
finally gave up his trade and profession to become
a farmer, and while he is very busy as proprietor
and manager of the Republican Courier at Bozeman,
he is still interested in the practical side of agri-
culture and has a first class farm in Gallatin County.
Mr. Sears was born in Kent County, England,
October 16, 1866. His father, Thomas H. Sears,
was born in the same county in 1845, was reared
and married there, and was a country gentleman
and owner of a valuable estate. He sold his life
interest in that estate in 1870 and crossed the ocean
and settled at Brantford in the Province of Ontario.
.After that he lived retired and died in Ontario
in 1909. He was educated in the famous Eton
Preparatory School of England. Thomas H. Sears
married Blanche Knowles, who was born in Kent
County, England, and died at Brantford, Ontario,
in igii. They had a large family of children.
Thomas H., the oldest, is representative for a type
foundry at Toronto, Canada; Blanche Marian is
deceased; Charles J. is a real estate broker at Boze-
man, and Henry Francis is the next in age. Isabella,
Florence and Edith are all deceased. Margaret is
the wife of Frank Alderson, a farmer and linotype
operator at Bozeman. Mrs. Alice Thomas still lives
at Brantford, Ontario, and Edwin, the youngest of
the family, is a cigar maker at Elmira, New York.
Henry Francis Sears secured his early education
in the public schools of Brantford, Ontario. When
thirteen years of age he began working in a print-
ing shop at Brantford, and at fifteen went to Buffalo,
New York, and completed his apprenticeship as a
printer and followed his trade there as a journeyman
one year. He was at Detroit two years, and in 1885
arrived at Bozeman and was soon working in the
office of the Bozeman Chronicle and also with the
Courier. For six years he was a printer in these
establishments, and then left the printing shop al-
together for nearly ten years and devoted that time
to farming in Gallatin County. In 1900 Mr. Sears
and J. H. Dawes established the Gallatin County
Republican. They conducted this paper until 1905,
when they consolidated with the Avant Courier, thus
establishing the present Republican Courier. In
1905 the Republican Courier Company was incor-
porated, and in succeeding years Mr. Sears bought
all the other stock and is sole owner of the publica-
tion.
While the Republican Courier is a comparatively
new paper the Avant Courier was established fifty
years ago, in 1869. It was first published as the
Pick and Plow. In 1871 Major Anderson obtained
control and gave it the name .Avant Courier, and
continued its publication until its consolidation in
1905. This is therefore one of the very oldest papers
in Montana. Mr. Sears is publishing a column of
items each week from the files of thirty-five years
ago, and probably no other paper in the state can
do this. He has a well equipped plant and offices
at 241 West Main Street, and the mechanical facil-
ities are adequate not only for the printing of the
paper but for a large commercial and job printing
business.
Mr. Sears is a republican, a member of the
Episcopal Church, is affiliated with Bozeman Lodge
No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
Bridger Camp No. 62 Woodmen of the World at
Bozeman, Eureka Homestead No. 415, Brotherhood
of .\merican Yeomen, at Bozeman, is a member
of the Chamber of Commerce, and the Bozeman
Typographical Union.
Mr. Sears owns a farm of 175 acres seven miles
east of Bozeman and has other real estate both
in the city and county, including a modern home
at 415 Third Avenue, South. Mr. Sears married at
Bozeman in 1889 Emma Bradley, daughter of John
and Elizabeth Bradley, both now deceased. Her
father was a Pennsylvania miner and farmer. Five
children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Sears: Clyde
R., a graduate of the Gallatin County High School,
now in the confectionery business at Whitehall,
Montana; Frank, also a graduate of the County
High School, a linotype operator in his father's
office; Edith, a graduate of the County High School,
who attended the Montana State College one year,
and is the wife of G. C. Davenport, an automobile
salesman at Bozeman ; Thomas H. who is a graduate
of high school and a student in the Montana State
College; and Harry, who died April 29, 1919, at the
age of twelve years.
Charles E. Hartley when he came to Montana
was a young man with a college education but no
special business training beyond his experience as a
teacher. He learned the laundry business in this
state, and starting with modest capital and small
equipment has developed at Hamilton the only steam
laundry plant in Ravalli county, and with a wide
scope of service bevond the limits of that county.
It is the Bitter Root Steam Laundry of which he
is proprietor and owner.
Mr. Hartley was born on a farm in Webster
County, Missouri. February 25, 1878. He is of Eng-
lish ancestry and his people were colonial settlers
in some of" the southern states. His grandfather,
Jesse Hartley, was born in Tennessee in 1803. In
1840 he took his family to southern Missouri and
was one of the first settlers in Webster County,
where he homesteaded. In the course of years he
developed a fine farm of four hundred acres. Jesse
Hartley was remarkable for the substance of his
achievements and also for the length of his life.
He died January 28, 1908, in Webster County, Mis-
souri," at the age of a hundred and five.
Robert Hartley, his son, father of the Hamilton
business man, was born in Tennessee in 1838, and
was two years of age when his parents moved to
Webster County, Missouri. The old homestead in
Webster County is still his home. He has spent
his active life as a farmer, and during the Civil
war was a soldier on the Union side. He saw
much of the border warfare, participating in the
campaigns against Price and Quantrill, and was also
in the great battle of Wilson Creek. He was a
republican and an active member of the Baptist
Church. Robert Hartley married Jane Murrell. who
was born in North Carolina in 1848. A brief record
of their children is as follows : I. A., a farmer arid
orchard owner at Escandido, California; Minnie M.,
wife of N. M. Lowder, a banker at Elkland, Mis-
souri; Jesse George, who runs the old home farm
of his parents; Charles E. ; Floyd O., a hardware
merchant at Ozark, Missouri; Hester, wife of Joseph
Jackson, a farmer of Webster County, Missouri;
60
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mabel, wife of Olaf Peterson, a paint, oil and
general merchant, and a painter by trade, at Ham-
ilton. Montana: and Ezra, a clerk in a store at
Marshfield in Webster County. Missouri.
Charles E. Hartley secured his education in the
rural schools of his native county in Missouri.
For four years he attended the Southwest Baptist
College at" Bolivar. Missouri, graduating with the
class of 1900. He was a member of the .Athenian
Society in college. Before graduating he had taught
one year in Webster County, and after getting his
diploma he went back to the same school as its
principal.
Mr. Hartley came to Montana in 1901 and ac-
quired his practical knowledge of the laundry busi-
ness at Missoula. In the spring of 1905 he removed
to Dillon, where he managed a laundry for two
years. Then with his experience and modest capi-
tal he came to Hamilton and bought a small hand
laundry. Since then he has extensively remodeled
and re-equipped the plant, has introduced steam and
other mechanical appliances and now has a large and
modern plant. He owns the building in which the
business is conducted at the corner of Main and
First streets.
Out of his prosperity he has acquired a modern
home at the corner of Fifth and State streets, also
another dwelling adjoining his residence, and two
other city lots. Mr. Hartley is an independent re-
publican, is treasurer of the Baptist Church, a mem-
ber of the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce and
affiliated with Ionic Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Hamilton Chapter No. 18. Royal
Arch Masons, Crusade Commandery No. 17. Knights
Templar. .Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Helena. Ravalli Lodge No. 36, Knights of Pythias,
and Pine Cone Camp No. 7=;4, Woodmen of the
World.
January 14, 1904. at Missoula, Mr. Hartley mar-
ried Miss .\nna Svoboda, daughter of John and
Frances (Dolinski) Svoboda. Her parents are resi-
dents of Missoula and her father is a retired laun-
dryman. Mr. and Mrs. Hartley have two children :
Zelma. born February 25, 1905, and June, born June
8, 1911.
John William Chapman, president of the Meyer
and Chapman State Bank of Red Lodge, is one of
the oldest residents of the northwest, and its fertile
valleys and rugged mountain sides constitute almost
the breath of life to him. As an old time cowboy
and cattle man he was associated with some of the
newest country opened to settlement in Wyoming
and Montana, and recalls many of the noted names
of pioneer characters of that time.
Mr. Chapman, who still retains extended ranching
and farming interests, was born at Springfield. Illi-
nois. May i,^, 1850, the only son and child of William
and .\rtie ."Knasa (Riddle) Chapman. The Chapmans
are an English family but have been in America since
colonial times. William Chapman was born in 1827
and was one of the early farmers of Central Illi-
nois. He died at Springfield, that state, in iS.tI.
His wife was born in the territory of Iowa in 1833,
and soon after his death she removed to Ore.eon
in 1851, settling in Douglas County. She became the
wife of William Merriman, who died in Jackson
County, Oregon. She died at Medford, Oregon, in
1917.
From the facts just related it will be seen that
John W. Chapman had his first conscious recollec-
tion of his mother's home in Oregon. He grew up
there in the country, attended the rural schools of
Douglas County to the age of sixteen, and then hired
out as a cowboy. He was employed by some of
the first cattle outfits ranging stock in the vicinity
of Virginia City, Nevada. He made his first ac-
quaintance with Montana in 1878, when he was run-
ning cattle on the Tongue River near Miles City.
In 1879 he settled on a ranch on Tongue River but
a year later went to the vicinity of Cody, Wyoming,
and had his ranch headquarters there for twenty-two
years. In that time he acquired extensive interests
as a cattle man, and had under lease or individual
ownership great tracts of land. Mr. Chapman has
been a resident of Red Lodge since 1904. He still
owns about 2,000 acres of grain and stock land situ-
ated in Wyoming and in Carbon County and the
Big Horn country of }iIontana.
Mr. Chapman was associated with the late W. F.
Meyer and Paul Britsche in founding the Meyer
& Chapman Bank, and became its president upon its
reorganization as the Meyer & Chapman State Bank
on December i, 1912. Frank Lyle is vice president
and the cashier is Fred Alden. This is one of tire
largest banks of Carbon County, with a capital of
$.SO,ooo, surplus and profits of $28,000 and deposits
averaging $500,000. The bank owns and occupies
part of the most conspicuous business building in
Red Lodge, a substantial two-story banking and
office structure at Broadway and Eleventh streets.
Mr. Chapman is also president of the Hardin State
Bank at Hardin and president of the Bank of Belfry.
His home is the most commodious and attractive
residence in Red Lodge, surrounded with well kept
grounds. Politically he acts independently and has
never sought any public office. Mr. Chapman mar-
ried Miss Alpha Chapman at Canyonville in Douglas
County, Oregon, in 1882. She was a native of that
county.
J. S. SoLBERG made a definite choice of Big
Timber as his home thirty years ago. He was
the pioneer shoemaker and harness dealer in that
town, followed his regular trade for many years,
but is now proprietor of the leading men's furnish-
ing goods store in Sweetgrass County.
Mr. Solberg was born at Bergen, Norway, De-
cember 29, 1863. His father, S. Solberg, spent
all his life as a carpenter and builder. He was born
in 1832 and died in 1885. He had served his
regular term in the Norwegian army and was an
active member of the Lutheran Church. His widow,
Martha Solberg, still living at Bergen, was born
in 1833. The oldest child, Oli. came to the United
States and did farm work at Black Earth. Wiscon-
sin, and died while making a voyage back home
to his native country. J. S. Solberg is the second
of the family, and his other brother, Martin, is
a farmer at Huntsville, Alabama. The two younger
children, Annie and Sophia, are both unmarried
and live in Norway.
J. S. Solberg received his education and also
served his apprenticeship at the shoemaker's trade
in his native city. He was twenty years of age
when he came to the United States in 1884 and he
not only followed his trade but also did farming
at Black Earth in Dane County, Wisconsin. In
July, 1887, he arrived at Big Timber, Montana, and
was soon busily working at his trade as a shoe-
maker. At the end of three years, his services
having come into demand in repairing harness, he
established the first harness shop. He has the
distinction of having made the first pair of shoes
in Big Timber. He continued his shoe and harness
business until 1907, when he broadened out his
business enterprise by establishing a men's furnish-
ing store. He owns both this store and its large
and well selected stock on McLeod Street, and he
also has a modern home on the corner of Anderson
HISTORY OF MONTANA
61
and Fifth Avenue. Mr. Solberg is a member of
the Sons of Norway, is a Lutheran and a republican.
At Melville, Montana, in 1891 he married Miss
Hannah Bekken, a native of Wisconsin. Their
oldest child is Selmer H., a graduate of the Mon-
tana State College at Bozeman, who is now silent
partner and active assistant to his father in the
business. The second child, Oscar, has a place
on the roll of honor of Montana's volunteers in
the late war. He went overseas in July, 1918. and
was killed in France September 29th. The three
younger children are Stella, Louis and Helen. Stella
graduated from the State College at Bozeman and
is now teaching in the high school at Virginia
City; Louis attends the County High School in the
sophomore class, while Helen is in the eighth grade
of the grammar schools.
Reuben J. Lord. Since coming to Montana, more
than twenty years ago, Reuben J. Lord has been
actively identified with the industrial interests of
Billings, and as a successful contractor and builder
has been an important factor in aiding the develop-
ment and promoting the growth of this now pros-
perous city. A son of the late Luther Lord, he was
born July 5, 1859, in Surry, Hancock County, Maine.
On the paternal side he comes of good old Scotch-
Irish stock, being a lineal descendant of one of two
brothers, John Lord and James Lord, who migrated
from Londonderry, Ireland, to Maine in 1621, land-
ing in Kittery, not far, probably, from the present
site of the Portsmouth Navy Yard. His great
grandfather settled permanently in Surry, Hancock
County, Maine, and there Isaac Lord, the next in
line of descent, spent his entire life, his birth oc-
curring in 1741 and his death in 1820. during his
years of activity having been engaged in farming
and lumbering.
Born on the home farm in Surry, Maine, in 1816,
Luther Lord received excellent educational advan-
tages as a youth, and for upwards of forty years
taught school in Hancock County. He was like-
wise engaged to some extent in literary work, hav-
ing been a book agent, and becoming widely known
in his native county as editor of a newspaper. A
whig in politics as a young man, he joined the
republican party soon after its formation, and from
that time until his death in 1883 was one of its
stanchest adherents. Active and influential in public
affairs, he served as county treasurer of Hancock
County for nine consecutive terms, and for many
years was town clerk and selectman of Surry, and
also filled the office of justice of the peace for a
long, long time. Uniting with the Baptist Church
at the age of twenty-one years, he became very
prominent in its affairs, and served many years as
deacon.
Luther Lord married Priscilla Jellison, who was
born in Mariaville, Hancock County, Maine, in 1834,
and died in Surry, Maine, in 1883. Seven children
were born to their union, namely: Edgar, a civil
engineer, resides at Bar Harbor, Maine ; Reuben J. ;
Isaac, deceased; Abhie, wife of Stephen H. Leland,
of Lamoine, Maine, a retired custodian of the naval
station of that place; Martin Luther, who was a con-
tractor and builder at Berkeley, California, and died
in April, IQI9; Clara, living at Southwest Harbor,
Maine, is the widow of Augustus Mayo, who was
for many years prosnerously engaged in mackerel
fishing, and Maurice S.. a contractor and builder at
Columbus, Montana.
Educated in the public schools of his native town,
Reuben J. Lord at the age of nineteen years began
his career as a teacher at Ellsworth, Maine, and
served as principal of the schools one term. Going
then to Bar Harbor, he worked as an apprentice at
the carpenter's trade two years, after which he
started there in business on his own account, con-
tinuing for a period of si.xteen years. In the spring
of 1899, realizing the great demand for skilled labor
in the newer states of the far West, Mr. Lord fol-
lowed the trail of the ever wide-awake emigrant to
Montana, locating in Billings. Embarking in busi-
ness as a general contractor, he has been busily
employed ever since, his work being appreciated.
Among the buildings which he has erected in Bill-
ings is the substantial structure in which the Billings
Industrial School is located and the attractive resi-
dences of Frank O'Donnell, Frank Raedemher,
Dr. W. A. Allen and others of equal prominence and
beauty, including his own residence at 407 South
Thirty-first Street.
At Mount Desert, Maine, October 14, 1882, Mr.
Lord married Miss Julia M. Mayo, a daughter of
the late Thomas Mayo. Her mother, whose maiden
name was Lydia Smith, was born in Mount Desert,
Maine, in 1834, and is now living in Billings, making
her home with Mr. and Mrs. Lord. Mr. Mayo was
for many years engaged in sea-faring work as cap-
tain of a vessel traversing the ocean. Three children
have blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Lord, as
follows : Charles R., who died at the age of twenty
years; Alice, who died in childhood, and Lida
Grace, wife of LeRoy E. Torrence, assistant cashier
of the Yegen Bank at Billings.
J.\MES E. Elliott, M. D. Former county health
officer of Gallatin County, Dr. James E. Elliott is a
Bozeman physician and surgeon, and a man of wide
and varied experience and of splendid talents in
his profession. His father was a doctor, and several
other members of the family have earned a worthy
place in the same profession.
His paternal ancestors came from England and
were colonial settlers in Virginia. However, the
family for several generations have lived in Indiana.
James E. Elliott was born in Clay County, that
state, July 20, 1883. His grandfather was Harrison
B. Elliott, a native of Indiana, a pioneer farmer,
and a leader in local politics. At one time he
served as county commissioner. He died at Green-
castle in Putnam Countv, Indiana, many years ago.
The father of Doctor Elliott was T. A. Elliott, who
was born in Indiana in 1851, was a graduate of the
Medical College of Nashville, Tennessee, and for
twenty-five years practiced his profession in Clay
County, where he died in 1907. He was a democrat
and a member of the Presbyterian Church. Dr. T.
A. Elliott married Anna B. Collier, who was born
in Indiana in 18^9, and is still living at Kansas
City, Missouri. The oldest of her children is Harry
Elliott, a graduate of the Indiana Medical College
at Indianapolis, a physician and surgeon at Brazil,
the county seat of Clay County, Indiana, for over
a year a captain in the Medical Reserve Corps and
up to the spring of 1919 still on duty with the
.American Expeditionarv Forces at Verdun, France.
Dr. Tames E. Elliott is the second of the family.
Mrs. Tennie Shaw is the wife of a Kansas City
publisher. Frank is a resident of Dallas, Texas,
joined the Officers Training Camp in 1908, was com-
missioned captain and served until mustered out m
1919 and has since become an oil operator in Texas.
John, the youngest of the family, is a dentist by
profession at Kansas Citv, and was connected with
the Dental Corps of the army during the war.
Dr. James E. Elliott attended rural schools _ in
Clav Countv, Indiana, graduated from the high
school at Poland in 1899 and soon afterward entered
the Indiana Medical College at Indianapolis, where
HISTORY OF MONTANA
he graduated M. D. in 1904. He spent one year
as an interne in St. Anthony's Hospital at Terre
Haute, and has since come in contact with the most
advanced ideas and methods of medicine and
surgery by post-graduate work and attending clinics
in Chicago and with the Mayo Brothers at Roches-
ter, Minnesota. Doctor Elliott practiced medicine
at Terre Haute, Indiana, for eleven years. He
came to Montana in 1915, and has been permanently
located at Bozeman since December, 1917, and has
already built up a large and satisfactory general
practice as a physician and surgeon. His offices are
in the Story Block. His home is in the Evergreen
Apartments. He served as county health officer in
1918. He is a member of the County, State and
American Medical Associations. Doctor Elliott owns
a ranch of 157 acres of irrigated land four miles
north of Belgrade. He is a democrat in politics, a
member of the Presbyterian Church and affiliated
with the Knights of Pythias at Terre Haute.
In 1906, at Brazil, Indiana, he married Miss
Kathryne Dietz, daughter of Emil and Anna Dietz,
who now reside at Anaconda, Montana. Her father
is a traveling salesman. Mrs. Elliott is a graduate
of the high school at Noblesville, Indiana. They
have one daughter, Kathryne, born December 8,
1909.
Willis C. Wells grew up in Wisconsin, in the
heart of the great dairy district of that state, was
a practical dairyman when only a youth and sub-
sequently became a recognized expert as a butter
maker and creamery man. For a number of years
he was in that business in Wisconsin. He has also
been manager of a number of creameries in the
northwest, and has put several such establishments
on their feet in Montana. Mr. Wells is now pro-
prietor of the Hamilton Creamery, and has done
much to make that institution a stimulus to the
dairy industry of Ravalli County.
Mr. Wells was born in Dodge County, Wisconsin,
November II, 1868. His people were Wisconsin
pioneers. His grandfather, Newton Wells, was born
in 1815 and was an early settler in Wisconsin, where
he developed a farm. He died at Neosha in that
state in 1865. Mathias N. Wells, father of the Ham-
ilton citizen, was born in Vermont in 1844, and
began his career as a farmer in Dodge County,
Wisconsin. Since 1879 his home has been at Neills-
ville in that state. He continued farming until he
retired. For three years he was a Union soldier.
serving with the Seventh Wisconsin Battery. Most
of his service was around Memphis, Tennessee, and
on the western border. He is a republican in politics.
Mathias Wells married Alberta Pettingill, who was
born in Vermont in 1846. They were married in
Dodge County, Wisconsin. Willis is the oldest of
their children. Burton H. is connected with an un-
dertaking establishment at Neillsville. Hattie May
is the wife of Ed Lloyd, a farmer near Columbia,
Wisconsin.
Willis C. Wells acquired his early education in the
rural schools of Clark County, Wisconsin. He lived
on his father's farm until 1891, and while there ac-
quired a practical knowledge of farming, dairying
and the creamery business. In 189S he took the but-
ter-making course at the University of Wisconsin
at Madison. He then took charge of the creamery,
known as the Farmers Co-operative Creamery at
Strum, Wisconsin. In the fall of 1896 he was called
back to Madison to serve as instructor in butter-
making, and gave his services to the University for
one term. The following two years he had charge
of the Farmers Co-operative Creamery at Edmund.
Wisconsin, for three years was creamery manager
at Arcadia, Wisconsin, and then left his native state
to take charge of the Farmers Co-operative Cream-
ery at Corona, South Dakota. After nine months,
on account of rheumatism, he was compelled to
give up his work and on December 26, 1900, he
reached Kalispell, Montana. He bought a farm in
the Flathead district, and operated it for six years.
On leaving the farm he spent a year as manager of
the creamery at Yakima, Washington, and then for
two years followed various lines of employment at
Columbia Falls, Montana. He returned to Kalispell
to take charge of the Farmers Co-operative Cream-
ery, and after nine months bought the plant and
operated it with increasing success and profit for five
and a half years. At the end of that time he re-
turned the plant to the farmers and patrons.
Mr. Wells came to Hamilton in March, 1917, leas-
ing the Farmers Co-operative Creamery. At the end
of two years he bought it and is now sole proprie-
tor. The plant is located at Sixth and North streets,
and it handles a large bulk of the cream produced
over a territory fifty miles around.
Mr. Wells is a republican and a member of the
Methodist Church, and is affiliated with the Ancient
Order of United Workmen. He resides on Fifth
Street, North. He married near Strum, Wisconsin,
in 189*5, Miss Theoline H. Soland, daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. T. H. Soland. Her father, now deceased,
was a Wisconsin farmer, and her mother lives at
Blair in that state. Mr. and Mrs. Wells have two
children : Mabel, who received a high school edu-
cation and is at home and Lawrence, who lives at
Portland, Oregon.
Elbert Hymer was the pioneer real estate man
and has the leading real estate business at Red
Lodge. He has been a resident of Red Lodge for
a number of years, and has had a very active
career, his range of experience including everything
from farm work to engineer in coal mines.
Mr. Hymer was born near Holdrege, Nebraska,
on a homestead. The postoffice at that time was
called Sacramento. His grandfather, John B.
Hymer, was a native of Ohio, and was of Scotch-
Irish ancestry, his wife being Irish. He spent a
number of years at Holdrege, Nebraska, where he
died in 1896. His trade was that of stationary en-
gineer. W. E. Hymer, father of Elbert Hymer,
is a well known resident of Red Lodge. He was
born in Illinois in 1854 and after his marriage moved
to Sacramento, near Holdrege, Nebraska, and took
up a homestead. He moved into Holdrege in 1884
and was engaged in the implement business and
later as president of the Holdrege National Bank.
In 1891 he came to Red Lodge, Montana, and was
an important factor in developing the coal mines
in that part of the state and also owned one of the
important portions of Red Lodge, known as the
Hymer .Addition, most of which has since been sold.
He is now living practically retired. He is a re-
publican, a member of the Methodist Church, and is
affiliated with Lincoln Lodge of Elks at Lincoln,
Nebraska. W. E. Hymer married Mary E. Dunlavy,
who was born in Illinois in 1853. "They had six
children : Otis, a newspaper man at Bakersfield,
California ; Katherine, who is the wife of George E.
Blanchard. a physician practicing at Pomona, Cali-
fornia ; Clarence E., who was killed by a sheave
wheel in the mines at Red Lodge at the age of
twenty-five; J. A., who is in the automobile business
at Los Angeles; Elbert; and Evangeline, at home
with her parents.
Elbert Hymer attended public school at Holdrege,
Nebraska, to the age of twelve. The following year
he left home and went to work, doing farm labor,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
63
accepting other employment and on going to Lin-
coln, Nebraska, drove a delivery wagon. Later he
took the preparatory course in the Nebraska Wes-
leyan University, and that finished his education.
Mr. Hymer first came to Montana in 1895. spending
one summer at Red Lodge. For a number of years
he followed the business of stationary fireman and
hoisting engineer in mines, and he worked in the
Red Lodge mines for two years beginning in 1905.
From 1907 for five years he was a hoisting engineer
in the mines at Butte, and when the mines were shut
down he found work with the Northern Pacific
Railway as a locomotive fireman.
Mr. Hymer returned to Red Lodge in I9i2and en-
gaged in the real estate and farm loan business.
His ol^ices are in the Meyer-Chapman Bank Build-
ing. He is individually owner of some fine ranch
lands to the extent of 661 acres in Carbon and
Yellowstone counties. He also has a modern home
at 324 North Platte Street.
Mr. Hymer is a republican, is affiliated with Bear
Tooth Lodge No. 534 of the Elks, and a member of
Red Lodge Chamber of Commerce. At Helena.
Montana, December 10, 1898, he married Miss Mabel
E. Terry. Her mother is Mrs. Sarah E. Terry, of
Butte. They have one child, Elmer Clare, born
March 22, 1913.
Henry Ellingson, president of the Ellingson
Mercantile Company at Big Timber, has been a
Montanan for many years and has made his time
and energies count for successful achievement as
a farmer, rancher and business man, and has en-
joyed high standing among his fellow citizens, who
have twice elected him to the Legislature.
Mr. Ellingson was born near the famous cathedral
city of Trondjen, Norway, September 9, 1846. His
father. Filing Gaustad, was born in 1809 and died
in 1887, having spent all his life on a farm near
Trondjen. He was a Lutheran in religion. He
married Gertrude Langorgen, who was born near
Trondjen and died there in 1873. They had two
sons, Ole the older dying on a farm near Trondjen
in 1910.
Henry Ellingson was educated in Norwegian
schools, and lived on his father's farm until 1866,
when, at the age of twenty years, he came to Amer-
ica, spending a short time in Chicago and then
going out to the northwestern frontier and settling
in Fillmore County, Minnesota. Both in Chicago
and the first year he spent in Minnesota he attended
American schools for the purpose of learning the
English language. In the spring of 1867 he moved
to Stevens Point. Portage County, Wisconsin, and
worked in the pineries four years. He then re-
turned to Fillmore County, Minnesota, was a farmer
there eleven years, and then established his pioneer
home in Montana, at what is now Melville in Sweet-
grass County. He located on railroad land and
followed farming there for twenty-five years. His
next location was in Bear Creek in Carbon County,
where he was a pioneer merchant. He sold out
his business in the fall of 1913, and then took a
rest from business cares, spending about fifteen
months on the California coast. On returning from
California Mr. Ellingson joined his son Edwin H.,
at Big Timber, where they established the Motor
Inn Garage, one of the first two enterprises of that
kind in Big Timber. The business is conducted
by the Ellingson Mercantile Company, of which
Mr. Ellingson is president. He owns the garage
building on McLeod Street and Second .Avenue,
where they have floor space 60x140 feet. Recently
they purchased the building on Second and Ander-
son streets, including four lots, the building being
Vol. II— 5
50x140 feet. They not only do general garage
service but repair and handle automobile accessories
and sell the Overland car, the Oil-Pull Rumely
tractors, the Monarch Never-Slip tractors and
handle a general line of threshing machinery and
trucks. Mr. Elhngson also owns his home at the
corner of Fourth Avenue and Bamble Street.
He was elected on the republican ticket to the
House of Representatives from Carbon County in
1912, serving during the session of 1913. In 1916 he
was chosen by Sweetgrass County to the State
Senate for a term of four years. In the Senate
he has served on the county and towns, public
lands, public buildings, public morals, irrigation
and water rights and other committees. Mr. Elling-
son IS a member of the Lutheran Church and is a
member of the Big Timber Lodge, Knights of
Pythias.
In 1870, in Waupaca County, Wisconsin, he mar-
ried Miss Gina Becken. She was born in Norway,
a daughter of Hans Becken, who brought his
family to the United States in 1857, and was a
pioneer homesteader in Portage County, Wisconsin,
where he died m 1872. Mrs. Ellingson was educated
in Portage County. Her mother, Siegred Becken,
was born in Norway in 1827 and died at Big Tim-
ber, Montana, in 1911.
Mr. and Mrs. Ellingson have had seven children:
the oldest is Edwin H., his father's active business
partner. Edwin was born in Fillmore Couiity, Min-
nesota, in 1872, was educated in the common schools
there and at Big Timber. Susanna, the second
child, is the wife of George Rostad, a rancher at
Big Timber. George, the third in age, died in
18S9, at the age of thirteen. Emma is the wife of
a farmer near Tacoma, Washington, Marks Smaby.
Oscar is one of the firm and has charge of the
office of the Ellingson Mercantile Company at Big
Timber. John G., is in the insurance business at
Big Timber, while Hilma, the youngest, is the wife
of Oliver O. Bekken, a mechanic at Big Timber.
Charles F. Kinmonth. A man of energy and
enterprise, possessing good business ability and
judgment, Charles F. Kinmonth, of Billings, has
for several years been actively identified with the
agricultural interests of Yellowstone County, and
holds a position of note among the extensive land
holders of this section of the state. A native of
Iowa, he was born in Lucas County October 22,
1868, a son of the late O. F. Kinmonth. His pa-
ternal grandfather, Alexander Kinmonth, was born
in Scotland in 1809, and there married a Miss Foote.
Soon after that happy event he emigrated with his
wife to the United States, settling in Hobart, Dela-
ware County, New York, where both spent their
remaining years, his death occurring in 1889. He
was a carpenter and cabinet maker by trade, and
also became owner of quite a tract of land, on which
he carried on general farming to some extent.
O. F. Kinmonth was born in Delaware County,
' New Y'ork, in 1834, and grew to manhood on the
home farm. As a young man he migrated to Illi-
nois, and soon after the breaking out of the Civil
war enlisted in the Fourteenth Illinois Infantry, and
with his comrades saw hard service on the field of
battle. Subsequently engaging in agricultural pur-
suits, he spent a year in Stark County, Illinois, and
then removed with his wife to Lucas County, Iowa,
where he improved a good farm and became promi-
nent as an agriculturist. He lived to a ripe old age,
dying in Russell, Iowa, in 1904.
The maiden name of the wife of O. F. Kinmonth
was Esther Ann Atherton. She was born in Stark
County, Illinois, in 1849. and is now residing in
64
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Russell, Iowa. Seven children were born of their
union, as follows : Roderick, a farmer by occupa-
tion, died in Russell, Iowa, aged thirtv-six years;
Charles F., the subject of this brief sketch; Maude,
wife of C. A. Currier, who is engaged in farming
at Chariton, Iowa; Alexander, a farmer in Ballan-
tine, Montana; Orin. living on the home farm in
Russell, Iowa; Mabel, wife of Arthur Pyle, a mail
clerk on the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Rail-
road, residing in Russell, Iowa, and Belle, wife of
Neil Lonychan. who is engaged in agricultural pur-
suits in Russell, Iowa.
Having laid a substantial foundation for his future
education in the rural schools of Lucas County,
Iowa, Charles F. Kinmonth completed a course of
study at Elliott's Business College in Burlington,
Iowa. Having as a youth become thoroughly ac-
quainted with the various branches of agriculture,
he chose the independent calling to which he was
reared, and was engaged in farming in his native
county until 1904. Migrating then to Western Ne-
braska. Mr. Kinmonth operated a threshing outfit,
and did a good business as an auctioneer for four
years. Coming from there to Ballantine, Montana,
on April 16, 1908, he took up in Yellowstone County
a homestead claim of eighty acres of land, and to
this original tract he has since added other valuable
tracts, having title now to 1,280 acres of fine Mon-
tana land. Leaving his homestead in November,
1916, Mr. Kinmonth assumed possession of his beau-
tiful residence at 114 Avenue B, Billings, and has
since devoted his time and attention to auctioneer-
ing, a business in which he is an expert.
Mr. Kinmonth married in 1897 at Kearney, Ne-
braska, Miss Dessa Larimer. Her father, J. R. Lari-
mer, was born in Ohio in 1834, and died in Kearney,
Nebraska, April 2, 1918. During his earlier life
Mr. Larimer was for many years engaged m the
grain and elevator business at Bloomington, Illinois.
In 1884 he removed with his family to Kearney,
Nebraska, where he continued as a farmer and
commission broker until his death. He was a stanch
republican in politics and an active and prominent
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Dur-
ing the Civil war he served for three years in the
Fifty-third Illinois Volunteer Infantry, doing his
duty faithfully as a soldier. Fraternally he was a
member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
His wife, whose maiden name was Margaret E.
Jones, was born at Arrowsmith, Illinois, in 1851,
and is now a resident of Billings, Montana.
Mr. and Mrs. Kinmonth are the parents of four
children, namely: Maurine. a graduate of the Bill-
ings High School, is the wife of Preston Trask, of
Ballantine, Montana, a well-known and successful
ranchman; Clarice, now, in 1919, a junior in the
Billings High School ; Mildred, an eighth-grade pupil
in the public schools, and Eleanor, who is attending
school in the first grade. In his political affiliations
Mr. Kinmonth is independent, voting for the best
men and measures without regard to party preju-
dice, and fraternally he is a member of Kearney
Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, at Kear-
ney, Nebraska.
John A. Harader began his career as a teacher.
He was connected with schools in four or five
different states in the West and Northwest, which
was followed by a period of newspaper and con-
vention reporting. But he found the true field for
his energies and abilities as an executive in com-
mercial affairs. He is the present manager of the
Bozeman Chamber of Commerce, and has made that
one of the livest and most influential commercial
bodies in Montana.
Mr. Harader was born at Mount Aetna, Iowa,
January 12, 1878. His is an uncommon family name,
and probably all the Haraders in the United States
trace their ancestry back to his great-grandfather,
who_ was one of two brothers coming from Switzer-
land on the French border and settling in Virginia
in i8l2. , One of the brothers never married. The
great-grandfather established his family in Virginia.
His son Jacob, grandfather of John A., lived in
Virginia for a number of years and after his mar-
riage took his family to Indiana, then to Iowa. He
was a farmer and flour miller. He was a stanch
Union man, and during the Civil war joined the
LTnion army and was killed in an engagement in
Texas. A. Harader, father of John A., was born
in Virginia in 1843, and when a boy accompanied
his parents to Indiana and then to Iowa. At the age
of eighteen, in 1861, he enlisted in the Fourth Iowa
Infantry, and served as a gallant and faithful
soldier all through the war. He was at Shiloh,
Gettysburg, Lookout Mountain, and with Sherman
in many of his campaigns. He received a gun shot
wound through the chest at Chattanooga. Follow-
ing the war he returned to Mount Aetna, Iowa,
married, and settled down as a merchant in that
Jocality. In 1883 he established the pioneer store at
Mount Vernon, South Dakota, then a territory.
Later he farmed in South Dakota and about 1898
moved to Cottonwood, Kansas, where he continued
farming until he retired. He is now living at
Cassoday, Kansas, past seventy-five years of age.
He has been prominent in politics in different locali-
ties as a republican. At Mount Vernon, South
Dakota, he was police judge. He is one of the lead-
ing members of the Dunkard Church. A. Harader
married Jane Magness, who was born in Ohio in
1851^ They had ten children: Ada, wife of M. G.
McKenzie, a minister of the Methodist Episcopal
Church and a member of the Missouri Conference;
Jacob, who died in infancy; Jennie, wife of W. A.
Bell, a hardware merchant at North Yakima, Wash-
ington; Maggie, who died in Texas at the age of
thirty-five ; William, a merchant at Burns, Kansas ;
John A., who is the sixth in age among the children;
Ward, a teacher in the public schools at Enumclaw,
Washington; Mabel, a resident of Seattle, Washing-
ton, wife of Wid Vinson, who was with the Amer-
ican Expeditionary Forces and the Army of Occupa-
tion in Germany; Blanche, wife of Samuel Vinson,
a farmer living at Clements, Kansas; and Benjamin,
who received military training at Camp Lewis and
was recently mustered out and returned home.
John A. Harader received a public school educa-
tion. He graduated from the high school at Mount
Vernon, South Dakota, in 1897 and spent the fol-
lowing year teaching in Davidson County, that state.
He went to Cottonwood, Kansas, with his parents
and for a year was principal of the schools at Home-
stead, Kansas. He is a graduate of the Commercial
Department of the Kansas Wesleyan University at
Salina, and also attended for one year the State
Normal School at Emporia. For four years, be-
ginning in 1902, Mr. Harader was connected with
a business college at Superior, Wisconsin. Coming
west to Payette, Idaho, he engaged in the real estate
business, then traveled through Colorado and on
returning to Payette joined the Chamber of Com-
merce as manager. In 1914 he was called to Yakima,
Washington, as manager of the Chamber of Com-
merce, remaining there two years, when his services
were requisitioned by the business men of Bozeman.
He has been manager of the Bozeman Chamber of
Commerce since 1916, and his business offices are
in the Story Block. The organization comprises
300 members, and its membership and effectiveness
HISTORY OF AIONTANA
65
are in the main a tribute to the organizing and
executive abilities of Mr. Harader. 'Mr. Harader is
president of the Montana Association of Commercial
Secretaries for the years 1918-19.
For over a year he had all his time and energies
enlisted in war work, being chairman of the War
Chest at Bozeman. serving as County Food Admin-
istrator, working in every Liberty Loan and other
campaign, and was also secretary of the Council of
Defense. He has been prominent in all move-
ments to develop the state.
Mr. Harader is an independent in politics. He
has become affiliated with several fraternal organi-
zations in different towns where he has had his
home, including Yakima Lodge of Masons, Boze-
man Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, and Payette Lodge of Knights of
Pvthias.
Mr. Harader and family reside at 401 South
Eighth Avenue. He married at Pa3'ette, Idaho, in
1909, Miss Edith M. Wood, a daughter of A. E. and
Elizabeth (Gerould) Wood. Her parents reside at
Payette, where her father is a real estate broker.
Mrs. Harader is a graduate of the Payette High
School. To their marriage were born three chil-
dren, all members of the home circle, as follows:
Gerould, born in August, 1910; Marcus, born in
November, 1912; and Frank, born March 17, 1915-
Theodore Reinbold. As a boy in his native city
of Newark, Ohio. Theodore Reinbold became inter-
ested in automobile mechanics. ' He tinkered with
some of the first practical makes of cars. For a
number of years he has been recognized as a. past
master of everything propelled by a gasoline engine.
At Hamilton, Montana, he has developed the largest
automobile and garage business in Ravalli County.
Mr. Reinbold is still very young, having been born
August 30, 1891. His parents were Christian and
Mary Reinbold, both natives of Germany. His
father was born in 1859, and as a young man settled
in Ohio, where he married, and since his marriage
has lived in Newark. He is a stationary engineer
and Theodore' inherits his mechanical ability. The
father is a democrat and a member of the Lutheran
Church and the Fraternal Order of Eagles. His wife
was killed in a railroad accident at Newark in 1907.
They were the parents of five children : Fred, man-
ager of the C. L. .\dams lumber yard at Stevens-
ville, Montana; Elizabeth, wife of John Freednour.
a glass blower at Newark ; Carl August, owner of
the Reinbold plumbing and heating establishment at
Newark ; Theodore ; and Otto Christian, an auto-
mobile mechanic whose present home is at Spokane,
Washington.
Theodore Reinbold acquired a public school edu-
cation at Newark. He left school at the age of
fourteen and went to work in the Ford Garage of
that city. He operated cars and did general re-
pair and mechanical work there until 191 1. In that
year he came to Stevensville, Montana, and for two
years had full charge of the cars and trucks owned
and operated by the Sunset Orchard Corporation.
Another year he spent at the Spokane headquarters
of the Holt Manufacturing Company, makers of the
celebrated Caterpillar tractor. Mr. Reinbold estab-
lished a garage and Ford agency at Stevensville,
Montana, in 1914. The firm was Stratton & Rein-
bold, which was continued until May, 1918. At the
latter date Mr. Stratton sold out to H. O. Bell of
Missoula. The firm is now Bell & Reinbold. and
there is a third partner, Harold Holt. Mr. Bell has
charge of the H. O. Bell Company, a Ford agency
at Missoula, while Mr. Reinbold is in complete
charge of the Ford agency and garage at Hamilton.
His garage occupies three ci.ty blocks, at the corner
of Main and Third streets. He handles Ford cars
and Fordson tractors and all accessories.
Mr. Reinbold is an independent in politics. He
is affiliated with the Lutheran Church and is a mem-
ber of Ionic Lodge No. 38. Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Alasons, Hamilton Chapter No. 18, Royal
Arch Masons, Crusade Commandery No. 17. Knights
Templars, Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Butte, and is a member of the Hamilton Chamber
of Commerce. He owns a modern home on South
Fourth Street.
August 12, 1916, at Missoula, he married Miss
Vivian Marguerite Stratton, daughter of R. A. and
Theressa (Stiern) Stratton, residents of Stevens-
ville. Her father is president of the Montana Farm
and Livestock Company. Mrs. Reinbold was edu-
cated in the Stevensville High School and in a
girls' seminary at Spokane. !Mr. and Mrs. Rein-
bold have one son, Theodore Robert, born Febru-
ary 13, 1918.
Thomas G. Armstrong came to Montana more
than thirty years ago. His services have proved
valuable t6 several mercantile organizations and
for a number of years past he has been president
and director of the Big Timber Supply House and
has also acquired and owns some important ranch-
ing interests.
Mr. Armstrong was born at Ausable Forks in
Clinton County, New York, November 2, 1862, and
represents the third generation of the Armstrong
family in this country. His grandfather, Thomas
Armstrong, was a native of Durham, England, and
on coming to America became a farmer in Vermont.
He died at Brandon in that state in 1878. George
W. Armstrong was born in Vermont in 1842, but
spent the greater part of his life in New York
State. While at Ausable Forks he managed a large
mercantile establishment and was also a superin-
tendent in the J. & J. Rogers Iron Company. In
1899 he removed to Plattsburg, New York, and
was bookkeeper for the Davis Provision Company.
He died at Plattsburg in 191 5. In politics he was
a democrat and served a term as clerk of Clinton
County. Outside of business and family his chief
interest was his church membership as a Methodist.
He married Sarah Hodgson, who was born on
the Isle of Motte in Lake Champlain in 1837, and
is still living at Plattsburg at the advanced age
of eighty-two. Thomas G., is the oldest of her six
children. Norman, the second in age, is a farmer
at Anoka, Minnesota, while Harry, the youngest,
is an electrician at Duluth, Minnesota. The other
three reside at Plattsburg, New York. Mrs. Nellie
Cason is the wife of a bookkeeper, Mrs. Annie
.'Vgnew's husband is an attorney, while Ethel is un-
married and lives with her mother.
Thomas G. Armstrong attended rural schools in
Clinton County, New York, but at the age of
thirteen left his books and studies and began doing
for himself. He lived on a farm in Clinton County
four years and then went to the mining district
of the' Upper Peninsula of Michigan at Houghton
and for three years was an employe of the Calumet
Hecla Mining Company. The next stage of his
progress .brought him to the Red River Valley
of North Dakota, where he was clerk in a store
at Hunter two years. Mr. Armstrong arrived on
the scene of his permanent career at Big Timber,
Montana, in November, 1888. For the next eight
years he was employed by the pioneer mercantile
firm of Hatch Brothers & Company, then spent
two years in the sheep business and ranching, and
for eight years was with the H. Bliss Hardware
66
HISTORY OF MOXTAXA
Store. He was a primary factor in establishing
the Big Timber Supply House in igo;. This com-
pany does an extensive retail and wholesale trade
in groceries, hardware, farm implements and other
supplies. The offices, plant and warehouses are
located on Anderson Street. The business is^ in-
corporated with Mr. Armstrong as president, W. S.
Widdicomb, vice president, and J. W. Kirkwood,
secretary and treasurer. Mr. Armstrong also owns
a 320 acre grain ranch in the Gibson district of
Sweetgrass County. He has a modern home in
Big Timber.
Politicallv he is identified with the democratic
party and 'is affiliated with Hunter Lodge of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and Big Timber
Camp No. 10610, Modern Woodmen of America.
He married at Livingston, Montana, in 1894,
Alarie Anderson, a native of Ontario, Canada.
They have two children, Nina and Dick. The
daughter is a graduate of the Montana State College
at Bozeman and the wife of A. D. Burkett, chemist
for a cement plant at Trident, Montana. Dick
enlisted in June, 1918, and the following August,
after completing his training in camp, went overseas
with the Expeditionary Forces to France.
Charles H. Draper, publisher of the Picket-
Journal of Red Lodge, is a native Montanaii, has
made his paper the medium of news and history
in Carbon County for a number of years, and through
a knowledge of the experience of his honored
father, Frank W. Draper, probably knows as much
of the real history of men and events in Carbon
County as any other individual.
Frank W. Draper, his father, was born in Ticon-
deroga County New York, February 4, 1854, and a
few years later his parents, Hiram and Mehitable
(Le Crane) Draper, moved west to Illinois and
settled at Belvidere. Hiram Draper, also a native
of New York State, entered the Union army and
lost his life in a battle in 1863. Frank W. Draper
grew up in Belvidere, graduated from the high
school and at the age of seventeen went with other
members of the family to Edgar, Nebraska. He
taught there for a year or so and in 1874 went to
Sioux City, Iowa, and shortly afterward started for
California. From that time forward he had a life
of hardship and adventure, and was vitally identi-
fied with many of the fundamental activities of the
Northwest. About three years after he started for
California he was on the way by prairie schooner
from Denver to the Black Hills of Dakota, where
he became a pioneer furniture merchant in partner-
ship with a Mr. Pepper. Not long afterward he
sold his interest and engaged in the drug business
for eighteen months. His next experience was as
wagon boss for a large freighting company doing
business between Bismarck and the Black Hills.
Frank W. Draper drove to Miles City, Montana,
in 1880, and took charge of the Diamond R wagon
train, which performed a large part of the trans-
portation service out of Miles City in those days.
The following winter was one remembered by the
oldest inhabitant for the severity of the cold and
the excessive snow, when livestock by the thousands
perished on the ranges. Traffic and transportation
had to be maintained in spite of such conditions and
Mr. Draper and his men suffered untold hardships
in keeping up the service. Later in that year Mr.
Draper moved to Junction City and opened a retail
liquor store and a few months later went to Ben-
son's Landing, four miles from where Livingston
now stands. Centers of business and industry in
those days were seldom permanent, and in order to
keep up with rapid changes and fluctuations Mr.
Draper built a house in sections, which enabled him
to move without loss and inconvenience. When
Clark, now Livingston, was started, he was almost
immediately on the ground with his section house,
and that house is recorded in history as the first
building erected there. He continued in business at
Clark or Livingston until the fire of 1885 destroyed
his property. His next move was to Cooke City,
then a lively place, but on November 6, 1886, the
smelter shut down and the business and population
of the camp dwindled away. The Drapers remained
at Cooke City until August, 1887, when he trans-
ferred his residence to Nye. This camp had to move
when its site was found to be included within the
Indian Reservation. The next move proved to be the
last one for Mr. Draper. He located at Red Lodge
and in partnership with Doctor Macomber opened
the first drug store of the town. He sold out his
interest in that a year or so later and spent one
summer on the ranch, and eventually took up farm-
ing and ranching as his regular work. He was liv-
ing on the ranch when death came to him on July 10,
1901, and removed one of the best loved and most
honored citizens of Carbon County.
He was a charter member of the Knights of
Pythias and Independent Order of Odd Fellows at
Livingston and the Woodmen of the World at Red
Lodge, was a stanch republican and a factor in local
politics, and is remembered as the first school trustee
at Red Lodge, hiring the first school teacher in 1888.
September 13, , 1882, he married Miss Matilda
Martin. In the absence of ministers in the Mon-
tana of that day the ceremony was performed by
Judge Braden. Mrs. Draper was born in Germany,
where her father died, and she came to this country
with her mother, two sisters and two brothers in
1874, locating at Sioux City, Iowa, and later going
to Miles City, Montana, with friends. She is now
living at the home ranch four miles northwest of
Red Lodge. She is the mother of six children :
Irwin Albert, also on the home ranch ; Alvin, his twin
brother, who died in infancy ; Edwin W., a rancher
at the home place ; and Charles H. ; and twin sisters
who died at birth.
Charles H. Draper was born at Nye City, Montana,
March 25, 1888. He acquired a limited education in
the rural schools of Carbon County, the public
schools of Red Lodge, and took the preparatory and
the regular' collegiate course at the State College at
Bozeman, where he graduated in 1912. He is a
member of the Sigma Chi College Fraternity.
Since leaving college Mr. Draper has been con-
tinuously in journalism. He bought an interest in
the Carbon County Journal in 1912, becoming its
editor and manager and in 1913 acquired all the
property. The Carbon County Journal was estab-
lished June 26, 1909, at Joliet, and was moved to
Red Lodge January i, 1912. It is a democratic paper
and the official organ of Carbon County, going to
most of the homes of that county and also having
a large circulation in surrounding counties. The
offices of the plant are at 211 Broadway. In October,
1918, i\lr. Draper also acquired the Red Lodge Picket,
consolidating the two under the present name of
Picket-Journal. The Picket was established in 1888,
one of the early papers of Montana. Mr. Draper
now has the best equipped and most conveniently
arranged printing and publishing plant in the Mon-
tana weeklv newspaper field.
He is a democrat, though never an aspirant for
public office, and served four years as chairmnn of
the Democratic County Central Committee. He is a
vestrjTnan of the Episcopal Church and is affiliated
with 'Star in the West Lodge No. 40, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534 of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
67
the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, is a
member of the exclusive local social club known
as the Inquiry Club, and is on the governing board
of the Red Lodge Chamber of Commerce. Mr.
Draper owns his modern home at 511 North Hauser
Avenue.
May 14, 1914, at Kalispell, he married Miss Meryl
A. Fitch, daughter of John H. C. and Lena J.
(Babcock) Fitch. Her parents still live at Kalis-
pell. Her father is a pioneer druggist of that town.
Mrs. Draper is a graduate of the Flathead County
High School and finished her education in the State
College at Bozeman. To their marriage have been
born two children ; Richard John, born September
2, 1916, and Gayle Adele, born April 15, 1919.
Daniel Martin Crowley. The type of business
ability and citizenship represented by the late Dan-
iel Martin Crowley is a distinctive contribution to
any community. The city of Lewistown was the
place honored by his residence for many years, he
was one of the earliest settlers there and had the
honor of erecting the second frame building on the
site.
Mr. Crowley, who died January 19, 1906, was very
successful in business and joined his success with
traits of kindness and generosity that made him
popular wherever known. It is said that one of the
largest concourses of people ever witnessed in that
community followed his body to its last resting
place. Mr. Crowley was born at Brasher Falls, New
York, January 17, 1856, being the third of nine chil-
dren of John and Mary (Hurley) Crowley. His
parents were natives of Ireland and came to America
on their wedding tour, where John Crowley spent
the rest of his life as a farmer.
On his father's farm Daniel Martin Crowley lived
to the age of nineteen. He had a common school
education. In 1875 he started for the Northwest,
and for several years worked in lumber camps and
in other occupations in Minnesota. He came to Mon-
tana in 1879, and with his brother John was associated
in ranching near Townsend. He came to Lewistown
about 1881. As one of tlie original settlers he took
up a homestead, and rapidly acquired interests that
made him one of the big men financially and other-
wise in this section of the state. He was perhaps
most widely known because of his success in devel-
oping strains of horses for the track. Some of the
fastest and best horses ever produced in Montana
were bred or trained in his stables. He also owned
several ranches, was a stockholder in the Electric
Light and Telephone Company at Lewistown, and
his investments covered almost the entire state. He
served as deputy sheriff of Fergus County, but
otherwise took no prominent part in politics except
to aid the republican party and his friends.
Since his death his extensive business interests
have been capably managed by Mrs. Crowley, who
still resides in Lewistown. She shared with her
late husband in generous plans and helpfulness
toward her community and was very prominent in
the various war auxiliary movements in recent years.
The Crowleys as a family are active in the Catholic
Church.
Mr. and Mrs. Crowley were married at Lewistown
August 23, 1898. Her maiden name was Annie E.
Glancy. Her father, John Glancy, came to Montana
in 1886 and was a successful rancher in the Judith
Basin. Mrs. Crowley has two sons, Charles J. and
Glancy D.
Clyde H. Lorance, president of the Lorance Vul-
canizing and Tire Company at Billings, is one of
the progressive and enterprising young business citi-
zens of this flourishing center of commercial activity,
who has recognized the trend of the times, taken
cognizance of his opportunities and established him-
self in a line of effort in which his inherent abilities
have been given full play in the working out of
success and the development of a prosperous enter-
prise. He was born at Beatrice, Nebraska, Novem-
ber 7, 1890, a son of O. P. and May B. (Bradley)
Lorance.
William H. Lorance, the grandfather of Clyde H.,
was born in 1828, in Tennessee, and was there edu-
cated and reared to young manhood, when he went
to Missouri and was there married. For a time he
was engaged in agricultural pursuits in that state,
but subsequently pushed on to the frontier of Ne-
braska, in 1865, and was a pioneer in the vicinity
of Brownville, adjoining which town he owned a
farm. In addition to developing a productive farm-
ing property he carried on extensive operations as
a contractor, and was also successful in his activities
as a quarr3'man, being a man of industrious habits
and natural abilities. In 1893 he retired from active
labor and took up his residence at Auburn, Ne-
braska, where he served as justice of the peace and
rounded out an honorable career, his death occur-
ring in 1912. .\t that time he was the last surviving
Mexican war veteran of Nemaha County, Nebraska.
Mr. Lorance was an active and general supporter
of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and was a
.stanch democrat in his political allegiance. He mar-
ried Mary Owen, a native of Missouri, who died at
Brownville, Nebraska, and thev became the parents
of the following children: John H., who is con-
nected with a packing company at Kansas City,
Missouri, as a machinist ; Doctor B. F., a successful
practicing physician at Auburn, Nebraska ; Thomas
Arthur, of Houston, in charge of the buying for
the silk department of the largest department store
of that city or vicinity, and he lost his wife in the
great Galveston flood while a resident of that city;
O. P.; Ed. a boilermaker of Omaha, Nebraska;
William I., a large ranchman of Alliance, Nebraska ;
Belle, the wife of Rev. Clyde Metcalf, a Methodist
Episcopal minister with a charge at Visalia, Cali-
fornia; Ethel, the wife of Tom Reeves, owner of a
vast sheep ranch, with 20,000 head of sheep, at Flag-
staflf, Arizona ; and Hope, who married a tonsorialist
of Los Angeles, California.
O. P. Lorance was born in Gentry County, Mis-
souri, July 2, 1863, and was reared and married in
Nebraska. He was brought up as a farmer's son,
but soon made his way to the big cities, and for
eighteen vears was identified with the big packing
firm of Swift & Company at South St. Paul, Minne-
sota. In the spring of 1914 he came to Montana and
settled on a farm in Yellowstone County, purchas-
ing one-half section of land. On this he carried on
operations until the year 1917, when he took up his
residence at Billings, where he is now secretary
and treasurer of the Lorance Vulcanizing and Tire
Companv. Mr. Lorance belongs to Billings Camp,
Modern' Woodmen of .America, and the Billings
Midland Club, is independent in politics, and a mem-
ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He married
Mary B. Bradley, who was born at Grass Lak.e,
Michigan, in 1871, and of their children, Clyde H.
is the only survivor.
Clvde H. Lorance attended the public schools of
the Twin Cities, St. Paul and Minneapolis, in Min-
nesota, as w^ell as a private high school, but at
the age of eighteen vears put aside his studies to
embark in business affairs. For a time he followed
the vocation of surveving and was subsequently
employed in the Stock Yards at South St. Paul for
one year, following which he spent four years in the
68
HISTORY OF MONTANA
employ of the Wells Fargo Express Company at St.
Paul. In 1914 he accompanied his parents to Mon-
tana and settled with his father on the farm in
Yellowstone County, where he remained until 1917,
the year of the organization of the Lorance Vul-
canizing and Tire Company. Under his capable
and energetic management this business has grown
to large and important proportions, and the business
house, at No. 3012 First Avenue, North, has been
the scene of enlargement and additions, both as to
building and stock. In addition to doing a large
business in the line of vulcanizing tires, the firm
sells new automobile tires, solid rubber tires, auto-
mobile accessories and gasoline, and its business has
shown a consistent, healthy and gratifying increase
since its inception. Mr. Lorance has shown himself
a business man of marked attainments, and has
already established himself in a substantial place
among the leaders of the younger gerierations en-
gaged in commercial pursuits at Billings. Mr.
Lorance is independent in his political views, and
his only public office has been that of constable,
which he filled while a resident of Acton, Montana,
he then being engaged in farming with his father.
Mr. Lorance has made the most of his opportunities
for investment, and is the owner of three handsome
and valuable ranches, an irrigated tract of forty
acres at Warden, Montana ; a dry farming tract of
160 acres at Custer, Montana ; and an irrigated
farm of 100 acres at Fishtail, Montana. Mr. Lor-
ance belongs to the Methodist Episcopal Church and
is a member of the Billings Midland Club.
In 191 1, at St. Paul, Minnesota, Mr. Lorance was
married to Miss Perlie Marie Kimball, daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. J. S. Kimball, the latter of whom
resides at Billings. Mr. Kimball, who is deceased,
was for a number of years clerk of the Modern
Woodmen of America at St. Paul, and later en-
gaged in ranching in Yellowstone County, Montana.
Two children have been born to Mr. and Mrs.
Lorance: June, born June 28, 1915; and Jean, born
in 1917.
Don C. Taylor, superintendent of schools at
Hamilton, is an educator whose work has brought
him favorable attention not only in Montana, but
in other states of the northwest and southwest. He
began teaching in his home state of Michgan, and
has made education his life work.
Mr. Taylor was born in .Mlegan County. Michi-
gan. December i, 1876. In the paternal line he is
of Scotch-Irish ancestry, while his mother's family
were English colonial settlers in Massachusetts. The
Taylors first settled in New York. The grandfather
of the Hamilton educator was John Taylor, who
was born near Ogdensburg, New York, lived many
years there and afterward became a pioneer in
northern Wisconsin. He was a stone mason and
farmer, and died at Augusta, Wisconsin, at the age
of forty-five.
Joel W. Taylor was born in New York in 1843,
and at the age of sixteen moved to Allegan County,
Michigan. That district of southern Michigan was
then heavily covered with the finest quality of pine
timber, and' for a number of years he was actively
engaged in lumbering, until the center of the mill-
ing industry was transferred to other fields. After
that he remained as a farmer in Allegan County
and died there on July 4., 1893. For ten years he
held the office of township supervisor, was a re-
publican in politics, an active supporter of the
Methodist Episcopal Church and affiliated with the
Knights of Maccabees. Joel W. Taylor married
Emma Crawford, who was born in Barry County,
Michigan, in 1845, and died in Allegan County in
1910. Don C. is the oldest of their children. Joel
Clare is a train dispatcher with the Michigan Cen-
tral Railway at Holland, Michigan. Burke W. is
an employe of the Dodge Brothers Motor Com-
pany at Detroit. Florence is the wife of John Prak-
ken, office manager for the Bush & Lane Piano
Company at Seattle, Washington.
Don C. Taylor grew up on his father's farm in
the rural schools of Allegan County. He spent
three years in the preparatory department of Hope
College in Holland, Michigan, and afterward took
the regular four years' course in Hope College,
graduating with his Bachelor of Arts degree in
1905. In the meantime he had taught four years
in the rural schools of his native county. In Sep-
tember, 1905, Mr. Taylor went to Albuquerque, New
Me.xico, wliere he was principal of the Second Ward
School for six years. From the southwest he went
to the northwest, and for a year followed commer-
cial occupations in Spokane. In 1912 he became
superintendent of schools at Murraj', Idaho, re-
maining there two years, and for five years was
superintendent at Mullan in Idaho., Mr. Taylor ac-
cepted his present responsibilities as superintendent
of schools at Hamilton in July, 1919. The local
school system under his supervision comprises three
schools, a staff of twent}--five teachers and an en-
rollment of six hundred scholars.
Mr. Taylor has been a member of the National
Education Association since 1908 and also belongs
to Montana State Teachers' Association. He is a
republican, a member of the Presbyterian Church
and is junior warden of Mullan Lodge No. 50, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons. His home is on
South Third Street in Hamilton.
In 1900, in Allegan County, Michigan, he married
Miss Lucinda Beery, daughter of Joseph and Mary
(Pritchard) Beery. Her father was an Allegan
County farmer and is now deceased. Her mother,
member of one of the most prominent families of
Allegan County, resides with Mr. and Mrs. Taylor.
Mrs. Taylor is a graduate of the Allegan High
School. To Mr. and Mrs. Taylor have been born
five children: Marjorie, born May 31, 1901. now in
her first year in the State University of Montana;
Don Milan, who died at the age of ten and a half
years; Joel Wilson, born August 26, 1904. .a fresh-
man in the Hamilton High School; Emerson B., born
November 4, 1909, a student in the grammar school ;
and Don C, Jr., born February 21, 1915.
Fred L. Gibson. In no profession is there a
career more open to talent than is that of the law,
and in no field of endeavor is there demanded a
rnore careful preparation, a more thorough appre-
ciation of the absolute ethics of life or of the
underlying principles which form the basis of all
human rights and privileges. Possessing all the
requisite qualities of the successful lawyer, Fred
L. Gibson, of Livingston, stands today among the
eminent practitioners of his section of the state.
Fred L. Gibson was born at Dundee, Michigan,
on September 20, 1874, the son of Matthew and
Ellen CCarney) Gibson, the former of whom died
in Madison County, Montana, in 1894, and the latter
is now making her home with her son, the imme-
diate subject of this sketch. Matthew Gibson was
born in 1828 in Cattaraugus County. New York,
but in his early youth the family moved to Southern
Michigan, where he was reared. His permanent
residence was in Monroe County, that state, where
he followed the trade of a plasterer and where
also he operated a farm. In 1888 he removed to
Clerniont County, Ohio, and he followed agricultural
pursuits there until April, 1894, when he came to
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Madison County, Montana, where his death oc-
curred shortly afterwards. He was a democrat
in his political faith and was a highly esteemed
citizen. While living in Michigan Mr. Gibson mar-
ried Ellen B. Carney, who was born in 1843 in
Monroe County, that state, and to them were born
two children, Fred L., and Guy, the latter of whom
is now a farmer in Madison County, Montana.
Fred L. Gibson received his elementary educa-
tion in the rural schools of Monroe County, Mich-
igan, and in 1891 graduated from the high school at
Owensville, Ohio. In 1894 he accompanied his
parents on their removal to Madison County, Mon-
tana, and during the following two years was en-
gaged in teaching school. Then for the same
length of time he operated a ranch, but these voca-
tions did not satisfy his ambitious spirit, and he
entered the law department of the University of
Nebraska. At the end of a year he became the
publisher of the Alder Gulch Times at Virginia
City, which engaged his attention for about a year.
In June, 1899, Mr. Gibson was admitted to the bar
and entered upon the practice of his profession.
In the spring of igoi he removed to Forsyth, Mon-
tana, and helped to organize Rosebud County, of
which he was appointed county attorney, a position
which he filled for two and a half years. Resigning
that position in 1903, he removed to Livingston,
where he has since resided and where he has re-
ceived emphatic recognition as a lawyer of unusual
ability and as a citizen of progressive and yet sound-
ly conservative ideas. He has since coming to
Livingston commanded a large share of the legal
practice in the local courts and has been success-
ful in both criminal and civil practice. On January
I, 1917, Mr. Gibson formed a law partnership with
Vard Smith, under the firm name of Gibson &
Smith, with offices in the National Park Bank
building.
Politically Mr. Gibson is a republican, and ever
since reaching his majority has taken a live interest
in public affairs. His abilities and public spirit
were quickly recognized after he came to his state,
and in 1899 he was elected to represent Madison
County in the Sixth Legislature. In 1909 he rep-
resented Park County in the Eleventh Legislature,
in which he rendered effective service as a member
of the judiciary and other committees. In 1918 the
citizens of Park County again chose him to rep-
resent them in the Legislature, where he again
was assigned to some of the most important com-
mittees of the House, including those on judiciary
of which he was chairman, and revenues and taxa-
tion. During 1907 and 1908 Mr. Gibson served as
city attorney of Livingston and in 1911-12 was
county attorney of Park County, his services in
both positions being eminently satisfactory. He
is deeply interested in educational matters and is
now serving as a member of the county High
School Board. He is a director of the National
Park Bank. He is a member of the Park County
Bar Association, the Montana State Bar Association
and the American Bar Association.
In 1899, at Meadow Creek, Montana, Mr. Gibson
married Winifred Fletcher, the daughter of Wil-
liam A. and Ellen (Gordon) Fletcher, the latter
of whom is now residing at Meadow Creek. The
father, who is deceased, was a pioneer ranch owner
in Madison County. To Mr. and Mrs. Gibson have
been born the following children : Kathleen is a
senior in the Park County High School at Living-
ston, Alice is a freshman in the same school, and
Fred L., who was born on April 18, 1917.
Years of conscientious work have brought to
Mr. Gibson not only increase of practice and repu-
tation, but also that growth of legal knowledge
and that wide and accurate judgment the possession
of which constitutes marked excellence in the
profession. In discussions of the principles of law
he is noted for clearness of statement and candor ;
he seeks faithfully for firm ground and having
once found it nothing can drive him from his
position. His zeal for a client never leads him to
urge an argument which in his judgment is not
in harmony with the law, and in all the important
litigation with which he has been connected no
one has ever charged him with anything calculated
to cast a reflection upon him or his profession.
Hubert Alfred Simmons. The history of Hubert
Alfred Simmons reads like a story thrown on the
screen of life, for it shows how an industrious lad
climbed from a lowly position to one of responsi-
bility, and then, having discharged his duty to his
mother and younger brothers and sisters, earned the
money to educate himself for a learned profession
in which he gained so distinguished a reputation that
he was selected more than once to represent the
people in high public office, at present being county
attorney of Carbon County. He was born at Spadra,
Arkansas, November 13, 1881, a son of Ferdinand
Simmons, who was born in Germany in 185 1 and
died at Spadra, Arkansas, in 1888. He was reared
in Germany, and, according to the custom, gave his
country the usual military service, but so convinced
did he become of the hardships this entailed that
after his marriage he came to the United States so
that his children would not be compelled to enter
the army, and in 1879 became mine foreman at
Oweta, Arkansas, and later held the same position
at Spadra in the same state. Prior to this he had
bought a farm at Spadra, and there died, firm in the
faith of the Roman Catholic Church. Politically he
was a republican. He was married to Anna Eliza-
beth Graff, born in Germany in 1861, who survives
him and makes her home at Red Lodge. Their
children were as follows : Hugo, who died in in-
fancy; Hubert Alfred, whose name heads this re-
view ; Frank, who is a coal miner of Klein, Montana ;
William, who is the only policeman and constable
of Bear Creek, Montana, and also serves as deputy
sheriff; Otto J., who owns the only abstract business
of Red Lodge. The mother of this family was
married second to William Voungholter, now of Red
Lodge, who came to the United States from Ger-
many when about twenty years of age. Until 1917
he was a member of the police force of Red Lodge,
but is now engaged in mining. Mr. and Mrs. Young-
holter became the parents of the following children :
John, who died in infancy; Katherine, who married
C. R. Northrop, who lives at Red Lodge and is em-
ployed by the Chapman State Bank ; Anna, who died
at the age of eight years; and Mayme, who married
Dave Henderson, a mine mechanic of Red Lodge.
Hubert Alfred Simmons attended the ■ public
schools of Spadra and Jenny Lind, leaving school
to engage in mining and farming, living on the
homestead during the time he was so engaged. In
1898 the family came to Belt. Montana, and he was
given employment during the summer and fall of
that year on a section of the railroad, and in the
winter entered the mine. In the spring of 1899 there
was a strike at the mine, and he returned to section
work for a short time, improving his position by
going with an extra gang of workmen to repair
bridges at Belt on the Great Northern Railroad, a
difficult and dangerous undertaking. Until Septem-
ber, 1899, he remained with this railroad, when he
accompanied his mother and her family to Red
Lodge, at which time he engaged with a grading
outfit building the switches at the mines, but left
70
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in December of that year to resume mining. In
1901 Mr. Simmons began clerking in a general store,
and at the same time took a commercial course in
the International Correspondence School. Always
ambitious, he resolved to fit himself for the legal
profession. He took a business course at Red Lodge,
and then began to read law at nights while working
in the day, thriftily saving every penny he could
spare from the bare necessities. Having prepared
himself as far as lay in his power and saved up
$1,000, Mr. Simmons entered the Indiana law school
of the University of Indianapolis, from which he
was graduated May 23, 1906, with the degree of
LL. B. Additional expenses aside from those he had
figured upon necessitated the earning of more money
than the initial $1,000, and Mr. Simmons for eighteen
months eked out his scanty resources by waiting on
the table in a hotel as have so many o"thers before
him who regarded, as he, no sacrifice too great in
.order to secure the proper training.
Following his graduation Mr. Simmons returned
to Red Lodge and for a short time was in the office
of Judge George W. Pierson, and in the fall of igo6
was elected clerk of the court to fill an unexpired
term of two years, and re-elected in 1908 and 1912.
In 1916 he was placed upon the regular republican
ticket for county attornev, to which office he was
elected by a gratifying majoritv, and was re-
elected to the same office in 1918. His offices are in
the United States National Bank Building. A con-
sistent member of the Methodist Episcopal Church,
he IS active m its good work. Mr. Simmons belongs
to Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks ; Star in the West Lodge No.
40, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of which he
was master for two terms ; and Carbon Chapter No.
20, Royal Arch Masons, of Red Lodge. He is a mem-
ber of the Chamber of Commerce and the Carbon
County Bar Association, of which he is vice presi-
dent. He has been a member of the Republican
State Central Committee for Carbon County since
1914- A man of affairs, he is vice president of
the Eagle Coal Company of Red Lodge, and secre-
tary of the W. B. Innes & Company, of Billings.
Montana. His modern residence at No. ^18 North
Piatt Street, is owned by him.
On June i, 1907, Mr. S'immons was married to Miss
Ellen Freeman, a daughter of William and MarV
(Robinson) Freeman, of Red Lodge, where Mr
l-reeman is engaged in mining. Mr. and Mrs. Sim-
mons have the following children : Hubert Alfred,
Jr., who was born February 10, 1910, and Helen
Annie, who was born April 20, 1918, and her twin
sister, Margaret Ida.
John W Clark. A man of brains and intellect,
keen-witted and enterprising. John W. Clark a
well known resident of Billings, has won a brilliant
record as a commercial traveler, and as a reore-
sentat.ve of the Oliver Chilled Plow Company has
achieved distinguished success, winning a command-
ing position in the ranks of his fellow-salesmen
A son of the late George H. Clark, he was born
at btamtord. McLean County, Illinois, July ^i 1876
His paternal grandfather, Milton Clark, a 'tailor
by trade, spent his entire life of ninety-seven years
in Lancashire. England.
Born in 1853 in Lancashire, England, George H.
Clark there spent the days of his boyhood and youth,
in 1871, long before attaining his majority, he im-
migrated to this country, locating at Stamford,
Illinois, where he was engaged in general farming
for many seasons Removing to Gibson City, Illi-
nois, he continued his agricultural labors in that
vicinity from 1889 until ,900, when he purchased ^
farm at Indianola, Iowa. To the improvements al-
ready inaugurated he added others of much value,
making it one of the most desirable pieces of prop-
erty in the neighborhood. Retiring from active
work in 1914. he made his home in the village of
Indianola until his death April 18, 1915. A republi-
can of the old school, he was prominent in local
affairs, and while in Stamford, Illinois, serving as
deputy sheriff and constable. He was a Presbyterian
in religion, and a generous contributor toward the
support of the church. He married Sarah Bos-
singham, who was born in Stamford, Illinois, in
1855, and now resides in Indianola, Iowa. The fol-
lowing children were born to them : John W., the
special subject of this sketch; Clarence, a rancher
at Pompey's Pillar, Montana, died of the influenza
in December, 1918; Clara, twin sister of Clarence,
married Percy Last, a farmer at Indianola, Iowa;
Ada. wife of Bruce Nunemaker, who is engaged
in farming at Indianola; Fred, also a farmer, re-
sides in Indianola; Ernest, of Indianola, is a tiller
of the soil ; Fern, wife of James Blackford, a suc-
cessful agriculturist of Indianola, and Albert, living
with his mother on the home farm.
Leaving the public schools of Stamford. Illinois,
at the early age of thirteen years, John W. Clark
accompanied the family to Gibson City, and the fol-
lowing year assisted his father on the farm. Having
a natural aptitude for mechanics, he secured a posi-
tion in Peoria. Illinois, and for seven years was
there employed in a threshing machine shop, be-
coming an expert workman. Continuing then with
the same firm, the Colean Manufacturing Company,
he was transferred to Fargo, North Dakota, and for
two years was traveling expert and salesman. Re-
maining in Fargo, Mr. Clark entered the employ of
the Huber Manufacturing Company, which made a
specialty of threshing machines, and was with that
concern nine months. For two years thereafter he
held a similar position in the same city with Reeves
& Company. His next venture was with the Minne-
apolis Threshing Machine Company as traveling
salesman, his headquarters being at Fargo.
In 191 1 Mr. Clark made his advent into Montana,
coming to Billings with the Moline Plow Company
as traveling salesman, his territory including all of
Montana. In 1912 he took up a homestead of 280
acres lying seven miles south of Billings, and he
still owns the ranch on which he lived for four
years, making extensive improvements upon it dur-
ing that time. Returning to Billings, he was en-
gaged in the real estate business a year, and then
went back on the road, traveling for the Sandusky
Tractor Company for fifteen months. Accepting
then his present position as expert traveling sales-
man for the Oliver Chilled Plow Company, he
covers a territory embracing the south half of the '
state, and in his work is meeting with characteristic
success, his sales being large and eminently satis-
factory to all concerned. He has accumulated val-
uable property, and in addition to having title to
his ranch owns his pleasant residence at 615 South
Thirty-fourth Street. He is a stockholder in the
Farmers Elevator at Billings and served as its
first president, resigning the position on account of
being away from home so much of the time.
Mr. Clark is a steadfast republican in politics,
and is prominent in fraternal circles, being a mem-
ber of Jamestown Lodge No. 6, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, at Jamestown, North Dakota; of
Hiawatha Chapter, Royal Arch Masons ; of Hiawatha
Commandery. Knights Templar, at Jamestown, North
Dakota ; of Billings Camp, Woodmen of the World ;
of Jamestown Lodge. Beneveloent and Protective
Order of Elks; of Illinois Council, United Com-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
mercial Travelers of America, and of Billings Lodge,
Brotherhood of American Yeomen.
Mr. Clark married, July l6, 1916, at Big Timber,
Montana, Mrs. Sigred Marie (Malmberg) Gray, a
daughter of C. F. Malmberg. Mr. Malmberg was
born in 1847, in Sweden, where he grew to man's
estate. Coming to the United States in the spring
of 1884, he settled in Omaha, Nebraska, where he
followed his trade of carpenter and cabinet maker
until his death October 28, 1916. He was a republi-
can in politics, a member of the Swedish Mission
Church and of the Ancient Order of United Work-
men. His first wife, whose maiden name was Sophia
Palm, was born in Sweden in 1852, and died in
Omaha, Nebraska, in 1898, leaving five children, as
follows : Joe, engaged in the milling business at
Minneapolis, Minnesota; Ada, wife of Frank Dudley,
who has been connected with the street railway
service of Omaha, Nebraska, for the past twenty
years, being now an auditor; Sigred Marie, who
became Mrs. Clark ; Albin Robert, associated with
a wholesale shoe firm at Omaha, and Carl Henry,
also living in Omaha, Nebraska, occupies a position
in one of the banks of that city. After the death of
his first wife Mr. Malmberg married a second time,
Huldah Carlson becoming his wife, and to them
one child was born, Harry, who lives with his
brother, Carl Henry, in Omaha, and is attending
the public schools. Mr. and Mrs. Clark have no
children.
William Young Pemberton. Judge Pemberton
is probably the only living member of the Montana
bar whose memory and experience might be quoted
as authoritative on subjects connected with the his-
tory of the early territorial bar. He came to Mon-
tana, fresh from his law studies, in 1863, and as a
lawyer and subsequently as Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court he has participated in the develop-
ment of Montana law, courts and precedence from
the very beginning of organized civil conditions in
the territory and state.
Judge Pemberton, who is one of the advisory
editors of this publication, was born at Nashville,
Tennessee, June i, 1841, a son of William and
Martha (Brooks) Pemberton. He is of English
and Scotch ancestry and the Pembertons were early
settlers in Old Virginia. Judge Pemberton grew up
in Missouri, attended public schools, the Slasonic
College at Lexington, Missouri, and graduated
LL. B. from the Cumberland University Law School
at Lebanon, Tennessee, in 1861. For about a year
he practiced law in Missouri, and in 1863 arrived
at Virginia City, Montana. He was one of the
few college trained and regularly qualified lawyers
in that pioneer mining camp. In the work of bring-
ing about law and order and a system of civil gov-
ernment under the auspices of the Territory of
Montana, Judge Pemberton played a notable part.
In 1865 he moved to Helena, then only a mining
town, and practiced law there for several years.
In 1868 he went back to Missouri, and he also prac-
ticed as a lawyer in the State of Texas. Judge
Pemberton located at Butte in 1880 and since 1909
has again resided at Helena.
He was elected district attorney of the West Side
District in 1882, and prosecuted cases arising from
most of the counties of Western Montana. He was
re-elected in 1884. In 1891 he was appointed District
Judge of the Second Judicial District, and about a
year later was elected and qualified for the highest
position in the State Judiciary, Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court. He began his duties January i,
1893, and served until 1899.
After retiring from the Bench Judge Pemberton
looked after the interests of a large clientage, in-
cluding some prominent corporations. Since June,
1909, however, he has given his entire time and at-
tention to his duties as librarian of the State His-
torical and Miscellaneous Library at Helena. Judge
Pemberton has been one of the prominent democrats
of Montana from territorial times to the present.
He is a Mason and is a former president of the
Society of Montana Pioneers.
Judge Pemberton was an infant when his parents
died in Tennessee, and he knows little of his an-
cestry. His grandmother on his mother's side was
a Powell, whose father was at Yorktown under
Washington at the close of the Revolution. On
October 26. 1865, at Helena, Judge Pemberton mar-
ried Clara May Hutchison, daughter of Major John
C. Hutchison. ' He has four children : Warren T.,
who married Ollie Minor; Alice M., wife of W. H.
Allen ; Early P., who is married and lives in Mis-_
souri; and Lulu, wife of Harry A. Rheem.
Daniel H. Billmeyer, M. D. Doctor Billmeyer
came to Montana about thirty-five years ago, and for
a long time was a company physician and surgeon
with the Northern Pacific Railway. Since 1905 he has
been engaged in a general practice at Plains, and is
proprietor of a well equipped hospital, one of the
best institutions of its kind in Northwestern Mon-
tana.
The Billmeyer family came originally from Alsace-
Lorraine and were colonial settlers in Pennsylvania.
The grandfather of Dr. Billmeyer was Martin Bill-
meyer, who spent all his life in Pennsylvania and
was a farmer. Peter Billmeyer, father of the doc-
tor, was born at Chilaquisa, Pennsylvania, in 1813,
and also lived all his life in that state. For many
years he was in the iron business, and was the first
sheriff of Columbia County. He was a Democrat
and a member of the Lutheran church. He died at
Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, in 1904. His wife was
Mahila Roat, who was born at Chilaquisa in 1824
and died at Bloomsburg in 1913. They had four
children : Frank, an attorney at New York City ;
Emma, who died at Philadelphia in 1917 the wife of
A. J. Williams; Daniel Harrison; and Blanche, wife
of Howard Bravton, a business man of New \''ork
City.
Daniel Harrison Billmeyer was born at Blooms-
burg, Columbia County, Pennsylvania, January 28,
1864, was educated in the local schools, including
high school, and took special studies in the State
Normal College at Bloomsburg. From there he en-
tered the Jefferson Medical College at Philadelphia,
from which he received his M. D. degree in 1884.
Dr. Billmeyer began practice in Montana at Thomp-
son Falls, ijeing there a short time. For three years
he was assistant surgeon in the Northern Pacific
Hospital at Missoula, and was then transferred to
Rosslyn, Washington, as chief surgeon for the
Northern Pacific Coal Company. He was there dur-
ing the strike troubles of 1888. Following that for
five years he was again assistant surgeon of the
Railway Hospital at Missoula, after which he left
Montana and practiced medicine at Waupan, Wis-
consin, until 1905. On returning to this state he lo-
cated at Plains, where he has been in general prac-
tice. He established his private hospital in 1914. His
hospital clientage is drawn from all over Western
Montana. He has facilities for accommodating
twelve patients. Dr. Billmeyer has served several
times as coroner of Sanders County, and is a mem-
ber of the County, State, and American Medical as-
sociations. He is" a stockholder in the Helena Build-
ing and Loan -Association. Politically he is a demo-
crat and is affiliated with the Lutheran church and
72
HISTORY OF MONTANA
is a member of Waupun Lodge. Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, and Waupun Chapter. Royal Arch
Masons, and also of the Knights of Pythias Lodge at
Waupun, Wisconsin.
In l8p2, at Missoula, he married Miss Georgia
Holmes, daughter of George and Eliza (Hadden)
Holmes. Her mother resides at Fond du Lac, Wis-
consin, where her father, a traveling salesman, died.
Doctor and Mrs. Billmej'er have two children : Harri-
son, who graduated from the high school at Plains
and vv'as a clerk for the Northern Pacific Railway,
died in igiS at the early age of twenty-four;
Blanche, born September i, 1897, is a graduate of the
Plains High School and is still at home.
Robert D. Shorthill has lived in Montana since
he was three years of age. and from boyhood has
been identified with the commercial affairs of Liv-
ingston either as clerk or since 1912 as an inde-
pendent merchant. He has one of the leading gro-
cery stores in Southern Montana.
Mr. Shorthill was born in Trinidad, Colorado,
October 20, 1882. Some of his family have parti-
cipated in the pioneer development of Montana.
His grandfather. David R. Shorthill, is well re-
membered by some of the old timers in the Yellow-
stone Valley. He was born in Pennsylvania in
1825, was with a Pennsylvania regiment in the Civil
war, and in 1869 made his first trip to the North-
west, spending about two years prospecting in Emi-
grant Gulch, Montana. He then went back to
Pennsylvania and in 1879 finally settled in Park
County, Montana, homesteading 160 acres on the
Yellowstone River. He lived there until his death
in iQoo. He was a republican, a Methodist, and a
member of the Masonic fraternity.
John R. Shorthill, father of the Livingston mer-
chant, was born in Pennsylvania in 1847, lived in
his native state until after his marriage, and spent
many years as a railroad man, beginning in Penn-
sylvania and afterward serving various railroads in
Mexico, Arizona and Texas. In 1885 he came to
Bozeman, Montana, and on the 17th of March of
that year homesteaded 160 acres on Yellowstone
River, sixteen miles south of Livingston. He was
a prosperous pioneer, developed a fine farm and
ranch of 320 acres and lived in that environment
until his death in 1914. He was a republican and
a Methodist. John R. Shorthill married Alice
Divelbliss, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1851
and died on the Montana farm in 1910. May, the
oldest of the children, became the wife of Thomas
E. Allen and both are now deceased. Charles A.
lives on a ranch on the Yellowstone River in Park
County, Dave occupies the old homestead. Lizzie
is the wife of a railroad engineer and lives in Port-
land, Oregon.
Robert D. Shorthill, youngest of the family, at-
tended country schools in Park County, and at
the age of fourteen left his father's ranch and
began his commercial experience at Livingston. He
worked for several firms of grocers, being a clerk
steadily for sixteen years. In 1912 he entered the
grocery business with George D. Allen under the
name Allen & Shorthill, establishing their store at
102 North Main Street. Mr. Shorthill is now sole
proprietor of this business, one of the largest stocked
grocery stores in Livingston and emphasizing the
quality of its service.
Mr. Shorthill is a republican, a Methodist, and
is affiliated with Park Lodge No. 117, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, at Livingston, Livingston
Lodge, Knights of Pythias, Livingston Lodge of
the Loyal Order of Moose and Zephyr Camp No.
151, Woodmen of the World. He is also active in
the Chamber of Commerce and Commercial Club
and a stockholder and member of the Railway
Club of Livingston. His residence is at 223 South
Sixth Street.
October 22. 1913, at Livingston, he married Miss
Carrie Boyd, a native of New York State. She is
a graduate of a shorthand school in Vermont.
Ch.^rles Wilson, one of the best known citizens
of Carbon County, a retired merchant, well known
in fraternal and civic circles, has been a resident
of Montana for over thirty years and has had an
exceedingly busy life since boyhood.
He was born at Gordon in Berwickshire, Scotland,
August 5, 1846. His ancestors were Scotch farmers
for generations. His grandfather was Charles Wil-
son, who spent all his life in Scotland, and his
maternal grandfather was Andrew Dobie, who owned
a small farm in Scotland. Francis Wilson, father
of Charles, was born in Scotland in 1820, followed
farming there, for four years was a policeman in
GreenlaWj Scotland, and in 1855 brought his family
to the United States. He was an Iowa pioneer,
settling on a farm at Delhi. He was also a brick
and tile maker. He died at Delhi April 2, 1864, at
the comparatively early age of forty-four. He was
a member of the Established Church of Scotland, the
Presbyterian, and was an Odd Fellow. Francis Wil-
son married Elizabeth Dobie. She was born in
Berwickshire. Scotland, July 13, 1820, and at her
old home in Delhi, Iowa, she recently celebrated her
ninety-ninth birthday. Charles Wilson is the oldest
of her children. A. D., the second in age, was last
heard of while employed as a foreman for a mining
company at Cripple Creek, Colorado, in 1904, and on
leaving there went to Arizona. Frank is a farmer
at Delhi, Iowa. Christina lives at Manchester, Iowa,
widow of J. B. Smith, a farmer. J. D. lives on a
farm between Alberta and Chokio, Minnesota. Agnes
is the wife of J. T. Brown, a farmer at Milltown,
Wisconsin.
Charles Wilson had some education in the schools
of Scotland, attended school in Delhi, Iowa, from
the age of nine, but in 1863 left school and owing
to his father's death the following year, being the
oldest son, he had to assume the responsibility of
caring for his mother and remained with her until
he was twenty-one. Some of his early e.xperiences
were working in stone quarries, as a railroad man,
and one summer operating an engine in a distillery
at Guttenberg, Iowa. After that he farmed in
Delaware County, Iowa, until 1877, and for the fol-
lowing ten years was employed by the Fort Dodge
Coal Company near Fort Dodge, Iowa. .
Mr. Wilson came out to Montana in 1887. He was
one of the early residents of Red Lodge and for
one summer followed the trade of carpenter. After
that he was a stationary engineer until 1896, in
which year he established a confectionery store and
bottling works. He built that up to prosperous pro-
portions and sold out the plant in 1910 to the firm
of Brooks & Powell. He fully intended to retire
and did so at that time, but in 1916 he and Neil
D. Argo bought back the bottling works. The man-
agement devolved on Mr. Argo and in October,
1918, ]Mr. Wilson sold his interest to Mr. Argo.
Mr. Wilson has always affiliated with the demo-
cratic party in politics. He served as police judge
of Red Lodge for two years. He is one of the
oldest Odd Fellows in the State of Montana and
the oldest past grand at Red Lodge. He joined that
order January 25, 1873, and has a forty year jewel
for continuous membership. He was through all the
chairs of his local lodge as long ago as 1875. He
is now a past grand of Garfield Lodge No. 36,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
73
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. On January 2,
1886, he became a member of the Knights of
Pythias, served as chancellor of his lodge in_ Iowa
and at present is affiliated with Park Lodge No. 22.
In Masonry his lodge affiliation is with Star in the
West Lodge No. 40, of which he was master in
1892-93 and again in 1909-10. He is also affiliated
with Carbon Chapter No. 20, Royal Arch Masons,
Aldemar Commandery No. 5, Knights Templar, Al-
geria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena, and is
past patron of Venus Chapter No. 32 of the Eastern
Star.
Mr. Wilson owns two business buildings in Red
Lodge and a modern home at 605 North Houser
Avenue. At Delhi, Iowa, March 15, 1874, he married
Miss Jennie A. MacRunnels. She died at Coleville,
Iowa, October 31, 1885. On August 25, 1888, at St.
Paul, Minnesota, Mr. Wilson married Miss Olive A.
Roberts. She died at Red Lodge April 16, 1910.
Mr. Wilson married Mrs. Jennie (Roberts) Argo
at Sibley, Iowa, April 20, 191 1. Mr. Wilson has no
children. His wife's father was J. D. Roberts of
New York State, who was an early settler at Bur-
lington, Iowa, and afterward homesteaded in Min-
nesota, six miles over the line from Little Rock,
Iowa. Mrs. Wilson by her first husband has three
children: Mamie, wife of Lavette PoUey, a dentist
at Sibley, Iowa; Winnie, wife of Frank Dunn, a
farmer at Beaver Creek, Minnesota; and Neil D.
Argo.
Neil D. Argo, one of the prominent younger busi-
ness men of Red Lodge, was born at Little Rock,
Iowa, February 4, 1891. His father, Jerry A. Argo,
was born in 1851, and died at Little Rock in 1895.
He spent all his business life there, and owned two
ranches and also a hotel. He held several local
offices as a democrat and was affiliated with the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. During the
Civil war he was for two years a private in an Iowa
regiment. Jerry A. Argo married Liza Roberts, who
was born at Clinton, Iowa, in 1863 and is now Mrs.
Charles Wilson of Red Lodge. Mr. and Mrs. Argo
had three children : Mamie, a resident of Sibley,
Iowa, and wife of Doctor Policy, a dentist, who
served with the rank of second lieutenant and as a
dentist with the American Expeditionary Forces ;
Winifred, wife of Frank Dunn, a rancher in Minne-
sota; and Neil D.
Neil D. Argo attended public school at Little
Rock, Iowa, also the high school there, and in 1910
finished his education in Palmer's Business College
at Cedar Rapids. He was first employed at Red
Lodge as timekeeper with the Northwestern Im-
provement Company, was promoted to bill clerk and
collector, .then to billing clerk, and spent six years
with that corporation. In 1916 he and his step-
father, Mr. Wilson, bought the Red Lodge Bottling
Works and confectionery business. The confec-
tionery department was closed out in October, 1918.
and at that time Mr. Argo became sole proprietor
of the Red Lodge Bottling Works. This is an im-
portant local industry, and it supplies soft drink
retailers throughout Eastern Montana and Northern
Wyoming.
Mr. Argo is independent in politics, is a member
of the Red Lodge Chamber of Commerce, and a
thoroughly public spirited local citizen. On June 16,
1915. he married Miss Kate Torreyson. Her mother
is Mrs. Fannie Torreyson, of Red Lodge. Her
father. Jack Torreyson, was a prominent pioneer
character of Red Lodge, owning the first ranch that
was developed adjoining that town. Mr. and Mrs.
Argo have one child, Neil, Jr., born June 13, 1917.
NoRRis F. Burger. A prominent and popular
young business man of Billings, Norris F. Burger, is
amply qualified for the responsible position he holds
as manager of the Purity Bread Company, Incorpo-
rated, which supplies a large area of the surround-
ing country with bakery products. A son of S. F.
Burger, he was born at Buffalo, New York, Decem-
ber 31, 1887, of pure Dutch stock, the ancestors from
which he traces his descent having emigrated from
Holland to Pennsylvania in colonial times. His
grandfather, George S. Burger, a life-long resident
of Pennsylvania, was born in 1818, and died at his
home in Erie in 1890. He was a contractor and
builder, and followed his trade in the vicinity of
Pittsburg for many years. He married Sarah Franz,
who was born in Pennsylvania in 1820, and died
in Erie in 1892.
Born in i860, near Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, S. F.
Burger was reared and educated in Erie, and early
in life entered the employ of the New York Central
Railroad Company, being located at Buffalo, New
York, until 1891, and the following eight years serv-
ing as conductor on a passenger train, with his home
at Erie, Pennsylvania. Becoming associated with
the Northern Pacific Railway service, he removed
to Tacoma, Washington, in 1899, and is there still
employed as conductor of a passenger train. He is
a republican in his political affiliations, a member
of the Baptist Church, and belongs to the Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows. He married Annie
M. Weeks, who was born in Oswego, New York, in
1869, and to them three children have been born, as
follows: Flora, wife of C. F. Elder, an accountant
at Tacoma, Washington; Norris F., the subject of
this brief personal history, and Edith, living with
her parents.
Having acquired the rudiments of his education in
the public schools of Erie. Pennsylvania, Norris F.
Burger continued his studies in Washington, being
graduated from the Tacoma High School with the
class of 1904, and later attending the University of
Washington at Seattle for two years. Then, after
spending one year at the drug business in Tacoma,
he was for four years deputy county engineer of
Pierce County, Washington. In 191 1 Mr. Burger
became associated with the baking business at Ta-
coma, and continued thus employed for six years,
in the meantime becoming familiar with every detail
of the trade. In March, 1917. he came to Billings,
where he has since resided, his home being at 815
North Broadway. Holding a position of importance
with the Purity Bread Company, Incorporated, he
has proved himself extremely capable and efficient
in the management of its business and financial af-
fairs, through his efforts its operations being ex-
tensive and constantly increasing in volume and ex-
tent. This company, with plant and office at 824
North Twenty-seventh Street, has the following
named officers : L. F. Miller, president ; Louis Dous-
man, vice president; E. B. LeClair, secretary, and
N. F. Burger, treasurer and general manager. Carry-
ing on a general baking business, it supplies a large
territory, including Northern Wyoming and Montana
west to Big Timber, east to Beach, North Dakota,
and north to Buffalo, Montana. Mr. Burger has
management of the entire tract, in his work having
supervision of a corps of thirty-two employes.
Mr. Burger married, December 15, 1915. at Seattle,
Washington, Miss Jessica Cleveland, a daughter of
George and Nora (Wilson) Cleveland, neither of
whom are now living, Mr. Burger is a republican
in politics, and belong to the Rotary Club and to
the Billings Midland Empire Club.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Frank W. Machemer. Few can draw rules for
their own guidance from the pages of Plutarch, but
all are benefited by the delineation of those traits
of character which find scope and exercise in the
common walks of life. The unostentatious routine
of private life, although in the aggregate more
important to the welfare of the community than
any meteoric public career, cannot, from its very
nature, figure in the public annals. However, each
locality's history should contain the names of those
individuals who contribute to the success of the
material affairs of a community and to its public
stability; men who lead wholesome and exemplary
lives which might be profitably studied by the on-
coming generation. In such a class must consistently
appear the name of Frank W. Machemer, one of
the leading business men and public-spirited citizens
of Bozeman.
Frank W. Machemer is descended from sterling
old Holland stock, the family having been trans-
planted to America in the days of the colonies,
settling in Pennsylvania. In that state the subject's
grandfather, William Machemer, was born in 1813.
In 1856 he moved to Constantine, Michigan, being
numbered among the pioneers of that locality, and
there he engaged in farming and in merchandising
until his death, which occurred in 1889. He married
Catherine Seaman, a native of Pennsylvania, and
also of old colonial stock. Among their children
was Levi Machemer, who became the father of the
subject of this sketch. He was born in Williams-
port, Pennsylvania, in 1841, and was reared there
until fifteen years of age, when he accompanied his
parents on their removal to Mottville, St. Joseph
County, Michigan. He was married in Constantine,
Michigan, and has made that place his home during
the remainder of his ilfe, being now retired from
active labor. He was a woodworker by vocation and
led a very active life. He is a republican of the con-
servative type and is a member of the Dutch Re-
formed Church. He married Eliza Teasdale, who
was born in 1848 in Constantine, Michigan, and it
is noteworthy that they celebrated their golden
wedding anniversary in September, 1917, in the
very house where she was born, reared and married
in Constantine. To this worthy couple were born
the following children : Mary L. ; Frank W., the
immediate subject of this review; and L. J., who
is the partner of his brother Frank at Bozeman.
Frank W. Machemer received his education in
the public schools of Constantine, Michigan, com-
pleting his studies in the high school. At the age
of sixteen years he left school and, entering a
furniture factory, applied himself to learn the trade
of a cabinetmaker, which engaged his attention for
four years. He then removed to Sturgis, Michigan,
where he worked at his trade, also being employed
at different times in Elkhart and Cambridge City,
Indiana. In May, 1903, Mr. Machemer came to
Bozeman and entered the employ of the Bozeman
Manufacturing Company, with whom he remained
for eight years. In 191 1 he went to work for
Eschenbacher & Company, who then operated the
plant which he now owns. In January, 1917, he
bought the plant in partnership with liis brother
L. J., and they have since operated the business
under the firm name of the Machemer Brothers.
The plant, located on South Church Avenue, was
erected by John Koch in 1882 and is one of the
pioneer industries of Gallatin County. It has be-
come one of the most important enterprises of the
kind in Southern Montana. The firm manufacture
window frames, sash, inside woodwork, automobile
bodies — in brief, practically everything that is made
of wood and for which there is any local demand.
This plant was destroyed by fire in August, 1919,
but will be rebuilt as soon as a suitable new location
is secured.
Politically Mr. Machemer is a stanch republican.
His fraternal relations are with Western Star Lodge
No. 4, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, at Boze-
man, and Constantine Lodge, Knights of the Macca-
bees, at Constantine, Michigan.
In Conftantine, Michigan, Mr. Machemer was
married to Jessie E. Roberts, the daughter of Will-
iam E. and Amanda (Malam) Roberts. The father,
who was a farmer, is now deceased, and his widow
now resides in Battle Creek, Michigan. To Mr. and
Mrs. Machemer have been born the following chil-
dren : Harold R., born May S, 1896, is on a ranch
near Bozeman: Levi M., born April 25, 1899, 's a
student in the Alontana State College, at Bozeman.
Mr. Machemer has consistently given his support to
every measure looking to the advancement of the
best interests of the community and enjoys to a
marked degree the confidence of all who know him.
Rev. M. J. DoxoHUE has given all his time since
his ordination as a priest to various churches in
Montana. He is now pastor of St. James Church
at Plains, and has a parish including all the area
of Sanders County. Besides the church at Plains
there are churches at Thompson Falls, at Paradise
and at Hot Springs, while missions under the direc-
tion of Father Donohue are at Camas Prairie, Lone-
pine, Perma, Eddy, White Pine, Alger, Trout Creek.
Heron and Noxon.
Father Donohue was born at Florence. New York,
November 25, 1876, son of Michael and Anna (Mee-
han) Donohue. His parents were of Irish ancestry.
His father was born at Utica, New York, in 1845.
and for manv years was a merchant and farmer at
Florence. He died at Camden, New York, in IQ17.
He held various town offices and was an influential
citizen in local affairs. He was a democrat and a
Catholic, and during the Civil war enlisted at Utica. ^
New York, and served in a Union regiment. His '
wife was born at Florence, New York, in 1849 and is
still living at Camden.
Father Donohue attended the public schools at
Florence and spent six years with his classical stud-
ies at Niagara University at Niagara Falls. He took
his theological course in St. Viator's Seminary and
College at Bourbonnais, Illinois, spending five years
in that institution. He was ordained in 1911 at Buf-
falo. New York, by Bishop Colton of Buffalo. His
first active work was as assistant pastor of St. Jo-
seph's parish at Butte, where he remained a year.
For a year and a half he was assistant pastor of St.
Peter's Church at Anaconda, and for a short time
was assistant pastor of St. Helena Cathedral at
Helena. He came to Plains July 24. 1914, and for
five years has given a diligent and faithful adminis-
tration of his many duties in maintaining and build-
ing up the Catholic church in Sanders County. The
new St. James Church at Plains was dedicated De-
cember 14, 1919. There are about two hundred fam-
ilies in the parish. Father Donohue is a member of
Anaconda Council, Knights of Columbus, and is a
third degree knight.
O. R. Duncan was elected public administrator
of Sweetgrass County in April. 1919. He has be-
come well known in that county through his busi-
ness activities, formerly as a creamery manager
and now as proprietor of a complete and well pat-
ronized garage.
Mr. Duncan was born at Clinton Falls, Minne-
sota, June 12, 1822. His grandfather established
the family in New York State, coming from Scot-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
75
land. His father, Henry Duncan, was born near
Syracuse, New York, in 1847, was reared and mar-
ried there and had a farm. On this farm was
an extensive grove of hard maples, and the manu-
facture of maple sugar was an important industy
with him. During the '70s he moved to Minnesota
and was a pioneer homesteader at Clinton Falls.
Later he sold his farm there and in 1892 moved
to Medford, Minnesota, where he was proprietor
of a hotel until his death in 1912. He was an ac-
tive prohibitionist in politics and a very devout Bap-
tist. Henry Duncan married Sarah Brown, who
was born in 1850 and died at Medford. Minnesota,
in 1913. Ella, the oldest of their children, is the
wife of Richard Cheesman, a miller living at Whist-
ley. Alabama ; Eslie is a traveling salesman whose
home is at Redford, South Dakota; Marion is the
wife of Henry Cheesman, a mechanic in the rail-
road shops at Edmonton, Canada ; while O. R. Dun-
can is the fourth and youngest of the family.
He acquired his early education in the public
schools of Clinton Falls and Medford, Minnesota,
and was a student in the Owatonna Business Col-
lege at Owatonna, Minnesota, until 1900. By prac-
tical work he learned the creamery trade in Min-
nesota, and followed it a year at Ranchester, Wyo-
ming. In igog he came to Big Timber, Montana,
and for three years managed the local creamery.
The following three years he spent at Butte, where
he worked for the Henningson Produce Company.
Since returning to Big Timber he has been en-
gaged in the automobile business. He built his new
garage in September, 1917. He has floor space
36 by 60 feet, and furnishes not only a garage serv-
ice but handles accessories and has a shop for re-
pairs. His garage is at the corner of McLeod Street
and Third Avenue.
Mr. Duncan is a republican in politics and was
elected on that ticket to his office as public ad-
ministrator. He is affiliated with Sweetgrass Camp
No. 10610, Modern Woodmen of America, is a
member of the Big Timber Chamber of Commerce
and Sweetgrass County Good Roads Association.
In 1902, at Medford, Minnesota, he married Miss
Nora May Reinhard, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
C. S. Reinhard, farming people who live at Med-
ford. Mr. and Mrs. Duncan have two children,
Leona, born in 1904, and Lavern, born in 1905.
Charle.s L. Bryan. One of the best diversified
farms and ranches in Sweetgrass County is at
McLeod, owned by Charles L. Bryan. Mr. Bryan
is a veteran Montana farmer and rancher. He
came to the territory over thirty-five years ago
and rode the range as a cowboy for a number of
years before homesteading and settling down to
the serious business of life.
He was born in Marion County, Missouri, July
13, 1863. His ancestors came originally from Ire-
land and were pioneers in Kentucky. His father,
William Bryan, was born in Missouri in 1829, was
a carpenter by trade but spent most of his time
at farming. He lived for many years in Marion
County, Missouri, and died at the home of his son.
Carter Bryan, in Great Falls, Montana, where
both he and his wife are buried. He was a demo-
crat and a very interested Presbyterian and a man
of the highest morals. It is said that he never
drank liquor or used tobacco throughout his life.
He married Elizabeth Pender, who was born in
Marion County, Missouri, in 1833, and died at
Great Falls, Montana, in igi2. Florence the old-
est of their children, lives at Livingston, Montana,
wife of D. W. McLeod, who in 1^3 homesteaded
the island on the Yellowstone River at the foot
of Main Street in Livingston. Fannie, the sec-
ond of the family, is the wife of Charles Hans-
brough, who came to Great Falls and lived on a
farm near there from 1896 to igoi, then moved to
California, and is still living in Idaho. Charles
L. Bryan is the third in the family. His brother.
Carter, above mentioned, is a farmer, came to Liv-
ingston during the '90s and afterward lived at Great
Falls and is now a resident of Boise City, Idaho.
Emma, the fifth of the children, lives in California
while of Benjamin, the youngest, the family has
had no word since he was last heard from on a
ranch in Oregon.
Charles L. Bryan attended rural schools in Mar-
ion County, Missouri, also the Palmyra Seminary
at Palmyra, Missouri, and spent the first twenty
years of his life on his father's farm. Soon after
reaching Livingston in April, 1883, he engaged as
a cowboy with a cattle outfit and for ten years
rode the range. In the meantime he had married
and he and his wife settled on his homestead twenty-
tive miles south of Big Timber, on the Boulder
River. He still owns 160 acres in that homestead,
but it is only part of his ranch of 1,080 acres. This
ranch and farm have a set of modern buildings
and farm equipment that betokens the progres-
sive enterprise of Mr. Bryan. Much of his land
produces grain and he specializes in the Poll An-
gus cattle. Mr. Bryan is a democrat and is affili-
ated with Livingston Homestead of the Brotherhood
of American Yeomen.
He married at Livingston in 1888 Miss Maggie
McLeod, a daughter of William F. and Martha
(Sowel) McLeod, both now deceased. William
F. McLeod, who died at Big Timber in 1914, was
a California forty-niner, afterward lived in Ore-
gon, and in 1881 settled on the Crow Indian Reser-
vation in Montana. He was a pioneer stock raiser
and a man of much prominence in Southern Mon-
tana. The main street of Big Timber is named
in his honor, as is also the Town of McLeod in
Sweetgrass County, the postoffice of Mr. Bryan.
Mr. and Mrs. Bryan had seven children: Charles
L., Jr., a musician and piano tuner at Big Tim-
ber; Edna, wife of Harry Cross, a tailor at Big
Timber; WiUiam F. and Roy, both on the home
ranch with their parents; Pat who is employed in
the implements and hardware department of the
A. W. Miles Company at Livingston ; Edith, wife
of Charles Campbell, a rancher at Big Timber;
and Bessie, a junior in the County. High School at
Big Timber.
Charles Woodworth. In the distribution of her
personal gifts Nature, however generous, rarely con-
fers upon a single individual superior excellence in
more than a single line. The qualities that go to
make for success in one field of endeavor are not
as a rule the same which would bring prosperity
in another. Yet there are some men who seem to
have been gifted in a way that forms the exception
proving the foregoing rule, and in this class may be
mentioned Charles Woodworth, one of the pro-
prietors of the Lewistown Automobile and Truck
Company, who during a comparatively short career
has invaded numerous fields of activity, in each of
which he has come forth a conqueror.
Mr. Woodworth was born at Townsend, Broad-
water County, Montana, September i, 1885, a son of
John J. and Mary C. (Shirlock) Woodworth. John
J. Woodworth was born in 1852, in California, and
was there married, his wife being a native of New
Zealand. They became the parents of nine children,
all living, of whom Charles is the fourth in order of
76
HISTORY OF MONTANA
birth. The .father received his education in the
public schools of California, and as a young man en-
gaged in the sheep business in his native state,
a vocation which he followed for about four years.
In 1882 he came to Broadwater County, Montana,
and ran bands of sheep in the vicinity of Townsend
until 1886, in that year moving to Fergus County.
Here he continued in the sheep business for five
more years, and then sold his business and retired to
Lewistown where his death occurred m 1906, when
he was fiftv-four vears of age. Mr. Woodworth
took an interest in the affairs of his community
and served efficientlv in the capacity of road super-
visor for many years. He was a democrat in his
political adherence, and was fraternally afhliated
with the Woodmen of the World. Mrs. Woodworth,
who survives him, makes her home at Lewistown.
After attending the public schools of Lewistown.
Charles Woodworth, at the age of eighteen years,
embarked upon his independent career as the pro-
prietor of a small draying business. Subsequently
he became the proprietor of a retail liquor estab-
lishment, which he conducted until 1919, but in the
meantime had entered other lines of industry. In
191 1 he had embarked in the real estate business, and
since the same year has been raising stock, at this
time operating some 4,000 acres of land, in addition
to which he has an interest in other ranches. His
live stock at this time numbers approximately from
500 to 600 head of cattle. In March, 1919. after dis-
posing of his saloon business, Mr. Woodworth em-
barked in a new line of endeavor when, with L. S.
Butler and W. A. Cooper, he founded the Lewis-
town Automobile and Truck Company. This busi-
ness has been another in which he has been success-
ful, a further indication of his possession of fine
business abilities. Mr. Woodworth is a member of
the Fraternal Order of Eagles, and in politics is a
democrat. He has formed many acquaintances and
won many friendships at Lewistown, and in busi-
ness circles his reputation is that of a man of
integrity and high business principles.
Mr. Woodworth was married February 5, 1910, to
Miss Helen M. Crevier, who was born at Minne-
apolis, Minnesota, and they are the parents of one
daughter, Mary Elizabeth.
'Ernest A. Boschert. While not one of the old
timers of Montana, the career of Ernest A. Boschert
is of interest because of the phenomenal enterprise
he has directed to the upbuilding of the leading
hardware business at Ballantine, beginning there
with a stock of goods valued at only a few hundred
dollars and making his own business e.xpand even
more rapidly than the town itself.
Mr. Boschert was born at Burlington, Wisconsin,
January 11, 1883. His grandfather, a native of Ger-
many, came to America, and at a time when Wis-
consin was virtually an unbroken wilderness and
years before it became a state he located on land
at Burlington and spent the rest of his years making
a farm. Charles Boschert, father of Ernest A., was
born on that farm in 1843 and is still living there,
having spent more than three-quarters of a century
in one locality. He is a democrat and a Catholic.
Charles Boschert married Josephine Prasch, who
was born at Burlington in 1855.. Ernest A. is the
second of their family of children, seven in num-
ber. The others are A. A., salesman for the F. B.
Connelly Company, of Helena, Montana; Otelia, wife
of Clarence Brown, manager of the Detroit, Mich-
igan, branch of the Cudahy Packing Company; Ed-
ward, a farmer at Burlington, Wisconsin; Elnora,
wife of Charles McCarthy, also of Burlington; Al-
bert, on the home farm at Burlington; Marie, wife
of Joseph Bazel, a butter maker at Burlington.
Ernest A. Boschert attended the rural schools of
Racine, Wisconsin, and lived at home with his
father until he was twenty-two. He then went to
Chicago, and during 1904-05 was a student in Bryant
& Stratton's Business College. He had some metro-
politan training and experience in mercantile busi-
ness in Chicago, being for si.x months an assistant
bookkeeper in a wholesale dry goods house and for
five months working in the neckwear department of
the wholesale men's furnishing store of Wilson
Brothers. For seven months he was bookkeeper and
clerk in a hardware store in Evanston, a Chicago
suburb, and with this experience and equipment came
to Billings in April, 1907. .\fter eight months with
the Sande Hardware Company he bought a small
stock of groceries at Ballantine. and when he took
charge he was also invested with the duties and
responsibilities of postmaster. He held the postoffice
and continued his store for ten years. In the mean-
time his little stock of groceries had expanded into
a large general or department store, and in 191 1 he
closed out everything except hardware and is now
proprietor of the leading establishment of that kind
in his part of Yellowstone County. He owns the
store building, and keeps everything needed on the
farms and ranches in the way of hardware.
Mr. Boschert also owns a modern home on Beech
and Third streets in Ballantine. He is a republican
and Catholic, and is affiliated with Billings Council
No. 1259, Knights of Columbus, the Royal High-
landers, and the Billings Midland Empire Club. On
August 6, 1913, at David City, Nebraska, he married
Miss Edena Fenlon, daughter of P. F. and Fannie
(Flynn) Fenlon. Her mother lives at Ballantine,
while her father, now deceased, was a traveling
salesman. Mr. and Mrs. Boschert have one daugh-
ter, Margaret Lewine, born July 7, 1918.
William J. Beall. The history of the City of
Bozeman would be far from complete without a
sketch of William J. Beall, who was one of the
founders of the little citv that is the county seat of
Gallatin County. Mr. Beall was born in Pittsburg,
Pennsylvania, May 19, 1834, was educated in the
public schools of his native city and studied for his
profession as an architect and builder in the office
of his father, Benjamin Beall, who then stood high
in his profession in Pennsylvania.
William J. Beall moved to Kansas in 1856, from
there to Fort Laramie, Wyoming, and in 1862 to
Denver and in March, 1863, arrived in Montana.
For a few months he engaged in mining at Vir-
ginia City, but January, 1864. found him in the
Gallatin Valley, where he located a mine, but sold
his interest to his partner a few months later and
in company with D. E. Rouse came to the present
site of Bozeman, where they located adjoining farms
in the month of July and built the first two houses.
The division line between the farms was where
the old Laclede Hotel building stands on Main
Street and Bozeman Avenue, Rouse's quarter section
lying east and Beall's west of that line. The
government survey afterwards threw Mr. Beall's
line farther east, making what is now Rouse Street
his east line, with Main Street his south line. Mr.
Beall built his house on Bozeman Street, near Main,
just back of the site of the Masonic Temple. Mr.
Rouse built on the south side of Main Street, east
of Bozeman .'\venue. After a few years Mr. Beall
was in partnership with W. H. Tracy, who took up
a claim adjoining Mr. Beall's on the west, and part
of these claims were platted into town lots.
In the winter of 1865-66 Mr. Beall did the car-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
77
penter work on the large story and a half log resi-
dence erected on the Alderson ranch a mile south
of Bozeman. While holding his claim and as his
time and means would permit he followed his trade
as carpenter and builder in Bozeman and in other
towns in Montana. In 1868 he built a residence on
Bozeman Avenue, four blocks from Main Street.
This has long been recognized as one of the pic-
turesque and attractive homes of the city. Here
Mr. Beall died September 3, 1903. His wife, still
living, has enjoved the comforts of that home since
November, i868'.
Many business blocks and residences in Bozeman
are monuments to Mr. Beall's architectural skill.
The old Sacred Heart Cathedral Building, built in
1874-75. and the Herald Building, erected in 1875
at Helena, are among the buildings still standing
in other parts of the state. Mrs. Beall still cherishes
among her records a testimonial from the building
committee of the Cathedral in the handwriting of
Robert C. Walker, consisting of an extract from the
minutes of the building committee of the Roman
Catholic Church, Helena, Montana Territory, Octo-
ber 5, 1874, as follows :
"Whereas, it has been deemed necessary on ac-
count of the lateness of the season and on account
of disappointment in the delivery of the required'
cut stone, to temporarily suspend work upon the
church, and
"Whereas, W. J. Beall, the architect and superin-
tendent of the building, has given the committee
great satisfaction by his definite and artistic plans
and specifications drawn according to designs origi-
nating with himself,
"Therefore, resolved, that the Building Committee
of the Roman Catholic Church tender to Mr. Beall
their thanks and this expression of their approbation
for his energy and skill displayed in behalf of the
building and for the faithful performance of the
duties reposed in him.
"L, F. LaCroix, chairman,
"Robert C. Walker, secretary."
In the spring of 1875, as the records show, Mr.
Beall was sent for by the building committee to
superintend the completion of the structure, which
he did to the utmost satisfaction of all concerned.
The building after completion was called the
"Sacred Heart Cathedral" and it was only a few
years ago that a larger cathedral was erected. A
prominent architect from the east while visiting in
Helena a few years ago noticed this Sacred Heart
Cathedral and said it was one of the finest speci-
mens of architectural skill he had seen in the West.
Mr. Beall was a quiet and unobtrusive citizen,
ever attentive to whatever business he had in hand.
He was universally recognized as one of the most
honorable and upright business men of the com-
munity, a gentleman in every sense of the word.
He was made a Mason in Gallatin Lodge No. 6 in
1866, and was interested in all the subsequent growth
and advancement of the lodge. He was a charter
member of the Pioneers Society of Gallatin County
and also a member of the Society of Montana Pio-
neers. He is survived by his wife, formerly Rosa
V. Barker, whom he married in November, 1868.
Mrs. W. J. Beall. whose maiden name was Rosa
V. Barker, enjoys the distinction of having been
the first white woman to locate at Bozeman, coming
here August i, 1864. Bozeman has been her home
ever since, though she has traveled east and west
since she could travel by railroad. For more than
half a century her home has been a comfortable
residence on Bozeman Avenue, North, erected by
her husband in 1868. Plans are now under way to
secure the block of ground on which the Beall resi-
dence stands, originally a part of the Beall home-
stead, for a recreation park as a memorial to the
young men of this community who served in the
World war.
Mrs. Beall's father was James Barker, an early
pioneer of Montana. She was born in Lewis
County, New York, and spent there the early years
of her life. She graduated from Fairfield Seminary
m New York, making a specialty of music and art,
in both of which she was very proficient. She
taught music in the seminary for one year and is
still identified with the alumni society of the school.
She moved whh her parents to 'Wisconsin and
went through many trying experiences in the South
during the Civil war, and in crossing the plains
with her husband and two little girls in 1864 she
had many narrow escapes from being killed bv
Indians. They had other trying experiences and in
crossing the Big Horn River she and the children
came near being drowned.
Mrs. Beall has taken an active part in the social
and religious life of Bozeman, and is highly es-
teemed by citizens of the community. Her children
were a comfort to her in her pioneer days, and the
loss of these little ones brought her much grief.
When the first Sunday school was organized in 1866
by W. W. Alderson in Bozeman, under the auspices
of the Methodist Episcopal Church, she was one
of the most active members and was a worker in
that pioneer church.
Mrs. Beall helped in establishing St. James Epis-
copal Church in Bozeman and has been the most
faithful communicant ever since, much of the time
being a worker in the Sunday School and the Guild.
She was a charter member and the first conductress
in Lily of the Valley Chapter of the Order of
Eastern Star, with which she is still identified. In
the Pioneers Society of Gallatin County she served
as historian for several years, and is now serving
her second term as president of this organization.
She is also a member of the Society of Montana
Pioneers and is identified with the Sons and Daugh-
ters of Pioneers of the County and State. For
many years she was active in the "Women's Christian
Temperance Union of Bozeman.
Her husband's career as a Montanan has been
sketched on precediag pages. During his lifetime
Mrs. Beall assisted him in his business affairs and
since his death in 1903 she has looked after her own
business with remarkable accuracy. Though past
the allotted three score and ten, she is remarkably
well and active in body and mind.
Mrs. Beall has lived the life of an earnest Chris-
tian, and her strong faith in God through her trials
and tribulations has kept her above the sorrows that
might have crushed to earth a woman of ordinary
character. In the fifty-five years she has lived in
Bozeman she has seen the city grow from two log
cabins to one with hundreds of beautiful homes
and a population of 8,000 people having the best
religious and educational advantages possible.
Arad H. Franklin is an old timer in Montana
and the Northwest, has been a miner, contractor and
in other lines of business, and is at present repre-
sentative in the Legislature from Mineral County,
with home at Superior.
Mr. Franklin was born in Harrison County, Iowa,
July I, 1868. This branch of the Franklin family
came originally from England and settled in Massa-
chusetts in colonial times. His father, Jerome B.
Franklin, was born in New York State in 1832, was
reared and married there, and afterwards became
a farmer in Harrison County, Iowa, and was a
78
HISTORY OF MONTANA
hotel proprietor at Dunlap in that state. He also
did considerable business as a bridge builder. In
1887 he came to Helena, Montana, and was employed
as a carpenter by the Montana Central Railway
Company. In the fall of 1887 he located at Butte,
where he continued business as as carpenter and
builder until 1894. The last years of his life were
spent on a ranch at Stevensville, Montana, where
he died in 1915. He was a republican in politics,
a member of the Presbyterian Church and affiliated
with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. His
wife was Mariette Baskin who was born in New
York State in 1828 and died at Stevensville, Mon-
tana, in 1912. They had a family of seven children:
Helen who married Steven Corley, a contractor
and carpenter and both died at Stevensville, Mon-
tana; Mary is the wife of J. J. Moorhead, a farmer
and cattle buyer at Dunlap, Iowa; F. S. Franklin is
a carpenter in the shipyards at Spanway, near
Tacoma, Washington; Kate is the wife of George
A. Smith, and they own the old Franklin ranch
at Stevensville; Sarah, the fifth child, died in in-
fancy, and the sixth in order of birth is Arad H.;
John, the youngest, is an electrician at Seattle, Wash-
ington.
Arad H. Franklin received his early education
in the public schools of Dunlap, Iowa. He was about
eighteen years of age when he came to Montana in
1886. His first experience was at Rosebud, where
during the summer he rode the range as a cow-
boy. In the spring of 1887 he was at Great Falls
and shortly afterward at Helena, where he spent a
year with Porter Brothers, a well known firm of
railroad contractors. For four years he was with
the Electric Light Company at Butte. He then
formed a partnership with his brother F. S. Franklin,
and for two years they did teaming contracting.
They also owned mining property near Shoupe,
Idaho, and they operated their mine in that locality
from 1894 to 1897. From the latter year until
1900 Mr. Franklin engaged in prospecting in both
Idaho and Montana. From 1900 to 1905 he con-
ducted his father's ranch, and he and his brother
then spent about a year filling a contract for the
construction of a water ditch in Ravalli County.
Mr. Franklin in 1907 moved to Spokane, where
he spent the winter as a barber and from May
to August, igo8, had a barber shop at Grand Forks,
Idaho. Since 1908 he has conducted a high class
barber establishment at Superior. He is also presi-
dent of the Mask Iron Company, and owns a mod-
ern home and other real estate at Superior.
Mr. Franklin has long been interested in politics
in various communities, being affiliated with the
democratic party. He served as a justice of the
peace at Superior and also in Missoula County.
He was elected to represent Mineral County in the
Sixteenth Session- of the Legislature in 1918. He
was a member of the fish and game, railroad trans-
portation, mines and mining, journal and other
cornmittees. Mr. Franklin is a Catholic, and is
affiliated with Missoula Council No. 1021, Knights
of Columbus, Missoula Camp No. .^329, Modern
Woodmen of America, and Jocko Tribe No. 10.
Independent Order of Red Alen.
In 1005, at Missoula, he married Mrs. Agnes
(Welch) Clark, daughter of Martin and Mary
Welch, both deceased. Her father was a Wisconsin
farmer and afterwards owned a timber claim at
DeBorgia, Montana. Mr. Franklin has no children
of his own. but has two step-children. Laura, wife
of A. C. Bennett, a carpenter at Butte ; and O. J.
Pike, who conducts a pool hall at Superior.
J. B. Selters is a lawyer, and soon after gradu-
ating from law school and his admission to the bar
of Illinois came to Montana and is now in his tenth
year of his successful general practice at Big Tim-
ber.
Mr. Selters represents a family that has been
substantially identified with the agricultural and
business and professional interests of Illinois for
nearly seventy years. He was born at Topeka, Illi-
nois, May 22, 1884, and is a son of Henry Selters,
■who was born in Germany in 1826 and came to
the United States in 1847, when twenty-one years
of age. He was a pioneer in the locality where
the Town of Havana, Illinois, now is and developed
a homestead and lived as a farmer the rest of his
life. He died at Havana in 1905. He became a
republican when that party was founded and was
a member of the Evangelical Church. His brother,
George Selters, was a Union soldier with an Illi-
nois regiment and while a prisoner at Anderson-
ville died May 24, 1864. The State of Illinois is
now erecting a monument at Andersonville in honor
of the sons of the Prairie state who lost their lives
while prisoners of war in that notorious stockade.
Of the eight children of Henry Selters and wife,
Barbara Shundlemeyer, who was born in Germany
in 1840 and died at Havana, Illinois, in 1914, J. B.
is the youngest and the only one to adopt the State
of Montana as his home. Mary, the oldest, mar-
ried a Mr. Deiss and she is a widow and lives at
Monte \'ista, Colorado; Enoch is a banker and
livestock man at Clayton. Illinois ; Chris owns a
large ranch at Monte Vista, Colorado ; Anna is un-
married and lives on the home farm at Havana,
Illinois ; Henry is also a ranch owner at Monte
Vista, Colorado, as is also Joseph, the seventh child ;
Kathryn,, sixth in age, is a graduate nurse, lives
at Peoria, Illinois, for several years had charge
of the Peoria County Hospital, and is at this writ-
ing engaged in special work in her profession in
Chicago.
J. B. Selters attended rural schools in Mason
County, Illinois, spent three years in the literary
department of Illinois Wesleyan University at
Bloomington, and after a three years* course in
the law department graduated witli the LL. B. de-
gree in 1910, and was admitted to the Illinois bar
the same year. A few weeks later he arrived at
Big Timber, Montana, and after a brief novitiate
was accorded a living business as a lawyer and
has handled some of the very important civil and
criminal cases of the local courts. His offices are
in the Lowry Building on McLeod Street. He
served as city attorney from 191 5 until he resigned
in 1918, and during 1917-18 was county attorney.
During the World war he was a member of the
Legal Advisory Board and was the Government
appeal agent for Sweetgrass County. He is also
a member of the Eastern Montana Bar Association.
Mr. Selters is a republican, member of the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church, and he and his wife are
well known in social circles of Big Timber. Re-
cently he sold his modern home on Fourth Avenue
and has now purchased a home on Sixth Avenue,
East. Mr. Selters married at Billings in 1912 Miss
Estelle Clark, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Charles S.
Clark, residents of Hobart, Oklahoma. Mrs. Sel-
ters is a skilled vocalist and instrumental musi-
cian, and completed her musical education in the
.American Conservatory of Music at Chicago. They
have one son, J. B., Jr., born September 14, 1914.
Hexrv Cheesmax, who first came to Montana in
pioneer times, over thirty-five 3"ears ago, was for
ten years prominently identified with the ranching
and farming interests of this state and is now living
in comfortable retirement at Lewistown.
Mr. Cheesman was born in Racine Countv, Wis-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
79
cousin. August i6, 1857, a member of a pioneer
family of the Badger State. His parents. Edward
and Eliza (Johnson) Cheesman, were both natives
of England. Henry Cheesman was the third son
and fifth child. Two of the daughters and one son
were born in England. They came to America in
1844 by sailing vessel, being six weeks on the ocean.
From New York City they traveled by boat to Al-
bany, thence by canal to Buffalo and around by the
lake by sailing ship to Kenosha, Wisconsin. Edward
Cheesman reached Wisconsin with only $2.50 in
money. He located a tract of Government land in
Racine County and virtually hewed a home out of
the wilderness. His first house was built of logs.
He lived tliere many years and prospered, owning
200 acres of good farming land, devoted to general
crops and sheep and cattle. He retired in 1886.
and spent his last days in Milwaukee, where he died
in 1903, at the age of eighty-nine years. His wife
died at the age of sixty-five in 1882. They had six
sons and three daughters, six of whom are still
living. Edward Cheesman held various township
offices and was a whig and republican in politics,
and during the Civil war was a strong supporter
of the Union.
Henry Cheesman acquired his education in the
public schools of Racine County and attended the
Rochester Academy in that state for 2' 2 years.
After his first marriage he engaged in tlie hotel
business at Rochester, and then took up farming in
Rock County. After selling his interests in Wiscon-
sin he came to Montana in June, 1883, with a herd
of sheep. His destination was Dillon, where he
sold his flock to some sheep men. He spent several
montlis in the state and then went back to Wis-
consin. He afterward returned to Fergus County,
Montana, and in 1908 engaged in farming on a large
scale, operating about 4,500 acres and acting as
superintendent for the Judith Basin Land Company,
as stock buyer. Since June, 1918, he has lived re-
tired. In 191S Mr. Cheesman raised 26.000 bushels
of wheat on 600 acres of land. He is affiliated with
Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights of Pythias, and in
politics is a republican.
Mr. Cheesman is an enthusiastic Montanan and
shows his pride and confidence in his adopted state
not alone by words but by deeds. No measure or
project tending to the betterment of either local
or state conditions has ever come up that failed
to receive his hearty support, both in time and
money. He has always worked to the end of a gen-
eral improvement in all phases of both public and
private progress, and has given substantial evidence
of his beliefs. Never desiring political preferment,
his judgment and opinions have nevertheless had
much to do in shaping public matters for their
betterment.
In 1880 he married for his first wife Emma A.
Gipson. She was born in Racine County. Wisconsin,
and died in 1884. In 1886 Mr. Cheesman married
.\nna B. Emery, who was born in Industry. Maine.
They have two children, Wallace Henrj-, who lives
at Clinton, Wisconsin, and married Edna Conley;
and Harriet L., who is the wife of Frank J. Hughes,
of Lewistown, and the mother of one daughter,
Ellen.
Ch.\fles O. Stout. For all the magnificence of
its variegated sources, Montana is an agricultural
state, and its prosperity will rest more securely
every year upon its farms and ranches. One of the
men who have achieved a practical success in the
raising of crops and the operation of land in Yel-
lowstone County is Charles O. Stout, of Ballantine.
Mr. Stout, who has been a resident of Montana
for twelve years, was born at Carlisle, Pennsylvania,
January 12, 1881. His grandfather, Michael Stout,
was born in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, spent
his life as a farmer and died in Cumberland County
of that state before his grandson was born. John A.
Stout, father of the Montana rancher, was born in
Cumberland County in 1852, also spent his life in
Pennsylvania as a farmer, and died at Shippensburg,
Pennsylvania, in October, 1907. He was a republi-
can and a very active member of the Baptist Church.
His wife was Emma Saltzgiver, who was born in
Adams County, Pennsylvania, in 1846, and is now
living at Newville, in Cumberland County, Penn-
sylvania. She was the mother of three children.
Alba S., wife of W. S. Meals, owner of a coal mine
and farm near Johnstown, Pennsylvania; Charles O.,
and Mary R., wife of C. R. Killian, ticket agent in
the Pennsylvania Depot at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Charles O. Stout attended public school in Cum-
berland County, for two years was a student in the
Blue Ridge College at New Windsor, Maryland, and
m 1904 completed a course in the Philadelphia Busi-
ness College. For a time he worked in a business
office in Philadelphia and after taking a civil service
examination was appointed to a position in the chief
postoffice inspector's office at Washington. He broke
away from the routine duties and the life of the
East and came out to Billings in June, 1907. The
first seven months he was in the state he was em-
ployed by the Billings Sugar Company, and then
moved to Ballantine, where for over ten years he
has been busily engaged in ranching. Mr. Stout
owns forty-seven acres of the highly valuable irri-
gated land between Worden and Ballantine. He has
everything in complete order and with facilities in
the way of barns and other buildings that make
efficient farming possible. He also has a modern
home. During 1918, when patriotism demanded the
utmost of the farmers, Mr. Stout operated 400 acres.
He also has other interests, being vice president of
the Ballantine State Bank and is director of the
Ballantine Telephone Company.
Mr. Stout is one of the leading republicans of
Yellowstone County. He was a candidate for the
Legislature in 1912 and for six years was justice of
the peace for his precinct. He is a member of the
Baptist Church.
In January. 191 1, he married Miss Re Bryson,
daughter of Robert and Elizabeth (Asher) Bryson,
at Ballantine. Her parents live at Ballantine, her
father being a retired farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Stout
have five children: Robert John, born October 12,
1912; Mary Elizabeth, born February 13, IQM; Will-
iam Charles, born September 22, 1915 ; Edna Aileen,
born June 4, 1916, and Ruth, born February 18, 1918.
William Duane T.\llman. One of the distinc-
tive incidental functions of this publication is to take
recognition of those citizens of the great common-
wealth of Montana who stand distinctively repre-
sentative in their chosen spheres of endeavor, and
in this connection there is eminent propriety in
according consideration to Professor William Duane
Tallman, one of the able and popular^ educators of
the state, who holds a professorship in the mathe-
matical department of the State College at Bozeman.
William D. Tallman was born at Sterling, Ar-
kansas, on Februarv 12. 1875, and is a son of Duane
Dano and Jennie (Whittemore") Tallman. The
father was born in 1831 at Reedsburg, Wisconsin,
was reared and educated there, and in young man-
hood went to Arkansas, where he went mto the
general mercantile business. He died at Lake Vu-
lage, Arkansas, in October, 1874. He was .a
republican in politics and a member of the Masonic
HISTORY OF MONTANA
fraternity. He married Jennie Whittemore, who
was born in Iowa in 1854 and who died at Lake
Village, Arkansas, on April 19, 1875. The subject of
this sketch was their only child.
William D. Tallman received his elementary edu-
cation in the public schools of Sparta, Wisconsin,
graduating from the high school there in 1892. He
then entered the University of Wisconsin at Madi-
son, where he was graduated in 1896. with the
degree of Bachelor of Science, in mathematics. He
is a member of the honorar\' Greek Letter society
Phi Beta Kappa. During 1896-7 he taught mathe-
matics in the Madison (Wisconsin) High School,
and during the following school year was a fellow
in mathematics at the University of Wisconsin.
During the next year he taught mathematics in the
Eau Claire (Wisconsin) High School, and then,
from 1899 to January l, 1901, he was instructor in
mathematics and a graduate student at the University
of Wisconsin. On the date last mentioned Pro-
fessor Tallman came to Bozeman and accepted the
chair of mathematics in the Montana State College.
He is still the incumbent of that position, and has
for manv years been one of the most popular and
respected members of the faculty of this splendid
institution.
Professor Tallman gives his support to the re-
publican party and has taken an active interest in
local public affairs, having served four years as a
member of the City Council of Bozeman. He is
also a member of the Presbyterian Church, while his
fraternal relations are as follows: Gallatin Camp
No. 5245, Alodern Woodmen of America; Bridger
Camp No. 62, Woodmen of the World; Eureka
Homestead No. 415, Brotherhood of .American Yeo-
men, and Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks. He is also a member
of the American Mathematical Society and the
Society for the Promotion of Engineering Educa-
tion.
Professor Tallman has been twice married, first,
on June 27, 1900. at Lake Bluff, Illinois, to Anna
DeMuth, daughter of Mrs. Susanna DeMuth, of
Peru, Indiana. Mrs. Tallman was a graduate of
the Chicago Deaconess Training School. Her death
occurred on February 4, 1908, at Rochester, Minne-
sota. The children born to this union are as fol-
lows: Mildred, born May 2, 1903; Hazel, born
November 10, 1904, and Duane, born December 17,
1907. On September 8, 1909, at Bozeman, Professor
Tallman was married to Maude DeMuth, a sister of
his former wife and they have one child, William
D., born December 12, 1910. Mrs. Tallman is a
graduate of the Montana State College.
Professor Tallman realized early in life that there
is a purpose in life and that there is no honor not
founded on worth and no respect not founded on
accomplishment. His life and labors have been
eminently worthy because they have contributed to
a proper understanding of life and its problems.
Charles C. Willis. In that section of Montana
known as Sanders County probably no citizen's
personal recollections and experiences go back fur-
ther and give him more of the authority of a
spectator and historian than Charles C. Willis, a well
known rancher and real estate dealer at Plains.
Mr. Willis, who has lived in Montana thirty-five
years, was born at Columbia, Missouri. August 7,
1854. His paternal ancestors were Englishmen who
settled in New Jersey in colonial times, and several
of the family were revolutionary soldiers. Mr.
Willis' grandfather. John Willis, was born in New
Jersey in 1800. For many years he devoted himself
to the cause of the Baptist ministry in Missouri.
He was a circuit rider and founded and built many
churches of his denomination. Besides his eloquence
as a preacher he was a skillful carpenter and me-
chanic, and in building some of the early churches
he used his individual skill in constructing the build-
ings and in making the pews and other articles of
furniture. He lived a long and active life and died
near Columbia, Missouri, in 1886.
John E. Willis, father of Charles C. Willis, was
born in ^Mississippi in 1828, but was reared and
married near Columbia, Missouri, where he followed
the business of stock raising. He was a man in
advance of his time in that section of Missouri,
and was one of the first to establish a herd of pure
bred Shorthorn cattle. When the Civil war came
on, as a Southerner, he joined the Confederate side,
and while serving in the regimental commissary
department in Price's army was killed near Spring-
field. Missouri, in 1863. He was a democrat and a
member of the Christian Church. His wife was
Sallie A. Cromwell, a direct descendant of the
Oliver Cromwell family of England. She was born
near Columbia, Missouri, in 1829, and died at Cen-
tralia in that state in 1880. Charles C. was the
oldest of her children. Elizabeth died at the age
of three months. John is in the life insurance
business at Glasgow, Montana, while J. R. Willis, a
farmer at Plains, was killed in a runaway accident at
Plains February 26, 1920.
Charles C. Willis while a boy attended rural
schools in Boone County, Missouri. He was only
nine years of age when his father died. For two
years," in 1872-73, he attended the Missouri State
University at Columbia. After leaving college he
became a farmer, at first in Boone County, and
after 1878 in Audrain County, Missouri.
Mr. Willis arrived at Thompson Falls, Montana,
January 18, 1885. He conducted a ranch near that
town and was also the pioneer drayman. For eight-
een months he had the contract for hauling water
for the town. In 1886 he moved to Plains, and
developed one of the first farms and ranches in this
vicinity. Mr. Willis is now owner of about 1,300
acres of land. For a number of years he did much
contracting for the Northern Pacific Railway, and
for several years was interested in the lumbering
industry. Since 1909 he has handled a large amount
of the local real estate transactions and has bought
and sold property for others as well as for himself.
He still lives on 'his home ranch of 200 acres a half
mile west of the depot. Part of this farm is in the
corporation limits of Plains.
Mr. Willis has been a member of the State Board
of Horticulture since it was created more than
twenty years ago. He was also a justice of the
peace' in the early days, at a time when the present
Sanders, Flathead, Ravalli and Lincoln counties
were part of the larger Missoula County, comprising
nearly all of Western Montana. Politically he is
a democrat.
In 1875, near Columbia, Missouri, Mr. Willis
married Miss Mary Shock, daughter of James H.
and Susan (Keith) Shock, both deceased. Her
father was a pioneer settler in Missouri. Mrs.
Willis died at Plains in 1895. She was the mother
of seven children : Clarence H., living on the home
ranch ; Maude, who died at the age of three months ;
Alvin K., a shipyards worker living at Oakland,
California; Mary, died at the age of twenty-four
years; John K., a farmer near Avondale in Valley
"County, Montana; Charles M., whose home is at
Hot Springs in Sanders County and who operates
a dray line between Hot Springs and Plains and
Perma ; and Willard P., the present postmaster of
Plains.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
81
In 1898, at Plains, Mr. Willis married for his
present wife Miss Sadie Cave, daughter of James
and Celia (Woody) Cave. Her father was for
many years a farmer at Ozark. Missouri. He died
in the" fall of 1917 at the advanced age of eighty-
five, while her mother died in 1919, aged eighty-
seven.
LoRiN F. DouTHETT. Of the forty odd years
since he left college Lorin F. Douthett has spent
nearly thirty in Montana and his name is asso-
ciated actively with several of the important busi-
ness institutions of Big Timber. He is regarded
as one of the men who have had most to do with
the upbuilding of that city.
Mr. Douthett was born in Bloomington, Illinois,
June 12, 1854, and is of Scotch ancestry. His pa-
ternal ancestors settled at an early date in Penn-
sylvania. His father, Robert Douthett, was born
in Pennsylvania in 1825, grew up there, moved
to Illinois when a young man and after his mar-
riage moved to Bloomington, where he followed
the business of carpenter and builder a number of
years. He was also an Illinois farmer. In 1886
he moved to the new agricultural district around
Wessington, South Dakota, and finally went to
the Pacific Coast and then to Tacoma and Seattle
and was retired at San Francisco when he died
in 191 1. He was a republican and a member of
the Methodist Church. His wife was Eliza Mont-
gomery, who was born in Boone County, Iowa, in
1832, and died at Tacoma, Washington, in Septem-
ber, 1916. Lorin F. was the second of their family
of six children. Eugene, the oldest, is a farmer at
Covington, Nebraska; Don Clarence, whose home
is in Sioux City, Iowa, is connected with the Gov-
ernment river improvement work on the Mississippi;
Veleria is the wife of John M. Reynolds, a manu-
facturer of hardwood floors, parquetry and other
products at Mill Valley, California; Alma, whose
home is at Tacoma, Washington, is the widow of
her second cousin, Heber Douthett, who was a
farmer; Minnie Belle is the wife of W. U. White, a
farmer at Hope, North Dakota.
Lorin F. Douthett attended public school at
Bloomington, Illinois, spent three years in the State
Normal University at Normal, and completed his
sophomore year in the Illinois Wesleyan Univer-
sity at Bloomington. After leaving college in 1876
he farmed for several years in McLain County,
Illinois, and was also in the grocery business at
Bloomington. He moved out to Dakota Territory
in 18S4 locating in Wessington, South Dakota, and
was a farmer there until he came to Big Timber in
1891. His first work here was at teaming, and he
then established what is now the pioneer wood and
coal business at the town. He added a lumber
yard in 191 1 and since 1914 has been a dealer in
automobiles. His offices and yards are on First
Avenue near McLeod Street. He leases an auto-
mobile garage on First Avenue and handles Ford
cars and accessories. He also owns the ice house
at the foot of McLeod Street. Mr. Douthett is the
president of the Big Timber Building & Loan As-
sociation and is secretary and treasurer of the
Montana Cold Storage and Fuel Company. His
modern home is on Third Avenue.
Mr. Douthett is a democrat in politics. He served
one term as alderman of Big Timber and is affili-
ated with the Congregational Church.
In 1007, at Chicago, Illinois, he married Miss
Margaret May Duggan, daughter of William and
Isabelle Duggan. Her parents now reside at Min-
neapolis. Her father is a machinist. Mr. and Mrs.
Douthett had eight children : Edward B., born in
December, 1908; Doris Evelyn, born in 1909; Mary
Audrey, born in 191 1 ; Jane Thais, born m 1912;
Carol, born in 1913; Lorin Frank, born in 1915;
Lawrence O'Neil, born in 1916; and Alice Mar-
guerite, born in 1918. Carol died March 24, 1914,
Lawrence O'Neil died September 2, 1916; and Alice
Marguerite died March 28, 1919. Mrs. Douthett
died March 23, 1919.
Wyllys a. Hedges, a former receiver of the
United States Land Office at Lewistown, where he
still resides, has had a career that honorably supple-
ments that of his distinguished father, the late Judge
Cornelius Hedges, one of the greatest of Montana's
pioneers.
Cornelius Hedges, whose story has probably been
told in every published work on Montana and which
should be set down here in brief as a matter of ap-
propriate record, was born in Westfield, Massachu-
setts, October 28, 1831, and died in 1909. He had an
ancestor in the Revolutionary war, and his people
for many generations were prominent in New Eng-
land. His parents were Dennis and Alvina (Noble)
Hedges. Cornelius Hedges was liberally educated,
graduating from Yale College in 1853 and from the
law department of Harvard College in 1856. He
became a pioneer lawyer at Independence, Buchanan
County, Iowa, and practiced there until 1864, part
of the time also editing the Buchanan County Bulle-
tin, the first paper in Independence, Buchanan
County.
In April of 1864 he started across the plains by
team to Virginia City, Montana. There he worked
as a practical miner, and on January 15, 1865, arrived
at Helena. He was one of the first members of the
bar of the territory. In 1867 he brought his family'
to Montana, coming by steamboat up the Missouri
River. He was appointed United States attorney for
Montana by President Grant, and in 1872 was ap-
pointed superintendent of public instruction of the
territory. His service in that office for six years
did much to formulate the early educational policy
of Montana. He served as probate judge five years
and in 1882 was reappointed sunerintendent of public
instruction. He was a member of the State Con-
stitutional Convention and elected a member of the
first State Senate in 1889.
One of the publications of the Montana Historical
Society's collections is the journal of Cornelius
Hedges, recounting the trip headed by General Wash-
burn, of which he was a member, in the explora-
tion of the Upper Yellowstone and the Yellowstone
National Park. Cornelius Hedges is said to be re-
sponsible for the original suggestion that this be
made a national preserve.
For many years he was called "the father of
Masonry in Montana." He took his first degrees
in that order in Iowa in 1859. He became a charter
member of Helena Lodge No. i in 1865. and was its
first master. He held all the offices in the York Rite
and the Scottish Rite. He was also one of the
founders of the City Library of Helena, and in the
early days was a member of the Vigilante organiza-
tion. In politics he was a stanch republican. For
many years Judge Hedges was one of the prominent
sheep men of Montana, running thousands of head
on the range along the Mussel Shell River.
In 1856 Judge Hedges married Miss Edna L.
Smith, who" was born at Southington, Connecticut,
in 1836. She died in 1912. Of their eight children,
five are living: Wvllys A.; Dennis, who died ni
childhood: Henrv H. : Edna L., wife of H. B.
Palmer: Emma, wife of John Woodbridge ; Lang-
ford; Ellen, who died in childhood; and Corne-
lius, Jr.
82
HISTORY OF MONTANA
\\'vllys A. Hedges was born at Independence,
Buchanan County, Iowa, July 3. i857. and was not
yet ten years of age when brougiit to the Territory
of Montana. He was a student in some of the early
schools of Helena, and in 1869, at the age of thir-
teen, was appointed librarian of tlie Helena Public
Library. After finishing high school he entered Yale
University, and returned from the East to becorne
the original settler on the townsite of Great Falls in
1878. He lived there until 1880, and then went to
California and bought a flock of sheep which he
drove overland to Bercail on Careless Creek in
Meagher County. He reached his destination No-
vember 6, 1881, and, associated with his father, con-
tinued in the sheep and cattle business until 1906.
He was largely responsible for the development of
the sheep industry in the Mussel Shell Valley, and
a town in that vicinity is still known as Hedges.
In 1906 Mr. Hedges was appointed by the late Col-
onel Roosevelt receiver of the United States Land
Office at Lewistown, and held those responsibili-
ties until October 2, 1913. Since then he has been
engaged in the real estate business. As a republican
he was elected a member of the Lower House of
the State Legislature in the Fourth. Sixth, Seventh
and Ninth assemblies, and during his last term was
speaker of the house. Like his father, he is active
in Masonry, being affiliated with Lewistown Lodge
No. 37, Ancient Free and Accepted jMasons, Hiram
Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch Masons, and he and his
wife are members of Marie Chapter No. 36 of the
Eastern Star.
September 3, 1884, he married Miss Ida S. Beach.
She was born in Southington, Connecticut, where
Mr. Hedges' mother spent her girlhood. Mr. and
Mrs. Hedges' four children are all deceased.
WiLLARD HiCKOX, of Billings, is probably the pre-
mier authority in Montana on all subjects connected
with bee culture and honey production. Like most
men who have been successful in that industry
he seems to have a natural genius for work, though
of course experience and training count largely for
his success. He is secretary, treasurer and manager
of the Rocky Mountain Bee Company and is secre-
tary and treasurer of the Montana Honey Producers'
Association, Incorporated.
Mr. Hickox was born at Fowler, in Trumbull
County, Ohio, November 12, 1857. The name Hickox
is of English origin and was one of the first names
transplanted to the soil of New England. His grand-
father, Jesse Hickox, was born in Connecticut in
1782 and in 1818 took his family to the western
wilderness and settled in the Ohio Western Reserve
in Trumbull County. He had previously served as a
soldier of the War of 1812. He died at Fowler in
1867. His wife was a Miss Janes.
Daniel B. Hickox, father of Willard, was born in
Connecticut in 1814 and was four years old when
his parents moved to Ohio. He spent the rest of his
life there as a farmer and died in 1876. He was
an old school republican and was active in the
Methodist Church. His wife, Laura Tanner, was
born in Fowler and died there November 15, 1857.
Willard Hickox, only child of his parents, grew
up on his father's farm to the age of nineteen, at-
tended school at Fowler and graduated from the
Cleveland High School in 1877. He also took special
courses in the Spencerian Business College at Cleve-
land. For fifteen years Mr. Hickox was employed
as a bookkeeper and stenographer in Cleveland, and
while working in that city and with his home nearby
he acquired his first practical knowlfedge and expe-
rience in bee keeping. In 1000 he moved to Shawnee,
Oklahoma, and after one summer there went to Fort
Collins, Colorado, and organized the Rocky Moun-
tain Bee Company. Besides his work in handling
bees at Cleveland he also spent a year in Michigan
in the same line of work. Mr. Hickox has been
manager of the Rocky Mountain Bee Company since
it was established. In 1911 he moved his headquar-
ters to Rosebud, Montana, and during that year
made his home in Cartersville. In 1912 he moved
to Forsyth, Montana, and since 1916 has had his
home in Billings, his residence being at 508 St. Johns
Avenue.
The Rocky Mountain Bee Company in 1919 owned
2,000 stands of bees. These are moved about from
point to point to secure the best results of honey
productions, the principal location being near Rose-
bud, Cartersville, Oronoco, Sanders, Myers, Hysham
and Laurel. The company has produced and shipped
as high as 150,000 pounds or fifty-five tons of honey
in a single year, and this honey is distributed all over
the United States. All the Montana business is
handled through the offices at Montana Avenue and
West Fifth Street in Billings. The company is in-
corporated in Colorado with headquarters at Ber-
thoud.
While he was a resident of Cleveland Mr. Hickox
made his home at Rockport, a suburb of that city.
He was postmaster of Rockport at one time, also
mayor, and a member of the Christadelphian Church
of Cleveland. He is a republican, a Mason, Elk
and Woodman of the World.
Mr. Hickox married at Rockport, Ohio, in 1879,
Miss Dora McBride, daughter of Samuel and Delilah
(Holton) McBride. Her father was a farmer in the
states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Nebraska and Okla-
homa, keeping well out to the frontier. He is now
deceased and her mother is living at Chattanooga,
Oklahoma.
Robert Schaefer. Among the citizens and busi-
ness men of Southern Montana who believe in fol-
lowing twentieth-century methods is Robert
Schaefer, the pioneer cheese manufacturer of Mon-
tana and proprietor of three successful factories in
this state. He comes of a splendid Swiss family,
one that has always been strong for right living
and industrious habits, for education and morality,
and for all that contributes to the welfare of the
commonwealth. Such people are welcomed in any
community, for they are empire builders and as
such have pushed the frontier of civilization ever
westward and onward, leaving the green wide-
reaching wilderness and the far-stretching plains
populous with contented people and beautiful with
green fields ; they have constituted that sterling
horde which caused the great Bishop Whipple to
write the memorable line, "Westward the course of
empire takes its way."
Robert Schaefer was born in Canton Berne,
Switzerland, on February 8, 1878, and is the son
of Peter and Margaret (Willener) Schaefer. Peter
Schaefer was born in 1842, in Canton Berne, Swit-
zerland, and his death occurred there in 1911. In
many respects he was a most remarkable man. He
received a good, practical education, as do all the
children of Switzerland, and after taking up work
on his own account showed himself to be the pos-
sessor of more than ordinary mental capacity. He
held practically all the state offices of his native
country and at the early age of twentj- years he
became a supreme judge in Canton Berne, an ofiice
he held for a number of years. He was well known
throughout his country and was held in the highest
esteem. He was by trade a carver. He became
the inventor of the art of wood carving as prac-
tised by the Swiss, and traveled all over the world
HISTORY OF MONTANA
83
in that vocation. He was a soldier in the Swiss
army, serving along the border in 1870-71, holding
the rank of first sergeant. In 1876 he came to the
United States, locating at Philadelphia, where he
became a noted wood carver and was in the employ
of the leading furniture factory there. He became
a citizen of the United States, but returned to his
native land in 1879. He was a member of the
Evangelical Reformed Church and was very active
and earnest in his religious life. He married
Margaret Willener, who was born in 1853 in Canton
Berne, Switzerland, and who now resides in Meirin-
gen, that country. To them were born the follo^ving
children : Edward, who has been a soldier of the
United States Army since 1898, was a soldier iii the
Spanish-American war, and more recently in the
World war, being at the present time in France
with the Fifty-Third Division, holding the rank of
supply sergeant; Robert, the subject of this sketch,
is the next in order of birth; Peter is a laborer
and resides in Cleveland, Ohio ; Saloma is the wife
of Fritz Boesch, who resides at St. Gallen, Switzer-
land, and is a soldier in the Swiss national army;
Werner is a wood carver at Meiringen, Switzerland ;
Lena, who died at Meiringen, Switzerland, in 191 1,
at the age of twenty-three years ; Katherine is a
school teacher at St. Gallen, Switzerland.
Robert Schaefer received a good education in the
public and high schools of Berne and then learned
the trade of cheese making, a vocation in which the
Swiss excell all other nationalities. He then went
to Germany and for a short time was engaged in
the cheese business there. In July, 1902, Mr.
Schaefer came to the United States, landing at New
York, where he remained for about three weeks.
He then went to Canal Dover. Ohio, where he was
engaged in general work until 1911, when he went
to Arlington, Wisconsin, and established a cheese
factory for Jacob Marty. April i, 1915, he came
to Salesville, Montana, and erected a cheese factory,
the first one to be established in the State of Mon-
tana. He has equipped his factory with every
modern facility for the making of all kinds of
cheese, and so successful has he been in his opera-
tions that he has established two other similar fac-
tories in this state, one at Belgrade and one at
Central Park, both of which have proven very
successful. The products of these factories have
already earned a high reputation for their excellent
quality and they are sold all over Montana and
other neighboring states. Mr. Schaefer has $30,000
invested in the business, and he is reaping the fruits
of his faith and his works.
Politically Mr. Schaefer is an ardent supporter
of the republican party, while his fraternal relations
are with Salesville Lodge No. 69, Independent Order
of Odd Fellows ; Pythagoras Lodge No. 2, Knights
of Pythias, at Bozeman ; and the local lodge of the
Daughters of Rebekah.
In 1902, at Nobitz, Saxony, Robert Schaefer was
married to Anna Eliza Ruchti, a native of Canton
Berne, Switzerland, and to them have been born
three children, namely : John Godfrey Peter, who
died at the age of six months ; Alma Louise, born
February 21, 1904, and John William Franklin, born
September 11, 1905.
Although a quiet and unassuming man, with no
ambition for public position or leadership, Mr.
Schaefer has contributed to the material, civil and
moral advancement of his community, while his
admirable qualities of head and heart and the
straightforward, upright course of his daily life has
won for him the esteem and confidence of the people
with whom he has been associated.
William Castles has been in Montana fourteen
years, and since he came to Superior his business
as a merchant has rapidly increased until his firm
is now one of the largest individual taxpayers
in Mineral County.
Mr. Castles was born at the City of Liverpool,
England, February 12, 1878. His father, Wesley
Castles, was born at Drumlin, County Armagh,
Ireland, in 1855, was reared and married there,
and became a farmer and butcher. After his mar-
riage he moved to Liverpool, where he owned a
chain of meat markets. He prospered in his
business affairs and subsequently retired to Belfast,
Ireland, where he died in 1912. He was a member
of the Masonic fraternitj', the Apprenticed Boys of
Derry, was a Methodist and a conservative in
politics. His wife was Mary Theressa Bland, who
was born at Lancaster, England, in 1854, and died
at Belfast in 1915. They had a family of ten chil-
dren, including : Wesley, who became a miner, went
to Australia, and died in that country at the age
of forty; Lavinia Augusta, wife of George Ruddell,
owner of a meat market at Lurgan, Ireland; Bertha
Louise, wife of Robert J. Mulligan, a musketry
instructor in the British army living at Belfast';
William; Garfield and Eleanor Gertrude, both of
whom came from the old country and have lived
at Superior, Montana, since December, 1919.
Williarn Castles acquired his early education in
the public schools of Liverpool and at Lurgan,
Ireland, finishing his work in school at the age of
sixteen. He learned the butcher business under
his father. Mr. Castles is a veteran English soldier,
having spent eighteen months in the Boer war dur-
ing 1901-02. He was a sergeant of the Sixtieth
Company of Imperial Yeomanry. From South
Africa he returned to Lurgan, Ireland, and engaged
in the butcher business for himself for several
years.
Mr. Castles came to the United States in 1906,
and going to Missoula, Montana, was employed by
the John R. Daily Company and Koopman & Wiss-
brod, owners of two extensive wholesale and retail
meat businesses in that city. In November, 191 5,
Mr. Castles came to Superior, and in partnership
with Koopman & Wissbrod bought the butcher
shop of Tom Merkle, who was a pioneer miner and
butcher at Superior. Mr. Castles dissolved his
partnership with Koopman & Wissbrod in 1916, and
acquired the entire business. Soon afterward he
formed his present partnership with Paul Westfall,
each partner sharing equally. Mr. Castles is a
practical meat market man, and Castles and West-
fall own and operate a large ranch at Ashmore.
On this ranch are raised the cattle, sheep and hogs
which constitute practically the entire source of
supply for the meat sold at the market in Superior.
They specialize in fresh and choice beef, mutton
and pork, and as the animals are killed and dressed
at the ranch and sold at the market the middle-
man's profits are eliminated and the business is
conducted on the lowest possible scale of prices
consistent with high quality and good service.
In November, 1917, Castles & Westfall also bought
the general merchandise store of Jesse Daly at
Superior. Mr. Castles also is manager of this busi-
ness, located on Main Street. It carries one of the
best selected stocks of general merchandise in West-
ern Montana, and the firm enjoys a trade derived
from all over Mineral County and the western
portion of Missoula County.
Mr. Castles is an independent voter, is a member
and trustee of the Metliodist Episcopal Church
and superintendent of its Sunday school, and is
a member of Montana lodge of Superior, Ancient
84
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Free and Accepted Masons, having been transferred
from Acacia Lodge No. 24, Lurgan, Ireland.
In 1912, at Missoula, he married Miss Catherine
Louisa Irwin, daughter of William and Elizabeth
(Brown) Irwin. Her father is a retired butcher
at Lurgan, Ireland, and her mother died there.
The children of Mr. and Mrs. Castles are five m
number: Mary, born March 22. 1913; William
Irwin, born June 12, 1914; James Bland, born Sep-
tember 22, 1915; John Ross, born January 17, 1917,
and Wesley, born September 26, 1918.
Charles C. Wallin, M. D., vice president of the
Montana Medical Society, has been a resident of
this state since 1905 and has achieved special promi-
nence as a physician and surgeon. His home is
at Lewistown and he is a former president of the
Fergus County Medical Society.
Doctor Wallin was born at Saugatuck, Michigan,
January 3, 1876. a son of Franklin B. and Hannah
(Chadbourne) Wallin. His parents were both na-
tives of New York State. His grandfather Wal-
lin was a tanner and was in that business nearly
seventy years. He built up a large industry^ in
Michigan, conducted for many years as C. C. Wal-
lin & Sons. Franklin B. Wallin learned the trade
from his father and after 1874 continued the busi-
ness as the Wallin Leather Company, with offices
both at Chicago and Grand Rapids, Michigan. He
was president of this company until his death,
which occurred in August, 1908. He was then sev-
enty-seven years of age and had lived in Michigan
from early childhood. He was a member of the
Michigan Legislature during the Civil war and
gave ardent support to all war measures. He was
active in the Congregational Church and was widely
known at Grand Rapids and vicinity not only be-
cause of his business prominence but for his many
philanthropies. His wife, Hannah Chadbourne, was
born in Otsego County, New York, and died at
Grand Rapids in 1910. She was descended from
a Revolutionary soldier and through her Doctor
Wallin has membership in the Sons of the Ameri-
can Revolution.
Doctor Wallin is the oldest of a family of three
children. He grew up from the age of five in
Grand Rapids, attended the public schools there
and finished his literary education at the Univer-
sitv of Michigan, graduating in 1898. In the spring
of'that year he enlisted in the Thirty-Second Michi-
gan Volunteers for service in the Spanish-American
war, and was afterward transferred to the hos-
pital corps of the Third Division of the Fourth
Army Corps. While at Tampa, Florida, he was
stricken with typhoid and- was invalided home.
Doctor Wallin graduated from the medical school
of the University of Michigan in 1902, and began
practice at Grand Rapids, where he was associated
with an eminent Michigan surgeon. Dr. S. C. Graves.
While at Grand Rapids, Doctor Wallin was on the
staff of three of the city hospitals. He came to
Montana in 1905, first locating at White Sulphur
Springs and in 1908 moving to Lewistown. His
work as a surgeon has been especially noteworthy,
and he ranks among the state's best qualified men
in that field. He has held a captain's commission
in the medical department of the National Guard
of Montana. He is a member of the American
Medical Association, and is affiliated with all
branches of Masonry, including DeWitt Clinton
Consistory of the Scottish Rite at Grand Rapids
and Saladin Temple of the Mystic Shrine in the
same city. Doctor Wallin has served as health
officer of Lewistown for half a dozen years. He
has done post-graduate work in Chicago and in
191 1 went abroad and spent much time in the
Vienna Hospital. He is a member of the Judith
Club, is a Delta Upsilon college fraternity man and
in politics a republican.
September 10, 1902, Doctor Wallin married Miss
Florence A. Munro, daughter of Malcolm Munro.
Mrs. \\'allin was born at Wardville, Ontario, Can-
ada. She and her husband are members of the
Episcopal Church. Doctor and Mrs. Wallin have
two children, Chadbourne and Frances Marcella.
Isaac Morris Hobensack was among the founders
and for many j'ears president of one of the greatest
hardware businesses in Montana, the Judith Hard-
ware Company of Lewistown. In recent years he
has become noted as a Bonanza wheat grower in the
Northwest, and his acreage produced a tremendous
volume of cereal during the war years. He is still
prominent in that industry.
Mr. Hobensack was born on his father's farm in
Bucks County, Pennsylvania, February 7, 1858, and
has been a resident of Montana for over thirty
years. His parents, Isaac Cornell and Mrs. (Hog-
land) Hobensack, were both natives of Pennsyl-
vania, where they spent their lives, his father as a
Pennsylvania farmer. The father died in 1904, at
the age of sevent>'-six and the mother at the same
age in 1908. Isaac C. Hobensack was a whig and
republican in politics. He and his wife had nine
children, five of whom are still living, Isaac Morris
being the second in age.
The latter lived in Pennsylvania until he was
twenty-seven years old. In that time he received
his education in the common schools and worked
at home on the farm. His health became increas-
ingly impaired, and he finally sought recuperation
and improvement in the northwest country. He ar-
rived at Lewiston, Montana, August 4, 1885, having
made the journey by railway and stage. Mr. Hoben-
sack since boyhood has been possessed of much me-
chanical talent, and while he came to Montana with
little or no capital, he found a ready outlet for
his energies and one that has brought him rapid
advancement along the road of prosperity. His
first work in this state was sawing wood. Later he
bought a wood sawing outfit. In July, 1889, he had
the distinction of opening the first hardware store
at Lewistown, his partner being Oliver Jutras. The
business was conducted as Jutras & Hobensack until
1892, at which date Mr. Theodore Sloan purchased
Mr. Jutras' interests. The firm continued as Hoben-
sack & Sloan until the spring of 1898 when Mr.
Arthur Stoddard purchased Air. Sloan's interest.
Mr. Hobensack organized the Judith Hardware Com-
pany in 1900, and was its president and manager
until 1904. After that he was satisfied with the
duties of president, which gave him more time to
look after his other interests. He remained presi-
dent of this prominent hardware house until 1917.
In 1915 Mr. Hobensack first appeared upon the list
of prominent Alontana wheat growers. In that year
from 500 acres of land he harvested 25,000 bushels
of wheat. Partly through his interest in the busi-
ness and under the stimulation of patriotisrn he ac-
complished almost a miracle in Montana in 1918,
when he harvested twenty-four bushels of spring
wheat to the acre on 500 acres. While that much
grain has been frequently raised by individuals in
Montana in other years, it will be remembered that
the year 1918 was marked by an almost total failure
of wheat in Montana. Mr. Hobensack has used a
unique implement for the northwestern wheat fields,
known as the Holt Self Propelled Combination
Harvester, a machine which accomplishes a remark-
able saving in extensive wheat fields.
B^H
^Kl' ^^^H
^aPI^^^^^^I
^^^^^H
^^^^^^^^^^1
^^1
j^i^i
v^W^?r:Vsr^J^.**<^^t^L.^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
85
Mr. Hobensack was one of the organizers of the
VVinnett Irrigation Company, owning many thousands
of acres of land. Mr. Hobensack has turned his
interests amounting to a ninth of all the land over
to his wife and five children. The company is rapidly
developing this tract as one great wheatfield. Mr.
Hobensack is interested in local affairs, particularly
in educational matters, and served as a member of
the Lewistown School Board many years. He is a
republican in politics.
For several years past he and his family have
spent the winters in California. May lo, 1878, he
married Miss Sarah Saurman, a native of Mont-
gomery County, Pennsylvania. Anna, the oldest of
their five children, is the wife of Paul Taber and
has a son and daughter; Elsie is the wife of Harry
Eldridge and the mother of two children; the son
Horace enlisted June 14, 1918, in the Machine Truck
Corps at Camp Taylor, Louisville, Kentucky, and re-
ceived his honorable .discharge in December of the
same year. Ella is the wife of 'Frank J. Hagan and
has a son. Bernice, the youngest child, is still at
home with her parents.
Phiup Wesch, a resident of Billings since 1899,
a mason contractor, has done a notable service in
the upbuilding of the city, and there are many mon-
uments in the shape of important public and busi-
ness structures that testify to his personal abilities
and the efficiency of the organization of which he is
the head.
Mr. Wesch was born at Mannheim, Baden, Ger-
many, June 21, 1859. His father, John Valentine
Wesch, was born in 1814 and died in 1862. He
spent all his life in Germany, and was also a con-
tractor. In religion he was a Lutheran. His wife
was Atelheit Diemer, who was born in 1819 and
died in 1870. Of their children Philip alone came
to the United States. Henry, Hiop and Julius all
died in the old country. Tobias is still living in
Baden, a policeman. Rosina is the wife of Henry
Steck, a shoemaker. Atelheit is deceased. Valen-
tine is a cabinet maker and city clerk.
Philip, the youngest of eight children, attended
the common schools to the age of fourteen and then
served a thorough apprenticeship at the mason's
trade. He came to the United States in 1883, spend-
ing one year in Wisconsin, followed his trade at
Mitchell, South Dakota, until 1889, was in the Black
Hills region at Hot Springs for ten years, and in 1899
moved to Billings, where he has since been at the
head of an organization for mason contracting. Mr.
Wesch did the mason work on the City Hall, the
Northern Hotel, the Public Library, tlie Northern
Pacific Freight Depot and many other important
buildings. Out of his business effort he has achieved
property, having a modern home at 522 North Thir-
tieth Street, an apartment house at 2905 North
Twenty-ninth Street and a ranch of 320 acres a
mile west of Acton. Until he sold his interest in
1918 he was president of the Billings Artificial Stone
Company.
Mr. Wesch votes as a republican, is affiliated with
the Congregational Church, and is a member of Bill-
ings Star Lodge of Odd Fellows, Hot Springs
Lodge, Ancient Order of United Workmen, the
Mystic Toilers, Billings Lodge, Brotherhood of
American Yeomen, and the Billings Club.
In 1885, at Mitchell, South Dakota, Mr. Wesch
married Miss Bertha George, daughter of Julius and
Amelia (Witset) George. Mrs. George lives at the
home of Mr. Wesch. Julius George was a sailor by
life occupation, and his family lived at Hamburg,
Germany, while he sailed to all parts of the world.
After retiring from the sea he came to the United
States. Mrs. Wesch died at Hot Springs, South
Dakota, in 1890, the mother of one daughter, Rosa
Anna, wife of John W. Barnes, a dentist at Billings.
In 1891, at Hot Springs, Mr. Wesch married Her-
mina George, a sister of his first wife. They have
four children: Walter Philip, who lives at Billings
»nd was recently mustered out of the United States
service as a lieutenant of the ordnance department;
Leo, who is a sergeant with the Army of Occupa-
tion in Germany; Florence, a student in Bozeman
College at Bozeman, and Elizabeth, in the Billings
public schools.
Nelson Story, Jr., started life with the tre-
mendous responsibility of being worthy of the name
he bears, one of the oldest and most honored in
Montana's commercial history. In the course of
twenty years he has fully justified his possession of
the name of his honored father. He is a thorough
business man, a capable executive, and by his judg-
ment in picking new tenants has been able to carry
on and direct many of the large and important en-
terprises of his section of the state.
While the Story family has been prominent in
Montana for over half a century, from this state
its wealth and enterprise have radiated into other
sections, particularly to Southern California, and
much of the individual wealth and enterprise of Los
. Angeles is associated with the family.
Nelson Story, Sr., still credits Bozeman as his
home town. He is past eighty years of age and was
born at Bungtown in Meigs County, Ohio, April I,
1838. His paternal ancestry goes back in New Eng-
land history to about 1640. He lived on his father's
farm in Ohio until fourteen years of age. The death
of his father threw him upon his own resources,
and from tliat time forward he had to carve his
own destiny. He had a partial college education.
He was a participant in the early freighting between
the Missouri River and the Rocky Mountains, and
as a miner, _ freighter, cattle and horse dealer and
man of varied interests his career belongs to the
history of California, Montana and a number of ter-
ritories. Going to Kansas in territorial times he
worked at splitting rails, breaking the tough prairie
sod, and at other forms of arduous labor. He first
came to Montana in 1863. starting from Fort Leaven-
worth and crossing to Denver. From Denver he
started for Bannock. Montana, with an outfit of
two wagons, two yoke of cattle and si.xteen packs
of jacks. He made his first stop at Alder Gulch
and then established a store with the goods he had
brought overland at Summit City. Much of the
merchandise he sold was brought in by pack train
from Nevada. He also bought a mining claim and
took out $40,000 worth of gold. Nelson Story, Sr.,
arrived at the little community of Bozeman in 1865,
and no one figure has been longer and more com-
pletely identified with that ilontana City than Nel-
son Story. During the Civil war period he drove
a wagon team for the government in the vicinity of
Fort Laramie. In 1866 he went to Texas, bought a
large number of cattle and drove them over the
northern trails to Montana. He was very successful
in the stock business and for many years continued
merchandising. At one time he was one of the
leading cattle men and horse men of Montana, and
ran his cattle on the Crow Indian Reservation. He
disposed of his horses in 1888 and gradually sold
out his cattle between 1890 and 1893. He was also
in the milling and banking business, establishing the
Gallatin Valley National Bank, of which he was
president. He' is still a large stockholder in the
Commercial National Bank. Most of the money
derived from his cattle interests he invested in Los
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Angeles city propert}-. He established the Nelson
Story & Company flour mill, afterwards the Boze-
man Milling Company, which was owned by his
son Nelson and Thomas B. Story. In 1919 they
transferred their holdings in this company to the
Montana Flour Mills Company for stock in that
corporation. Though retired from the heavy re-
sponsibilities of business, Nelson Story, Sr., is still
a very active man for his years. He is a republican
in politics.
Nelson Story, Sr., married Ellen Trent, who was
born in Neosho County, Kansas, in 1845. The two
oldest of their children died in infancy. Rose is
the wife of Dr. G. L. Hogan, a physician and sur-
geon at Los Angeles. The next in age is Nelson,
Jr. Thomas Byron is president of the Bozeman
Milling Company, an extensive sheep rancher, stock-
holder in the Commercial National Bank and owner
of a large amount of city property in Bozeman.
The sixth child, Alice, died in infancy. Walter P.
Story is a prominent figure in the City of Los
Angeles, and is distinguished as the builder of the
first skyscraper office structure in that city, the
Story Building, which was completed in 1910.
Nelson Story, Jr., was born at Bozeman May 12,
1874, and had every opportunity for a thorough
business training and liberal education. He attended
public school at Bozeman, including high school,
spent three years in the Shattuck Military Academy
at Faribault, Minnesota, two years in the Ogden
Military Academy at Ogden, Utah, where he gradu-
ated in 1893, and during 1893-94 was a student in the
Bryant & Stratton Business College. On returning
to Bozeman he went to work in his father's flour
mill and managed it for several years. He then
established a machine shop and foundry, building
it up to a successful local enterprise and then sell-
ing. Since then his interests have been of a broad
and varied nature. He still owns a large arnount of
real estate, several business buildings and residences ;
is vice president of the Bozeman Milling Company ;
owner of the Story Supply Company, automobile
accessories, on West Main Street and Grand Street,
of which James R. Cochran is manager; and owner
of the Story Rock Company, operating a rock crush-
ing plant at Logan, Montana, with a capacity of 500
tons of rock a day during the summer season. This
business is managed by O. A. Harris. Mr. Story
does a great amount of contracting. At present he
has a force of men and equipment, with Ben Hager
as foreman, digging ten miles of dyke and drainage
for the Madison Dyke & Drain Company. This is a
project to keep the ice in the Madison River from
overflowing the farms in Gallatin County. For the
prosecution of his many varied business affairs Mr.
Story maintains a suite of offices in the Story
Building on the corner of West Main Street and
Black Avenue. This office building, one of the best
in Bozeman, is owned by his sister Mrs. G. L. Hogan.
Mr. Story has been sensitive to his obligations to
the public welfare. He was elected in 1902 and
again in 1910 a member of the Legislature, serving
in the eighth and tenth sessions. For one term he
was mayor of Bozeman, for four years a member
of the City Council, and for two years a county
commissioner of Gallatin County. He is a republi-
can in politics, is past master of Bozeman Lodge
No. 18. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, a mem-
ber of Zona Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, is past
commander of the Knights Templar, and is affiliated
with Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena.
He also belongs to Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks, and is a mem-
ber of the Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Story and family live in a modern home .at
722 South Central Avenue. He married at St.
Louis, Missouri, June 10, 189S, Miss Etha L. Mayo,
daughter of William Henry and Ella (Curley)
Mayo. Her father, now deceased, was a thirty-third
degree Mason, at one time recorder of the Masonic
bodies of the Missouri jurisdiction, filling that
office for thirty years before his death. Mrs. Mayo
lives with Mr. and Mrs. Story. The latter have two
children. Nelson Story HI, born January 13, 190Q,
was educated in the local public schools and in Cul-
ver Military Academy in Indiana two years and
graduated in 1919 from the Gallatin County High
School. Mayo, a daughter, was born October 13,
1902, and is attending one of the best finishing
schools for girls in the Middle West, Monticello
Seminary at Godfrey, Illinois.
J. C. CoXKEY for the past fifteen years has been
editor of the Ravalli Republican at Hamilton. That
accounts for only about half of his experience
as a printer and newspaper man. For a number
of years before coming to Montana he was a director
of one of the leading papers of California.
Mr. Conkey was born at West Union, Iowa,
November 7, 1870. He is of Scotch ancestry. In
Scotland the name was spelled McConkey. Three
of the McConkey brothers came to New York in
colonial times. The family to which J. C. Conkey
belongs subsequently dropped the "Mc." His grand-
father, Jacob Conkey, was born in New York State
in 1800, and was an early settler in Iowa. He ac-
quired a large amount of farm land, in the vicinity
of West Union, and left a large farm to each of
his three sons and much valuable city property
to his daughter. He died in 1864. A. B. Conkey,
father of the Hamilton editor, was born at Defiance,
Ohio, in 1845. and during his youth removed to
West Union, Iowa, where he married and where he
was successfully engaged in farming until 18S1. He
then followed the business of contracting and build-
ing in West Union, but in 1899 retired from busi-
ness and has since been a resident of Fresno, Cal-
ifornia. He is an independent republican in politics.
A. B. Conkey married Edith Daniells, who was born
in New York State in 1843. J. C. Conkey is the
eldest of their children. Maud is married and lives
at Fresno, while Laura is the wife of Clyde Wolf,
an orchard owner at Lindsay, California.
J. C. Conkey attended the public schools of West
Union, Iowa. Already he had acquired some prac-
tical knowledge of printing and newspaper %york,
having begun an apprenticeship with the West Union
Gazette in 1886. In 1887 on leaving high school,
he went to Alameda, California, and there for
thirteen years was connected with the semi-weekly
Argus. He was one of the incorporators of the
publishing company which issued that paper as a
daily, and remained a director in the establishment
until 1900. By too close application to his work
he found that' he needed a change and vacation,
and during that interval he visited a friend in
Anaconda. While in Anaconda he worked with the
Standard and then with the Jefferson County Zephyr
at Whitehall. That was a busy time for newspaper
men and editors. W. A. Clark was making a cam-
paign for the United States Senate, and journalism
was a much cultivated profession.
While visiting the Bitter Root Valley in 1904
Mr. Conkey leased the Ravalli Republican for one
year with the privilege of purchasing the plant.
About 1909 he bought the paper, having in the mean-
time edited it. The Ravalli Republican was estab-
lished in 1887 and is the leading paper in Ravalli
County and enjoys a large circulation and influence
throughout Western Montana. The plant and oflices
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at 301 Main Street have the best of equipment in
the way of a printing plant. The paper is republican
in politics.
Mr. Conkey is a republican voter. He is affiliated
with Ionic Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free and .Accepted
Masons, Hamilton Chapter No. 18, Royal Arch
Masons, Crusade Comraandery No. 17, Knights
Templar, ."Mgeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Helena, and is a member of the Hamilton Chamber
of Commerce. In 1915, at Watsonville, California,
he married Miss Isabel Gilraj-, daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. William Gilray. Her parents reside at Sault
Ste. Marie, Michigan, where her father is a Gov-
ernment employe. Mrs. Conkey finished her edu-
cation in a college in Michigan. They have one
daughter. Catherine, born October 21, 1917.
George D. Aune. In the present day when com-
petition is keen in all lines of endeavor, the ac-
complishment of success demands a definite and
decided superiority. This is true at the village
four-corners, but it is applicable in a much greater
degree in those lines of high specialized work where
the best brains are devoted to intricate detail, striv-
ing to produce absolute efficiency and to secure
the advantage from each new trend of circum-
stance. Whether in the professions, in productive
lines, in work of a promotive character, or in the
markets of the world, a man finds equally keen
strife ahead of him; and when the fight is made
with discernment, vigor and aggressiveness, and
success is acquired, half the compensation, other
than financial independence, is derived from the
satisfaction of having come a conqueror over those
worthy of his steel. One of the highly-specialized
industries of today is that which deals with the
sale of insurance. In this field George D. Aune
of the firm of Osborne & Aune, at Lewistown is
practically a newcomer, but what he .has accom-
plished thus far in his career would make it indi-
cate that he will be able to hold his own in the face
of stern competition.
Mr. Aune was born at Delavan, Faribault Coun-
ty, Minnesota, July 19, 1884, a son of Peter and
Bargild (Iverson) Aune, natives of Norway, where
the former was born in 1S60 and the latter in 1861.
The Aune family was first founded in the United
States by the grandfather of Mr. .\une, who came
here during the excitement raised over the dis-
covery of gold in California, in 1849. .A.fter spend-
ing some time in California he returned to Nor-
way, but this country had made such an impres-
sion upon him that he decided to make it his home,
and in 1866 again came here, this time with his
family. Locating in Faribault County, Minnesota,
he passed the remainder of his career in farming.
Peter Aune was but si.x years of age when he ac-
companied his parents to the United States, and
his education was secured in the district schools
of Faribault County, where he passed his boyhood
in assisting his father with the work of the home-
stead. He inherited this property at his father's
death and made numerous improvements there, de-
veloping it into one of the most valuable proper-
ties in the locality. He continued to be engaged
in farming and raising stock for some years in
Faribault County, but finally disposed of the home-
stead at an attractive figure and moved to Cot-
tonwod County, where he bought land and engaged
in farming and stockraising until 1913. Since that
time his attention has been given largely to busi-
ness ventures, for Mr. Aune has been a most suc-
cessful and energetic man and has branched out in
his activities in a number of directions. He is now
the owner of undertaking establishments at Heron
Lake, Jeffers, Lamberton, Windom, Cotton and
Highwater, in addition to which he superintends the
operation of his farm and has large landed inter-
ests in the states of South Dakota and Oregon
Mr. Aune is a member of the Lutheran Church
and m politics a republican. He was married in
Nicollet County, Minnesota, to Bargild Iverson, and
they are the parents of three sons and three daugh-
ters, all of whom are living.
The eldest of his parents' children, George D.
Aune received his education in the public schools
of Faribault County, Minnesota, and Saint Olaf
College. His boyhood was passed on his father's
farm, and his first money was earned during the
threshing season, but he had no desire for an agri-
cultural life, and when the opportunity presented
Itself accepted the chance to enter the First State
Bank of Walnut Grove, of which he was assistant
cashier for two years. In 1907 he came to Mon-
tana, and, at Moore, became identified with the
Judith Commercial Company, in which general store
he worked for six months. In the meantime he
had entered Government land and eventually proved
up on 160 acres. Subsequently he entered the State
Bank of Moore, of which he was assistant cashier
until 1913. and then removed to Denton, Montana,
where he became one of the organizers of the Den-
ton State Bank. Of this institution he remained
cashier and manager until May, igi8. That month
marked his advent at Lewistown, where he became
associated with J. N. Osborne, under the style of
Osborne & Aune. general agents for the Montana
Life Insurance Company. The firm is doing an
excellent business, and Mr. Aune has already es-
tablished himself in public confidence and that of
his business acquaintances as a man of marked abil-
ity and energy and of strict integrity and probity.
Mr. Aune is a member of the Western Star Lodge
No. 104, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and
Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks. He is a Lutheran in his re-
ligious belief, but at Lewistown supports the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church in its benevolent and char-
itable work. .\s a voter he favors republican candi-
dates and principles.
On June 15, 1910, Mr. Aune married Miss Chaun-
cie A. Albright, who was born at New Haven,
Pennsylvania, a daughter of David J. and Martha
K. (Ash) .'\une, who were the parents of three
sons and three daughters. Mrs. Aune was the third
child in order of birth and four are now living.
Mr. and Mrs. Albright are farming people of near
Stafiford, Kansas, and are held in high esteem.
Three children have been born to Mr. and Mrs.
Aune: Arlene M., Judith O. and Margaret L.
Frank C. Cline. President of the Billings Laun-
dry and owner of one of the valuable ranches of
this section, Frank C. Cline has earned the right
to be numbered among the leading business men of
Billings. He was born at Bay City, Michigan,
March 6, 1876, a son of M. C. Cline. The Cline
family was established in the United States by the
grandfather of Frank C. Cline, and he died at Simco,
Ontario, Canada, before his grandson came into the
world. M. C. Cline now resides at Saginaw, Michi-
gan, but he was born in Ontario. Canada, in 1847,
and was there reared. After attaining his majority
he came to the United States and located at Bay
City, Michigan, where he became superintendent of
the Industrial Iron Wqrks, this concern being en-
gaged in building large cranes, so that his position
was a responsible one. Here he remained until 1901,
when he moved to his present location to become
foreman of the Jackson-Church Company, but he is
88
HISTORY OF MONTANA
now retired. Politically he is a democrat. His re-
ligion is that of the Roman Catholic Church. While
living in Canada he served in the Dominion Army.
M. C. Cline was united in marriage with Margaret
Leonard, born at Jersey City, New Jersey, and died
at Bay City, Michigan, in 1895. Their children were
as follows: Frank C, whose name heads this re-
view ; Arthur M., who owns a laundry at Stockton,
California; and Mabel, who died at the age of thirty-
five years. After the death of his first wife M. C.
Cline was married to Kate Moriaraty, born at Mon-
treal, Canada, and their children are as follows:
Leo, who is attending the Ann Arbor Training
School for the, United States Service, and Martin,
Jr., a student, who is at home.
Frank C. Cline attended the public schools of Bay
City through the eleventh grade, and the Bay City
Business College, from which he was graduated in
1896. Too close application to his books brought
on a period of ill health, and he decided to enter
the business world, his first position being with the
Bay City Telephone Company. Mr. Cline then
learned the laundry business and established the Val-
ley Laundry at Bay City, selling it in 1897. For the
subsequent twelve months he was at Grand Forks,
North Dakota, being there connected with railroad
work, but then re-entered the laundry business at
Delano, Minnesota, selling his establishment seven
months later. In 1900 he came to Montana and for
two years had charge of the National Laundry at
Great Falls, leaving that city for Idaho Falls, Idaho,
where he owned and operated a laundry for two
years, and then sold it. For a short period there-
after he had charge of the New Laundry at Butte,
Montana, and then, in June, 1907, came to Billings
and bought the Billings Laundry, having as part-
ners in his venture George H. Casey, T. J. Casey
and Frank T. Ryan. This laundry, which was estab-
lished in 1894, is the largest establishment of its
kind in Southeastern Montana, and gives employ-
ment to over 100 persons. Work is sent to it from
points as far distant as 200 miles in Montana, North
Dakota and Wyoming. The building, located oppo-
site the post office, is of brick and is supplied with
every modern appliance known to the laundry trade,
Mr. Cline today is the majority stockholder and is
its president and Mrs. Cline is the treasurer. Mr.
Cline is independent in his political views. He be-
longs to the Roman Catholic Church of Billings,
and" to Billings Council No. 1259, Knights of Colum-
bus, and Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks._ Since coming to Billings
he has been connected with the Midland Club and
the Billings Golf Club. His residence is regarded as
one of the finest in the cit\', and it is located at
729 North Twenty-ninth Street. In addition to his
other holdings he owns 640 acres of valuable ranch
land nine miles east of Billings, which he devotes
to the growing of grain.
In 1907 Mr. Cline was united in marriage with
Miss Louise Hayes, a daughter of John and Louise
Hayes, the former of whom was a merchant, but is
now deceased. The latter, who survives, lives at
Escanaba, Michigan. Mr. and Mrs. Cline are the
parents of the following children : Dorothy, who
was born April 23, 1908; Arthur, who was born in
June, 1911; Francis, who was born February 10,
1915, and John Martin, born March 31, 1919. A
sound, reliable and upright business man, Mr. Cline
has forged ahead and has firmly established himself
in the confidence of the people of Billings. His
name stands for good work and honorable methods,
and his business shows a healthy and gratifying in-
crease annually.
Ernest C. Busch. A man who can speak with
authority on the life and times of Montana going
back over forty years is Ernest C. Busch, a retired
rancher living at Lewistown. In his early days
in the state Mr. Busch worked as a sheep herder,
and he has covered a large part of the state in his
experiences with sheep, cattle and horses.
Mr. Busch was born in Germanv, October 28, 1849,
a son of John C. and Elizabeth (Wilah) Busch. His
parents spent all their lives in Germanj', where his
father was a produce dealer. His father died at
the age of seventy and his mother at seventy-four,
Ernest being the oldest of their eight children, two
of whom are now living.
Mr. Busch finding the conditions of Germany op-
pressive and restrictive of business opportunity came
to this country in 1876. His first destination was
Council Blufifs, Iowa, where he arrived in the month
of March. After working out as a farm hand for
about two years he .came up the Missouri River to
old Fort Benton, Montana, thence to Sun River,
working as a cowboy, and later in the vicinity of
Fort Maginnis took employment as a sheep herder.
In 1883 he located his homestead in section 27, town-
ship 14, range 19, and made a start with a small
flock of sheep. In 1890 he disposed of his flocks and
began raising cattle and horses, and from that time
on was connected with general farming until Novem-
ber I, 1918, when he leased his farm and with ample
means retired to enjoy life at Lewistown, where in
addition to his own home he owns considerable real
estate. Mr. Busch is a republican but has never
cared for office, and has done his part as a Montana
pioneer by studious attention to his own business
and respecting always the rights and privileges of
others. January i, 1898, he married Miss Dena Al-
bers.
Lester Park Work is vice president and manager
of the Story-Work Sheep Company, which with re-
lated interests comprise one of the most extensive
sheep outfits in Montana. Mr. Work is a young
business man, well fitted by experience and training
for the great responsibilities he bears, a native Mon-
tanan and son of a noted pioneer of this country,
John F. Work.
John F. Work; who is still living at Bozeman,
was born June 30, 1835, not far from the battlefield
of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania. He was a son of
James and Marie (Black) Work, his father also
a native of Pennsylvania. James Work during the
early '40s moved to Illinois and later to Missouri,
was a broom manufacturer and meat packer in
those states, and in 1849 started overland for Cali-
fornia with a bull team. In 1853 he returned to
Missouri and resumed pork packing, but during
1862-63 was again in California engaged in mining
and farming, spent another year in Idaho, and after
that lived on a farm in ^Missouri until his death
in 1869.
John F. Work was too young to accompany his
father to California. He spent his early life on a
^Missouri farm and in 1857 took up the business of
driving cattle from Missouri to the twin cities of
Minnesota. In 1859 he went to the Pike's Peak
gold mines. He was a member of the party with
his father which started with an outfit of mules and
horses to California in 1862. At South Pass he left
the party to join an expedition going to the gold
mines at Salmon River, and had many varied ex-
perience^ and adventures in Idaho and Washington.
In the latter part of 1865 he arrived at Virginia
City, Montana, soon afterward went to Helena,
and in succeeding years was identified with several
pioneer communities in the Northwest, including
(yi^n.t^< (f^^ C^-u^t^^
MRS. ERNEST C. BUSCH
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Deer Lodge. He was at Bozeman in 1867 and in
1872 he located on a ranch on the Upper Yellow-
stone River in Park County. He was a rancher
and miner for several years and in 1876 accom-
panied an expedition to the Black Hills. He was
superintendent for several large cattle firms in
Montana, also continued his business as a freighter,
and about 1880 became interested in the sheep busi-
ness, which he handled on a growing scale in con-
nection with many other activities in transporta-
tion, contracting, and other lines of business. He
made his permanent home at Bozeman in 1892. He
was personally associated with many of the fore-
most men of Montana in pioneer and later times,
and probably no one now living has a better mem-
ory of the history of Montana over a period of
fifty years than John F. Work.
January 10, 1884, he married Mary Evelyn Stone,
who was born in Missouri. Her father, Jeremiah
Stone, came to Montana in 1883 and was a rancher
near Bozeman for many years. John F. Work and
wife had three children : Ward, who died in child-
hood; Vida M., who is the wife of Ray C. Hollo-
way, a Bozeman merchant ; and Lester P.
Lester Park Works was born thirteen miles east
of Livingston February 25, 1889. He was educated
in the common schools of Bozeman, completed his
junior year in the Gallatin County High School and
spent two years in the Montana State College.
On leaving school in 1909 he entered the sheep
business in the Yellowstone River Valley, and for
a time was associated with Peter Koch, a Montana
pioneer who died at Pasadena, and with John Har-
vat, the well known business man of Livingston.
These men handled sheep on a thousand hills and in
many valleys of Montana. They bought out the
Briggs Ellis outfit, one of the largest in the state.
In 1914 Mr. Work withdrew from this combination
and became associated with T. B. Story of Boze-
man, organizing the Story-W6rk Sheep Company
and the Clear Range Sheep Company. In the in-
corporation of the Story-Work Sheep Company T.
B. Story is president, Mr. Work, vice president and
manager, and W. P. Harmon, secretary and treas-
urer. In 1918 this firm sheared 65,000 old sheep and
raised thousands of lambs. They own 100,000 acres
of deeded land in Park, Sweetgrass, Gallatin, Broad-
water and Meagher counties. The offices of the
corporation are in the Story Block at Bozeman.
Mr. Work is also interested in real estate at
Bozeman and has a modern home there at 415 South
Central Avenue. He is a republican in politics and
is afliliated with Bozeman Lodge No. 463 of the
Elks. At White Sulphur Springs, Montana, in
November, 1917, he married Miss Olga Black, daugh-
ter of Air. and Mrs. Powell Black, both now de-
ceased. Her father was a pioneer lawyer at White
Sulphur Springs. Mrs. Work is a graduate of the
College for Girls at Lexington, Kentucky.
Jeffrey P. Whyte has lived in the Bitter Root
country of Western Montana for the past twenty
years, and has developed one of the leadihg mer-
cantile concerns at the town of Darby in Ravalli
County.
His ancestors were English. His grandfather
was born in England in 1799, and was an early
settler in the province of Quebec, Canada, where
he followed tarmiiia. He died at Carillon, Quebec,
in 1889. Capt. John Whyte, his son, and father
of the Montana merchant, was born at Carillon,
Canada, in 1847. He was reared and married in
his native province, and became a boat captain on
the St. Lawrence River. He lived for many years
at Grenville, but since 18S4 has had his home at
North Bay in Ontario and is now retired from his
profession. He is a liberal in political thought
and a Catholic and Knight of Columbus. He mar-
ried Bridget Carlon, who was born in Ireland in
184s and died at North Bay in 1908. A brief record
of their children follows : Thomas, a farmer at
Wisawasa, Ontario, Canada; Jeffrey P.; Robert, a
demonstrator for the Ross Rifle Factory living in the
City of Quebec; Rose TEllen, wife of William Tray-
nor, chief mail clerk on the Canadian Pacific Rail-
way, living at North Bay, Ontario.
Jeffrey P. Whyte was born at Grenville, Quebec,
Canada, August 19, 1876, and received most of his
education in the public schools of Wisawasa. He
left school at the age of eighteen, and worked in
the lumber woods of Michigan until he came to
Montana in 1900. Then for eight years he was
connected with the lumber industry of the Bitter
Root Valley until 1908 when he opened a cafe at
Darby. He conducted that business seven years,
and in 1915 opened a toggery store and in 1918 built
the substantial structure on Main Street which
houses his , present mercantile concern, with a full
stocked department of groceries and a store for
men's and boys' clothing. He also owns a modern
home on Main Street.
Mr. Whyte is a member of the Catholic church,
is affiliated with Hell Gate Lodge No. 383, of the
Elks, and is a democratic voter. In April,' 1908, ■
at Hamilton. Montana, he married Miss Josephine
SoUeder, a daughter of August and Marv (Lyman)
Solleder, who reside at Darby, Montana. Her
father is a carpenter and builder. Mr. and Mrs.
Whyte have two children : Gordon, born in June,
1909, and Maxine, born in September, 1910.
Oscar O. Mueller. From the practice of law
to a position of trust in the Government of his
community is but a step for an individual to make,
one that has been frequently taken to the better-
ment of the aspirant and his constituency. In his
professional practice an attorney must necessarily
show his hand, expose his ability, the strength of
his personality and the stand he "takes on the fun-
damental principles governing society. Should he,
at some future time, desire to enter political life
he must rely upon the record of his practice to
gain him support. He may be accredited with the
requisite knowledge and experience, but unless the
footprints he has left behind him are clear and
clean and in unshaken places he cannot inspire nor
hold public confidence. If, on the other hand, he
leaves behind him a succession of imprints all
leading unerringly in the proper direction, the pub-
lic recognizes him as being trustworthy, and the
step from legal practice to a repressentative posi-
tion in the Government is successfully accomplished.
Of the members of the Fergus County legal pro-
fession who have impressed themselves upon their
communities as worthy of trust and have thereby
been honored by election to public office, Oscar O.
Mueller, city attorney of Lewistown, is an example.
Mr. Mueller was born on his father's farm in
Madison County, Iowa, March 29, 1877, a son of
George and Katherine (Schutt) Mueller, the for-
mer born at Wa!deck-on-the-Rhine, Germany, in
1846, and the latter was born in Germany in 185 1.
George Mueller was but thirteen years of age when
he emigrated to the United States on a sailing
vessel which made port at New York after a voy-
age of three weeks on the Atlantic. After spend-
ing some time in New York City he went to War-
saw, Illinois, where he remained for three years,
and during that time was married. He and his
wife becarne the parents of seven children, all of
90
HISTORY OF MONTANA
whom are living, of whom Oscar O. was the fifth in
order of birth. From Warsaw Mr. Mueller re-
moved to Madison County, Iowa, and there worked
as a farm hand. He was industrious and frugal,
and eventually managed to accumulate sufficient
means to purchase a farm of i6o acres, on which
he engaged in farming and stock raising operations.
As the years passed he continued to add to his
holdings until he and his youngest son were the
owners of a full section of fine farming land, which
is still in their possession. They are also exten-
sive breeders of graded stock and are well known
among the agriculturists and stockmen of their
part of the State of Iowa. Mr. Mueller is one of
the prominent men of his locality and has various
interests, one of which is the Farmers Insurance
Company, of which he was one of the organizers
and of which he has served as president for about
ten years. He takes an active and interested part
in the promotion of the best interests of his lo-
cality, and in his political adherence is a stanch
republican.
After attending the public schools of Madison
County, Iowa, Oscar O. Mueller took a four-year
course in the Iowa State Normal College, being grad-
uated therefrom in the class of 1903. At that time he
entered upon a short career as a school teacher,
being for two years principal of schools at Stacy-
ville, Iowa, but this was not his chosen vocation,
and in 1905 he entered the law department of the
University of Iowa, being graduated therefrom with
his degree of Bachelor of Law with the class of
1908. He was admitted to the Iowa bar, and Sep-
tember 11, 1908, came to Lewistov^m, Montana,
being admitted to practice in this state in the month
following, when he at once settled down to the
duties of a professional business, the growth of
which has since been as rapid as it has been satis-
fying in its importance. He maintains olBces in
the Empire Bank Building and is accounted one of
the leaders of the Fergus County bar. His knowl-
edge of the fundamental principles of his calling
and his skill in presenting his arguments put him
in a position where he was recognized as being
of official qualifications, and for two years he
served as assistant county attorney. On June i,
1916, to fill a vacancy, he was appointed city at-
torney of Lewistown, and May i, 1917, received the
reappointment to that office, which he has since
filled with ability and fidelity. He is a republican
in politics and his fraternal connections include
membership in Lewistown Lodge No. 37, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, of which he is past
master, and Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch
Masons, of which he is at present high priest.
On June 9, 191 5, Mr. Mueller was united in mar-
riage with Miss Josephine Cook, who was born at
White Sulphur Springs. Montana, the elder of the
two children of Charles W. and Abbie (Kenne-
cott) Cook, pioneers of Montana, where they are
now living, the former a native of Unity, Maine,
and the latter of New York State. Mr. and Mrs.
Mueller are the parents of one son, Glenn H.
H. Leonard DeKalb. A former judge of the Dis-
trict Court, H. Leonard DeKalb began the practice
of law at Lewistown in 1902, and has been identi-
fied with many important professional and public
interests since that date.
Judge DeKalb was born at Alexandria, Nebraska,
May 10, 1879, a son of Thomas J. and Margaret
(Raugh) DeKalb, both natives of Pennsylvania. His
father was born in Philadelphia April 2, 1845. His
mother was born in Luzerne County June 15, 1847.
Thomas J. DeKalb was educated in Philadelphia
and in 1861, at the age of sixteen, enlisted in tli-
Second Pennsylvania Cavalry and served with tli'
Army of the Potomac until the close of hostilitic-
He was in the battle of Gettysburg and all the other
campaigns of his regiment. At the close of the war
he returned home, taught school for several year^,
and then set out for the western frontier, locating
in Jefferson County, Nebraska, where he took up a
homestead and where he still lives, owning betwe< 11
700 and 800 acres of land. He gave his active super-
vision to general farming and stock raising unt)l
1904, since which year he has lived retired. He ha-
served several terms as county commissioner of Jet
ferson County, is a democrat and a member of thi
Grand Army of the Republic. He and his wife had
six children, three sons and three daughters, all
living.
H. Leonard DeKalb attended the public schools m
Nebraska and finished his law course in the Uni-
versity of Nebraska with the class of igo2. He was
admitted to the Nebraska Bar in June of that year
and on the 24th of December arrived at Lewistown,
Montana, where he was soon admitted to the state
bar. Since then he has been busied with a general
practice. He was elected city attorney of Lewistown
in 1904, and filled that office six years. On March
31, 1917, he was appointed district judge, but re
signed from the duties of that office May 18, 191s
Judge DeKalb served as a member of the County
Council of Defense. He is a democrat and a mem-
ber of the State Bar Association. He is junior
partner of the well known law firm of Belden &
DeKalb, of Lewistown. Fraternally his affiliation-:
are with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
May 30, 1905, Judge DeKalb married Vera B. Mc-
Clean. She is a native of Muscatine, Iowa. Thev
have one daughter, Nellie Mohrine.
Edwin L. Fexton. There are no obstacles so great
that they cannot be overcome provided a man brings
to bear upon them a sufficient amount of mental
effort and persistence. One of the advantages of
this country is that opportunities are offered to all
alike, and that the poor boy can give rein to his
ambition with just as much hope of attaining to the
goal he sets for himself' as the one who is the son of
wealthy parents, and sometimes with more, because
in the'first instance the economic necessities of the
lad without means are sufficiently urgent to compel
him to exert himself to the utmost and to develop
every facult}-. Edwin L. Fenton, one of the alert
business men of Laurel, Montana, presents in his re-
markable career a case which comes under the above
classification. Left an orphan, and reared in an
orphan school, he has never ceased to press forward,
and each time he has entered a field he has regis-
tered the sharp, resonant impressions of the vibrat-
ing needle of experiences gained in a former one.
His every act has been sharp, clear and illuminating,
and yet at the same time he has kept an open mind
and heart and quick understanding for the needs of
humanity. The result has been that he has not only
achieved material prosperity, but he has been elected
and re-elected to various offices by his appreciative
fellow citizens and stands today as one of the repre-
sentatives of the highest type of western manhood
and American citizenship.
Edwin L. Fenton was born at Wellsboro, Pennsyl-
vania. November 8, 1859, a son of Henry Fenton and
grandson of Luman Fenton, who was an early
farmer of Pennsylvania, and died on his farm near
Wellsboro. Pennsylvania, in 1886. He married Emily
Austin, and she also died on the old homestead near
Wellsboro. Henry Fenton was born near Wellsboro.
Penns.vlvania. and was a farmer in his native state.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
91
With the outbreak of the Civil war he enlisted in
Company G, Forty-fifth Pennsj-lvania \'olunteer In-
fantry, in 1861, and was killed during the first battle
of the Wilderness. With the organization of the
republican party he espoused its principles. His wife
bore the maiden name of Maria Hard, and she was
born in Pennsylvania and died at Wellsboro, Penn-
sylvania, having borne her husband two children,
Ida L., who died in Ohio, and Edwin L., whose name
heads this review.
Losing his father at such a tender age, Edwin L.
Fenton was reared and educated in the Soldiers'
Orphan School at Mansfield, Pennsylvania, and re-
mained in this institution until he was sixteen years
old, leaving at that age to begin working in the
outside world. Until 1883 he remained in Pennsyl-
vania, working at whatever tasks of an honest nature
could be secured, for one year of that period teach-
ing school, but his ardent young spirit could not be
content with the narrow confines of the East, and
in the spring of that year he struck out for the
West, and like our "greatest American," gained ex-
perience and health on a ranch, spending one sum-
mer near Grand Forks, North Dakota. Marrying
in that fall, he went back to Wellsboro, Pennsylvania,
and for a year worked in a lumber yard and saw-
mill. He then moved to Pen Yan, Xew York, and
for four years was engaged in farming, but having
once experienced the freer life of the West, he came
back to it, arriving in Park City. Montana, in 1889,
and after some changes homesteaded, his ranch being
located between Park City and Laurel. After prov-
ing this property he sold it in 1899, and that same
year came to Laurel, was made its postmaster and
held that office for fourteen successive years. In
1913 he embarked in his present realty business, and
also sells insurance and negotiates loans, doing the
largest business of its kind in the county. His office
is conveniently located on First Avenue, and he owns
the building in which it is located, as well as a
modern residence on Third Avenue.
A republican of the stalwart tjTpe. ilr. Fenton has
been a potent force in his party ever since coming
to Laurel, being its first maj-or, and he is deputy
assessor for Yellowstone County and clerk of the
school board of Laurel. In addition to his other
interests he is justice of the peace and a iiotary
public, and discharges the duties of police judge.
He is secretary and treasurer of the Laurel Realty
Company, the Old Mill Ditch Company, and of the
Farmers Mutual Telephone Company, to all of these
concerns bringing a ripened experience and sound
judgment which are of great benefit in the trans-
action of business and the securing of public con-
fidence.
In fraternal matters Mr. Fenton is deservedly
popular and is past grand of Laurel Lodge, Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows ; helped to organize
Camp Laurel, Modern Woodmen of America, and
he is also an aggressive member of the Laurel
Commercial Club, exerting himself to add new names
to the membership list of all of these organiza-
tions. The Laurel Congregational Church has in
him one of its most helpful members, and he is one
of its deacons.
On December 3, 1883. Mr. Fenton was united in
marriage with Miss Anna L. Crans at Grand Forks,
North Dakota. She was born at Wellsboro, Penn-
sylvania, a daughter of O. V. Crans, who also offered
up his life on the altar of his country during
the Civil war. Mr. and Mrs. Fenton became the
parents of the following children : Nina, who mar-
ried B. H. Clark, lives at Billings, Montana, where
Mr. Clark is an inspector for the Northern Pacific
Railroad Company, and they have three children.
Anna, Edwin and Frank ; George \y., who is un-
married, resides at Laurel, and assists his father
in business; Helen, who married Frank Jacobs, is
a resident of Perma, Sanders County, Montana,
where Mr. Jacobs is a stockman and stock in-
spector ; Frances," who resides at home, is one of
the teachers of the First Ward School of Laurel ;
and Harriet, who was graduated from the Laurel
High School in the class of 1918, is stenographer
for Attorney W. L. A. Calder, of Laurel. The
children have all been well educated and are a credit
to their parents and the training they have received.
Mr. Fenton is admittedly a man who early learned
the value of time, the pleasure of working, the in-
fluence of example and the virtue of patience, and
is now reaping the benefits of this knowledge, and
his community is the richer for his presence in it.
William Merriam Cobleigh is the scientific
authority to whose department are referred many
problems involving the pure water supply, sani-
tation, and matters involving the science of chem-
istry in relation to industry. Mr. Cobleigh is a
chemist, and has been teaching and practicing his
profession in Montana for over a quarter of a cen-
tury. He is state chemist and head of the chem-
istry department of the Montana State College at
Bozeman. where he has his home and headquarters.
He was born at Haverstraw, New York, Sep-
tember 7, 1872, of New England ancestry. His
grandfather, John Cobleigh, was a native of New-
Hampshire, descended from a family that settled
there in colonial times from England. John Cob-
leigh spent his active life as a farmer and died
in Northumberland. New Hampshire, about 1874-
Professor Cobleigh through his mother is a mem-
ber of the Merriam family, which was also estab-
lished in New Hampshire in colonial days, when
four brothers came over from England.
William Cobleigh, father of William Merriam,
was born in Northumberland, New Hampshire, in
1838. He was a student in Dartmouth College
when the war broke out and in 1861 joined the
Sixteenth New Hampshire Infantry and was all
through the war. He was in the Shenandoah Valley
campaign under General Sheridan and at the
famous Battle of Winchester. He was mustered
out with the rank of captain. After the war he
married and engaged in the mercantile business at
Stratford, New Hampshire, and about i86g moved
to Haverstraw, New York, where he remained a
few years. In the meantime he finished his studies
and entered the ministry of the Presbyterian
Church. He is well remembered in a number ot
communities of the Northwest for his missionary
labors. He preached at Park River and Grafton,
North Dakota, and in the spring of 1887 came to
Corvallis, Montana. He was one of the first min-
isters there and also at Grantsdale. Later he had
pastorates in Idaho and Washington, but finally
retired to Corvallis in Ravalli County. He was
a republican in politics and a member of th? Ma-
sonic fraternitv. Rev. William Cobleigh married
Julia A. Merriam, who was born in Northumber-
land. New Hampshire, in 1840 and is now living at
San Diego, California.
William Merriam Cobleigh was the only child
of his parents. He was fifteen years old when they
came to Montana. He had attended school in
Grafton, North Dakota, including the high school
there, and after September, 1887, continued his
preparatory work in the College of Montana at
Deer Lodge and was graduated from that insti-
tution with the degree of E. M. in June, 1894.
In the meantime he had spent several vacations as
HISTORY OF MONTANA
assistant chemist for the Anaconda Mining Com-
pany at Anaconda. A quarter of a century ago
Mr. Cobleigh came to Bozeman as assistant in
chemistry at the State College. He is now the
oldest professor in continuous service among the
state colleges of Montana. As head of the depart-
ment of chemistry his offices are in the New Chem-
istry Building. Mr. Cobleigh has been a close
student of his profession, and has taken post-gradii-
ate courses in Columbia Universitj-, Harvard Uni-
versity, the University of Chicago. He received
his master's degree in chemistry at Columbia Uni-
versity in 1899.
Besides his work as state chemist of Montana
he is chemist for the State Board of Health. He
is a member of the American Public Health Asso-
ciation, Fellow of the American Association for
the Advancement of Science, is a member of the
American Waterworks Association and the Ameri-
can Chemical Society. Mr. Cobleigh is a trustee
of the Presbyterian Church at Bozeman, is a re-
publican, and is affiliated with Bozeman Lodge No.
18, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
He resides in a modern home at 909 South Third
Avenue. He married at Sunderland, Massachusetts,
in 1901, Miss Esther Rose Cooley, daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. George L. Cooley, the latter now
deceased. Her father is a retired farmer at Sun-
derland. Mrs, Cobleigh is a graduate of the Moody
Seminary at Northfield, Massachusetts. To their
marriage were born three children. Winifred M.,
born December 16, 1903, now in the Gallatin County
High School; Lois E,, born December 21, 1910,
a pupil in the grammar schools of Bozeman; and
Norman B., born June 12, 1919.
H. L. Summers. Soon after his return from
France, where he served with the Twentieth Engi-
neers, H. L. Summers, a native son of Montana,
engaged in business at Darby, being president and
founder of the Darby Mercantile Company.
Mr. Summers was born near Hamilton, Montana,
June 9, 1892, and his people were among the pioneers
of the territory and state. In the paternal line
he is of Welsh ancestry. His father, John A.
Summers, was born near Springfield, Missouri, in
1849, grew up there and at the age of nineteen
came to Montana in 1868. He was a pioneer black-
smith at Deer Lodge, Blackfoot City, Missoula, and
Corvallis, and was married in the latter town. After
his marriage he moved to the vicinity of Hamilton,
where he engaged in cattle raising. He was suc-
cessful as a rancher much above the ordinary and
at one time owned 800 acres of land and ran be-
tween 1,000 and 1,500 head of cattle. He sold his
cattle interests in 1899. Not long afterward he
bought a ranch of 380 acres near Corvallis, improved
it as a diversified farm, and in 1907 harvested the
largest crop of oats ever produced by an individual
farm in the Bitter Root Valley. His yield that
year was 22,000 bushels. Not long afterward he
sold his farm and in the spring of 1908 moved to
Missoula, where he lived retired, and in 191 1 went
to Los Angeles, California, where he died January
15, 1915. He was a republican in politics, and for
many years served as master of Ionic Lodge No.
38, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
John A Summers married Juda Chaffin. She was
born in Kansas in i860, and when a small girl came
to the Bitter Root Valley of Montana, where she
grew up. She is now living at Santa Monica,
California. Her father, Elijah Chaffin, was a Mon-
tana pioneer and a successful farmer and stock-
man in the western part of the state. He died at
Corvallis many years ago. John A. Summers and
wife had tlie following children: Inez, wife of
John Ashby, a farmer at Corvallis; Margaret, who
lives with her mother; Jeanette, wife of Harry W.
Johnson, a rancher at Corvallis ; Fred, a contractor
of street paving at Los Angeles: H. L. Summers;
Leland. a stockholder in the Keyes & Company
produce business at Corvallis; and Louise, who
lives with her mother in California.
H. L. Summers was educated in the public schools
of Hamilton, attended the high school at Corvallis
through his junior year, spent eight months in the
Garden City Commercial College and for one term
was a student in the Los Angeles Business College.
Leaving school in 1912, Mr. Summers spent three
3-ears as cashier with the Missoula Electric Supply
Company, for two years was bookkeeper with the
Western Montana Bank at Missoula, and in 1916
he made an extensive travel tour by automobile,
leaving Missoula, going to San Francisco, to Ti-
juana in Lower California, and returned to Mis-
soula in the spring of 1917. Following that he
was teller in the Missoula Trust & Savings Bank
until March 25, 1918, the date of his enlistment
for war service. He was sent to Washington,
District of Columbia, with the Forty-Third Engi-
neers, and soon afterwards was transferred to the
Twentieth Engineers, with which he went over-
seas May 22nd, reaching France on the 30th of
May, 1918. He was overseas more than a year,
and on his return landed at Newport News, Vir-
ginia, June 23, 1919, and was mustered out at Fort
A. D. Russell July 2, 1919.
After spending three months recuperating Mr.
Summers organized the Darby Mercantile Company,
and opened the general department store on Novem-
ber I, 1919. This company now has the leading
general mercantile business in Ravalli County out-
side of Hamilton. Besides Mr. Summers as presi-
dent of the company Valentine Troop is vice presi-
dent and E. L. Sargent is secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Summers is also secretary and treasurer of
the Majestic Bottling Works at Missoula. He is
a republican, and is affiliated with Harmony Lodge
No. 49, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at
Missoula, and Hell Gate Lodge No. 383, of the
Elks at Missoula. He is unmarried.
Walter H. Peck. A pioneer of Montana of the
year of 1881, WaUer H. Peck furnishes in his ca-
reer an illustration of self-made manhood typi-
cal of the lives of many of the men who had the
privilege of opening up this state and who, in ad-
vancing the general progress of the community,
found the opportunity of prospering personally,
both in fortune and position. Mr. Peck, who is
now practically retired from active affairs, makes
his home at Lewistown, but is still a large land-
holder and is vitally interested in all that pertains
to the welfare of the state in which he was given
his chance to prove himself.
Walter H. Peck was born in Illinois, August 28,
1853. a son of Rev. John and Sarah (Bremmer)
Peck. His father, who was a graduate of the New
York State University, was a Presbyterian minis-
ter who came west in young manhood and had
his first charge in Indiana. He was born at Green-
wich, Connecticut (then known as Horse Neck),
and for a number of years filled pulpits in Indi-
ana and Illinois, then returning to New York, where
he preached in churches in the western part of
that state. Subsequently he again came west, lo-
cating at Saint Peter, Minnesota, where he was
engaged in his ministerial labors at the time of
the Indian uprising at Mankato, Minnesota, near
Saint Peter, during the '60s, when thirty-six of the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
93
belligerents were hanged by the United States Gov-
ernment. Later Reverend Peck went to Paterson,
New Jersey, where he passed his last days, and there
his death occurred in 1868, when he was fifty-six
years of age, his wife, a native of New York City,
surviving until 1876 and dying at the age of fifty-
four years. Reverend Peck w^as first a whig and
later a republican in his political views. He and
his wife were the parents of two sons and one
daughter, and Walter H. was the second in order
of birth.
Walter H. Peck was educated in the public schools
of Paterson, New Jersey, and was but fourteen
years of age when he began work in the general
offices of the Erie Railway Company. Assigned
to the auditor's office, during the next eleven years
he applied himself to clerical work and gave his
employers the best of satisfaction. The call of the
West, however, which he had heard for some years,
eventually proved too strong and in the spring of
1881 Mr. Peck settled his affairs in the East and
journeyed by train to Bismarck, North Dakota. He
arrived in time to catch the first steamboat of the
year, the famous old Far West, with Captain
Good in command. The boat was crowded to its
capacity with early spring arrivals, and fourteen
days were consumed in making the trip to Fort
Benton, Montana, where Mr. Peck continued his
journey by securing passage on a stage. This car-
ried him to what was known as Little Alack's Ranch,
the sheep ranch of a Mr. McDonald, for whom
Mr. Peck worked for about 2^2 months, at $35 per
month, this being the first money he had earned in
Montana. Returning to Fort Benton, he joined an
ox team outfit which he accompanied to another
sheep ranch. It was not long thereafter that Mr.
Peck purchased his first band of sheep, buying
them from Paris Gibson, one of the pioneer sheep-
men of the state. Mr. Peck herded this band dur-
ing the winters of 1881 and 1882, and then located
on Government land on Box Elder Creek. There
he established the first postoffice in Meagher (now
Fergus) County, on his ranch, this being known
as Roy postoffice, of which he was the first post-
master. It was a year later before he secured serv-
ice by the United States mail, the stage coaches
running between Fort Meginnis and Rocky Point,
stopping tri-weekly at his office.
Mr. Peck continued in the sheep business until
l8gq. in which year he sold out his bands and lo-
cated at Garneill, opening a general merchandise
store. _ In the meantime he did not give up his
ranching operations, in fact increased them and
ran large herds of cattle, and continued in both
lines of endeavor until igi6, when he practically
retired from active labor. He has since resided
at Lewistown, where he has been in the enjoyment
of the rewards which are his by reason of his years
of faithful and industrious labor. He is still the
owner of between 1,300 and 1,400 acres of valu-
able ranch land, which he rents to tenants, in ad-
dition to 320 acres which he himself superintends
merely "to keep his hand in." Mr. Peck has always
been satisfied with the activity to be found in his
ranch and business interests, and has had no de-
sire for the political forum. While public life has
not appealed to him, he has been of value to his
community in his interpretation of the meaning of
citizenship and all good movements have had his
unquestioned and unwavering support and co-
operation. As a voter he is a republican, and he
has several fraternal affiliations.
Mr. Peck was married September 22, 1885, to
Miss Zelinda Stuart,^ who was born in Randolph
County, North Carolina, a daughter of Henry and
-Abigail (Lossiter) Stuart, natives of the Old North
state, the latter of whom still survive. Mr. Stuart,
who was born July 15, 1828, died December 17,
1906, having been the father of seven children, all
of whom are still living, and Mrs. Peck is the eld-
est. Mr. Stuart left North Carolina and went with
his family to Adams County, Illinois, where he
was engaged in farming and stock raising for
some years, but later sold his property and pur-
chased a farm in Hancock County of the same
state, where he spent the last years of his life.
He was a republican politically, and in religious
faith was reared as a Quaker, but later embraced
the faith of the Methodist Episcopal Church. To
Mr. and Mrs. Peck there have been born a daugh-
ter and two sons: Helen B. who resides with her
parents ; Henry Stuart, an electrical engineer, ap-
plied for an office in the United States Engineer-
ing Department at Vancouver, British Columbia,
in September, 1917, and October i, 1918, received
his commission as first lieutenant of United States
Engineers, United States army, sailed from New
York City, and is now in service in France. In
April, IQ19 he received his commission as captain.
John Walters, a farmer and ranchman of Fergus
County, married Margaret Schuster and has three
children, John .•Addison, Walter Hyer and Virginia
Stuart.
Fred R. Warren came to Montana in 1883. As
a freighter, rancher, banker and business man of
large affairs his interests have been identified with
the Judith Basin for a third of a century, and his
name is well known all over the region around
Lewistown.
Mr. Warren was born in Wyoming County, New
York, January i, 1857, a son of Otto and Mary
(Jones) Warren. His parents were also natives
of New York State. His father spent his active
career as a farmer and building mover, and also
rnade a creditable record as a Union soldier. He
died at the age of sixty-three. He was a Metho-
dist, a republican, and a member of the Grand
Army of the Republic. His wife dietf at the age
of fifty-five. Fred is the fourth in a family of two
sons and five daughters, all living.
He acquired his education in Livingston County,
New York, attending the grammar and high schools
there. In 1879, at the age of twenty-two, he came
West, his first destination being Fort Collins, Colo-
rado. He spent two years on a sheep ranch, and
learned many of the details of that industry. He
then engaged in teaming, hauling the output of a
brick yard while Fort Collins was in process of
construction. On ATarch i?. 1S83. he left Fort Col-
lins with a four-horse team bound for Billings,
Montana. He reached Billings May 4th, and that
may be considered the date of his permanent es-
tablishment in Montana, .^t Billings he made the
acquaintance of P. W. McDow, and soon took
a load of freight and came on to the Judith Basin,
stopping where Utica is now located. For about
two years he worked for John D. Waite in the
sheep business, and then began handliner a flock
of his own. He increased his interests and at one
time he had 14,000 sheep grazing on his own and
leased lands. In 1914 he sold his ranch and sheep
and in that year located at Lewistown, where he
built the comfortable home in which he still resides.
In 1910. with his son-in-law, Mr. Woodward,
he organized the Warren Banking Company at
Hobson. Later they established the First National
Bank at Hobson. Mr. Warren having served as
president from the beginning. He is also presi-
dent of the Stone Born Ranch Company, president
94
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of the Sapphire Oil Company of Kansas and vice
president of the Lewistown Oil Company of Mon-
tana.
In politics Mr. Warren is a republican. While
living at Utica he served as chairman of the school
board and while on the board a fine public school
building was erected. He is affiliated with Lewis-
town Lodge No. 37, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, Hiram Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, and
Lewistown Commandery, Knights Templar. He also
belongs to Lewistown Lodge Xo. 456, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks, and is one of the
lodge trustees. He is also a trustee of the Judith
Club.
March 27, 1887, Mr. Warren married Margaret
Tabler, a native of New Albany, Indiana. They
have one daughter, Ethel G., wife of Herbert F.
Woodward. Mr. Woodward is manager of the
First National Bank at Hobson, Montana. The
five grandchildren are Margaret, Warren, Ruth,
Ethel Louise and Claria Woodward.
J. A. North. During the past fifteen years one
of the leading operators in realty at Billings has been
J. A. North, a progressive, energetic and well-
informed business man who has steadily worked his
way to a place of importance. His interests are ex-
tensive and varied, centering principally in city
properties, farms and loans, and in each line of en-
deavor he has brought to bear an inherent and
developed ability that has carried his activities
through to a successful conclusion.
Mr. North was born at Adel, the countj' seat of
Dallas County, Iowa, January 20, 1872, a son of
T. R. and Naomi E. (Stewart) North, and a member
of a family which originated in England and settled
in Ohio at an early day in the history of that
state. T. R. North was born in Ohio in 1835, and
was reared in Ohio and Indiana, being first married
in the latter. A lawyer by profession, he first prac-
ticed his calling in Indiana, subsequently went to
-■\del, Iowa, where he had an office for some years
and where he was married a second time, and finally
returned to 'Warsaw, Indiana, in 1909, and retired
from active pursuits. He now makes his home there
and is in the enjoyment of the rewards that have
corne to him through the unceasing labors of his
active years. Mr. North was a railroad attorney and
became well and favorably known in his profession,
as he was also as a leader of the democratic party
in the various communities in which he resided. On
numerous occasions he was a delegate to state, con-
gressional and national conventions, and, while he
never sought nor cared for public office, was elected
mayor of Adel, Iowa, and gave that cit\' an excellent
administration. He was formerly a member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. In 1864 Mr.
North enlisted in the Fifty-second Regiment, Indiana
Volunteer Infantry, and, among other engagements,
fought at Stony Creek. His only brother. Jack
North, was captain of a company of Indiana volun-
teers, and fought under General Sherman in his
notable march from Atlanta to the sea. By his first
marriage T. R. North had one daughter, Lillie, who
married J. H. Whitman, who is now deceased. She
was again married, being united with A. Andrus,
a mine owner and timberman of Astoria, Oregon.
The second union of T. R. North was with Naomi
E. Stewart, who was born in Illinois in 1839 and
died at Medford, Oregon, in 1888, and they became
the parents of six children : Etta, who is unmarried
and a resident of Racine, Wisconsin ; Austin, presi-
dent of the North Real Estate and Investment Com-
pany, of Billings : J. A., of this review ; Alice, who
is the widow of Mr. Milliken, who died shortly
after their marriage, and a resident of Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania; Joseph R., president of North
Brothers, Incorporated, a real estate firm of Billings;
and Otto, secretary and treasurer of the same con-
cern. After the death of his second wife T. R.
North was again married, being united with Laura
Abbott, of Des Moines, Iowa. They became the
parents of one child, Ava, who is married and re-
sides at Warsaw, Indiana.
J. A. North obtained his education in the public
schools of Adel, Iowa, and after his graduation from
the high school there in 1889 went to Omaha, Ne-
braska, where he secured a position with the Mer-
chants Dispatch and Transportation Company. One
year later he went to Oregon and for eight years
was engaged in horticultural work, and in 1898 lo-
cated at Garfield, Washington, where he was em-
ployed in the same capacity, and in buying, packing
and shipping fruit for four years. His next location
was at Spokane, Washington, where for two years
he was identified with the Great Northern Railway,
and from that city he came to Billings in 1904 tu
engage in the real estate business, with offices at
No. 13 First National Bank Building. He is the
sole proprietor of the business, and is prominent
among the handlers of farms, city properties, loans
and insurance. Mr. North'is an excellent judge of
property values, and his wide and varied experience
in different localities has served to develop his abili-
ties and equip him particularly for the line which
he now follows. His standing in business circles
is an excellent one, for his entire career has been
characterized by integrity and honorable dealing.
His pleasant, modern home is situated in the suburbs,
southeast of Billings. Mr. North is independent in
his political views, and has not sought the doubtfui
honors of public life, but has demonstrated his good
citizenship by public-spirited actions and through his
support of movements calculated to benefit the gen-
eral weal. He has various connections of a civic,
business and social nature, and is a man who natur-
ally makes friendships and retains them indefinitely.
In 1892, at Jacksonville, Oregon, Mr. North was
united in marriage with Miss Minnie Johnson,
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. A. S. Johnson, both of
whom are deceased. Mr. Johnson was a real estate
operator, first at Medford, Oregon, and later at Gar-
field, Washington, in both of which communities he
was held in high esteem by his business associates.
To Mr. and Mrs. North there have been born three
children: Bessie, the wife of Ralph L. Morris, of
Billings, proprietor of the Billings Times: J. La-
Verne, who is engaged in ranching west of Billings ;
and Stewart Wells, who resides with his parents.
RoY Orvis Wilson is registrar of Montana State
College and is also head of the department of sec-
retarial studies. Mr. Wilson has spent most of
his time since leaving college in some phase of
educational administration, and much of the time
also as a teacher of commercial arts.
He was born at Dell Rapids, South Dakota, No-
vember 26, 1884. His paternal ancestors came from
Scotland and were colonial settlers in Massachusetts.
The family was one of the first to settle in the
Territory of Iowa, going there nearly a century
ago. Grandfather Wilson was born near Decorah.
Iowa, in 1825. He spent his life as a farmer, and
after retiring rhoved to Arlington, South Dakota,
where he died in IQ09. The name of his wife
was_ Mary Wilson. B. L. Wilson, father of Roy
Orvis, was born at Decorah, Iowa, in 1856, was
reared and married there, moved to Dell Rapids,
South Dakota, a little before his son Roy was born,
and in 1887 located on a farm at Brookings, South
HISTORY OF MONTANA
95
Dakota, where he now lives. He has spent all
his active life as a farmer and is now retired. He
is a republican and is affiliated with the Ancient
Order of United Workmen. B. L. Wilson mar-
ried Mary Holm. She was born in Decorah, Iowa,
in May, 1863, a daughter of John Holm. John
Holm is a native of Copenhagen, Denmark. He
was a merchant in that city and also a prominent
factor in world trade, owning twelve merchant
vessels which operated on the Baltic Sea. He
achieved much wealth by his varied commerce. He
came to the United States and lived on a farm in
Decorah, Iowa, for several years, but a short time
before the outbreak of the World war returned to
Copenhagen and resumed his business there, and
is still living in that city. B. L. Wilson and wife
had three children : Frank Martin, dentist, at Port-
land, Oregon; Roy Orvis; and Ada, wife of Guy
Miner, a merchant at Des Moines, New Mexico.
Roy Orvis Wilson spent his early life on a South
Dakota farm, attended school at Brookings, and
graduated from high school in 1901. He did two
years of commercial work in the South Dakota
State College at Brookings, receiving his certifi-
cate in June, 1903. From 1903 to 1905 he was
private secretary to the president of the South
Dakota State College and assistant registrar.
For one year he was instructor in the commer-
cial department of the South Dakota State Col-
lege. From 1907 to 191 1 he attended the South
Dakota State College, and after graduating from
the four year course, he came to Montana on
July 5, 191 1, and in the fall of that year entered
upon his duties in the Montana State College at
Bozeman as registrar. Since March, 1918, he has
also been professor of secretarial studies.
Mr. Wilson is an active member and has served
as an elder of the Christian Church. He is a re-
publican in politics. Fraternally he is affiliated
with Bozeman Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Western Star Lodge No. 4, Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows, Bozeman Lodge
No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
and is a member of the Young Men's Christian
Association. He and his wife reside in the Ever-
green Apartments. He married at Bozeman in
November, 191 1, Miss Maude Moore Parker, daugh-
ter of Rev. J. E. and Nellie A. (Moore) Parker.
Her parents reside at Missoula, Montana. Her
father is a minister of the Christian Church and
is also interested in Montana property, owning a
ranch near Missoula.
F. M. Lewellen is a prominent merchant and
business man in Northwestern Montana, being secre-
tary and treasurer of the McCowan Commercial
Company, operating the largest department store in
Sanders County.
Mr. Lewellen is a native of Missouri, and re-
ceived his early commercial training in that state.
He was born in the town of Paris November 22,
1880. His paternal ancestors were Welsh and came
to the United States in colonial times. His father.
Thomas Lewellen, was born at Florida, Missouri!
in 1827, and spent his life as a farmer at Florida
and Paris. He died in the latter locality in 1901.
For a number of years he devoted his farm largely
to the typical Missouri industry of raising mules.
During the Civil war he was on the Confederate
side, and was all through the struggle. He was
severely wounded near Richmond and at one time
was made a prisoner, being kept at Alton, Illinois,
until exchanged. Politically he was a democrat.
Thomas Lewellen married Rebecca Woodson, who
was born at Stoutsville, Missouri, in 1839 and died
Vol. n— T
at Paris in that state, in 1903. She was the mother
of five children: Lena, wife of C. H. Bondurant,
a farmer in Madison, Missouri; J. W., in the
insurance business at Paris, Missouri; C. T. and O.
I., both merchants at Welch, Missouri ; and F. M.
Lewellen.
The latter attended the rural schools of Monroe
County. Missouri, and in 1901 graduated from the
Gem City Business College at Quincy, Illinois. For
some time he was employed in a wholesale dry
goods house at St. Louis, and came to Montana
in 1904. For a short time he was with the Bozeman
Milling Company, and spent two seasons with the
Wylie Transportation Company in the Yellowstone
National Park and one winter in the offices of the
Northern Pacific Railway at Livingston.
Mr. Lewellen joined the McGowan Commercial
Company at Plains in 1907, beginning as clerk. He
has promoted himself by his individual ability and
industry to an important share of the executive
responsibilities, now holding the offices of secretary
and treasurer. The McGowan Commercial Company,
whose large department store is on Railroad Street
in Plains, was established in 1882 by the late J. A.
McGowan. The business was incorporated in 1901,
and the officers are C. H. Rittenour, president, R.
A. Ruenauver, vice president, and F. M. Lewellen,
secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Lewellen is a member of the City Council
at Plains. He is a democrat, and is past master of
Ponemah Lodge No. 63. Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. He has a modern home at Plains.
November 11. igo8, he married Miss Ida Flagler,
daughter of J. Z. and Vinnie (Farmer) Flagler,
both residents of Plains, her father being a retired
farmer. Mrs. Lewellen is a graduate of the Missoula
County High School and is a graduate in music
from the Sacred Heart Academy of Missoula. Mr.
and Mrs. Lewellen have two children : John, born
January 7, 1912; and Marion born November 13,
1914.
JuLi,\N A. Sutter. The contribution of Julian
A. Sutter to the business prestige and development
of the thriving City of Lewistown is a jewelry
establishment that is at once a credit to the city
and to its founder and proprietor. Conducted as
Sutter Brothers; during the fifteen years of its
existence it has followed a policy of honorable and
straightforward business principles and policy that
have served to establish it firmly in the confidence
of the people and to place Mr. Sutter among the
leading business citizens of the community.
Mr. Sutter was born July 2, 1875, at Le Locle.
Canton of Neuchatel, Switzerland, a son of Joseph
and Bertha (Montandon) Sutter. His parents were
natives of Switzerland, where they were married,
and his father is now a resident of Plattsburg,
Missouri, where his mother passed away in 1893.
Of the two sons and five daughters in the family,
Julian A. is the only one to have been born in
Switzerland. Joseph Sutter was born in 1853 and
was brought up in a family which for many years
had followed the trade of watchmaking, one of
the principal industries of that country. He, ac-
cording to family custom, mastered the business,
whicli he followed in Switzerland until 1877, when
he immigrated to the United States with his wife
and son. The first location of the family in this
country was at Wooster, Ohio, where Mr. Sutter
followed his trade until 1879, but found this too
unremunerative in the face of the opportunities
that were presenting themselves, and in the year
mentioned went to Kansas, where he engaged in
farming. In this, however, he did not prove sue-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
cessful, and in 1881 he went to Plattsburg, Mis-
souri, and engaged in the jewelry business, which
is another enterprise for which the Swiss nation
is famous and for which its people seem to have
a natural penchant. Mr. Sutter has continued in
this line ever since and is now one of the promi-
nent business men of Plattsburg.
Julian A. Sutter was only two years of age when
he was brought to this country, and was still a
small lad when the family located at Plattsburg,
where his early education was acquired in the pub-
lic schools. He subsequently started to learn the
trade of jeweler from his father. He mastered
this business, as well as watchmaking, and after
leaving Plattsburg went to Lincoln, where he worked
at his trade for about nine years. In 1905 he
established himself in business at Lewistown, and
this city has since been the home of Sutter Broth-
ers, the business being thus named after Mr. Sut-
ter and his younger brother, Edouard Sutter, his
partner. Their establishment, located at No. 417
West Main Street, is the leading jewelry and watch-
making business in the city, and can boast of as
complete a stock, in proportion, as any of the great
establishments of Chicago or the other large cities
of the country.
Mr. Sutter is a master of his difficult trade and
a business man of excellent abilities, as well as a
gentleman who adds to his other qualifications cour-
tesy and geniality. His name on commercial pa-
per is highly honored, evidencing his standing in
business circles, and it has been his fortune to have
formed lasting friendships with many of the lead-
ing citizens of the city of his adoption. He is fra-
ternally affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 37,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Hiram Chap-
ter No. 15. Royal Arch Masons; Lewistown Com-
mandery No. 14, Knights Templar; Algeria Tem-
ple Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine, at Helena ; and Lewistown Lodge No. 456,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. His
political association is with the republican party,
although he is not a politician and has never sought
office as a candidate. With other leading business
and professional men of Lewistown he is an actively
interested member of the Rotary Club.
Mr. Sutter was married February 21, 1900, to
Miss Alta Wilson, who was born at Atchison, Kan-
sas, and they are the parents of one son, Claude E.
James L Wernham, M. D. The profession of
medicine embraces a vast field of knowledge, and
the successful physician must of necessity be a
man of varied learning. Never at any time has
the healing art demanded more of its practitioners
than at the present day and never has the profes-
sion given so fair an account of itself. Find the
leading physician in a community and this acquain-
tance will indicate with few exceptions the man
of the greatest intellectual attainment, the keenest
mind, the most progressive spirit and, in many
cases, the greatest public benefactions. In the list
of leading physicians of Billings the name of Dr.
James I. Wernham occupies a prominent place be-
cause of his professional accomplishments, his per-
sonal worth and his value to his community.
James I. Wernham was born at Marengo, Illi-
nois, November 25, 1874, a son of Dr. S. C. and
Emma (Titus) Wernham. The family is of Eng-
lish origin, and was founded in America by the
great-grandfather of Doctor Wernham, who im-
migrated to New York City, in which metropolis
was born in 1804 James Wernham. the grandfather
of James I. He was a sailmaker by trade and fol-
lowed that vocation for many years in New York,
but late in life retired from active pursuits and
removed to Marengo, Illinois, where he died in 1876,
the owner of a valuable property. He married
Margaret McKenzie, a native of 5«'ew Jersey, and
among their children was S. C. Wernham, who was
born in New York City in 1844. S. C. Wernham
was reared in his native community, where he
received his preliminary educational training, and,
having decided upon entering the medical profes-
sion and made some preparations therefor, went
to Chicago, Illinois, to complete his training, grad-
uating from the noted Rush Medical College with
the class of 1872 and the degree of Doctor of Medi-
cine. He at once located at Marengo, where he
has been engaged in practice ever since, for al-
though his years now number more than three-
quarters of a century he still retains the confidence,
reverence and affection of the poeple who have
had his ministrations for so many years and who
will allow themselves to be served by no other
practitioner. Not alone in his profession has he
been prominent, for civic affairs have claimed a
large share of his attention, and the pioneer physi-
cian has borne a goodly part of the responsibilities
of office. He served as alderman and mayor of
Marengo and as coroner of McHenry County, Illi-
nois,- in addition to which for many years he dis-
played his friendship for education as an active
and helpful member of the school board. He is
a faithful member of the Baptist Church, which
he joined many years ago, and is a leading Mason
of his locality. Doctor Wernham married Emma
Titus, who was born at Pennington, New Jersey,
in 1849, and they became the parents of four chil-
dren : Dr. James I. ; Spencer, who is a decorator
residing at Elgin, Illinois; George, a dry goods
merchant of Chippewa Falls, Minnesota; and Emma,
the wife of Frank McCarty, a leading attorney
of Elgin, Illinois, and at present a member of the
Illinois State Legislature.
James I. Wernham attended the public schools
of Marengo, Illinois, and early in his career evi-
denced a predilection for his father's profession.
He graduated from the high school at Marengo
in 1893 and after one year entered the University
of Illinois, where he pursued a four-year course
and graduated in the class of 1899, with the degree
of Bachelor of Science. This was followed by a
course of three years in Rush Medical College, Chi-
cago. Illinois, where he had a brilliant career, and
was a member of the Nu Sigma Nu Greek letter
medical fraternity and graduated in 1902 with the
degree of Doctor of Medicine. He was a member
of the Kappa Sigma Greek letter college fraternity
at the University of Illinois. During the year
1902 the young physician served as interne at the
Post-Graduate Medical College. Chicago, and in
1903 commenced practice at Marengo with his
father. In March, 1904, to further his medical
education, he went to Europe, where he remained
until April, 1905, taking post-graduate work at
Vienna and Berlin, particularly specializing in gen-
eral and surgical diagnosis, a field in which he
has since attained something more than a local
reputation and in which he is accounted an author-
ity. On his return to Marengo he rapidly assumed
a place of leadership among the younger physi-
cians, and was the recipient of a number of honors,
being elected president of the McHenry County
Medical Society and vice president of the Illinois
State Medical Society.
Doctor Wernham continued to practice at Marengo
until 1913, in which year he came to Billings, where
he has since carried on a professional business
as a general medical and surgical practitioner, and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
97
the reputation which he brought with him from
Illinois as a learned, skilled and thoroughly cap-
able devotee of his art has been strengthened and
fortified by his work since his advent at Billings.
He maintains well appoined offices in the Hart-
Albin Building, second floor, and continues to be a
close and careful student during his leisure hours,
as he is also an interested member of the Yellow-
stone County Medical Society, the ^lontana State
Medical Society and the American Medical Asso-
ciation. He is a popular member of the Billings
and Billings Midland clubs and of Billings Camp,
Modern Woodmen of America, is a republican in
his political views, and holds membership in the
Presbyterian Church. In addition to his modern
residence at No. 945 North Thirty-first Street, he
is the owner of a 640-acre ranch at Acton, Mon-
tana, where he is engaged in raising grain and
stock. The Wernham family has a good military
record, including the services of John Wernham,
an uncle of the doctor, who lost his life while fight-
ing as a soldier of the Union in Kentucky during
the Civil war. On September 24, 1918, Doctor
Wernham enlisted as a member of the Medical
Officers Training Corps, and after one month's train-
ing at Fort Riley, Kansas, where he was advanced
to the rank of captain, was sent to Debarkation Hos-
pital No. 51, National Soldiers Home. After five
months in the service as a surgeon he received his
honorable discharge February 24, 1919.
Doctor Wernham was married at Chicago, Illi-
nois, in 1908, to Miss Grace Middleton, daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Middleton, the lat-
ter of whom is deceased. Mr. Middleton, formerly
a well known and successful Chicago merchant, is
now retired from active pursuits and a resident
of Lake Wales, Florida. Three children have
blessed the union of Doctor and Mrs. Wernham:
Helen, born in January, 1910; Martha, born August
2, 191 1, and Elizabeth, born May 28, 1919. Mrs.
Wernham is a descendant of Hon. .'\rthur Middle-
ton, one of the signers of the Declaration of Inde-
pendence.
Joseph Pope. It is doubtful if there are any people
of Montana who have not heard of Joseph Pope
of Billings, this state, for his name is a household
v^ord in this part of the west, and will always be
associated with the monumental work he has accom-
plished in the cause of prohibition, to which he has
devoted the best years of his life, leaving the
ministry so as to give to this very important moral
reform all of his energies. ."Kt present he is super-
intendent of the Montana Anti-Saloon League, with
offices at No. 213 Stapleton Building, Billings.
Joseph Pope was born in Cornwall, England, May
14, 1866, a son of Jeremiah Pope, also born in Corn-
wall, in 1843. He there rounded out his useful life
as a farmer, dying in 1913. A man of strong re-
ligious convictions, he was a consistent and earnest
member of the Wesleyan Jvlethodist Church, which
he served as a lay preacher, and he gave generously
of his means and time toward its support. A con-
servative, he was very active in politics and held
a number of local offices, being one of the most
prominent men of his community. The maiden name
of his wife was Phillippa Andrewartha, and she
was born in Cornwall, England, in 1846, where she
still resides, having survived her husband. The chil-
dren born to them were as follows : Joseph, whose
name heads this biography ; Elizabeth, who married
James Hammill, a farmer of Cornwall, Eggland ;
Grenfell, who is a farmer of Cornwall; Eugenie,
who married Charles Bryant, a contractor and
builder of Cornwall ; Bampfykl, who is also a farmer
of Cornwall; Charles, who died in 1916, was
originally a farmer, but at the time of his demise
was engaged in gold mining ; IMabel, who is married,
now resides in England, but resided for a period
in South Africa; and Ethel and .'\nnie, both of whom
reside in England. The sons were gold miners in
young manhood in .^merica and South Africa.
Joseph Pope was carefully educated for the min-
istry, first in the public schools of his native place
and later in the Congregational Theological College
at Bristol, England, from which he was graduated
in 1890. Immediately thereafter Rev. Mr. Pope came
to the United States and for one year supplied the
pulpit of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Red
Lodge, Montana, leaving there for Big Timber,
where until 1894 he served as pastor of its Con-
gregational Church. From there he went to Colum-
bus, Montana, to take charge of its Congregational
Church, but in 1900 returned to Big Timber, and re-
mained for three years. His next charge was the
Congregational Church at Laurel. Montana, where
he remained for two years. After this he spent
three years on a ranch he had bought at Park City,
Montana, and during this period was engaged in the
cattle and sheep business. He also invested in a farm
near Howard, Montana, but has now disposed of
these interests. In 1908 Mr. Pope's services were
enlisted as assistant state superintendent of the Con-
gregational churches of Montana, and he held that
position until July I, 1915, when he was elected
state superintendent of the Montana Anti-Saloon
League, and is still serving as such. It is almost
impossible to give full credit to Mr. Pope for his
work along this line, for he has accomplished so
rnuch. It was he who is responsible for the prepara-
tion and introduction of the resolution providing
for the submission of prohibition to the electors
of this state. After the question was submitted Mr.
Pope conducted a resolute and aggressive campaign
and carried the state by a majority of 30,000 votes.
He has not given up the work of educating the
.masses, but is one of the national lecturers of the
Anti-Saloon League.
Ever since he came to Montana Mr. Pope has been
a prominent figure in public afl^airs. During the
thirteenth session of the State Assembly he was the
republican representative from Yellowstone County,
and much of the constructive legislation of 1913 is
directly or indirectly due to his efforts and influence.
A friend of education, he served on the school board
at Big Timber and Laurel, and at Big Timber he
was also a member of the county high school board.
Believing in purifying politics, Mr. Pope has never
spared himself in endeavoring to raise the standards
of the communities in which he has resided, and has
always been a very strong influence for moral up-
lift outside of his ministerial duties, for he is a man
who has always practiced what he preached in the
broadest conception of the words. He has held that
all reform is not effected by the churches, but
that a powerful force is exerted by the concerted
action of business and social organizations, and while
at Park City and Laurel he was one of the militant
members of the Chamber of Commerce, during the
period that the Great Western Sugar Company was
induced to locate its plant at Billings. Mr. Pope also
helped to organize the Sugar Beet Growers Asso-
ciation. A man of broad vision, he saw the neces-
sity of irrigation, and took a leading part in the
organization of the North Sanders Irrigation Dis-
trict, he now serving as its secretary. In the selling
of the $100,000 worth of bonds for the construction
of an irrigation canal to cover 5,000 acres of very
fine valley lands Mr. Pope waged an energetic cam-
paign, and was eminently successful in disposing of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
them. He owns 950 acres of irrigated land at
Hysham, Montana, which is now devoted to the
raising of grain and alfalfa, and it is in the North
Sanders District.
In 1890 Mr. Pope was married at Cornwall, Eng-
land, to Miss Susannah Coad, a daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. John Coad, both of whom are now de-
ceased. Mr. Coad was a farmer and auctioneer, and
very active in the political and social life of his
community, serving as a member of the County
Council and as chairman of the County Board of
Guardians for a number of years. Mr. and Mrs.
Pope have three children, namely; Lila Mae, who
was born January 28, 1895, is a graduate of the
State University at Missoula, Montana, and married
Donovan Worden, a farmer of Missoula, Montana;
Ethel Mildred, who was born November 27, 1896, at-
tended the Billings High School, from which she
was graduated, and the State University for one
year, and is now in the office of J. I. Case Threshmg
Machine Company at Billings, Montana; and Dorothy
Coad, who was born in August, 1906.
There was a time when Mr. Pope was called a
visionary when he promulgated his prohibition gos-
pel, although his motives were never questioned,
and few who listened to him then imagined that
before many years had passed his fondest hopes
would be realized. Had he and others who worked
with him just as earnestly and faithfully per-
mitted themselves to be discouraged and given up
their fight against the saloon element the glorious
results of the unceasing campaign would never have
come about. If he had accomplished nothing more
Mr. Pope can feel that he has achieved a revolution
in moral conditions which. will be everlasting in its
effects for good. He has fought long and hard,
straining every energy, and has evinced such ability
to influence his contemporaries that inuch of the
work has been left to his acute rnind and alert
vigilance. Each move has been strikingly charac-
teristic of the man, and any reverses have only
served to augment his resources. Attacks from the
saloon element have not deterred him from pur-
suing what he deemed was the right course, and
day by day converts have been added to his cohorts
until now he has all of the better class with him to
the end. It is such men as Mr. Pope who under-
stand how to put to practical uses the careful train-
ing they receive in preparing for their profession,
and teach their fellow citizens that the minister of
the gospel knows how to live Christianity as .well
as how to enunciate its doctrines from his church.
While Mr. Pope was a forceful preacher, and a
power for good in the ministry, he has those charac-
teristics which make him still more useful as a
worker with the masses in securing those reforms
which cannot be brought about unless they are taken
up by the men who have made them their life
study.
Antrim E. Barnes. The West is more prompt
to acknowledge merit, and many of the more am-
bitious men of the country are locating in the
flourishing towns in the more newly developed
states, knowing that there they will find opportuni-
ties to advance so that they may secure the posi-
tions in their communities to which their abilities
entitle them. Antrim E. Barnes, vice president of
the First National Bank of Three Forks, and loco-
motive engineer for the Chicago, Milwaukee and
St. Paul Railroad, is one of the men who has
achieved an enviable success in a state far removed
from his native one of Indiana. He was born at
Fort Wayne, Indiana, August 22, 1874, a son of An-
trim E. Barnes, born in Ohio in 1841, who died at
Fort Wayne in 1876.
Antrim E. Barnes, Sr., was reared in Ohio, but
after his marriage located at Fort Wayne, Indiana,
where he spent the remainder of his life, being
engaged in the lumber business. During the CivU
war he gave his country his support as a soldier,
and probably his early death was the result of the
hardships endured during his military experience.
The republican party had in him a hearty supporter.
Both as a Mason and a member of the Methodist
Episcopal Church he lived up to the highest ideals
of manhood, and, dying, left behind him an influence
for good on his community. His marriage to Jus-
tina HoUoman occurred in Michigan, but she was
born near Raleigh, North Carolina, in 1846, and she
survives him and lives at Coesse, Indiana. Her an-
cestors served in the American Revolution, as did
those of her husband, as the Barnes family came to
North Carolina from Ireland during the Colonial
period in this country's history. Mr. and Mrs. An-
trim E. Barnes, Sr., had but one child, who bears
his father's name.
After the death of her husband Mrs. Antrim E.
Barnes moved to Coesse, Indiana, and there Antrim
E. Barnes, Jr., was reared, and was graduated from
its high school in 1891. Soon thereafter he came
West to McCook, Nebraska, where for 3^ years
he was an apprentice to the machinist trade, and then
went to Sheridan, Wyoming, to become fireman on
the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, and
was later promoted to be locomotive engineer, leav-
ing that road in 1908 to go with the Wabash Rail-
road as engineer at Peru. Indiana, where he re-
mained until 1900. Mr. Barnes then returned to
the Burlington Road at Sheridan, Wyoming, for
two years. Feeling the need of further instruction,
in igo2 he matriculated at Perdu University at La
Fayette, Indiana, and took a three years' course.
In 1905 he came to Livingston, Montana, as engi-
neer for the Northern Pacific Railroad, leaving it
in 1907 for the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul
Railroad. He left Lewistown for Three Forks in
1911, and since then has become vice president of
the First National Bank. He owns his residence
at 622 Second Avenue, East, and one ranch
of 328 acres of land 3^/2 miles south of Roundup,
Montana, with water rights, and another one of 6140
acres of irrigated land sixteen miles northwest of
Three Forks. He is a republican and has served
on the school board. Not only is he a conscien-
tious member of the Presbyterian Church, but he
serves it as an elder. Well known as a Mason, he
belongs to Livingston Lodge, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons ; Livingston Consistory, which has
conferred en him the thirty-second degree; and Al-
geria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the
Mystic Shrine, of Helena, Montana. He also be-
longs to the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers,
and is chief of Painted Rock Division No. 744, and
was a member of its general committee for a num-
ber of years.
In 1907 Mr. Barnes was married at Billings, Mon-
tana, to Miss Lucy Marshall, a daughter of George
W. and Sarah Marshall. Mr. Marshall died at
Belgrade, Montana, in 1918, but his widow survives
him and continues to reside at Belgrade. One of
the pioneers of the Upper Madison River, Mr. Mar-
shall gained the name of "Elk" Marshall because
of the fact that he raised elk as well as stock upon
an extensive scale. Mr. and Mrs. Barnes became
the parents of two children, Lucy M. and Antrim E.
By a former marriage with Miss Zella Mossman at
Coesse. Indiana, in 1898, Mr. Barnes has a son,
Charles, who is a medical student. Mrs. Barnes is
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a lady well known in the county, and she and Mr.
Barnes have gathered about them a pleasant cir-
cle of friends to whom they dispense the delightful
western hospitality at their home upon many oc-
casions.
John A. McMillan is an old time Montanan,
in early life was associated with his father in the
building of mills and smelters, but for thirty years
has been railroading, and is now joint agent at
Butte for the Northern Pacific and the Oregon
Short Line and the Great Northern Railways. Mr.
McMillan was born at Lancaster. Ontario, Canada,
April, 5, 1868, of pure Scotch ancestry. His grand-
father, Allan McMillan, was born in Scotland in
lygo, and in early life crossed the ocean to Canada
and became a pioneer farmer in Glengarry County,
Ontario. He lived there until his death in 1880.
He married a Miss Campbell, also of Scotland.
Their son Hugh A. McMillan, long prominent in
the mining industry of the Northwest, was born
in Glengarry County, Ontario, 1838, and died at
Butte in 1910. He was reared and married in
Glengarry County, and took up the business of con-
tractor and builder. In 1876 he located at Mount
Pleasant, Michigan, continuing the same business,
and in i88j arrived at Butte, where he had an inter-
esting part in the pioneer development of that city.
He was the builder of the original Anaconda smelter.
He also remodeled the Alice Mine Mill, built the
Bluebird Mill, and as an expert in this class of
construction he was subsequently employed and as-
sociated with the Fraser & Chalmers Company of
Chicago and built many mills and smelters in South
Africa and Old Mexico. After coming to the United
States he voted as a republican, was a member of
the Presbyterian Church and the Masonic fraternity,
and in early life served with the Canadian Militia,
and was called to active duty during the Fenian
rebellion. Hugh A. McMillan married Mary Mc-
Leod, who was born in Glengary County, Ontario,
in 1844, and is now living at Butte with her son
John. John is the oldest of five children. Maude
is the widow of W. D. Shamburger and makes her
home on the large Shamburger ranch at Payette,
Idaho. Donald Andrew is a millwright and con-
tractor living at Johannesburg in South Africa.
Margaret is the wife of Robert Raff, secretary of
the Big Black Foot Milling Company at Missoula.
Harriet is the wife of C. F. Head, chief of police
at Loveland, Colorado.
John A. McMillan received his early education
in the public schools of Glengarrv County. Ontario,
and Mount Pleasant. Michigan. From the Michigan
home he returned to Glengarry Countv. and was
graduated from high school "there in' 1885. He
arrived at Butte, Montana, in August, 1886, and for
a short time was timekeeper at the Bluebird mill.
Then for two years he was with his father in build-
ing a mill for the Philadelphia and Idaho Smelting
Company at Ketchum, Idaho, and left there to go
to California.
Since the spring of i88q Mr. McMillan has been
a permanent resident of Butte. ■ He worked in
the mines until November of that year and then
entered the service of the Montana Union Railway
as a clerk. This line of railway was absorbed by
the Northern Pacific in 1896. at which date Mr. Mc-
Millan was made chief clerk to the auditor and
general freight and passenger agent of the larger
corporation. His next promotion was to cashier
of the Northern Pacific, and in January, igoi, he
was made joint agent for the Northern Pacific and
the Oregon Short Line roads. He has handled the
duties of that position for these roads nearly twen-
ty years, and subsequently was also made agent for
the Great Northern. In that capacity he has super-
vision over four hundred employes of these differ-
ent lines. His offices are on South Arizona street.
Mr. McMillan is an independent voter, is affiliated
with Butte Camp No. 153, Woodmen of the World,
and is a member of the Independent Order of For-
esters at Toronto. He also belongs to the Butte
Country Club and the Butte Curling Club. His
home is at 1041 Colorado Street.
In 1894, at Butte, he married Miss Elizabeth M.
McGregor, daughter of John and Margaret (Camp-
bell) McGregor, now deceased. Her father is a
farmer in Glengarry County, Ontario. The only
child of Mr. and Mrs. McMillan is Gregor M., born
November 9, 1896, now a student in the Montana
State Agricultural College at Bozeman.
Lewis S. Butler. During the last quarter of a
century Lewis S. Butler has supplied a large amount
of the business enterprise that has been made ef-
fective in advancing the commercial, industrial and
civic interests of Lewistown and Fergus County.
Mr. Butler is an active figure in a number of un-
dertakings, probably most conspicuously as senior
partner of the firm of Butler & Woodworth, a
firm owning and directing one of the largest ranch
and livestock properties in this part of Montana.
Something of the extent and operations of the firm
is told in connection with a sketch of his partner,
Mr. Woodworth.
Mr. Butler was born in Warren County, Illinois,
on his father's farm, January 24, 1867, a son of
Joseph R. and Rebecca Jane (Stockton) Butler.
His father was a native of Ohio and his mother
of Illinois. His father when a boy went with
his parents to Warren County, Illinois, was edu-
cated in Ohio and Illinois and in 1871 rhoved to
DeKalb County, Missouri, where he bought land
and engaged in farming and stock raising on an
extensive scale. He was one of the pioneer rais-
ers of Percheron horses and also of Shorthorn
cattle in Northwestern Missouri. He was a demo-
crat in politics. Joseph R. Butler died in 1878, at
the age of forty-nine. His wife passed away in
1871, at the age of thirty-five. Lewis is the young-
est and only survivor of six children.
He was eleven years of age when his father died,
and a few years later started to make his own
way in the world, working out at wages of fifty
cents a day. He attended school more or less regu-
larly until seventeen years of age, when he began
farming the tract of land inherited from his father.
His associations with Montana began in .\pril,
1885, when he arrived at Bozeman and was em-
ployed by William Fly. a cattle man, as a cowboy
riding the range through to Judith Basin in Meagher
County. Later he worked for Charles Lehman at
Cottonwood in Lehman's general store and hotel
for about a year. His next experience was driving
a hand of horses to Dakota.
February 11, 1888, at King City. Missouri, Mr.
Butler married Miss Ida M. Easterly. For their
wedding journey they started at once to Fergus
County. Montana, and on reacliing here Mr. But-
ler entered a tract of Government land on Spring
Creek, seven miles below Lewistown. He was on
the homestead three years and then sold his prop-
erty and engaged in business with J. M. Powers
on a horse ranch. He was there about two years,
then returned to Lewistown and was a butcher
for a year and a half and in the live-y business
for some length of time. The next five or six
years were "spent in traveling in Northern Montana
and in Canada, and about that time he became
associated with Mr. Woodworth. Mr. Butler was
100
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ness at Lewistown until 1916. Since then his chief
in the wholesale and retail liquor and cigar busi-
interests have been cattle ranching with the firm
of Butler and Woodworth. This firm owns about
6,000 acres of land located nine miles south of
Grass Lake, and it is stocked with 600 or 700 head
ot cattle. They also are extensive breeders of Per-
cheron horses.' In January. 1919, Mr. Butler also
engaged in business with Charles Woodworth and
W. A. Cooper under the title of the Lewistown
Automobile and Truck Company, handling the
agency for the Studebaker cars and Diamond T
trucks and operating a general garage and acces-
sory establishment at Lewistown.
Mr. Butler is a democrat, but has never cared for
official position. However, through the personal
influence of Tom Stout he consented to serve as
sergeant-at-arms in the State Legislature in 1917.
Mrs. Butler was born in Tennessee, a daughter
of Philip L. and Alpha (Pinington) Easterly, her
parents being also natives of Tennessee. Mrs. But-
ler is the first in a family of three daughters and
three sons. Her father died in 1899 and her mother
is still living. Her father was a successful farmer
and stockman of Gentry County, Missouri, and in
politics a democrat. Mr. and Mrs. Butler have six
children, and are also very proud of their nine
grandchildren. Alpha E., their oldest child, is the
wife of John McQuirk and the mother of three
sons ; Elsa L married Charles Thrasher and has
two sons and one daughter ; Octa is the wife of
Joseph Franchoise and has two daughters ; Ida
married William A. Cooper and has one son. The
two youngest children, both at home and in school,
are Dorothy and Lewis Stockton.
Charles F, Ridley. An active participation in
business matters and civic affairs during a period
covering fourteen years has made Charles F. Rid-
ley well and favorably known to the citizens of
Billings, where he is cashier of the Great Western
Sugar Company. Mr. Ridley entered the employ
of this concern in 1906 and has worked his way
steadily upward to his present position through
hard and conscientious application to his duties, and
though his private interests have been exacting and
heavy, he has still found time to devote to the wel-
ware of the institutions of his adopted community.
Mr. Ridley was born at London, Ontario, Canada,
April 23, 1876, a son of William and Mary Ann
(Heath) Ridley. His father was born in 1842, in
the City of Birmingham. England, where he was
reared, educated and married, and in that city
learned the trade of machinist, particularly as ap-
plied to the building of locomotives. In this con-
nection he also mastered the principles of the dis-
tribution of gas and the manufacture thereof, as
well as commercial steam heating and its relation
to distribution. Mr. Ridley came to the United
States in 1873, and after a short stay at Portland,
Maine, went to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, where
for two years he was connected with the Great
Western Railway Company. Subsequently he went
to London, Ontario, where he had charge of the
gas works until 1880, and later went to Denver,
Colorado, where he built the Denver City Steam
Heating Works and remained until 1913. In that
year he retired from active affairs and removed
to San Diego, California, where his death occurred
in 1915. In Denver Mr. Ridley had the distinc-
tion of having charge of the first electric railway
ever built anywhere, this being constructed after
the patents of Professor Short of Chicago, as
an underground electric, i. e., the current being
underground. One of the leading and foremost
members of his profession, he was a life member
of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, from
which he drew a pension. In politics Mr. Ridley
was a republican. He was an Episcopalian and a
strong churchman, and was a thirty-second degree
Scottish Rite Mason and a member of the Albion
and Cambrian Societies of England. Mr. Ridley
married Mary Anne Heath, who was born in Bir-
mingham. England, in 1844, and who survives him
as a resident of Denver, Colorado. Six children
were born to them, as follows : Arnold William,
manager of the steam heating department of the
Denver Gas and Electric Company of Denver, Colo-
rado ; Frances W., the wife of Victor Ryfa, for-
merly a bank clerk and now in the service of the
United States Government at Xew York City, where
his banking experience in handling French ex-
change has made him valuable as a French inter-
preter; Charles Frederick, of this notice; Edwin,
an engineering valuator of municipal plants for
the State of Washington, residing at Seattle, that
state; Reuben Thomas, an optician of Denver; and
Mary Ann, the wife of Charles H. Hines, an auto-
mobile mechanic of Denver.
Charles F. Ridley was educated in the public
schools of Denver, Colorado, and at the age of
fourteen years gave up his studies to accept a posi-
tion in the office of the auditor of a railroad com-
pany at Denver. In 1906 he became general book-
keeper for the Great Western Sugar Company,
with which concern his advancement has been steady
and consistent, until today he occupies the re-
sponsible post of cashier of the Billings' branch of
this important concern. The offices are located one
mile south of the city. Mr. Ridley since his ar-
rival at Billings has become widely and favorably
known among the business men of this community,
and is accounted a shrewd and astute man of affairs,
competent, reliable and substantial. He lives in a
pleasant home at No. 314 South Thirty-fifth Street,
and has established himself permanently as a citi-
zen of Billings, performed the duties of citizenship
well and being at present a member of the board
of school trustees. He is a republican in his po-
litical adherence, and is a member of the Billings
Midland Club and a thirty-second degree Mason,
belonging to Ashlar Lodge No. 29 Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, and to Billings Consistory.
In 1904 Mr. Ridley was married at Toronto, Can-
ada, to Miss Maude \'. Westlake, who died in
Denver in 1909, leaving two children: Lola Jean,
born October 12, 1905, and Mildred Westlake, born
December 31, 1907. The present Mrs. Ridley prior
to her marriage, January 29, 1913, at Denver, was
Miss Edith Parker, who was born at Lowestoft,
England.
W. E. Harmon. One of the men who has
stamped the impress of his strong individuality
upon the minds of the people of Montana in a
manner as to render him one of the conspicuous
characters of the state is W. E. Harmon, who had
a successful career as an educator for a number
of years, but who is now equally successful as a
farmer and ranchman. Faithfulness to duty and a
strict adherence to a fixed purpose, which always
do more to advance a man's interests than wealth
or advantageous circumstances, have been domi-
nating factors in his life, which has been replete
with honor and success worthily attained.
W. E. Harmon was born in Fulton County, Ohio,
on February 7. i8s6, and is a son of Arva and
Harriet (Benedict) 'Harmon. The father was born
in New York State in 1832, and was there reared
and married. In 1854 he removed to Fulton Coun-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
101
ty, Ohio, where he became a pioneer farmer, and
lived there until , 1876, when he moved to Michi-
gan. Ten years later, in 1886, he came to Liv-
ingston, Montana, of which locality he was a pio-
neer, and there he engaged in contracting for a
few years. In 1890 he came to Bozeman and lived
with his son, W. E. Harmon, until 1905, when he
retired from active life and went to Puyallup,
Washington, where his death occurred on June II,
1918. He was a democrat in his political views
and a strong and earnest member of the Baptist
Church. He married Harriet Benedict, who was
born in 1836 in Connecticut, and who now lives at
Puyallup, Washington. To this worthy couple were
born the following children: W. E., the subject of
this review: Carrie E. is the wife of Wilbur Dodge,
a shipyard carpenter at Puyallup, Washington ; Her-
bert is a farmer at Sycamore, Illinois; and Mary
is unmarried and resides at Zion, Illinois.
W. E. Harmon received his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of Fulton County, Ohio,
and Morenci, Michigan. He then took a five year
course in Valparaiso University, at Valparaiso, In-
diana, where he was graduated in 1884 with the
degree of Bachelor of Arts. The following year
he was principal of the Clayton, Michigan, schools,
and in 1885 he became principal of the schools of
Livingston, Montana, being retained here two years.
Then for lyYz years he was superintendent of the
schools of Bozeman, and it is stated that to him is
largely due the perfection of the educational sys-
tem of the schools of that city. Mr. Harmon's
abilities and success as an educator had attracted
favorable notice and he was elected state superin-
tendent of public instruction, entering upon the
duties of that office in 1905. He was elected to
succeed himself in that position, thus serving eight
years. The splendid service rendered by him to
the state is a matter of record, but it is specially
noteworthy that his incumbency was marked by
a tremendous forward stride in the educational
methods and standards of this state. Mr. Harmon
standardized the teaching certificates of the state; he
served on the State Text-book Commission, wrote
three courses of study for the state, and succeeded
in putting the state course in all schools. In addi-
tion to his long and creditable career in one of the
most useful and exacting of professions he also
proved an honorable member of the body politic,
rising in the confidence and esteem of the public,
and in every relation of life he has never fallen
below the dignity of true manhood nor in any way
resorted \o unworthy methods.
Upon leaving the office of state superintendent
of public instruction Mr. Harmon relinquished his
pedagogical career and took over the management
of his fine farm of 240 acres of irrigated land lo-
cated about a mile west of Bozeman. The place
is well improved and completely equipped in every
way and is considered one of the finest ranches
in the Gallatin Valley. Mr. Harmon also owns a
modern residence on North Seventh Avenue, Boze-
man, and a residence and si.x lots on Eighth Avenue.
Since retiring from the office of state superintend-
ent he has served three times as state representative.
Politically Mr. Harmon gives his support to the
republican party, and his religious connection is
with the Presbyterian Church, of whch he is an
elder. Fraternally he is a member of Eureka Home-
stead No. 41S. Brotherhood of American Yeomen;
Bridger Camp No. 62, Woodmen of the World.
He takes a deep interest in every movement or en-
terprise looking to the advancement of the best
interests of the community. He is a director of the
National Bank of Gallatin County.
In 1887, in St. Paul, Minnesota, Mr. Harmon
was married to Etta Kendall, a native of Minne-
sota, and whose death occurred in 1892. To them
were born the following children. Florence, who
died at Lewistown, Montana, May 13, 1919, was
the wife of David Bolton, assistant cashier of the
Fergus County Bank at Lewistown. She was a
graduate of the Helena High School, the State
Normal School at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and taught
school at Appleton, Wisconsin, one year, and at
Lewistown, Montana. Ella May, who is a graduate
of the Montana State College, is a home science
demonstrator for Ravalli County for the State Col-
lege. Cora Alice, who died on April I, 1919, was
a graduate of Leland Stanford University, Cali-
fornia, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and
had been a teacher of English in the schools of
Terry, Montana. In 1893 Mr. Harmon was married
to Mary Stegmier, a native of Minnesota.
Harry E. Perkins, of Billings, is a veteran lumber
merchant, and has been in that business for thirty
years. He started as a yardman, and is now presi-
dent of the Perkins Savage Lumber Company.
Mr. Perkins was born at Flora, Illinois, May 2,
1864, and represents old New England ancestors, his
people being among the early pioneers of Vermont.
His father, Henry P. Perkins, was born in Chilli-
cothe, Ohio, in 1825, grew up there, was married in
his native state, and shortly afterward moved to
Flora, Illinois, where he was a teacher. In 1866,
at the close of the Civil war, he established a home
well out on the frontier of Kansas, near Emporia,
and was a farmer in that section until 1883. He then
moved to Carlisle, Arkansas, where he continued
farming and where he died in 1889. He was a
staunch republican and a very active member of the
Methodist Church. Henry P. Perkins married
Martha A. Brainard who was born at Chillicothe,
Ohio, in 1835 and is still living in her eighty-fifth
year at Carlisle, Arkansas. She was the mother of
a large family of thirteen children, the first, a son,
dying in infancy, and the second, Mattie, dying at
the age of three years. George I., who died at Bil-
lings, Montana, at the age of fifty-seven, resided at
Springdale, Montana, where he was manager of a
lumber yard. David B. is a lumberman, banker
dnd farmer at Carlisle, Arkansas. Harry E. is fifth
in age. Maggie is the wife of Henry J. Lewis, a
farmer at Daphne, Alabama. John died in infancy.
Annie is the wife of C. A. Rosenbaum, a railroad ■
agent at Little Rock, Arkansas. Clara married
Alexander McRae, superintendent of an oil mill at
Argenta, Arkansas. Robert A. is a farmer at Car-
lisle, Arkansas. Rosie is the wife of William
Branch, a produce commission -merchant at Little
Rock, Arkansas. Daisy is the wife of Mr. Crips,
a farmer in Missouri. Charles C, the youngest, is a
farmer and dairyman at Carlisle, Arkansas.
Harry E. Perkins was two years old when the
family moved to Lyon County, Kansas, he grew up
on his father's farm there, attended rural schools,
a commercial college at Little Rock, Arkansas,
and at tlie age of twenty-five left home to make his
independent start in the world. He spent one year
on a ranch in South Dakota. Mr. Perkins had a
brief military experience on the northwestern fron-
tier during the Sitting Bull outbreak of 1890-91-
He was in the service of the organized militia for
eighteen months during the period of Indian hos-
tilities. Ever since that time he has been connected
with some phase of the lumber business. He went to
work for C. H. Chase at Willow Lake, South
Dakota, as a yard man, and eventually was made
manager of the local yards and a co-partner of Mr.
102
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Chase. The business was subsequently incorporated
as the C. H. Chase Lumber Company, with Mr.
Perkins as secretary and manager. In 1916 the
business was sold, and at that time Mr. Perkins and
Michael Savage joined forces and in February, 1918,
incorporated the Perkins-Savage Lumber Company,
with Mr. Perkins as president and Mr. Savage as
secretary and manager. This is a Montana corpora-
tion, the home offices being in the Babcock Building
at Billings. They handle retail lumber and hard-
ware and have a trade in and around Billings, also
have a yard at Lovell, Wyoming, and are interested
ni lumber yards at Acton, Molt, Gray Cliff, Spring-
dale and Belfry, Montana.
Mr. Perkins is also a ranch-owner, having one
farm of 160 acres north of Billings, and another of
640 acres at Pompeys Pillar. He owns a modern
home at 1240 North Thirtieth Street in Billings. Mr.
Perkins is a trustee of the Congregational Church,
and is affiliated with the .'\shlar Lodge No. 29,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Con-
sistory of the Scottish Rites, Parker Lodge of
Knights of Pythias of South Dakota, Billings Camp,
Modern Woodmen of America, Billings Chapter of
the Eastern Star, and the Royal Neighbors of
Parker, South Dakota.
September 19, 1893, at Willow Lake, South Dakota,
he married Miss Addie McMullin, daughter of
William and Mary (Pettit) McMullin. Her mother
lives at Clarkston, Washington, where her father, a
veteran of the Civil war and a retired farmer, died
March 27, 1919. Mr. and Mrs. Perkins have three
children : Hazel, who died at Huntley, Montana,
aged fourteen years ; Bernice F., born April 29,
i8g6, a graduate of Oberlin College at Oberlin, Ohio,
and a kindergarten teacher at Billings ; and Muriel
J., born August 9, 1900, who attended Oberlin Col-
lege and is preparing to finish her education in the
University of Minnesota.
Joseph Ch-ikuvin, one of the reliable and pros-
perous brokers of Butte, is recognized as one of the
political leaders of this region and a republican of
note in the Northwest. He is a son of Leander
Joseph Chauvin, born in the Province of Quebec,
Canada, in 1826, and died at Shelburn, Vermont,
in IQ15. In 1837 he came to the United States and
located at Shelburn, Vermont. Here he later en-
gaged in farming. His wife bore the maiden name of
Harriet Pepin, and she was also born in the Province
of Quebec, Canada, in 1829. Her death occurred
at Shelburn, Vermont, where all of their children
were born, they being as follows : Joseph, whose
name heads this review; an unnamed infant son;
Leander, who lives at Springfield, Massachusetts, is
a carpenter by trade ; Louis N., who is engaged in
farm work in the vicinity of Hamilton, Montana ;
Otheleo, who is deceased; Harriet, who married
Moses Charbonneau, a shoemaker of Barre, Ver-
mont; Emma, who married Harry Crawford, a con-
tractor and builder of Oak Park, Illinois ; Napoleon,
who is a carpenter and builder of Massachusetts;
Feli.x, who is doing farm work in the vicinity of
Shelburn, Vermont; Alma, who married Napoleon
Prunier, who has been coachman and later chauffeur
for a prominent family of Burlington, Vermont,
for many years ; and six others who died young.
Joseph Chauvin, the oldest son, came to Mon-
tana on June I, 1881, and has been engaged in
active business in this state ever since. For the
first twenty-five years he was occupied very profit-
ably in handling furniture, but then sold in 1906
and engaged in his present undertaking, being a
broker in stocks, mines and real estate, with offices
at 112 West Granite Street, where he has been
located for the past fifteen years. His residence
is at no West Granite Street. He also owns a
number of patented mines at Butte, which he esti-
mates to be worth $60,000.
Upon coming to Butte Mr. Chauvin was favor-
ably impressed with the possibilities of the place and
from then on has been one of the most active boost-
ers of the city, and through his efforts much outside
capital is brought here, the investment of which has
aided in the development of the industrial and com-
mercial interests. A natural political leader, he
has been the delegate of his party to numerous
county and state conventions, but he has not per-
mitted the use of his name on the ticket for any
office, as he prefers to use his influence as a private
individual. Enthusiastic in his support of the party,
he possesses the power to sway others, and his
advocacy of a candidate is accepted as practical
proof of his making a fine official, and as a usual
thing his election follows.
In his business operations Mr. Chauvin is a shrewd
aggressive man, whose reliability is unquestioned.
Having spent so many years at Butte he knows all
about realty and stocks, and his advice with refer-
ence to such matters is accepted as authoritative.
Mr. Chauvin is one of the oldest living members
of Butte Lodge, No. 240, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks, joining that order the year the
lodge was established at Butte. The Roman Catho-
lic Church has in him a devout member. Recog-
nizing the good work of the Young Men's Christian
Association, he has long been one of its members
and whenever a drive is on to secure funds for it,
Mr. Chauvin is always one of those making large
contributions and soliciting the same from others.
He also belongs to the Butte Business Men's Asso-
ciation, in which he is a forceful character, as he
is in another commercial organization known as the
Aero Club.
The children of Mr. Chauvin are as follows :
Charles Frederick, who is a resident of New York
City, New York, is secretary of the Hale Desk
Company, and he was graduated from the Hopkins
Institute of Burlington, Vermont; and Anna, an
adopted daughter. She married W. M. Jermain and
they live at Deer Lodge, Montana. Mr. Jermain
is a concrete contractor. They have one child,
Beulah, who married James Donnelly, a printer by
trade, and they live at Butte. Mr. and Mrs. Don-
nelly have a daughter, Dorothy, and on December
25, 1919, Mr. Chauvin had a little family gather-
ing at his home in Butte at which were pr'esent Mrs.
W. M. Jermain, her daughter, Mrs. James Donnelly
and her granddaughter. Dorothy Donnelly, and
grandson, Joseph G. Chauvin, four generations
thus being represented.
The Canadian element, not only the Scotch and
English, but the French, is strongly represented in
Montana and Mr. Chauvin at different times has
exercised his art and literary expression in the
characteristic dialect of old Quebec. The editor
takes the privilege of reproducing two examples of
his literary product, one entitled "The Wreck of
the Jule La Plant" and the other one of a series of
"Woodville Letters" which Mr. Chauvin contrib-
uted to a local publication and which entertained
a large group of readers.
'Twas one dark night on Lac Champlain,
De wind she blow, blow, blow.
When de crew of de skow Jule La Plant
Get scare and run below.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
103
For de wind she's blow like hurricane,
Bimeby she blow some more,
When de skow buss up on Lac Champlain
One half-mile from de shore.
De captain she's walk on de front deck,
She's walk on de hind deck, too ;
She's call de crew from up de hole,
She call de cook also.
De cook, his name was Rosa,
He's come from Montreal,
Was chamber-maid on a lumber barge
On dat big Lachine canal.
De wind she blow from nor, eass, wess,
De sou' wind she blow, too.
When Rosa say, 'Oh ! captain.
Whatever shall I do?'
De captain she's throw de hank.
But still dat skow she drift.
For de crew he can't pass on dat shore
Because he lose dat skiff.
De 'night was dark like one black cat,
De waves run high and fass,
W'hen de captain take poor Rosa
And lash her to de mass.
When the captain put on the life preserve
And he jump into de lac.
And say, 'Good-bye. my Rosa dear,
I go drown for your sack.'
Next morning very hearly.
About half-past two, three, four,
De captain, cook and wood skow
Lay corpses on dat shore.
For de wind she's blow like hurricane,
Pretty soon she blow some more.
For dat skow buss upon Lac Champlain,
One-half mile from de shore.
Moral :
Now all good wood-skow sailor mans.
Take warning by dat storm.
And go and marry one nice French girl.
And live on one good farm.
Den de wind may blow like hurricane.
And 'spose she's blow some more.
You shan't get drowned on Lac Champlain
So long you stay on shore.
The "Woodville Letter" is as follows:
Woodville. Mont., on ton de Montague Rocheus,
On de Hind Part of dis month:
My dear Chauvin :
I receive your hinvite to hattend ze grand cele-
bration to narade St. Jean Baptist de 24th June
on ton of Butte. But am feel so shame wid my
wife Julie for what she has been done, dat ham
hoblige to hask you to hexcuse me, and when am
fole you what she has been done, you will have
some compassion wid me.
Well, my dear Chauvin, my heart ees fill wid
sad tonite an eet give me much pain to wrote you
dis lettair, ef t'ing keep hon like dis, I'll be compel
to get divorce from my wife Julie.
My dear Chauvin. what you spose Julie been
done? You can't nevaire tink an eet make me
feel shame for him, to tole you de why she has
been bring disgrace on top my head.
The odder day I'll go on Pete Fontaines saloon
to see the boys. What you tink I'll fine dare?
Hexcuse me while I'll drop some tear. My wife
Julie was stan' up by de bar wid segar on his mout,
an schooner of beer on his hand, when Julie was
see me come een, he say to me, Pete, come have
someting on me, what you took, old boss?
Well, my dear Chauvin, when I'll seen that I'll
feel so much shame I'll try to crowl trough de knot
hole on top de floor, I can't move, an I can't say
someting, den Julie he say, what de troub' Pete,
dis de firs' time I been seen you refuse to took some-
ting, tint hevry day your wife hax you to drink
wid him, come took someting, Pete, am going 10
put some red paint on de town tonite, by gosh.
Whoop, I can lick hany son of a gun een Wood-
ville, wid one han' tie on my back. Am the stuiif
you bet. Have nudder on me boys, am got de long
green to pay for eet. All de bum on Woodville
was een de saloon and dey was all drink wid Julie.
Den what you suppose Julie done. His ax JocK-
pot Charlie for chew and heel bite off piece plug
tobac, and den he'll get down by card table and com-
mence to shuffle de cards, an ax Joe Shomway 10
play game stud poker wid him.
Am feel so shame for Julie dat I haint know what
to do, but I can't help hadmire de way he'll handle
dem cards, sometimes he'll hole four haces, some-
times five." by gosh, Joe was got skin hivry time.
Den Julie was walk up to de bar an call for
de drinks, she'll took cocktail an' lite fresh segar,
den he'll put his arm around ole John Tebo's neck,
and commence talk politic, an' discuss de League of
Nashun. Bemby' I'll go up to Julie an' I'll ax him
to come home wid me, an' what you spose he say?
Course I will Pete. Am got kine lonesome for
you, sometam, so I tought I'll go to de saloon
an got quaint wid you.
When we got home de baby was black on his
face wid cry, an' de dinner dish haint wash. Den
when am sure nobody see me I'll say Julie, dis ees
disgrace, you bought to be shame on yourself.
What for youil do all dat. .^m motion to broke
you back, an fore nudder day ees down on top
dis home I'll get divorce. When women ees got
so low down like dat, she haint got no respec for
himself 'tees time to disolve partnership an quit
beesness.
Am draw myself up an look just like mad, an
terreble as I can. but Julie haint got one bit scare.
He say, Pete, taint no worser for women to go
on top saloon an smoke an drink an play cards dan
for men to done dat, an am like to tole you right
here dat hevry time I'll see you go on Pete Fon-
taine's saloon. I'll go dare too.
When Julie hanswers me like dat, I cant say some-
ting. He look like he mean beesness, am like to
know where Julie been got such crazy notion on
top bees head, but Julie haint be on de saloon since,
an am been afraid to go dare myself.
Sometime when am tink about eet, am tink Julie
struck de whale on top de hed. What you tmk
about eet ?
Your Frem.
Jo. Tebo.
Bruce Anson Cumming. In the field of farm
loans and real estate, a line of business which de-
mands great ability and a comprehensive knowledge
of values, Bruce Anson Cumming has made a de-
cided success of his operations at Lewistown. He
has achieved an enviable positon in business circles,
not alone because of the brilliant success which he
104
HISTORY OF MONTANA
has achieved, but also on account of the honorable,,
straightforward business policy he has ever fol-
lowed. He possesses untiring energy, is quick of
perception, forms his plans readily and is deter-
mined in their execution, and his close application
to business and his excellent management have
brought to him the high degree of prosperity which
is today his. He has demonstrated in his career
the truth of the saying that success is not the re-
sult of genius, but the outcome of clear judgment
and experience.
Mr. Gumming was born on his father's farm in
Blue Earth County, Minnesota, September 24, 1879,
a son of William and Isabella A (Treanor) Gum-
ming, natives of Ganada. William Gumming was
born in 1834, and on first coming to the United
States as a young married man settled at Fond
du Lac, Wisconsin, but subsequently moved to
Minnesota, where he became a pioneer of Blue
Earth County. There he took up wild land, estab-
lished his home, and in time developed a substan-
tial and productive farm, upon which he died in
1909, at the age of seventy-five years, after having
completed a useful and honorable career. He was
first a whig and later a republican in politics, but
did not desire public office. Mrs. Gumming, who
was born in 1840. survives her husband and resides
on the old Minnesota homestead. Of the family
of four sons and three daughters, six children are
living. The parents were God-fearing people and
church members, and the children were reared to
lives of honesty and industry.
The fifth in order of birth of his parents' chil-
dren, Bruce Anson Gumming attended the public
schools of Blue Earth County, Minnesota, the Dixon
Business College and the Illinois Normal School,
and in igoi secured his first employment, as assist-
ant cashier of the First National IBank of Minne-
sota Lake, Minnesota. After about three and one-
half years in that capactiy he removed to Hope,
North Dakota, where he was bookkeeper for the
First National Bank of Hope, a position in which
he also had charge of the bank's general insur-
ance business. After about three years he went
to Blabon. North Dakota, and became cashier of
the Blabon State Bank. This position he also held
for about three years, but in the spring of 191 1
came to Lewistown, where he established himself
in the farm loans and real estate business, in which
he has since continued with much success. His
office is situated at No. 305 Montana Building.
Mr. Gumming is essentially a product of the grow-
ing, progressive Northwest, aggressive, enterpris-
ing and energetic, alive to the fast-appearing op-
portunities and strict in his conception of business
ethics and principles. He is a republican in his po-
litical adherence, and while residing at Blabon
served as school treasurer and township clerk. He
first became a member of Occidental Lodge No.
27, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Hope,
North Dakota, but after centering his activities at
Lewistown demitted and became a member of Lew-
istown Lodge No. 37. He belongs also to Lewis-
town Lodge No. 456 of the Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks.
On February 17, 1915, Mr. Gumming married Miss
Edna M. Woodrum, and to this union there have
been born two sons and one daughter : Mark Clin-
ton, Donald William and the infant daughter.
Warner L. Halgren. To be classed with the
dependable business men of a large city is no slight
honor, and such classification belongs to Warren
L. Halgren, manager for the Gamble Robinson
Company branch house at Billings, with which firm
he has been continuously identified for twenty-six
years. Beginning at the bottom of the ladder when
twelve years old, his successive promotions prove
the possession of those qualities which arouse re-
spect, esteem and confidence in employers. Mr.
Halgren came to Billings in 1913, but has been a
resident of Montana since 1909.
Warner L. Halgren was born at Watertown,
Minnesota, January 3, 1881, and is a son of Frank
L. and Carrie Belle (McKee) Halgren, the latter
of whom was born in 1863, at Watertown, Minne-
sota, and now resides at Los Angeles, California.
The father, Frank L. Halgren, was born in 1858,
on the Atlantic Ocean while his parents were com-
ing to America from Stockholm, Sweden. They
settled at Watertown, Minnesota, where he was
reared and educated, and where until 1891 he was a
schoolteacher. In that year he removed to Mont-
rose, Minnesota, where he was connected with the
postal service on the Great Northern Railway, and
died there. He was a republican in politics,
and for many years was a faithful member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. He belonged to the
Masonic fraternity. His three children all survive,
namely: Warner L. ; Forest G., who resides at Be-
midji, Minnesota, is manager for the Gamble-Rob-
inson Company at that point; and Josie, who re-
sides with her mother.
Warner L. Halgren attended the public schools
at Montrose and Minneapolis, and later took a
business course in the Metropolitan Commercial
College at Minneapolis. As early as 1893 he en-
tered the employ of the Gamble Robinson Com-
pany, working during vacations while attending
school at Minneapolis, starting with the laudable
ambition to be successful and has kept that end
in view during the succeeding years. Recognition
was given of his ability in 1901 when he was made
a traveling representative for this house, and for
eight years his territory was the State of Michigan.
In 1909 he was stationed at Miles City. Montana,
as manager of the Miles City branch of the busi-
ness, and continued there until 1913, when he came
to Billings to assume his present duties in a wider
field. The company has commodious offices at No.
2707 Minnesota Avenue. The territory under Mr.
Halgren's jurisdiction covers Northern Wyoming
and Eastern Montana, and he has fourteen em-
ployes under his supervision. The company handles
fruits and vegetables wholesale, and the Billings
branch, under Mr. Halgren, is in a very prosperous
condition.
In 1906, at Manistique, Michigan, Mr. Halgren
was married to Miss Elsie G. Brown, a daughter
of the late E. C. and Ida Brown, the former of
whom was a well known lumberman at Manistique.
Mrs. Halgren is a graduate of the Manistique High
School and the Ypsilanti Normal School. Mr. and
Mrs. Halgren have one son, Warner Brown, who
was born December 12, 1912. The family resides
at No. 335 Clark Avenue, Billings. In his political
affiliations Mr. Halgren has always been a republi-
can. He has been active in Masonry for many
years, and belongs to Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons; Billings Chapter No.
6, Royal Arch Masons; and Aldemar Commandery
No. 5, Knights Templar.
W. J. McMuLLEN was reared and educated at Deer
Lodge, and since early manhood has been connected
with local commercial affairs. He is now one of
the active partners in probably the leading drug
business at Deer Lodge.
He was born at Mineral Point. Wisconsin, Octo-
ber 23, 1887. The father M. McMullen was born
HISTORY OF MONTANA
105
in the same Wisconsin community in 1858, lived
there until after his marriage, was a farmer and in
1890 came to Deer Lodge and engaged in the hard-
ware business. However, his most successful efforts
were in mining operations. He died at Deer Lodge
in 1902. M. McMullen married Mary Bdwen, who
was born in England in i860 and died at Deer Lodge
June I, 1918.
VV. J. McMullen, only child of his parents, fin-
ished the junior year of the Powell County High
School and at the age of sixteen began doing for
himself. He gained a valuable business expeiiience
and training as clerk in the Cash grocery store until
1907. For a year he was with the City Mercantile
& Drug Company's store, and in 1908 opened a busi-
ness for himself as a druggist, the firm name being
Randall & McMullen. K. H. Wood bought the Ran-
dall interests in 1917 and the firm is now McMullen
& Wood. It is a growing business and they have
a high class clientele and a splendid stock of goods
and equipment in their store at 423 Main Street.
Mr. McMullen, who is unmarried is an independ-
ent republican in politics, is a member of Lodge
No. 14 Ancient Free and Accepted Masons at Deer
Lodge, \'alley Chapter No. 4 Royal Arch Masons,
Ivanhoe Commandery No. 16 Knight Templars,
Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Butte, and
Anaconda Lodge No. 239 Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks. Mr. McMullen owns a modern
home on Fifth Street in Deer Lodge.
Walter O. Downing, at the head of a prominent
real estate and insurance business at Lewistown, is
a man of interesting Montana experience, having
lived in the territory and state over thirty-five years.
He was born in Elizabethtown, Minnesota, March
14, 1875, a son of Christopher and Roseta (Els-
worth) Downing. His father, who was born at
Monroe, Michigan, in 1839, was a farmer, but left
his plow at the call of his country and enlisted in
Company A of the Fourth Michigan Infantry on
June 5, 1861. He went to the war for a three-year
term, but experienced such hardships that he was
granted an honorable discharge November 19, 1863,
at the General Hospital at Washington, District of
Columbia. He returned home with health broken,
but lived until 1876, his death being the direct re-
sult of his army service. He was a stanch republican
in politics. His wife was born May 17, 1853, at
St. Clair, .Michigan, and came to Montana with her
second husband, J. M. Weldon. By her marriage to
Christopher Downing she was the mother of two
children, Laura and Walter. The former is the wife
of Edward M. Nave, of Fergus County.
Walter O. Downing was seven years old when he
was brought to Montana by his mother and step-
father in 1882. They made the journey from
Harrisonville, Michigan, by railroad as far as Junc-
tion City, and thence overland by team and wagon
to Fort Maginnis, Montana. They located twelve
miles southeast of the present City of Lewistown,
then in Meagher County, now Fergus County. In
this frontier district Mr. Downing spent his boy-
hood and youth. His first schooling was at the hands
of a school teacher employed in the home of Mr.
Weldon. Later, with four other children, he was
taught in the home of a neighbor, and then attended
a log schoolhouse, the teacher being Miss Anna
M. Weidert, now the wife of George J. Wiedeman of
Lewistown. When thirteen years old Mr. Downing
went to work for a firm of carpenters and con-
tractors to learn the carpenter's trade. He also
cooked for the outfit to pay his board. During
winters he managed to get ip a term or two of
school. He also rode the range during the spring
and fall roundups, and while attending school he also
spent three months working for his board for the
late J. I. Corbley, county commissioner. He also
had some experience with the pioneer freighting
organization carrying goods between Billings, Fort
Benton, Great Falls and Lewistown.
It is evident that Mr. Downing even as a boy had
an object and an ambition. Though his earnings
were meager, he managed to save enough to pay for
a three-months term at the Agricultural College at
Bozeman. He remained in that college for two
years, working for his board at the college during
the last eighteen months. On leaving college with
an equipment of general and scientific training he re-
turned to the homestead and worked on the home
ranch as a farmer and stock man until 1912. In
that year he located in Lewistown and engaged in
the real estate, loan and insurance business, and
has since made the name Walter O. Downing Com-
pany one of especial prominence in its line.
Mr. Downing is a member of Lewistown Lodge
No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
and Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights of Pythias, and
in politics is a republican.
September 19, 1904, he married Katherine D. Wood,
of Auburn, Illinois. She died January 12, 1912, the
mother ■ of one daughter and two sons, named
Dorothy, Dell O. and Walter K. On November
22, 1916, Mr. Downing married Antoinette R. Vogt.
Marion E. Buck, general superintendent of the
Montana Power Company, was born at Danvers,
Illinois, on November 4, 1877, a son of Benjamin A.
Buck. The birth of Benjamin A. Buck took place
near Baltimore, Maryland, on November 12, 1844,
and he comes of a long line of upright ancestors,
all of whom were worthy descendants from the
founder of the family in the American colonies,
who came to this country from Holland in the
seventeenth century.
At the time the" original Buck reached Maryland
he with other pioneers had his choice of land, and
he took a pride in keeping it in the family, making
arrangements to have the title to it pass from
father to son without interruption until the gen-
eration to which Benjamin -A. Buck belonged, vvhen
changes in conditions made it expedient to dispose
of the homestead. When the family was first
founded in this country its members were Episco-
palians, but about the time of John Wesley's visit
to the colonies they embraced Methodism.
Students 'of biography are struck by the fact
that in nearly all old-established families appears
the tradition that when immigration was made here
from some of the countries of the old world three
brothers made the trip together, although often-
times they separated after their arrival. The Buck
family is no exception to this almost universal rule,
for in the old family Bible, which bears the date
of 1726, and on whose pages, brown with time and
soiled by the handlings of many generations, is
furnished proof of this tradition. One of these
brothers, was John Buck, born in 1693. John Buck
was, noted in his day as an extensive landed pro-
prietor, and he lived to the age of seventy-seven
years. His son was Benjamin Buck, born in Mary-
land, and his son, John Buck, was the grandfather
of Benjamin A. Buck. The birth of John Buck
took place in Maryland in 1767, and he died in 184O,
having been very prosperous and accumulating a
large amount of land, which was divided among
three sons, each one receiving sufficient to make
him independent, as did the one daughter of the
family.
Benjamin M. Buck, father of Benjamin A. Buck,
106
HISTORY OF MONTANA
was born in 1794 and died in 1877, both events tak-
ing place on the old homestead. All of his life
was spent upon this property until the outbreak of
the war between the states, when he left it for a
brief period. During that conflict he lost some of
his holdings, which were never recovered, and the
family fortunes, like those of so many others in
the South, were impoverished. In 1826 he was
married to Miss Sarah H. Hobby and they became
the parents of six children, namely: Catherine,
John S., W. H., Arabella. Benjamin A. and Sarah.
In political opinions he was a whig until the be-
ginning of the war, after which he affiliated with
the democratic party. A devout Methodist, he lived
up to the highest conceptions of his faith.
Benjamin A. Buck remained on the farm with
his father, who had been disabled by an accident,
until he was twenty-five years of age, first attend-
ing the common schools and later one of the high
schools of Baltimore, Maryland. In 1870 he came
to the West with his brother-in-law, H. M. Kennedy,
who owned a large tract of land in McLean Coun-
ty, Illinois, and remained with him for four years.
For a time subsequent to his leaving his brother-
in-law Mr. Buck clerked in a general store at
Danvers, and then for two years conducted a simi-
lar business of his own, also at Danvers.
In 1876 Benjamin A. Buck was married to Libby
A. Estes, a daughter of William and Amanda
(Goodrich) Estes, and soon thereafter moved to
Dwight, Illinois, in 1882. embarking in a hardware
business in that city and conducted it until he re-
tired in 1905, after a very successful and reputable
business career. Not only did he carry on his busi-
ness in an energetic and satisfactory manner, but
he gave an intelligent and effective support to civic
affairs, and was one of the valued members of the
Congregational Church. When he died at Dwight
in 1908 the whole community mourned his passing,
and Livingston County felt that it had lost one of
its most representative men. The children of Ben-
jamin A. Buck and his wife were as follows:
Marion E., who was the elder, and Agnes B., who
married H. B. Johnson, assistant electrical super-
intendent of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company
at Great Falls, Montana. Mrs. Benjamin A. Buck
survives her husband and makes her home with
her son.
After passing through the common schools at
Dwight, Illinois. Marion E. Buck became a student
of its high school and was graduated therefrom in
1892. He then entered the University (ff Illinois at
Urbana, Illinois, and completed the junior year in
1895. In that year he came to Colorado, and en-
tered as an apprentice the employ of the Telluride
Power Company at Telluride. For the first eighteen
months he and Ralph D. Mershon worked on a
special high tension investigation, the latter repre-
senting the Westinghouse Electrical Manufactur-
ing Company. The results of these months of in-
vestigation established the fundamental principles
for high tension transmission and methods of con-
struction in vogue today.
In the fall of 1897. after the completion of this
experimental work, Mr. Buck was called to Provo,
Utah, and constructed the first 40,000 volt trans-
mission line in the United States, for the Telluride
Power Company. Two years later Mr. Buck came
to Montana for L. L. Numm then general mana-
ger of the Telluride Power Company, who had asso-
ciated himself with John F. Cowan in Butte in a
water power development on the Madison River.
Still later a company was incorporated under the
name of The Power Company, and Mr. Buck was
a member of its executive construction staff. The
first development work on the Madison River was
done in 1900, and during the building of it Mr.
Buck took an active part, and the company was
enabled to commence serving power to Butte 'in-
dustries through a connection with the Butte Elec-
tric & Power Company. Mr. Buck was operating
engineer for The Power Company until 1905, when
the property was purchased by the Butte Electric
&■ Power Company, and he was retained by the pur-
chasers as operating engineer and superintendent
of construction.
From 1905 until 1908 Mr. Buck carried out the
reconstruction of the dam on the Madison River
and built the No. 2 development. In 1910 he came
to Butte to take charge of the operations of the
then enlarging system of the Montana Power Com-
pany, under M. Hebgen, general manager, and F.
M. Kerr, general superintendent. During the lat-
ter part of 1914 Mr. Buck began the construction
of the electrification of the Chicago, Milwaukee
& St. Paul Railroad, and was engaged in this work
continuously until May i, 1917, during which period
he completed and put into operation this 440 mile
section from Harlowtown, Montana, to Avery,
Idaho. The appreciation of Mr. Buck's services
by his company was genuine, as was shown by his
appointment in October, 1915, as general superin-
tendent of the Montana Power Company, together
with subsidiary companies, which very responsible
position he still holds, discharging its onerous re-
sponsibilities with dignified capability. The offices
are located in the Montana Power Building, at No.
40 East Broadway.
Like his ancestors before him Mr. Buck is a
democrat, and stanch in his support of his party, but
has never cared to go before the public for sup-
port for an office. He belongs to Virginia City
Lodge No. 390, Benevolent and Protective Order
Elks, which he joined in 1902; the Silver Bow
Club ; and the Montana Society of Engineers. He
maintains his residence at No. 1156 West Platinum
Street.
In 1899 Mr. Buck was married at McAllister,
Montana, to Miss Gertrude L. Bronner, a daughter
of S. M. and Catherine Bronner, the latter of whom
is deceased. The former is still living and makes
his home at Pokagon, Michigan, being now a retired
farmer. Mrs. Buck attended the Montana State
College at Bozeman, specializing in the domestic
science branch, and is a skilled housekeeper and
efficient homemaker, as well as a cultured lady.
Mr. and Mrs. Buck became the parents of the
following children : Dorothy Alice, who was born
June 10, 1900, was graduated from the Butte High
School in 1918, and is now attending Reed Col-
lege at Portland, Oregon ; and Edwin R., who vj-as
born August 18, 1903, is attending the Butte High
School.
Ruth SHERinAN. The Sheridan family have
been influential people at Big Timber for twenty
years. The late John E. Sheridan was a widely
known Montana newspaper man, who came to the
Northwest while in the service of the regular army
of the United States. Two of his sons served with
honor and credit in the World war. Several other
of the children have made for themselves posi-
tions of usefulness in their respective communi-
.ties. His daughter Ruth is now county clerk and
recorder of Sweetgrass County and has shown ex-
ceptional ability in handling the affairs of that office.
John E. Sheridan was born at Portland, Maine,
in 1861. of ancestors who came from Ireland and
settled in Maine in colonial times. He grew up
in Portland, learned the printer's trade, and in
HISTORY OF MONTANA
107
the regular service of the United States army came
to Montana in 1888 and was stationed at Fort
Assiniboine. He also lived for a time at Barker
in Cascade County, and going to Belt he founded
the Belt Valley Times, which he edited until 1899.
In that year he founded the Big Timber Pioneer
and made of that one of the most influential papers
in Southern Montana. It is republican in politics
and enjoys a large circulation in Sweetgrass and
surroundmg counties. John E. Sheridan died at
Big Timber in 1906. He was a republican in poli-
tics and a member of the Catholic Church. At
Helena, Montana, he married Miss Augusta Roth,
who was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, and is now
living at Big Timber.
Miss Ruth Sheridan, the third of their children,
was born at Belt, Montana, and was educated in
the public schools of Big Timber. She completed
her junior year in high school and has become
widely known in the town and surrounding coun-
try. For a time she was employed in the Big Tim-
ber postoffice and in 1918 was appointed deputy
county clerk. In the fall of that year her name
appeared as candidate on the republican ticket for
county clerk and recorder and January 6, 1919, she
began a term of two years in that office. Miss
Sheridan is a Catholic and active in the republican
party.
Her oldest brother, Albert, enlisted in April, 1918,
and was sent overseas in June and was with the
Expeditionary Forces in France. Her younger broth-
er, Philip, fifth in age among the children, enlisted
in October, 1917, and was with the American forces
sent to Siberia, going overseas in July, 1918. The
second of the family is Mary Sheridan, who is a
graduate of the Big Timber High School, attended
summer normal school at Dillion several terms,
and is a teacher at Lehigh. The next younger than
Ruth Sheridan is Rachel, who is a graduate of the
Big Timber High School, attended the Rassuss-
man Business College at St. Paul, Minnesota, and
is employed as a stenographer at Big Timber.
Esther, sixth in the family, is a junior in the Big
Timber High School, while Leah is in the sopho-
more year and Naomi, the youngest, is in gram-
mar school.
Noble M. Walker is president and general man-
ager of the Judith Hardware Company at Lewis-
town, a business whose service he entered as a
clerk less than twenty years ago. He is a native
Montanan, and is a member of a family around
which revolve many of the most interesting and
important associations of the pioneer as well as
the modern history of the state.
Pioneering has been a characteristic of the Walker
family for several generations. The Walkers are
of Scotch-Irish origin, one ancestor coming to this
country from Ireland and his wife from Scotland.
Their home was in Virginia, and they followed
Daniel Boone into the bloody ground of Kentucky.
David Walker, grandfather of the Lewistown mer-
chant, was born in Adair County, Kentucky, July
10, 1802, He grew up and married there, and in
1827 settled in Sangamon County, Illinois, where
he was one of the first farmers to break the soil
of the corn belt. In 1835 he joined the tide of
emigration to the Territory of Iowa, locating near
West Point in Lee County, long before there was
a town of that name. At West Point he spent the
rest of his years, a successful farmer, a citizen of
much public spirit, and was responsible for much
of the early religious influences of his commu-
nity. He was a charter member of the first Pres-
byterian Church organized in the Territory of
Iowa, and was a member of it until his death, which
occurred at West Point, September i, 1876. He was
a ruling elder in his church for twenty-five years.
David Walker was the father of several well known
citizens of Montana, including the late J. C. Walker,
A. M. Walker, H. L. Walker, and also two daugh-
ters, Mrs. William Hardenbrook and Mrs. John E.
Pyle.
Joseph C. Walker, father of Noble M. Walker,
was born at Springfield, Illinois, March 30, 1830,
and died at Lewistown, June 8, 1908, in his seventy- L,
ninth year. When he was five years old his par- ^
ents moved to West Point, Iowa, where he grew
up. He served with the Union army during the
winter of 1862-63, being at Corinth, Mississippi.
He then returned to Iowa, and at West Point in
April, 1863, married Miss Ruby A. Mason. She
was born in Ohio and was taken as a child to
Iowa by her parents. Two hours after their mar-
riage Joseph C. Walker started overland, accom-
panied by his bother, Alexander M. Walker, and
Dr. Allen Hardenbrook, bound for California.
They had wagons drawn by ox teams. At Denver
the news reached them of gold discoveries in Mon-
tana, and Joseph C. Walker and three companions
sold their outfit and mule teams and traveled to
Montana, reaching Alder Gulch, June 9, 1863. The
Walker brothers had some experience in mining
in Alder Gulch, not without profit, but soon bought
a sawmill and became pioneer lumber manufac-
turers. In December, 1864, they sold their mill
and all returned by stage coach, to Atchison, Kan-
sas, which was then the nearest railway point, the
trip requiring thirty days. From Atchison, Joseph
C. Walker took his gold to the United States mint
at Philadelphia and received a statement dated
January 21, 1865, apprising him that the bullion
value of his shipment was $8,903.89. Joseph C.
Walker and his brother acquired an outfit of
wagons and teams and in the spring of 1865 re-
turned to the West, after four months of travel
reaching the present site of Deer Lodge. Mrs.
Walker accompanied him on this return trip. Soon
afterward they settled at Helena, which was then
only a placer mining camp, and there again engaged
in the sawmill business. Besides lumbering they
also operated freighting outfits between Montana
points and Nevada. In 1874 Joseph C. Walker
was elected a member of the Territorial Legisla-
ture from Lewis and Clark county, and served
as sheriff of that county for three years. In August,
1883, he moved with his family to Fergus County
and engaged in ranching and stock growing. Sev-
eral years before his death he sold his ranch and
moved to the City of Lewistown. At the time of
his death he was vice president of the Montana
Pioneers Society. He and his wife had three chil-
dren, Maggie Montana, Noble M. and Joseph A.
Among the many tributes paid to this noble Mon-
tana pioneer the following editorial is exception-
ally worthy of quotation : "The man who lives an
upright and noble life, who has made trails into
a new country in order that others may come, and
who lays out his course in such a way that friends
may follow in his footsteps with assurances that
they are traveling the right road, who commands
the respect of every acquaintance — he is a man
whose name takes a prominent place in history.
Such a man was J. C. Walker of Lewistown, a
brother of A. M. Walker of Anaconda. A pioneer
of Alder Gulch, a member of the Territorial Legis-
lature, sheriff of Lewis and Clark county, in the
'70s, a prominent ranch and cattle owner, J. C.
Walker made for himself a name of which any
man should be proud. Montana's band of sturdy
108
HISTORY OF MONTANA
trail blazers is being decimated, and within a few
years more all of their names will be enrolled upon
the history of the state as the argonauts who have
done a glorious service to humanity and have passed
to the other shore."
Noble M. Walker was born August 20, 1872,
while his parents • were living at Helena, Montana.
When he was a few months old, in 1873, his mother
took him on a long stage journey of 600 miles
from Helena to Corinne, Utah. During the summer
of 1880 he and his mother left Helena by stage
for Fort Benton, going down the river by boat and
making a river journey to Bismarck. When Mr.
Walker was eight years old his parents moved to
Wisconsin, and the education begun at Helena was
continued in the p^ublic schools of Eau Claire. After
two years his parents returned to Butte, where he
attended public schools. In 1883, when eleven years
old, he earned his first money as a messenger boy
for the United States Telegraph Company at Fort
Benton. In the fall of 1883 he removed to Judith
Basin with his parents, and became actively associ-
ated with his father on the ranch as a cowboy.
He rode the range for his father and for other
outfits altogether for twelve years. After his father
closed out the cattle business he continued a sheep
raiser for about three years, and in 1903 he re-
moved to Lewistown and went to work as a clerk
for the Montana Hardware Company. After three
years with that firm he then became a life insur-
ance salesman and in 1905 entered the service of
the Judith Hardware Company, rapidly going
through successive promotions from clerk until he
was elected general manager in 1912, and president
and general manager in 1916. The Judith Hard-
ware Company is one of the largest firms of its
kind in the Judith Basin, and much of its growth
and prosperity in recent years can be directly credited
to Mr. Walker's genius as a merchant.
He has also been active in local affairs, serving
as alderman from the third ward by election in
1917, and in 1918 was elected president of the Lewis-
town Chamber of Commerce. He served as a
member of the War Industry Board and secre-
tary of the Community Labor Board and is a mem-
ber of the School Board of District No. 1. Mr.
Walker is a republican in politics, is affiliated with
Lewistown Lodge No. 4S6 of the Elks, Judith Lodge
No. T, of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows,
and Big Spring Camp No. 108 of the Woodmen
of the World. He and his wife are very fond
of music and share many other interests in com-
mon.
August 26, 1898, Mr. Walker married Miss Jen-
nie M. Harwood. She was born at Morton, Min-
nesota, a daughter of John and Evelyn (Dodge)
Harwood, and was the seventh of their ten chil-
dren. Her father later became a prominent rancher
in Fergus County. Mr. and Mrs. Walker have
three children. Joseph Albert, born September 2,
1899, graduated from the Fergus County High
School in 1918. and on October 9th of the same
year was enrolled as a member of the Student
Army Training Corps at the University of Mon-
tana. He received his honorable discharge De-
cember 18, 1918. Judith Adelaide, the second child,
was born April 20, 1901, and was a graduate of
the Fergus County High School. The youngest
child is Marjorie Evelyn, born February 4, 1908.
Robert H. W.'^tson is a man of wide e.xperience
and varied business interests and is connected with
several enterprises of Hall, including the operation
of a large real estate service. He was born at Nash-
ville, Tennessee, April 20, 1879, a son of Joseph
W. Watson. The Watson family was established
in the United States by the grandfather of Robert
H. Watson, who came to this country from Scot-
land. Joseph W. Watson was born in Kentucky
in 1828, and died at Wichita Falls. Texas, in 1907.
Reared in Kentucky, Joseph W. Watson left his
native state after reaching maturity and went to the
vicinity of Booneville, where he was engaged in
farming until after the close of the war between
the North and South, during which conflict he
espoused the side of the latter section and served
in the Confederate army under General Price, being
wounded in the right hand. Upon his return' home
from the war, he went into Indian Territory and
was engaged in ranching near Ryan until 1907,' when
he retired to Wichita Falls. His political beliefs
made him a democrat, and he was strong in his sup-
port of the principles of that party. In the Baptist
Church he found the expression of his religious
faith and he gave that denomination a hearty and
loyal support. Mr. Watson is survived by his widow
who lives at Enid, Oklahoma. She bore the maiden
name of Sarah E. Patterson, and was born near
Booneville, Missouri. Their children were as fol-
lows : John, who is in the harness business at Rush
Springs, Oklahoma ; Sarah, who married Robert
Green, resides at San Marcus, Texas, where Mr.
Green is engaged in ranching; Mary, who died at
the age of six years; J. H., who is in a real estate
business at Dallas, Texas; Elizabeth, who married
Oliver Greathouse, now serving as sheriff of a
Texan County; Mary, who married Jefferson
Thomas, a railroad man, lives in Missouri; George
W., who is a mechanic of Amarillo, Texas ; James,
who lives near Ryan, Oklahoma ; Robert H., whose
name heads this review; Lucy, who died in 1900;
Fannie, who married Tom Johnson a rancher in the
neighborhood of Enid, Oklahoma ; and Alice who
died in Oklahoma when thirty-five years old.
Robert H. Watson attended the public schools of
Indian Territory and Kansas, and lived at home
until he was seventeen years old. He then went to
Medicine .Lodge, Kansas, where he worked as a
cowboy, and was employed as such at Kiowa and
Coldwater, Kansas. With the outbreak of the
Spanish-American war, he served his country as a
soldier, and then in January, 1899, enlisted for serv-
ice in the Philippines to which he was sent, and
where he remained for three years and eight months,
during that period taking part in fifteen expeditions.
He was acting quartermaster sergeant in the
mounted constabulary scouts. Returning to this
country in IQ02, he was mustered out of the service
at San Francisco, California, from whence he re-
turned to Kansas and for the subsequent two years
was in a restaurant business at Wichita, and Ray-
mond, Washington, remaining in the latter city until
he came to Hall, Montana. Since locating here he
has invested quite heavily in local enterprises and
is owner of a barber shop, ice cream and confec-
tionery parlor, pool hall and telephone exchange,
and conducts the leading real estate business of this
section. :Mr. Watson is one of the live business men.
of Granite County, and whatever he undertakes he
carries through to a successful completion. The
republican party has in him one of its most force-
ful exponents. Fraternally Mr. Watson belongs to
Raymond Lodge, Loyal Order of Moose of Ray-
mond, Washington; Raymond Aerie No. 1631,
Fraternal Order of Eagles of Raymond. Washing-
ton, and still retains his interests in these organ-
izations. In addition to his interests at Hall, Mr.
Watson is a stockholder of the Drummond Light &
Power Company.
In 191 1 Mr. Watson was united in marriage with
ADoLI'llUS L),
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Miss Alma Hanley at Raymond, Washington. She
fs a daughter of W. J. and Mary (Campbell) Han-
ley. Mr. Hanley and his family reside at Hall
where he is conducting a garage. Mr. and Mrs.
Watson became the parents of the following chil-
dren: Lucy Belle born in 1912; Henry Jackson,
who was born in 1913; James Robert, who was born
in 1915; Bessie, who was born in 1917; and Jane,
who was born in 1919.
Otto K. Myers, who was brought to Montana
when a child by his parents, grew up on a ranch,
but for many years has been a successful business
man at Lewistown.
He was born at Midland, Ontario, December i,
1881, a son of Adolphus D. and Delia May (Davis)
Myers. His father was born in Buffalo, New York,
in 1834, while his mother, who is still living, is a
native of Canada. Adolphus Myers was a car-
penter by trade, was in the merchandise business
in Canada for several years, and in 1889 brought his
family to Montana. He entered a homestead ten
miles south of Great Falls and engaged in general
farming. The old homestead among other features
had a very fine spring of water. He later sold the
ranch and was employed at his trade for five or six
years with the B. M. Smelting Company at Great
Falls. Then for two or three years he was solicitor
for the Great Falls Tribune and in 1905 came to
Lewistown and took up the manufacture of soda
water and soft drinks. Later he built a fine plant,
and operated it very successfully until his death,
which occurred September 10, 1918. He was candi-
date for mayor of Lewistown in May, 1913, against
W. D. Symmes. In politics he was a socialist and
was a member of Lewistown Lodge No. zy. Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and a Woodmen of the
World.
Otto K. Myers, only child of his parents, was eight
years old when brought to Montana, and he acquired
his education in the public schools of Great Falls.
He also worked on the ranch of his father and at
one time had a thrilling experience when he and a
boy companion got in the way of a stampede of
about 1,000 head of cattle. They ran for about
three miles before they met his father and other
men, who by shooting into the on-coming herd
turned their course and saved the lives of the
boys. Mr. Myers on leaving the ranch went to work
for a soda water company at Great Falls, learning
the business, and in 1905 he used his experience
jointly with his father's capital in the soft drink in-
dustry, and since his father's death has been owner
and proprietor of what is one of the flourishing
business enterprises of Lewistown.
Mr.' Myers is independent in politics, voting for
the best man, and is a member of the Modern
Woodmen of America. On June 9, 1913. he married
Florence Connolly. She was born in Traverse City,
Michigan. They have one daughter, Arelene,
Charles H. Lane. In a city of the importance of
Butte almost every line of endeavor is well repre-
sented, this region offering an unsurpassed field for
the abilities of some of the most enterprising busi-
ness men of the country. One of them who is
attaining to a gratifying prosperity here is Charles
H. Lane, manufacturers agent. He was born at
Natick, Massachusetts, on May 13, 1854, a son of
John Edward Lane, an Englishman, born in 1801,
who died at Natick, Massachusetts, in 1861. He
founded the family in the United States, becoming
a sea captain and sailing out of Boston, Massa-
chusetts, across the ocean and carrying on trading
in almost every port of the world. After the
organization of the republican party, he voted its
ticket. His marriage occurred at Portsmouth, New
Hampshire, when he was united with Mary Jane
La Coste, born in New Hampshire in 1804. She
died at Natick, Massachusetts, in 1884, having
borne her husband the following children : Anria,
Mary, Victoria, Louise, Josephine, John Edwin.
William and Isabelle all of whom are deceased ;
Susan, who resides at Brooklyn, New York, is the
widow of H. O. Daniels, who was a shoe manu-
facturer, and she now conducts a large custom shoe
repairing shop of New York City and gives ern-
ployment to eleven persons ; and Charles H., who is
the youngest of the family.
Charles H. Lane was educated in the public
schools of Natick, Massachusetts, and was gradu-
ated from its high school cou'se in 1870. He be-
gan his business career as a clerk for a Natick
drug store and remained with it for eleven years.
In 1880 Mr. Lane came to the West, and for six
years was engaged in the sheep industry in Wyom-
ing. He then engaged with Beckwith, Quinn &
Company, general merchants of Carbon, Wyoming,
and remained with them until 1889. In that year
he came to Butte, Montana, to become secretary of
the W. R. Kenyon Hardware Company, now the
Montana Hardware Company, and held that office
for three years, when he became cashier of the
Miller, Chapman & Castle Hardware Company. A
year later he became cashier for the Tuttle Manu-
facturing Company, leaving it in 1897 to assist in
organizing the Harrison-Lane Compan}^ dealers in
coal and mining supplies at wholesale. At the ex-
piration of a year Mr. Lane sold his interests in
this concern and established himself as sales agent,
and for twenty-one years has represented the Ameri-
can Steel & Wire Company and other corporations
as a manufacturers agent, and he also is a whole-
sale dealer in coal, his offices being at No. lOi
Lewisohm Block. Butte. He covers the whole state
of Montana, visiting jobbers only.
A very prominent man and a leader in the local
democratic party. Mr. Lane served as mayor of
Butte from 1915 to 1917. and gave the city a sound
and businesslike administration, and he has also
been a member of the school board for eight years.
Both as a member and trustee of the Presbyterian
Church, Mr. Lane is valued by his associates in
religious endeavor. He belongs to Summit Valley
Lodge, Ancient Free and .Accepted Masons ; Parker
Chapter, Royal Arch Masons and Natick Com-
mandery, Knights Templar, the first of Butte and
the last two of Natick. Massachusetts ; of Butte
Council No. 106. United Commercial Travelers of
America; the Rotary Club of Butte; and joined the
Silver Bow Club in 1890. Recognizing the value to
the community of the Young Men's Christian Asso-
ciation, Mr. Lane is a member of the Butte branch
and is serving it as a director.
In 1887 Mr. Lane was married at Belvidere.
Illinois, to Miss Eliza Tompkins, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Newell C. Tompkins, the former of
whom was a retired prospector who died at Butte,
Montana, in 191 1, having been associated with the
Strang Company of Omaha. Nebraska, and Walker
Brothers of Salt Lake City, Utah, together with the
latter gentlemen opening a bank in that city dur-
ing its pioneer days, which was housed in a tent.
Mrs. Tompkins is also deceased. _ Mrs, Lane was
educated in the girls seminarv at Knoxville. Illinois.
The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Lane have been
as follows: Roger O.. who was born on November
23, 1888. is cashier in the pay office of the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company, and a graduate of Lake
Forest University of Illinois, with the aegree of
110
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Bachelor of Arts ; Anna Isabelle, who was born May
2, 1897, is at home; and Helen Elizabeth, who was
born September 23, 1899, is also at home. The latter
attended Ferry Hall Academy. Lake Forest. Illinois.
The family residence at No. 2744 Edward Street is
owned by Mr. Lane and he also owns a double
dwelling on North Christopher Street. A man of
capabilities and broad vision, he has been able to
look into the future and see possibilities not visible
to the ordinary man, and has possessed the courage
to take advantage of opportunities as they came to
his hand. His success is his own creation, and it
is not confined to business circles, for he has at-
tained to prominence both politically and socially.
Albert LeRoy Phillips came to Montana with
a thorough practical knowledge of the pharmacy
and drug business, and since 1912 has been the
leading business man of that class in Big Timber.
He was born on a farm in Sullivan County, Mis-
souri, March 15, 1880. His paternal ancestry came
originally from Wales and settled in Massachusetts.
However, his grandfather. Brice Phillips, was
born in Pennsylvania on December 16, 1821, and
about 1866 left his farm near Waynesburg in that
state and moved to Eastern Illinois, and a few
years later went to Sullivan County, Missouri,
where he died in 1806. Elias Phillips, father of
Albert L., was born in Pennsylvania in 1850, and
was sixteen years old when his parents moved to
Eastern Illinois, near Laharpe, and was still a youth
when he went with them to Sullivan County, Mis-
souri. He became a farmer in Sullivan County
and vigorously prosecuted his interests as a grain
and livestock raiser and is still a factor in that
promising agricultural district of Missouri. He is
a democrat in politics and is an active supporter
of the Church of God. He married Mary Isabel
Rowland, who was born in Elbridge. Illinois, in
1853. Chloey E.. the oldest of their children, is the
wife of James Scott, a farmer near Yukon. Okla-
homa; Albert L. is the second in age; Ira R. is a
farmer in Sullivan County; Kenney is also a farmer
in that county ; and Eva May is the wife of Albert
Shaver, a farmer in Sullivan County.
Albert L. Phillips lived on the farm and ac-
quired a rural school education, and in 1898 grad-
uated from the Green City High School. He early
determined that his career should not be that of a
farmer. In 1902 he graduated from the State Nor-
mal School at Kirksville, Missouri, and for two
years taught in his native county. At Green City
he acquired his first experience in the drug and
jewelry business, where he remained two years,
then worked in similar lines at Gait, Missouri, one
year, and three years at Fairfax, Missouri. With
this education and equipment he came to Montana
in 1910, and became proprietor of the Melville
Drug and Jewelry Company at Melville. His part-
ner there was H. P. Nelson. In 1912 he formed a
partnership with W. D. Richards under the name
Richards & Company, and established his present
business at Big Timber. In 191S he became sole
proprietor, and has given Big Timber a model es-
tablishment as a drug store, one of the best stocked
and managed stores of the kind in Sweetgrass
County. Mr. Phillips lives over his store.
He is a republican in politics, and is afliliated
with Doric Lodge. Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, at Big Timber, Big Timber Lodge No. 25,
Knights of Pythias, is a member of Green City
Camp No. 2656, Modern Woodmen of America,
and is a member of Big Timber Chamber of Com-
merce and the Sweetgrass County Good Roads Asso-
ciation.
Emil O. Kindschy. The deft manipulation of the
chisel has at all times commanded a liberal share
of wonder and admiration ; it has preserved to the
human race the beauty of antiquity, has marked
the final resting-place of our dearest and most be-
loved friends, and has made the home of their
mortal remains a garden of art and loveliness; it
has also contributed largely to the beautifying of
our cities, the adornment of our public parks, and
to the perpetuating of the memory of the great and
good. Among the men of Montana who are identi-
fied with this line of work as proprietors of monu-
ment establishments, one who has been particularly
successful is Emil O. Kindschy, of Lewistown, who
has likewise been prominent in civic affairs.
Mr. Kindschy was born on a farm in Montana
Township, Buffalo County, Wisconsin, June I,
1881, a son of Christ and Margaret (von Wald)
Kindschy, natives of Switzerland. Christ Kindschy
was born in 1836 and was nine years of age when
he accompanied his parents to the United States,
the family settling in 1845 in Sauk County, Wis-
consin. After coming to this country he was able
to secure only three months of schooling, but as
a man of natural intelligence and quick perception
acquired a practical knowledge of matters of im-
portance and moment which made up for his lack
of a technical education. When a young man he
went to Buffalo County, Wisconsin, where he se-
cured a homestead in the wilderness and hewed
himself a home out of the virgin forests, and in
his latter years was engaged largely in diary farm-
ing, with a prosperous business. He was one of
the prominent and influential men of his commu-
nity and served in various township offices, in-
cluding those of chairman and treasurer, in addi-
tion to being active in assisting in the advancement
and progress of his county and state. His death
occurred in 1912, when he had reached the age
of seventy-six years, while Mrs. Kindschy, to whom
he was married at Fountain City, Wisconsin, passed
away in 1888, at the age of forty-four years. Of
their seven children Emil O. was the sixth in order
of birth, and five still survive.
Emil O. Kindschy divided his boyhood between
working on the home farm during the sumirier
months and attending the district schools in the
winter terms in Buffalo County, and when he en-
tered upon his career it was in the role of school-
teacher. He was but si.xteen years of age when
he took his first class in his home community in
Buffalo County, Wisconsin, but the youthful in-
structor proved proficient and capable of securing
results, and for four years he was retained in the
same capacity. In l-goi he came to Montana, ar-
riving at Lewistown in February, and shortly there-
after secured a position teaching in the public
schools of Fergus County. After four years thus
passed he turned his attention to other pursuits
and until 1910 was occupied in connection with
employment in the ranch business, cattle raising
and farming. He then spent a year in visiting his
father and other relatives in Wisconsin, but in 191 1
returned to Lewistown, where he entered the em-
ploy of Abel Brothers, with whom he continued
something under three years. In 1913 he embarked
in the monument business, and now has a modern
establishment at No. 123 East Maine Street, where
he has the most up-to-date equipment to be se-
cured. He uses only the best of materials, and, as
a natural artist, his love for the picturesque and
beautiful asserts itself in every detail of his busi-
ness.
Mr. Kindschy was married April 25, 1905, to Miss
Ursula Camastral, who was born in Switzerland
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and was eleven years of age when brought to the
United States by her parents. Three children have
been born to this union: Lillian, Ruby and Doris.
In his political views Mr. Kindschy is a republi-
can. He has been active in local affairs, and in the
capacity of alderman of the first ward, to which
position he was elected in the spring of 1916, worked
effectively and constructively in behalf of the in-
terests of his city and his constituency. Fraternally
he is affiliated with Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights
of Pythias, and the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows, and he and Mrs. Kindschy belong to Anchor
Rebekah Lodge No. 55.
Frank M. Morse. Within the past couple of
years real Americans liave found that they possess
a priceless heritage in a line of honorable ancestry
dating back to the colonial days of this country,
and they realize that some record of their family
ought to be put in shape for preservation for their
children. Money cannot buy this distinction; it out-
weighs wealth and high social position, and with it
comes as a natural result, an earnest striving on
the part of this and future generations, to live up
to the standards of those who helped to make this
country what it is today, the greatest on earth. One
of these one hundred per cent Americans who are
living in Montana, is Frank M. Morse, postmaster
of Hall, who is one of the prosperous business men
of Granite County.
Frank M. Morse was born at Drummond, Mon-
tana, October 8, 1886. a son of F. D. Morse, and
grandson of Maj. John W. Morse. Major Morse
was borne in Maine, where his ancestors settled
prior to the American Revolution, coming to this
country from England. The date of his birth was
1834, and of his death, 1908, he passing away at
Philipsburg, Montana. He came to Philipsburg at
a very early day, and for years conducted a feed
store here. At the time he selected this city for
his permanent home, it was a pioneer settlement,
and Major Morse did much to insure its future,
both as an official and private citizen. A man of
more than average ability and education, he was
called upon to functionate as incumbent of practic-
ally all of the local offices, and as a non-official ad-
visor on matters of civic importance.
F. D. Morse, father of Frank M. Morse, was born
at Bangor, Maine, in 1834, and now lives at Drum-
mond, Montana. Coming to Montana in the early
'70s, he was engaged for a time in mining at Bear
Gulch, but later nomesteaded 160 acres of land in
the vicinity of Drummond, to which he has since
added until he now owns 1,600 acres of land and
devotes it to hay, grain and cattle raising, his prop-
erty being a very valuable one. His operations are
carried on upon an extensive scale, and he has been
very successful in his calling. A republican of_ the
old school he has always supported the principles
of his party, and served as deputy sheriff of Granite
County for eight years and as sheriff for two years.
His wife, who bore the maiden name of Julia Gas-
per, was born at Surry, Maine, in 1861. Their chil-
dren are as follows: Verdine B., and Frank M.
Verdine B. was born August 23, 1884, and after
attending the Drummond schools, was graduated
from the Garden City Business College of Missoula,
Montana. He then was engaged in farming until
1916, when he entered into partnership in a mer-
cantile venture with his brother at Hall, Montana.
Like his father he is a republican. Verdine B. Morse
was married to Wanda E. Burt, a daughter of
Charles E. and Rosa (Healy) Burt, the former of
whom is now deceased, having been a pioneer livery-
man of Drummond. Montana, but the latter sur-
voi. n— 8
vives and lives at Drummond. Mr. and Mrs. Ver-
dine B. Morse have the following children: Fran-
ces, Edwin, Muriel and Reuel.
Frank M. Morse was reared on his father's farm
until he was sixteen years of age, and during that
period attended the public schools of Drummond.
For the first five years following the completion of
his sixteenth year, Frank M. Morse was in the
employ of J. B. Featherman, a merchant of Drum-
mond, and then for two years he was with Duncan
Dingwall, another merchant of Drummond. In the
meanwhile, desiring to learn something of the theory
of business methods as well as their practical ap-
plication, the ambitious youth took a correspondence
course in this branch of learning, and then, feeling
qualified for independent action, formed a partner-
ship with his cousin, A. P. Morse, a son of Col.
G. W. Morse, a pioneer of Montana, and the two
young men carried on a mercantile business together
for eighteen months at Drummond, and then, in
1913 moved to Hall, Montana, and bought the small
store, 20 by 25 feet, owned by Albert Tinklepaugh.
From the time Mr. Morse took over this business,
the trade improved and some time ago it was neces-
sary for him to seek larger quarters, and now he
and his brother occupy a modern store, 90 by 20
feet, with full basement, and have three warehouses
for the storing of their stock. The store is located
near the depot, and the brothers keep at least
$14,000 worth of stock on hand. Although Mr.
Morse is a republican, his fitness for the office of
postmaster was so universally recognized, that he
was appointed by President Wilson on March 9,
191S, to this office, and has held it ever since. In
addition to his other interests, Mr. Morse owns a
dwelling at Drummond.
On June 10, 1908, Mr. Morse was married to Miss
Anabelle McDonald, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Jonas D. McDonald, both of whom were killed in
the wreck of the Coeur d' Alene in 1909. Mr.
McDonald was pumpman for the Missouri Pacific
Railroad at Drummond for ten years prior to his
tragic death. Mr. and Mrs. Morse became the
parents of the following children : Donald, who
was born December 25, 1909; Nevin, who was born
March 17, 1911; Julia Irene, who was born in igi2;
Fern, who was born in 1915; Carrol, who was born
in 1917; and Edith, who was born in 1918.
Mr. Morse is a splendid business man and under-
stands his trade and how to meet its demands. Dur-
ing the difficult days of the war and the reconstruc-
tion period he has lived up to government require-
ments, and made many sacrifices in order to meet
thim and at the same time protect his customers
from excessive prices and unnatural shortage of
commodities, and is certain to reap a well-merited
reward in the future by a continued patronage from
those whose interests he has kept in mind at a time
when some of his calling have not hesitated to
profit through the necessities of their customers.
Charles L. Wentworth. The career of Charles
L. Wentworth, of Lewistown, illustrates most
forcibly the possibilities that are open to a young
man who possesses sterling business qualifications.
It proves that neither wealth nor social position, nor
the assistance of influential friends at the outset
of his career, are at all necessary to place a young
man upon the road to success. It also proves that
ambitious perseverance, steadfastness of purpose and
indefatigable industry, combined with sound business
principles, will be rewarded, and that true success
follows individual efforts only.
Mr. Wentworth was born in Waldo County,
Maine, March 26, 1871, a son of Franklin L. and
112
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Margaret E. (Bennett) Wentworth, natives of the
same county, the father born August 24, 1838, and
the mother July 17, 1846. The parents were mar-
ried at Searsmont, Maine, and had two children :
Charles L. ; and Nettie, the wife of Harry Haskell,
of Portland, Maine. Franklin L. Wentworth passed
his boyhood days on his father's farm, where he
resided until his enlistment, June 26, 1862, in Com-
pany D, Nineteenth Regiment, Maine Volunteer In-
fantry. He served bravely and faithfully through-
out practically the remainder of the Civil war and
received his honorable discharge May 31, 1865. At
the close of his military career he returned to the
homestead, where he resumed farming, and was so
engaged until the time of his retirement in 1918.
A lover of fine horses, during his active years he was
greatlv interested in the breeding of such animals, as
he wa's also of Durham cattle. Air. Wentworthwas
originally a whig in his political views, but from
1856 was a republican. He was prominent and in-
fluential in civic affairs, and in addition to being
road supervisor for fifteen years was one of his
county's selectmen during a long period. He was
act.ve in the movements of the Presbyterian Church,
and for many years held the post of deacon. Mr.
Wentworth died May 2, 1919, and Mrs. Wentworth
on May 16, 1919.
Charles L. Wentworth received his education in
the public schools of Waldo County, Maine, walking
two miles from his father's farm to the little red
schoolhouse on the hill. He was an industrious
lad, and when only fourteen years of age earned
his first money shingling the home, barn and shed
of Isaac Burns, for which his daily wage was fifty
cents. On October 19, 1891, Mr. Wentworth left the
parental roof, and one week later arrived at Big
Timber, Montana, where he engaged in teaming
for the C. E. Severance Sheep Company. He sub-
sequently took charge of all the team work and
farming, and after about two years became super-
intendent of the cow outfit of the same company,
a position which he held for lYz years. During 1894
and 1895 Mr. Wentworth attended J. C. Duncan's
Business College at Davenport, Iowa. During this
time he had been employed as a cowboy in the outfit
of Oscar Stephens, and for four years rode the
range. His experiences as a rider of the range
ceased at the time of his marriage, November 26,
1896, to Miss Iva Ann Corbly, who was born near
Sedan, Kansas. January 8, 1875, a daughter of
Jacob Ingram and Jane (Bolton) Corbly.
Jacob I. Corbly was born in Pennsylvania and
died in 1904 in Montana, when sixty-two years of
age. Mrs. Corbly, who was a native of Iowa, died
in Kansas when her daughter, Mrs. Wentworth, was
but three months old, she being the youngest of
three daughters. In the fall of 1881 Mr. Corbly
came to Dillon, Montana, by rail, and then traveled
overland to near Bozeman, Gallatin County. In
1890 he removed to Fergus County, and bought land
four miles northeast of Lewistown, and also took
up Government land under his soldier's claim, to
which he added until he had nearly 1,000 acres at
one time. He was a large cattle operator, and was
not only well known in business circles, but was
prominent also in civic affairs, was chosen by his
fellow-citizens to represent them in the capacity
of county commissioner for two terms, and served
as a member of the school board for several years.
He was a democrat in politics, a member of the
Christian Church, and affiliated with Lewistown
Lodge No. 37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Following his marriage, Charles L, Wentworth
located on the land owned by his wife, an entry of
160 acres, and later he himself homesteaded 160 acres
in Fergus County. During the time of proving up
on this property he worked in the Gilt Edge mining
district, and subsequently bought the Nickel Plate
stage line, between Lewistown and Gilt Edge, at
the same time taking over the mail contract between
Lewistown and Kendall. In all, he continued in
the stage business for six years, and at the same
time continued his farming operations. At this time
Mr. Wentworth is one of the big wheat growers of
the county and also is actively engaged in breeding
standard-bred cattle and horses. His business con-
nections are numerous, including a directorship in
the Empire Bank and Trust Company, in which he is
a stockholder, the Montana and Eastern Banking
Corporation, and the Farmers Elevator Company,
of which he was one of the organizers in 1908. The
same year he engaged with the Montana State Fair
Association as county representative in collecting
all the produce exhibited from Fergus County, and
in 1910 was made a member of the Advisory Board
of that body. In 1913 he was elected vice president
of the Montana Seed Growers Association, and in
1918 was honored by election to the post of president
of the Fergus County Fair Association. Mr. Went-
worth is one of the prominent and influential re-
publicans of his community, and in 1916 was elected
alderman of the Third Ward of Lewistown, an
office to w^hich he was re-elected in 1918. His terms
nave been characterized by much constructive work.
Mr. Wentworth is fraternally affiliated with Judith
Lodge No. 30, Independent Order of Odd Fellows,
and is past noble grand of the Encampment of that
order; with Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights nf
Pythias; the Dramatic Order Knights of Korassan ;
Lewiston Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks ; and the Woodmen of the World.
Mr. and Mrs. Wentworth are the parents of tw"
children: Miss Leone Montana, who resides with
her parents, and Lloyd Ingram. Lloyd I. Wentworth
was married May 27, 1918, to Helen Waspbey, and
July 6, igi8, enlisted in the Quartermaster's Depart-
ment of the United States Army at Tacoma, Wash-
ington. He was subsequently transferred to the
Motor Transport Corps, and was sent to Camp
Johnson, Jacksonville, Florida. He was promoted
to first lieutenant and at the close of the great war
was identified with the Instruction Department. He
is now held in the Officers Reserve, subject to call
for five years from date of enlistment.
Thomas J. B. Shanley, M. D. There is no
vocation that commands greater respect and few
that ofTer better opportunities for the display of
character and ability than does that of the medical
profession. Dealing with the careers of men who
have contributed to the upbuilding and prominence
of the profession in the great commonwealth of
Montana is a task every writer enjoys, for it leads
through many and diversified avenues of useful-
ness, and gives truth and expression to the fact
that those, who have done most for their fellow-
men and the advancement of the profession, are the
ones who have lived honest and unselfish lives them-
selves. In preparing a review of the lives of the
men whose names stand out prominently among
the medical men of this state, who by character and
achievement have gained notable prominence, the
record of Dr. Thomas J. B. Shanley of Butte is
found to be one that compels more than passing
mention.
Doctor Shanley was born at Burlington, Vermont,
on November 11, 1880, a son of M. W. Shanley, and
grandson of Thomas Shanley. born in Vermont in
, 1805, and died at Burlington, that state, in 1885,
having spent his entire life in Vermont, where he
HISTORY OF MONTANA
113
followed farming. He married a Miss Barrett,
also a native of Vermont. His father, great-grand-
father of Doctor Shanley, served in the American
Revolution as one of the "Green Mountain Boys."
The Shanleys came to the American colonies from
Ireland, first living at Boston. Massachusetts, but
later locating permanently in Vermont.
M. \V. Shanley was born at Burlington. Vermont,
in 1850, and still makes that city his home, and
in it he was reared, educated and' married. For a
time he was engaged in farming in its vicinity and
then turned his attention to building. For about
five years he lived in the western portion of North
Dakota and was interested in the Stevens, Shanley
& Scofield Ranch, where horses and cattle were
grown upon an extensive scale, but returned to
Vermont. The democratic party gives expression
to his political views. In religious faith he is
Roman Catholic. The maiden name of his wife
was Elizabeth J. Flynn. born at Cambridge, Ver-
mont, in 1850. Their children were as follows :
Frank, who is a resident of Detroit, Michigan, is
a large landowner of Towner County, North Da-
kota, and spends a considerable portion of his time
there ; Doctor Shanley, of whom we write ; Helen,
who is studying medicine at Columbia Uni-
versity, New York City, New York ; Joseph Wil-
liam, who is an oil operator, resides at Casper, Wy-
oming; and Bernadette, who for two years was a
student of the School of Mines at Butte, but is now
attending Columbia University.
Doctor Shanley attended the public schools of
Burlington, Vermont, and his environment was a
valuable one during the formative period of his
life. When he had completed the sophomore year
in the Burlington High School, he did the work
of the last two years of high school at the Uni-
versity of North Dakota, and then entered George-
town University at Washington, District of Colum-
bia, and was two years in attendance on collegiate
course. For the subsequent two years Doctor Shan-
ley was at Atlanta, Georgia, looking after the min-
ing and plantation interests of his brother Frank,
and at the close of the second one he became a
student in the medical department of Columbia
University at New York City, New York, and was
graduated therefrom in 1909. with the degree of
Doctor of Medicine, and as a member of the Greek
Letter fraternity, Chi Zeta Chi.
Doctor Shanley was house surgeon at the French
Hospital of New York City for two years and
seven months, thus gaining an invaluable practical
experience, leaving that institution to become resi-
dent physician of the Manhattan Maternity and Dis-
pensary Hospital of New York City, where he re-
mained for thirteen months. In December, 1912,
Doctor Shanley located permanently at Butte, and
entered upon the practice of his profession, spe-
cializing in surgery, although he also has a general
medical practice, and has built up a very large and
valuable connection. His work has ever been dis-
charged with a keen sense of conscientious obliga-
tion, and his skill is evidenced through the results
which follow his labors.
Doctor Shanley is an independent democrat and
a Roman Catholic, following in both his politics
and religion the teachings of his father. He be-
longs to Butte Council No. 668. Knights of Colum-
bus, in which he has been made a third degree
knight ; the Silver Bow Club : and the county, state
and national medical organizations; and during 1919
served the Silver Bow Medical Society as president.
He was also president of the University Club of
Butte from July, 1916, to September, 1918. His
residence and offices are situated at No. 201 West
Granite Street.
In June, 1915, Doctor Shanley was married at
Butte to Miss Anne Sennett. a daughter of Mrs.
M. Sennett of Butte. Mrs. Shanley was born at
Leadville, Colorado. Doctor and Mrs. Shanley have
the following children : Thomas J. B., Jr.", who
was born on December 20. 1917; and Elizabeth
Anne, who was born on December 10, 1918.
Always interested in athletics. Doctor Shanley
stroked the "varsity crew" during his freshman
year at the Georgetown University at the inter-
collegiate boat race on the Hudson River at Pough-
keepsie. New York, in 1901, and came in second,
Cornell being first. He lias participated in many
other boat races, one being against the crew of the
United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Mary-
land. Doctor Shanley maintains membership with
the Virginia Boat Club of Richmond, Virginia, and
the Atlanta Athletic Club, and is also a member of
The Society of New York Alumni of Georgetown
University and of the Menden Alumni Society of
Columbia University, New York City. He has al-
ways stood for the things which are right and
proper both in his profession and outside of
it, and no one has been more strict in the main-
tenance of professional ethics than he.
Ernest R. Patterson, proprietor of one of the
chief mercantile establishments of Big Timber, was
about two years old when he made his first ac-
quaintance with Montana. That was in 1888, in
which year his father brought the familv from
the State of Maine and settled on the Musselshell
River. His father, Eugene L. Patterson, was born
near Belfast, Maine, in 1863. He had been em-
ployed in the logging camps of Maine, also operated
a milk route, and on coming to Montana was fore-
man for a large ranch on the Mussellshell River
and later conducted ranches in the Lake Basin
country and at White Beaver. In 1896 he bought
a ranch of his own on Sweetgrass Creek, twelve
miles from Big Timber, and lived on this property
until he sold out in 1908. He then bought the
hardware stock of the Montana Trading Company
at Big Timber and was financially interested in that
business until his death. This is the hardware store
of which his only son, Ernest, is now proprietor.
Eugene Patterson was a republican and was affili-
ated with Big Timber Lodge No. 2,, Knights of
Pythias. He died at Big Timber in 1914. His
wife was Alice Shorey, who was born in Belfast,
Maine, in 1869 and is still living at Big Timber.
Ernest R., who was born at Belfast, Maine, May
6, 1886, is the older of two children, his sister Edith
being the wife of John Cameron, a rancher near
Reed Point, Montana.
Ernest R. Patterson attended rural schools in
Sweetgrass County, and later secured a liberal edu-
cation. For three years he was a student in the
State Normal School at St. Cloud, Minnesota, grad-
uated in 1906 from the county high school at Big
Timber, and then spent a year in the state university
at Missoula. On leaving college he went to work
in his father's business and since February i, 1919,
has been sole proprietor. His store at the cor-
ner of McLeod Street and First Avenue is a com-
plete establishment, handling hardw^are and furni-
ture, and there is also an undertaking department
Mr. Patterson's partner in this being Casper GrafT-
Mr. Patterson is owner of a modern home on
Fourth Avenue, and another dwelling on Fifth
Avenue. He has served as city councilman of
Big Timber, is a republican, is a past chancellor of
Big Timber Lodge No. 25, Knights of Pythias, a
HISTORY OF MONTANA
member of the Dramatic Order of the Knights of
Khorassan and is affiliated with Big Timber Camp
No. 10610, Modern Woodmen of America.
He married at Big Timber in 1908 Miss Beulah
Busha. On another page is an account of the
numerous activities of her father, Charles T. Busha,
one of the leading citizens of Big Timber. Mrs.
Patterson is a graduate of the Sweetgrass County
High School and finished her education in the
Southern Female College of Virginia. To their
marriage were born five children, Riley, the oldest,
and Edith Lenora, both dying in infancy. The
other three are Alice Helen, born May 3, 1911, Ida
Elizabeth born May 13, 1914, and Beulah Gene,
born May 21, 1919.
Arthur A. Stapleton. Since his arrival at Lew-
istown in 1905 Arthur A. Stapleton has contributed
materially to the upbuilding of the city, and on
every side can be seen evidences of his ability as
a constructor of substantial structures. His career
has been indicative of the value of a useful trade
when properly mastered and of the awards to be
attained through following it through to its high-
est possibilities, for in this way has Mr. Staple-
ton become one of the leading factors in the busi-
ness life of Lewistown and placed himself beyond
the possibility for future financial needs.
Arthur A. Stapleton was born at St. Mary's, Can-
ada, October 25, 1874, a son of Arthur and Sarah
(Long) Stapleton. His father, who was born in
England in 1822, was brought to America on a
sailing vessel by his parents when he was a mere
child, the family being pioneers of the part of
Canada in which they settled. There Arthur Staple-
ton grew up in a somewhat wild part of the coun-
try, learning the various lessons connected with
the business of farming, which, with sawmilling,
constituted his occupations throughout life. He
was a man of industry and integrity, was honored
in his community, and death in 1876 was mourned
by a wide circle of acquaintances. Mrs. Staple-
ton, who survived her husband for a long period
and died in 1913, at the advanced age of eighty
years, was a native of Canada. There were nine
children in the family, of whom six are still liv-
ing, and Arthur A. was the eighth in order of birth.
Arthur A. Stapleton was only about two years of
age at the time of his father's death, and some two
years later his widowed mother took him to Michigan,
where, in the town of Lexington, he passed his boy-
hood and secured his education in the public school.
He was an industrious lad and even when still a mere
boy did much to assist his mother in her struggles
for a livelihood, remaining at her side until he was
sixteen years of age. At that time he began to be
self-supporting, and went to Grand Rapids, Mich-
igan, to learn the trade of plumber. After completing
his apprenticeship and mastering his trade he traveled
as a journeyman for some years, and his first per-
manent residence as a business man with an es-
tablishment of his own was at Flint, Michigan, where
he remained until 1905. During the time he had been
located there he had done a good business and had
become encouraged therein, but eventually decided
that a wider field was awaiting him in the west, and
accordingly, in the year mentioned, came to Lewis-
tovvn, Montana, where he has since centered his ac-
tivities. Mr. Stapleton is now at the head of a
large and prosperous business, which has grown and
developed into the proportions of a necessary com-
mercial asset. He has not alone confined himself to
placing plumbing systems in some of the largest
buildings in the city; on the contrary, his activities
have extended into various fields of business en-
deavor, he having been particularly active and prom-
inent in the construction of residences and other
structures. In addition to ten or twelve handsome
and substantial residences which he contributed to
the city's upbuilding, in [916 he built the handsome
Stapleton Block on Broadway, and is the principal
owner of the Broadway Apartment Building on the
same thoroughfare. His business transactions have
always been characterized by strict fidelity to prin-
ciple, contract and engagement, and his reputation is
that of a man whose word is as good as though it
were backed by his name on a bond. Mr. Stapleton
has found little time for politics, but is a stanch re-
publican as a voter. Good movements, and particu-
larly those affecting the welfare of his community,
always have his earnest support and cooperation.
Fraternally he is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ; and Lewis-
town Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
On June 28, 1894, Mr. Stapleton was united in
marriage with Miss Nettie Tyler, who was born in
Michigan, and to this union there have been born
three children: Ma>Tiard H., Bernice and Tyler, all
of whom are attending the Lewistown public schools
and reside with their parents.
H. A. Featherm.\n, who is one of the progressive
business men of Philipsburg, is successfully engaged
in handling real estate and loans and writing insur-
ance, and has been active in developing this sec-
tion of the state. He was born at Stroudsburg,
Pennsylvania, October 5, 1867, a son of Jacob A.
Featherman, and a member of a family of English
and French descent. Jacob A. Featherman was born
near Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, where his ances-
tors had located in pre-Revolutionary days, in 1827,
and died there in 1906, having spent his entire life
in that vicinity, and during his mature years being
engaged in milling. He was a democrat in his po-
litical belief, and a Reformed Lutheran in his relig-
ious creed. His wife bore the maiden name of
Ellen Stotz, and she came of Moravian descent.
Mrs. Featherman survives her husband and lives at
.A.Uentown, Pennsylvania. She was born at Bethle-
hem, Pennsylvania, February 24, 1834. Their chil-
dren were as follows : Mary, who married George
Johnson, a publisher of Easton, Pennsylvania; J. B.,
who came to Drummond. Montana, in 1878, became
a merchant of the place, and there died in 1918;
Lillie, who married M. J. Downs, now deceased, was
formerly engaged in a real estate business at Easton,
where his wife died in 1917 ; Annie, who married
Reuben Albert, a surveyor, lives at Trenton, New
Jersey; Jacob H., who died at Stroudsburg, Penn-
sylvania, was a farmer during his mature years ;
Amanda, who died when about thirty, at New Chi-
cago, Montana; Bertha, who is unmarried, lives at
Drummond, Montana ; H. A., whose name heads
this review; Oliver F., who came to Philipsburg
in 1885, was a bookkeeper, and died at Philipsburg
in 1909; Fannie, who is a trained nurse, lives at
Allentown. Pennsylvania ; and Daisy, who married
Anthony Graham, lives at Allentown, Mr. Graham
having had charge of the Allentown Rapid Transit
Company for many }'ears.
H. A. Featherman attended the rural schools of
Monroe County. Pennsylvania, and then in 1885
came to New Chicago, Montana, and for ten years
was in the store of his uncle, John A. Featherman,
and in the meanwhile attended the Helena Business
College. Going from New Chicago to Drummond,
Mr. Featherman clerked in the store of the same
uncle until 1906. and in that year was elected treas-
urer of Granite County, and re-elected to the same
I
HISTORY OF MONTANA
115
office in 1908, serving for four years, his second
term expiring in March, 191 1. He then became
cashier for E. A. Hannah & Company, bankers,
leaving that concern in April, 1918, to open up his
present business of real estate, loans and insurance
at Phihpsburg, which he has developed into the
leading one of its kind in Granite County. His
offices are located in the Featherman Block on
Broadway, which he owns, and he also owns a busi-
ness building and lot on Broadway, adjacent to the
post office, and his residence on the corner of Pine
and Alfa streets, as well as several other dwellings
in the city.
Mr. Featherman is a republican. The Methodist
Episcopal Church is his religious home, and he is
a trustee of it. Well known as a Mason Mr. Feath-
erman belongs to Flint Creek Lodge, No. 11, Ancient
Free and .Accepted Masons, of which he has held every
office including that of master; Hope Chapter No.
10. Royal Arch Masons, of which he has filled every
office including that of high priest; Omar Com-
mandery No. 9, of Missoula. Montana; Algeria
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Noble Mystic Shrine
of Helena, Montana; and Pearl Chapter No. 14,
Order Eastern Star, of which he served for two
years as patron. He is a member of the Chamber
of Commerce of Philipsburg, and is now one of
its directors, and has been active in it and in the
community generally, doing more than his part in
interesting outside capital, and encouraging civic
improvements and reforms.
JoHX H. McIntosh. Not only is John Mcintosh
one of the leading men of Montana, and very active
in the life of Butte as general manager of the
Associated Industries of Montana, but he is also
distinguished as belonging to one of the famous
.'\merican families, founded here in the very early
days of the colonies, by representatives of the family
who came from Scotland and located in a portion
of the present state of Georgia, which has a county
named Mcintosh in their honor. Gen. Lachlan
Mcintosh was one of the eminent commanders of
the Colonial troops during the American Revolu-
tion, and an aide de camp of General Washington.
He waged a successful warfare against the savage
Seminole Indians and was one of the founders, to-
gether with General Washington and Ale.xander
Hamilton, of the famous Society of the Cincinnati.
The grandfather of John H. Mcintosh was John
Houston Mcintosh, and he was born at Trenton,
New Jersey, and died at Saint Mary's, Florida, prior
to the birth of his grandson. He married Eliza
Higbee, who passed away at Trenton, New Jersey,
John Houston Mcintosh maintaining homes both
at Trenton and on his plantation on the Saint Mary
River in Florida, which were occupied by the family
according to the season.
John H. Mcintosh of this review was born in
Early County, Georgia, on February I, 1879, a son
of Dr. B. L.' Mcintosh, born at Saint Mary's, Flor-
ida, in 1837, and died at Marietta. Georgia, in July,
1902. He was reared at Trenton. New Jersey, and
was graduated from the .American Institute of Med-
icine and Surgery at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,
with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. When a
young man he went to Savannah. Georgia, and be-
gan the practice of his profession, but his plans
were disturbed by the outbreak of the war be-
tween the states and he, espousing the side of the
South, enlisted in the Confederate army and served
all through the war under General Lee, and par-
ticipated in the various campaigns of that com-
mander in Virginia. He was severely wounded in
the last battle of the war. at Sailors Creek in Vir-
ginia, in which battle Doctor Mcintosh's brother,
John H. Mcintosh, for whom the subject of this
sketch was named, met his death. After his re-
covery. Dr. Mcintosh located in Early County,
Georgia, where he practiced his profession until
1888, and was also interested on an e.xtensive scale
in the production of rice and cotton. In 1888 he
removed to Marietta, Georgia, and continued in
practice there until his death. A prominent demo-
crat, he served for one term as commissioner of
agriculture for the State of Georgia. He was an
Episcopalian, and both as a member of that body
and as a supporter of the public schools e.xerted
an influence for good in his community. Doctor
Mcintosh was married first to a Miss Nesbitt, a
native of Georgia, who died about a year after mar-
riage, in 1866, leaving one daughter, Lucy, who mar-
ried Hugh N. Starnes, and died at Birmingham,
Alabama, in 1918, her husband surviving her and
engaging in the manufacture of iron in that same
city. The second wife of Doctor Mcintosh bore
the maiden name of Mary C. Hill, and she is now
living with her son. She was born in Early Coun-
ty, Georgia, in 1854. By his second marriage Doc-
tor Mcintosh had the following family: Charlotte,
who died in infancy; May, who married D. C. Cole,
a capitalist of Marietta, Georgia ; John H., who was
the third in order of birth ; Bayard, who is super-
intendent of the woolen mills of Marietta, Georgia;
Joseph Higbee, who died in infancy ; and Richard
H., who is a public accountant of Birmingham,
Alabama.
After being trained under private tutors in Early
County, when he was ten years old, John H. Mc-
intosh was placed in the Marietta Academy, a boys'
school. Later he took the high school course 'at
Marietta, and was graduated therefrom in 1895.
Mr. Mcintosh then studied law for a year in the
office of United States Senator A. S. Clay at Mari-
etta, Georgia, following which he entered the Uni-
versity of Georgia at Athens, Georgia, in 1897, and
was graduated therefrom in 1899 with the degree
of Doctor of Law and as a member of the Greek
Letter College Fraternity, Sigma Alpha Epsilon.
During his collegiate course he was active in all-
branches of athletics and held the Southern record
for pole vault for years. He was captain of the
track team, played right field on the baseball team,
was a member of the "varsity" football team for ,
three years, and during his senior year was awarded
the position of all Southern full back.
On January i, 1900, Mr. Mcintosh came west
to New Mexico, and as he was without the suffi-
cient funds to open a law office he worked for eight
months in the copper mine at Silver City. He
then took a position as athletic director at the
School of Mines at Golden, Colorado, and held
it for a year. Going from there to Leadville, Colo-
rado, he became a reporter on the Herald Demo-
crat, of which he was later made city editor, and
remained with that newspaper for a year, when
he was made coach for the famous football team
containing five former All American players, rep-
resenting the Leadville Athletic Club, and traveled
all over the West, playing the best teams. This was
conceded to be the best club team in the West. In
1902 Mr. Mcintosh worked as assistant city editor on
the Denver News for three months, and then
in March of that year came to Butte and became
"sports" editor of the Intermountain, now the
Daily Post, and continuing as such for a year.
During this period he became interested in profes-
sional athletics and won the middle weight wrestling
championship of Montana when he defeated Adams
at Dillon, Montana, for the title. During 1903 he
116
HISTORY OF MONTANA
went with the Helena Record at Helena, Mon-
tana, for nine months, leaving that paper to take
a position as "sports" editor on the old Butte Eve-
ning News, which had just been established by
F. A. Heinze, the copper king, and remained with
it until in September, 1904, when he accepted the
position of athletic director and professor of Eng-
lish at the Colorado Agricultural College at Fort
Collins, Colorado. While he was with that institu-
tion he had signal success in his work, and among
other honors won by him, his baseball team was
twice champion of the state, or during 1905 and
1906. In the fall of 1906 he returned to Butte and
became associate editor of the Evening News,
and while in that position promoted nearly all of
the large athletic contests held in Butte, from 1906
to 1908. In September, 1908, Mr. Mcintosh accepted
the position of athletic director and instructor in
English at the Montana State College at Bozeman,
and remained there as such until the spring of 1911,
when he became editor of the Republican Courier,
a daily newspaper of Bozeman, but left it in 1912
and came back to Butte and laecame a partner in
the Cadillac State Agency. He sold part interest
in this in 1913 and became mining and financial edi-
tor of the Butte Daily Miner, holding that posi-
tion until the spring of 1916, when he resigned and
became secretary of the Silver Bow Employers As-
sociation, and was so successful in handling indus-
trial problems that a number of other communi-
ties organized similar organizations for handling
these problems following the methods of Mr. Mc-
intosh. In 1917 there was a coalition of all of
these units into the Associated Industries of Mon-
tana, of which Mr. Mcintosh was unanimously
chosen for general manager, and still retains that
important position. It is part of his duty to repre-
sent Montana twice annually at the National In-
dustrial Conference held at New York City. It
is the chief aim of Mr. Mcintosh to establish and
maintain industrial harmony by bringing employ-
ers and employes into a better understanding of each
other's problems. Mr. Mcintosh maintains offices
at Nos. 305-6 and 7 Lewisohn Block.
In his political faith Mr. Mcintosh is a repub-
lican. He belongs to the Episcopal Church. The
Silver Bow Club and the Butte Chamber of Com-
merce also hold his membership. He is still con-
nected with the Montana Cadillac Company as its
vice president, and he owns a modern residence at
No. II 19 West Park Street.
On October 22, 1902, Mr. Mcintosh was united
in marriage with Miss Mary Fleming at Colum-
bus, Georgia. She is a daughter of Dr. Malcom
and Anna (Meigs) Fleming, the former of whom
was a physician and surgeon who died in Virginia.
Mrs. Fleming survives and lives at Columbus,
Georgia. Mrs. Mcintosh was graduated from the
San Antonio, Texas, High School. The children
born to Mr. and Mrs. Mcintosh are as follows :
Mary, who was born in August, 1908; John H., who
was born in June, 1910; Bayard, who was born in
January, 1912; and Anna, who was born in June,
1918.
Few men are better suited for their work than
Mr. Mcintosh. Well educated and carefully trained,
belonging to the aristocratic class by birth and early
association, he can fully appreciate the stand of
those whose capital has placed them above the ruck
and stress of industrial striving; while his own
struggles early in his career and his subsequent close
association with young men in the making have
* given him a practical working knowledge of the
problems of the employes and the dire need for
their advancement. His training in law enables
him to act in accordance with established ordi-
nances and to plead with both sides so convincingly
and authoritatively as to bring about an understand-
ing when no one else could do so. A student of
men and their impulses, Mr. Mcintosh early learned
how to govern both and bring out of those with
whom he came in contact the best in them, and to
develop latent talents in a most remarkable man-
ner. AH of his former work has developed his own
resources and made of him a leader of men in
the greatest of games — life — in which, because of
his fairness, his insight into human nature and his
sympathy, he has been chosen to act as both direc-
tor and arbitrator, and through his services not
only are better understanding relations established
between the two classes, capital and labor, but tiie
public is a participant in the results.
John O. Helsing was connected with the building
of some of the pioneer railroads through Montana
and the Northwest, and has led an exceedingly
active life, much of it on the open range as a stock
man. A few years ago he retired from his ranch
and is now enjoying the comforts of a good home
in Lewistown.
Mr. Helsing was born in Sweden December 31,
1862. He was the youngest in a family of four
daughters and two sons, and was a small child when
his father died. At the age of nine years he came
to the United States with his mother and a sister.
They landed at Quebec, thence went to Chicago,
and two months later he accompanied his sister to
Lake City, Minnesota. For some five or six years
he lived in the family of Fred Winters, a farmer
in Minnesota, working for his board and clothing
and attending school as opportunity offered. His
next experience was as a farm hand at Wheatland,
Dakota, spending about two years there. He then
returned to Minnesota and went to work in the
railway shops of the Northern Pacific at Brainerd.
That was his first experience in railroading. After
about two years in the railway shops at Brainerd
he came to Montana, then the terminus of the rail-
way, and did railway construction work. In the
fall of the same year he moved to Reed's Point,
about forty miles west of where Billings now stands,
and subsequently was at Gardiner, or the present
site of that town, which had then been laid out
along the proposed route of the railroad. He helped
construct some log houses on the site. Then with
Mr. Plummer, a railway contractor, he came on to
White Sulphur Springs, where he went to work
for Charles Cook. He spent the summer of 1882
putting up hay, and he also operated the first self-
binder brought into the Deep Creek Valley. In the
fall of 1882 he came into the Judith Basin with
Barr Smith, a well known horse man, and worked
on the range with Mr. Smith for about three years.
He was then employed by the prominent Judith
Basin pioneer, William Berkin, one summer, and
about that time he took up a homestead of 160 acres.
He rode the range for about three years, and subse-
quently, with E. S. Smith, bought 160 acres and
engaged in stock ranching. They were associated
two and a half years, and upon the dissolution of
their partnership Mr. Helsing took over the land
and continued cattle and horse ranching until 1900,
when he sold his ranch property and moved to
Lewistown.
Prior to and preparatory to his settling down to
the permanent life of the farm and ranch, Mr.
Helsing married Miss Olive Lyons, a native of Iowa.
Mr. Helsing is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
37 of the Masonic Order and in politics is inde-
pendent.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
117
Edmund Wright, a resident of Montana over thirty-
years, is one of the best known men in Fergus County,
where his name has figured prominently as a public
official, business man and rancher and in connection
with many civic and social affairs at Lewistown.
Mr. Wright was born at Penn Van in Yates County,
New York, December 14, 1869, a son of Edmund and
Sarah (Walton) Wright. His father was born in
England in 1827 and died December 26, 1913. His
mother was born December 6, 1833, and died April
3n, 1914. Edmund, Sr., was eight years old when
brought to America by his parents, who located
in New York state. He received his education in
the public schools and learned the cabinet maker's
trade. Four of his brothers enlisted and served all
through the Civil war in the Union army, and he
himself tried to get into the service but was rejected
on account of physical disability. However, he was
able to serve his community in the capacity of deputy
sheriff during the war. For many years he served as
superintendent of the Birdsell Manufacturing Com-
pany, and after 1887 lived retired. He was a repub-
lican in politics.
Edmund Wright, Jr., was fifth in a family of eight
children, five of whom are still living. He acquired
his early education in the public schools of Yates
County and attended a business school at Elmira,
Xew York. He was only eighteen years old when
he came to Montana in 1887, and has witnessed
every phase of the development of Lewistown from
a pioneer village to the present time. For three
years he was employed as bookkeeper in the Bank
of Fergus County, and after that for many years
was in one of the offices of the courthouse, at first
as deputy county clerk and recorder two years, then
deputy clerk of the District Court four years, and
in 1896 was elected clerk of the District Court.
His admirable administration of the office called
for a second term in 1900, and when he retired in
1904 he had put in nearly fifteen years as an official
servant. Since then Mr. Wright has been engaged
in the real estate, loan and general insurance busi-
ness, and in 1910 he organized the Wright Land
& Investment Company, of which he is president.
This is one of the large corporations of Fergus
County and owns and operates 1,200 acres of im-
proved land five miles from Lewistown, using the
land as the basis of a general farming and stock
raising proposition.
Mr. Wright was a charter member of Lewistown
Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks, which he has served as exalted ruler; is
also a charter member and past chancellor of
Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights of Pythias, and was
one of the organizers of the Judith Club at Lew-
istown. Politically he is a republican and has been
a stanch factor in the party for many years.
In Mav, 1890, Mr. Wright married Lizzie M. Gud-
gell. She was born at Chillicothe, Missouri. They
have two sons, Frank A. and Robert G. Frank
is a graduate of the law department of the Uni-
versity of Michigan and served one term as county
attorney of Fergus County. He married Catherine
Breitinger and they are the parents of two daugh-
ters. Robert is in charge of the insurance depart-
ment and the city department of the Wright Land
& Investment Company. He is also treasurer of
the company.
H.\RRV H. AuSTTN is a member of the Big Tim-
ber bar. and came to Montana after fifteen years
of successful practice in his native State of Minne-
sota.
He was born in Blue Earth County, Minnesota,
December 27, 1881. His paternal ancestors were
from Scotland. His grandfather, Reuben Austin,
was born in New Y'ork State in 1809, and when
about middle age he moved west and became a
pioneer farmer in Rock County, Wisconsin. Dur-
ing the '70s he went out to Minnesota, and again
did pioneering as a farmer in Blue Earth County,
where he died in 1900. Orville H. Austin, father
of the Big Timber lawyer, was born in Oneida
County, New York, in 1837. He spent his early
life in Rock County, Wisconsin, where he mar-
ried and where he followed the business of car-
penter and builder. In 1876 he moved to Blue
Earth County, Minnesota, followed his trade there,
but since 1900 has lived retired at Minneapolis. He
is a very staunch democrat in his political affilia-
tions and a member of the Masonic fraternity.
Orville H. Austin married Loretta Earl, who was
born in Rock County, Wisconsin, in 1846. Charles,
the oldest of their children, was a telegraph opera-
tor and died in Blue Earth County, Minnesota, in
1893. Viola, whose home is in Minneapolis, is the
wife of Dr. E. C. Anderson, who is well known
to the medical profession in Montana, having prac-
ticed ar Billings. Anaconda and Missoula, and from
the latter city joined the medical corps of the army,
rose to the rank of major, and his last professional
services with the army were rendered at New York
City. Frank L. Austin is cashier of the Thomp-
son State Bank at Thompson Falls. Sanders Coun-
ty, Montana, Delia is the wife of John Costin, a
mine operator in the Iron Range of Minnesota at
Virginia. Joseph Earl is a graduate of the Univer-
sity of Minnesota Law Department and is practic-
ing law at Chisholm, Minnesota. Winnie, the sixth
of the family, died in infancy, and the youngest is
Harry H.
Harry H. Austin acquired his early education in
the public schools of Good Thunder and Mankato,
Minnesota, graduating from the Minneapolis High
School in 1902 and then entered the law depart-
ment of the University of Minnesota. He received
his LL. B. degree in 1905. He is a member of the
legal fraternity Delta Chi. Mr. Austin began his
practice at Chisholm, Minnesota, in 1905, and de-
veloped a fine business as a lawyer there. He
served as city attorney, also as a member of the
school board, and still has property in Minnesota.
He came to Big Timber in December, 1918, and
is already busy with a general civil and criminal
practice, his offices being in the Masonic Building.
He helped organize the Sweetgrass County Good
roads Association and is its secretary and treas-
urer. He is also a member of the Big Timber
Chamber of Commerce and on the board of direc-
tors. He is a republican in politics, and a mem-
ber of the State Bar Association of Minnesota, and
is affiliated with Chisholm Lodge No. 1334, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks.
In 1909, at St. Paul, he married Miss Clyde Pen-
nington, a daughter of Wellington and Bertha
(Reed) Pennington. Her father, who was in the
livery business, died at St. Paul in IQIO. Her
mother now lives in New York City. Mrs. Austin
is a graduate of the St. Paul High School and the
State Normal at Winona, Minnesota. To their mar-
riage were born three children : Don, born August
23, 1910; Barbara, born April 5. 1913; and Joseph,
born June 24, 1918.
Rev. D. p. Meade, pastor of St. Philip's Catholic
Church of Philipsburg, is one of the earnest and
scholarly men of his church, and one who is greatly
beloved. He was born in County Limerick, Ireland,
February 17, 1888. His preliminary education was
received in the national school at Ballintubber, County
Limerick, Ireland, following the completion of wliich
HISTORY OF MONTANA
he became a student of St. Andrew's Academy at
Kilfinane, County Limerick, Ireland, and for two
and one-half years took a classical course. The fol-
lowing seven years were spent by him at St. Pat-
rick's Seminary, at Thurles, County Tipperary, Ire-
land, in acquiring a philosophical and theological
course, and he was ordained to the priesthood on
June 14, 1914- ^ , .., ^
Soon after his ordination, Father Meade came
to the United States and to Montana, and spent
his first few weeks in the state at Walkerville, when
on November 5th of that same year he arrived at
Philipsburg to assume charge of the parish of St.
Philip, and here he has since continued. This parish
was organized in 1889, and is the first to be estab-
lished in Granite County. The present church edi-
fice at Philipsburg, was erected in 1892, but the first
services were held at Granite. The parish now
includes Southern Cross, Deerlodge County, and
Father Meade ministers to the needs of 400 Cath-
olics. The parsonage adjoins the church, which
is on the corner of Carney and Franklin streets.
Father Meade belongs to Deer Lodge Council No.
1810, Knights of Columbus, of which he is a fourth
degree knight; Division No. I, Ancient Order of
Hibernians at Butte, Montana, and is state chaplin
of this order, elected at the State Convention in
August, 1919. Practical in his application of moral-
ity to civic needs, he is a valued member of the
Commercial Club.
The father of Rev. D. P. Meade is Michael Meade,
who was born at Ballintubber, County Limerick,
Ireland, in 1858, and there he still resides, having
been a farmer all of his mature years. He is a firm
believer in the creed of the Roman Catholic Church
of which he is a life-long member. His wife bore
the maiden name of Ellen Hennessy, and she was
born at Knocklong, County Limerick, Ireland, in
1859. Their children were as follows : D. P., whose
name heads this review; Mary, who died at the age
of twenty-one years, was a Sister of Mercy in Gran-
ard. County Longford, Ireland ; John, who lives
with his parents at Ballintubber, Ireland, is a
farmer ; and Julia, who is also living with her
parents.
James M. Self was brought to Montana when
about seven years of age, grew up in this territory
and state, and for nearly thirty years has been a
practicing lawyer and has had much to do with the
Ijusiness, industrial and public affairs of the west-
ern counties.
Mr. 'Self, who for the past twenty years has lived
at Plains, was born in Nebraska City, Nebraska,
October 25, i86i. Three davs later, on the 28th
of October, his father, James M. Self, died. The
grandfather, Philip Jenkins Self, was born in Ken-
tucky about 1800 and at an early day settled on a
farm in Missouri. The Selfs are of English an-
cestry and the family was first established in Vir-
ginia. Philip J. Self died near Saline, Missouri,
in 1871. His wife was a Miss Black. James M.
Self, Sr., was born in Missouri in 1830 and by oc-
cupation was a wheelwright. After his marriage
he removed to Nebraska City, where he followed
his trade and carriage making until his death. He
was a democrat and a member of the Baptist
Church. His wife was Melinda Batterton, who
was born in Missouri in 1832 and died at Deer Lodge,
Montana, in 1905. In 1872 she had come to Mon-
tana with her brother, J. H. Batterton, and both
were early residents of Deer Lodge. James M.
Self, the lawyer, was the fifth and youngest of his
father's family. Mary E., the oldest, died at Butte,
-wife of John P. Reins, who is owner of ranching
and mining interests and lives near Sheridan, Mon-
tana; Mattie is the wife of C. E. Aspling, publisher
of the Powell County Post at Deer Lodge ; Eliza-
beth married C. E. Freyschlag, formerly a merchant
and banker at Philipsburg, Montana, now a resident
of Colorado Springs, Colorado ; and Nannie, who
died young.
James M. Self acquired his early education in the
public schools of Deer Lodge and graduated A. B.
from the College of Montana of that city in 1889.
He went east to take his law course in the law
department of Yale University, graduating LL. B.
in 1891. The following four years he practiced
law at Butte and after that lived at Anaconda, Deer
Lodge County, until 1900. He was deputy county
attorney of Deer Lodge County before Deer Lodge
and Powell counties were separated. Mr. Self
moved to Plains, Montana, in 1900. In 1902 he was
elected to represent that county in the eighth ses-
sion of the Legislature, and was a member of the
judiciary, state institutions, and public buildings
committees. After his legislative term he prac-
ticed at Missoula two years, and since the creation
of Sanders County has been one of the leading
lawyers of that section of the state, handling a
large civil and criminal practice. However, for
two years he lived at Thompson Falls and served
as attorney for Ed Donlan in acquiring various
rights for what is now the Thompson Falls Power
Company. For one year Mr. Self was cashier of
the Farmers and Merchants State Bank of Plains,
but has since sold his interests in the bank. His
law offices are in the First National Bank block and
he owns a modern home and a ranch adjoining the
town on the northwest. He is a member and clerk
of the Congregational Church, and is a member of
Ponemah Lodge No. 63, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, and past master of Thompson Falls Lodge,
and a member of the State Bar Association.
In 1898, at Plains, he married Miss Rowena Pierce,
daughter of M. H. and Unity (Sapp) Pierce, now
deceased. Her father was an early day rancher,
carpenter and builder at Plains. Mrs. Self is also
a graduate with the A. B. degree from the College
of Montana at Deer Lodge.
William Hanna has been identified with the
business life of Montana for nearly thirty years,
and since 1900 has been a merchant and citizen of
Lewistown.
He was born at Fergus, Ontario, Canada, August
15, 1866, son of William and Mary Jane Hanna.
His parents were both natives of Ireland but of
Scotch ancestry. His father came to Quebec when
a young man by sailing vessel, and later moved
into the wilderness of Ontario, locating near Fergus.
He was a man of great industry and good business
judgment, and acquired a tract of land which by
slow and laborious effort was cleared and developed
until it represented one of the best farms in that
province. He cleared up 650 acres and had his
farm well stocked with graded cattle and horses.
He was active in the Presbyterian Church. William
Hanna died April 15, 1909, at the age of seventy-
four years, two months and three days, while his
wife passed away December 15, 1914, in her seventy-
seventh year. They were the parents of five sons,
four still living, William being the third in age.
William Hanna spent his early life on his father's
Canadian farm, attending school in winter and work-
ing on the farm in summer. After finishing his
high school course he came west to Montana, reach-
ing Helena in the spring of 1890. Later he went
to Great Falls and was employed in tlie shops of
the Street Railway Company until the spring of
"^ ^
i
liiiiiiiifc
VJT, ^^yy^-C^ytA/^
cu
HISTORY OF MONTANA
119
1893. He then followed his trade as a carpenter
and helped build the Gilt Edge Cyanide Mill at Gilt
Edge. Following that he was in the restaurant and
meat market business until 1900, in which year he
removed to Lewistown, and has since been sole
owner of the Lewistown Feed and Seed Store, being
the largest wholesale and retail dealer in hay, grain
and poultry and feed in Montana.
Mr. Hanna is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Lewistown
Lodge No. 30, Knights of Pythias, of which he is
a past chancellor commander, and is a member of
the Chamber of Commerce, Judith Club and in
politics is a democrat.
J. H. Trower. is proprietor of the only cream-
ery industry in Sweetgrass County, at Big Timber,
is an expert dairyman and buttermaker, and has
had a long and active e.xperience in that business,
though in point of years he is still a young man.
Mr. Trower was born on a farm in Lincoln
County, Missouri, March 7, 1886. The Trower
family has been in America since colonial times,
coming originally from England. The grandfather,
Henry Trower, was a native of Kentucky, and was
an early settler in Lincoln County, Missouri, where
he spent his last years. Henry A. Trower, father
of the Big Timber business man, was born in
Lincoln County, Missouri, in 1851 and spent all his
life there as a farmer. He is now living at 01-
ney in that county. Politically he is a democrat
and is a member of the Presbyterian Church. His
wife, Margaret Downing, was born in the same
Missouri county in 1853 and died at Olney in 1899.
They had a family of nine children. Anna is the
wife of Joseph King, a farmer in Lincoln County;
Mary is unmarried and lives at home with her
father. Lula is the wife of Charles Kalb, an oste-
opathic physician at Springfield, Illinois. The
fourth child and oldest son is J. H. Trower. Isaac,
the next of age, was in the army from October,
1917, until March, 1919. He was in the aviation
department and was trained and in service at
Wright Field, San Antonio, Texas, in the Carnegie
Institute at Pittsburgh, at St. Paul and finally at
Door's Field in Florida. Since leaving the army
he has been helping his brother at Big Timber in
the creamery. The sixth is Frank Trower, who
runs the homestead farm at Olney, Missouri. J. E.
Trower enlisted the day following the declaration
of war with Germany and at this writing is still
in the navy, being chief water tender. William
Trower is a farmer at Corso, Missouri. Roy A.,
the youngest, was a participant in some of the
hardest fighting of the war. He was with the
Eighty-ninth Division, and was in the front line
trenches in France from August 2, 1918, until the
signing of the armistice. He was in the St. Mihiet
drive beginning September 12th, and on the 12th
of October was transferred to the Argonne sector
and was in that forest until the close of the war.
He was a corporal.
J. H. Trower while living ori his father's farm
attended the rural schools of Missouri and for five
years he carried studies in the Kirksville State
Normal. He left Kirksville in 1909 and then came
to the Northwest, and in the University of Idaho
at Moscow pursued a special dairying and butter
making course, graduating in 1910. For two years
he was assistant dairyman at the University of
Idaho. Then for one year he had charge of the
butter manufacturing department of the Schallen-
ger Produce Company at Spokane, Washington.
After this experience and training Mr. Trower came
to Big Timber in 1914 and bought out an old cream-
ery, but re-established and reorganized the business
with a complete new equipment in 1918. The cream-
ery plant is located on First Avenue. Mr. Trower
through his business has done a great deal to stimu-
late dairy production in Sweetgrass County, and
furnishes a market for the surplus milk and cream
to all the farmers in the county. He manufactures
large quantities of butter and ice cream, and the
surplus finds a ready market at Butte, Anaconda,
Livingston and other towns.
In other ways Mr. Trower is an aggressive and
progressive factor in his locality. He is vice presi-
dent of the Sweetgrass County Good Roads Asso-
ciation. He owns a modern home at Fourth
Avenue, West, and Stock Street. He is independent
in politics, a member of the Presbyterian Church,
and is affiliated with Big Timber Lodge No. 25,
Knights of Pythias.
In January, 1913, at Spokane, Washington, he
married Miss Ruby Rickel, a daughter of W. H.
and Rose (Roberts) Rickel, who now reside at Big
Timber. Mr. Rickel is employed in the Big Tim-
ber Creamery. Mrs. Trower is a graduate of the
Blair Business College of Spokane. To their mar-
riage were born two daughters, Elizabeth Rose,
born December 17, 1915, and Yevonne Elaine, born
December 17, 1918.
James A. Weaver, deputy game warden at Lewis-
town, is a citizen who has played in his time many
parts — farmer, cowboy, range rider, deputy sheriff,
merchant, and the scope of his experiences in Mon-
tana covers a period of thirty years or more.
He was born in Douglas County, Oregon, Feb-
ruary 24, 1868, a son of James B. and Sarah Ann
(Wright) Weaver. His father, a native of Ten-
nessee, was reared and educated in that state and
when a young man moved into Missouri. He was
one of the early Californians, making the trip
overland by ox team in 1850. After some expe-
rience in the gold diggings he went north to Ore-
gon, locating in Douglas County. He was a pioneer
hotel man and merchant in that locality, later be-
came a farmer, and finally retired from active busi-
ness and spent eight or nine years in Montana with
his children. He was a democrat and an Odd Fel-
low. He died in 1906, at the age of seventy-two.
His wife was born in Missouri and died in 1882.
They were married in Oregon and had eight chil-
dren, four of whom are still living, James A. being
the fourth in age.
The latter was reared in Douglas County, Ore-
gon, attending the public schools there and spent
much of his early life with his uncle, John W.
Weaver. When only eight years old he rode one
horse and led the other, dragging a harrow over
the plowed fields. This farm experience contin-
ued for about six years. He then went to Eastern
Oregon, became a cowboy in 1887, and rode the
range in Wyoming, and in July, 1888, arrived in
Fergus County, Montana. He was employed in
breaking horses and punching cows and in 1891
received his first initiation into public service when
appointed deputy sheriff of Fergus County. Later
he was in the saloon and livery business, and was
the first city marshal of Lewistown under Mayor
J. P. Barnes. For a number of years Mr. Weaver
has had ranch interests in the Stanford and Den-
ton country. He was appointed deputy game war-
den in igis.
Mr. Weaver is affiliated with Judith Lodge No.
30, Knights of Pythias, and has been a member of
Lewistown Lodge No. 456 of the Elks since its
organization. Politically he is identified with the
democratic party.
120
HISTORY OF MONTANA
On February 24, 1902, his birthday, he married
Bertha K. Hosch. She was born in Iowa T\yo
children were born to their marriage : James J^hiUp,
who died at the age of five years, and John Hosch.
Martin F. Hayes, a resident of Montana since
1901 is former deputy county clerk and recorder of
Powell County, and now has charge of the books
of the firm Branscombe & O'Neill at Deer Lodge.
He was born at Waterville, Minnesota, Septem-
ber 26 1886, of Irish ancestry. The Hayes family
came to New York State early in the last century.
His father Dennis P. Haves was born at Troy, New
York, in October, 1848, was reared there, and spent
many years as a railroad man. He was in the era-
ploy of the Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha
as road foreman at Le Seuer, Minnesota, where he
married and lived until 1889 when he located at
Mankato and was in the stone quarry business under
the partnership Jordan & Hayes until 1898. He
then sold his interests in Minnesota and moved to
Great Falls, Montana, where he was road foreman
for the Great Northern Railway, and from 1902
to 1905 filled a similar position at Winston and
since 1905 has been road foreman at Silver Bow
for the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railway. While
he lived at Mankato, Minnesota, he served as city
recorder. He is a democrat, a Catholic, a fourth
degree Knight of Columbus, being affiliated with
Anaconda Council No. 882, a member of the Ancient
Order of Hibernians and Mankato Camp Modern
Woodmen of .America and the Ancient Order of
United Workmen. He married Ellen Gorman, who
was born at LeSeuer, Minnesota, in 1852, member
of one of the early territorial families of Minne-
sota. She died at Mankato in 1888. Her children
were: William T., a railway conductor for the
Northwestern railway, living in Worthington, Min-
nesota; James P. in the livery business at Mankato;
Philip E., chef at the St. Regis Hotel. Spokane,
Washington; and Martin F. and John H., twins,
the latter a roadmaster for the Northern Pacific
Railwav at Moscow, Idaho; Charles E., powder
mixer for the Dupont Powder Company at Ramsey,
Montana.
Martin F. Haves was educated in the public
schools of Mankato, graduating from high school
in 1898. The next two years he was assistant book-
keeper for the Hubbard' Milling Company. In 1901
on coming to Montana he became foreman iii the
freight department of the Northern Pacific Railway
at Helena, was promoted to car distributor and in
1902 sent to Garrison, Montana. In 1907 he was
made cashier, and in 1912 came to Deer Lodge as
station agent holding that office until September,
1915, when he had rounded out nearly fifteen years
in the service of railway corporation. He then took
up his duties as deputy county clerk and recorder
but in February, 1918, resigned and took charge of
the books of the well known Deer Lodge automobile
concern of Branscombe & O'Neill at 306 Main
Street.
Mr. Hayes takes an active part in local politics,
being secretary of the County Central Committee,
an office he has held for the past three years. He
is a Catholic, is grand knight of Deer Lodge Coun-
cil No. 1810 Knights of Columbus. Mr. Hayes and
family live in a modern home at 907 Fourth Street.
He married at Deer Lodge in 1907 Miss Clara M.
Smith, daughter of Joseph and Mary Ann (Booth)
Smith, residents of Garrison, Montana. Her father
is roundhouse foreman for the Northern Pacific
Railway Company. Mrs. Hayes is a graduate of the
Powell County High School at Deer Lodge. They
have two children : Francis, born January 2, 1908,
and Dorothy, born March 16, 1913.
Theodore H.\rding Thomas has a veteran's ex-
perience and record as a miner in the western sec-
tion of the state. He has been mining in what is
now Mineral County for thirty years or more, and
while he has met vicissitudes and has had the usual
ups and downs of the mining game, his work and
profits on the whole have been more than moder-
ately successful.
Mr. Thomas, who enjoys a high place of esteem
in Mineral County and is the present county asses-
sor, was born at Canning, in Nova Scotia, Canada,
December 6, 1852. His grandfather, Henry Thomas,
was born in Wales, in 1779, and in 1829 crossed tlie
ocean and settled at New Canaan, Nova Scotia,
where he spent the rest of his life as a practical
farmer. He died in 1866. His son, David R. Thomas,
was born in Wales in 1826, and was three years
of age when the family came to this country. He
became a farmer at Canning and in 1861 moved
to Wolfville, Nova Scotia, and from there in 1890,
having retired, moved to Fitchburg, Massachusetts,
where he died in 1910. He was a conservative in
Canadian politics and a member of the Baptist
Church. His wife was Mary Isabelle Fitch, who
was born at New Canaan, Nova Scotia, in 1827 and
died at Wolfville in 1869. Jessie, the oldest of their
children, died at Fitchburg, Massachusetts, in 1919,
being then the widow of Isaac Murray, a merchant
in Nova Scotia. Maggie, who died in New York
City in 1912, was the wife of Arthur Cunningham,
who spent all his active career as a clerk in the
postoffice department at Halifax, Nova Scotia, being
finally pensioned for several years before his death.
Theodore Harding Thomas, now the only one
of the children living, was educated in the public
schools of Wolfville, including the high school, and
in 1873 received his A. B. degree from Acadia Col-
lege at Wolfville. At that time his ambition was
to become a physician, and he studied medicine at
Wolfville and at Port Hawkesbury, Cape Breton.
While reading medicine he taught school. Even-
tually he abandoned his ideas as to a medical career,
but continued teaching in Nova Scotia until the
spring of 1880.
He was first attracted to the mining district of
the West during the Leadville stampede in Colo-
rado. He also spent a time in Denver and at Colo-
rado Springs for two years was a bookkeeper and
a log scaler for the Colorado Pinery Trust Com-
pany. In 1883 he went to southwestern Colorado
in the San Juan district, where he prospected in
mines for two years.
Mr. Thomas came to Superior, Montana, in i83t,
and his experience covers most of the history of
that noted mining section. He was a prospector
and placer miner and also did quartz mining for
gold, silver and lead. He now owns stock in sev-
eral successful mines. He is secretary and treas-
urer of the Golden Sunset Mining Company, the
officers of which corporation are in Iron Mountain
opposite the Northern Pacific depot. The company
operates gold and silver mines on Cedar Creek.
Mr. Thomas was honored by his fellow citizens
with the office of county assessor in November,
1918, and began his official term of two years in
the following January. He is a democrat in poli-
tics and is a former member of the Improved Order
of Red Men. In 1892, at Missoula, he married Miss
Maggie Briggs, a native of New York state.
Herman Otten. Holding distinction as one of
the earliest cattle men of Montana and as one of
(^^^^^^^^cm^ ^^^
^Mm^ (Hdhru
HISTORY OF MONTANA
121
the first wheat-growers of Fergus County, Herman
Otten, a retired citizen of Lewistown, has led a
career that has included experience of an interesting
character, and in his business activities has invaded
a number of fields of endeavor, in all of which he
has been successful.
Mr. Otten was born at Radereisted Amt der Sted,
Germany, February 22, 1838, and received his edu-
cation in the public schools of his native place.
Feeling that the United States offered better oppor-
tunities for the gaining of success, at the age of
eighteen }-ears he left home and journeyed to New
"lork on a sailing vessel. In New York City he was
\ariously employed for three years, after which, in
1S59, he traveled to San Francisco by steamer,
around_ Cape Horn, and for three years was employed
on a farm near that city. Later he embarked in
the saloon business at San Francisco, but disposed
of his interests therein to go to Virginia, Nevada,
where he worked for a time in the silver mines.
Subsequently, in search of more remunerative em-
ployment, he came overland to German Gulch, Mon-
tana, by ox-team, but after a short stay joined
George Fitchin and John Saylor in a trip to Texas,
where the trio bought 300 head of cattle and drove
them overland to Big Hole, Montana. • Mr. Otten
applied himself uninterruptedly to the cattle business
until 1876, when he made a trip to the old country
to visit his parents, but in 1877 returned to the
United States, and June 17 of that year, at New
York City, was united in marriage with Elise
Ranges, who had been born in Brenkum, Germany,
June 3, 1854, and had recently come to the United
States. Shortly following their marriage Mr. and
Mrs. Otten came to Big Hole, Montana, where for
some years they resided on the range, but later
went to Silver Bow. In 1887 Mr. Otten purchased
a ranch at Cottonwood Creek, and in that year first
came to Lewistown. Two years later he sold his
cattle and became one of the organizers of the
Judith Basin Bank at Lewistown, of which he be-
came president. He continued to hold that position
when the reorganization was effected that changed
this institution to the First National Bank of Lewis-
town, and he remained in the chief executive ca-
pacity until his resignation, when he was succeeded
by David Hilger, although he still retains a large
share of stock in the institution. Mr. Otten has
been practically retired from business affairs since
1909, although he has large holdings and important
interests. While at Cottonwood he was the pro-
prietor of a successful general store, and in what-
ever community he has resided he has had several
irons in the fire in order to engage his energies and
abilities to the utmost. That his foresight is great
is noted in the fact that he was one of the first to
realize the suitability of Montana as a cattle country
and that he also was one of the first to recognize
the possibilities in wheat-growing in Fergus County.
His business reputation is of the highest, and in civic
and social circles he has a number of important
connections.
Five children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Otten.
namely: Anna O., the wife of W. M. Blackford, a
prominent attorney of Lewistown, with five children ;
Herman C, of Glengarr}% Montana, who married
Florence McMillen, and has two sons ; Elise, who
died December 9, 1918, as the wife of George W.
Tubb, leaving three children; Henry J., who mar-
ried Jennie Anderson ; and Ella M., who resides with
her parents.
Charles Halter, present superintendent of the
county farm of Carbon County, was the pioneer
restaurant man of Red Lodge, and became widely
known through his connection with that business.
He was born at Manistee, Michigan, January 14,
1870. His father, Anthony Halter, was born in
Germany in 1834 and when a small boy his parents
came to the United States and settled in Wisconsin,
where the grandfather died. The home in which
he was reared was six miles from Milwaukee.
After his marriage he moved to Manistee, Michi-
gan, when that was a lumber camp in the midst
of the primeval woods. He followed his trade as
a millwright for many years and died at Manistee
in 1899. He was a democrat and a Catholic.
Anthony Halter married Mary Stemper, who was
born in Wisconsin in 1839 and died at Maqistee in
1876. Their children were: Christine, wife of Alex-
ander Smith, a marine engineer on the Great Lakes
living at Klanistee ; John who was an engineer
with the Manistee and Northeastern Railroad and
died at Manistee in 1915; Annie, living in Manis-
tee, widow of William Douglas, who owns half of
the Manistee & Northeastern Railroad; George, a
retired engineer of the Manistee & Northeastern,
living at Manistee; Louis who is a messenger for
the United States Express Company and lives in
Texas; Charles; Michael, who was a blacksmith
and died at Manistee at the age of twenty-seven;
and Frank, who is a farmer in Idaho.
Charles Halter left school work at Manistee at
the age of fifteen and from that time forward has
made his own way in the world. He came to Mon-
tana in 1897, and soon afterward engaged in the
restaurant business at Red Lodge. He was about
the first to furnish that service to the community
and continued active therein until 191 5, when he
sold out. The next two vears he managed a pool
hall in the Pollard Hotel at Red Lodge, and in
IQ17 was appointed to his present responsibilities
as superintendent of the county farm. The county
farm is located a mile south of Red Lodge and is
a well equipped place, including a fine brick house
for the inmates, barns and other outbuildings.
There are twenty-one acres of land. Carbon County
has only a limited need for this institution, since
there are few who have to avail themselves of its
facilities. About the highest number who have
been inmates of the home is ten, and at the present
writing there are only seven.
Mr. Halter is independent in politics, is a Catholic
and is a third degree knight of Manistee Council
of Knights of Columbus. He owns a dwelling on
North Platle .A.venue.
He married at Sheridan, Wyoming, in 1905, Miss
Mary Johnson, a daughter of Peter and Mary John-
son, both now deceased. Her father was a moulder
by trade and worked at Manistee, Michigan, for
thirty-five years.
George Robert Lyons. The old New England
State of Massachusetts has contributed its share of
families which have left their comfortable homes
in the East to assist in the civilization and settlement
of the newer West, and among those now living in
Montana who claim the Bay State as the place of
their birth is George Robert Lyons, an extensive
sheep ranchman of the Twodot community in
Meagher County. However, although an easterner
by birth, Mr. Lyons is essentially and distinctively a
man of the West, for his education and training have
been secured in Montana, and here he has spent his
career and won his success.
Mr. Lyons was born at South Lee, Berkshire
County, Massachusetts, June 12, 1885, a son of
George and Mary (Orr) Lyons. His father, a
native of Ireland, came to the United States as a
young man, and subsequently made his way over-
122
HISTORY OF MONTANA
land across the prairies to Montana, where he sought
his fortune in the mines at Diamond City. Later he
was one of the pioneers of the freightmg industry
from Salt Lake City to Helena, and then located
in the Musselshell Valley, where he was an early
and prominent cattle man. His closing days were
passed on his ranch in that locality, and there his
death occurred in 1912, when he was seventy-two
years of age. He was a republican in his political
views, but never cared for nor sought public office.
Mrs. Lyons, who was born at South Lee, Massa-
chusetts, survives her husband and resides at Two-
dot. They were the parents of two children : George
Robert; and Helen May, the widow of Edward
Reaussen, who died in December, 1917, leaving a
son, Edward. Mrs. Reaussen resides at Twodot with
her mother. .
George Robert Lyons was educated in the public
schools of Montana, and for additional training was
sent to the military academy at Faribault, Minnesota,
known as the Chaddock Military Academy. His boy-
hood days were passed amid the surroundings of the
ranch, and he came to immediately know and appre-
ciate horses and cattle, so that it was not surprising
that he adopted ranching for his choice of vocations
when called upon to determine his career. When he
took over the business he conducted it along the
same progressive lines as had his father, and subse-
quently added a band of sheep to the stock on the
place. He gradually built up the business to its
present proportions through good management and a
knowledge of the needs of such an enterprise, and at
times has had as many as from 600 to 1,500 head of
cattle and from 5,000 to 6,000 head of sheep. This
property, the C. L. Ranch, is widely known, as is its
proprietor, who bears an excellent reputation as
cattleman, rancher and substantial business man of
integrity. Mr. Lyons is a member of Castle Lodge,
Knights of Pythias, at Twodot, and is popular with
its members. He is a republican in his political
affiliation, and while he has not sought the honors of
public life has been prominent in seeking to support
the movements which have promised the progress
and advancement of the community in which he has
made his home for so many years.
Mr. Lyons was married October 16, 1912, to Miss
Minnie May Fresser, who was born at Helena,
Montana, daughter of John H. Freeser, one of the
pioneer miners and stoclcmen of Montana, now mak-
ing his home at Twodot. Five children have been
born to Mr. and Mrs. Lyons, of whom four are
living : George Robert, Jr., Nancy Louise, Doris
Marie and John Henry.
John C. Docter, M. D. It is scarcely possible, in
these modern days, for a man to be a successful
physician without also being a man of learning and
of solid, scientific acquirements. Often the youth
who feels the inspiration tliat ultimately leads him
into the medical profession, finds his progress one
■ of difficulty from lack of encouragement, opportun-
ity or capital, and when all these drawbacks are
overcome, through personal effort, battles have been
won that make firm the foundations of character.
It is therefore easy to comprehend why the physician
is usually a dominating figure in his community.
Having conquered so many obstacles in his own
career, he is able to overcome those which come
up in civic affairs, and his fellow citizens naturally
turn to him for advice and support aside from their
need of his skill as a professional man. One of
these forces for civic betterment and increased
healthful conditions at Philipsburg is Dr. John C.
Docter, who has but recently returned from his
military service during the great war.
John C. Docter was born at Mayville, Wisconsin,
April 6, l8gi, a son of C. W. Docter, and grandson
of John Christian Docter. The great-grandfather
of Dr. John C. Docter, a native of Germany,
founded the Docter family in the United States.
John Christian Docter was born in 1830, and died
at Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 1878. After serving in
the Union army during the war between the North
and South, he located at Kenosha, Wisconsin, where
he worked at his trade of a carpenter and served
on the city police force. His wife bore the maiden
name of Elizabeth Stantz, and she survives him and
lives at Kenosha.
C. W. Docter was born at Kenosha, Wisconsin,
in 1869, where he lived until after his marriage,
when he located at Mayville that state. Early in
life he was a photographer, but later went into the
mercantile field, and is now one of the leading mer-
chants and publishers of Mayville, owning a large
novelty store and serving as president of the May-
ville News Company. He also owns one of the
popular moving picture theaters of the place and
is interested in other business enterprises. Mr.
Docter is an independent democrat, and has served
as treasurer of Mayville and is now a director of
its school board. He married Miss Anna Moeller,
born at Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 1871, and their chil-
dren are as follows : John C, whose name heads
this review ; Addie, who is unmarried, resides with
her parents ; Rudolph, who is a practicing dental
surgeon of Mayville, was graduated from the Mar-
quette University at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with the
degree of Doctor of Dental Surgery; Helen, who
is a graduate of the Mayville High School, is living
at home and Viola, who is also a graduate of the
Mayville High School, is at home.
John C. Docter attended the public schools of
Mayville, and was graduated from its high school
in 1909, following which for a year he was in his
father's store. He then entered the Marquette Uni-
versity at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from which he was
graduated in 1914 with the degree of Doctor of Med-
icine. At the same time he took a course in a night
school and secured the degree of Bachelor of
Science. He is a member of the Greek Letter fra-
ternity Phi Beta Pi.
In 1914 he became intern at the Northern Pacific
Hospital, at Missoula, Montana, where he remained
until the close of 1915, and then went to Drum-
mond, Montana, and was engaged there in an active
practice until January, 1918, when he came to
Philipsburg. During 1917 he took a special course
in surgery at the Northern Pacific Hospital. On
October 19, 1918, he received a commission of first
lieutenant in the Medical Corps, and was sent to
Fort Riley, Kansas, and had not the signing of the
Armistice occurred when it did. he would without
doubt have been sent overseas. He was mustered out
of the service at Fort Riley, in December, 1918.
Returning to Philipsburg, he resumed his general
medical and surgical practice which his military
service had interrupted, and maintains offices in the
Courtney Block. He is now health officer of Granite
County, and one of the most progressive young men
in his profession in this section. Independent in
politics he gives his support to those measures he
deems best for the people, irrespective of party
lines. He is a member of Ruby Lodge No. 36, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons of Drummond,
Montana ; Hope Chapter No. 10, Royal Arch Masons
of Philipsburg; Missoula Lodge. Benevolent Protec-
tive Order of Elks ; and to the Philipsburg Chamber
of Commerce.
On March 17, 1916, John C. Docter was married
to Miss Evaro Avery, at Missoula, Montana. She
HISTORY OF MONTANA
123
is a daughter of Amos and Caroline (Brunnell)
Avery, the forrner of whom is deceased, but during
life was the pioneer telegrapher of Missoula, and
his widow, who survives him, is acting as chief
telegrapher at Missoula and is the oldest in point of
service in the employ of the Northern Pacific Rail-
road. Mrs. Docter attended the Montana University
at Missoula and Bruno Hall at Spokane, Washing-
ton. Doctor and Mrs. Docter have two sons, John
Christian, who was born March 13, 1917, and Charles
William, born January 16, 1920.
P. H. McCarthy, M. D. The affection in which
the physician is held by those to whom he has
ministered is of a character that excites admira-
tion and inspires respect. The medical man occu-
pies a position that is unique for in his hands lie
the lives of those entrusted to his care and upon
his knowledge, skill and poise in times of danger
depends the future of the community. To the
credit of the profession be it said that very few
of the men who devote their lives to the healing
art fail to live up to the highest standards of fine
manhood and citizenship. They put self second, and
give lavishly of their time and professional serv-
ices often without thought as to recompense. They
not only care for the ailing, but through their fore-
sight and ability to provide for contingencies, pre-
serve the public health and enforce sanitary regula-
tions which oftentimes revolutionize the general
soundness of the people, and establish a salubrity
in their communities not dreamed of until they
came into the locality with their scientific knowl-
edge. One of the men who belongs to this dis-
tinguished class is Dr. P. H. McCarthy, physician
and surgeon of Butte.
Doctor McCarthy was born at Hancock, Houghton
County, Michigan, on October 15, 1875, a son of
James McCarthy, born in Ireland about 1835. The
paternal grandfather came to the United States from
Ireland when his son James was but a lad, and
located in New York City, where James McCarthy
received his educational training.
When he was still a young man. James McCarthy
came as far west as Hancock, Michigan, where he
was married, and he became manager of the Quincy
Mine. It was while discharging the duties of this
position that he lost his life in 1880, when there was
an accident at the mine. He was a veteran of the
war between the states. The Roman Catholic Church
had in him a devout member. His wife bore the
maiden name of Mary Driscoll, and she survives
him, making her home at Billings, Montana, her
second husband being a ranchman of that locality.
James McCarthy and his wife had the following
children : Mary, who married John Leary, now
deceased, a pioneer of Butte, which city he served
as a fireman, lives at Los Angeles, California; Gene,
who was a mining engineer, died in Colorado ; Dr.
P. H., whose name heads this review ; and James,
who was graduated from the Creighton Medical Col-
lege of Omaha, Nebraska, with the degree of Doctor
of Medicine, resides at Goldfield, Nevada. After
the death of Mr. McCarthy, Mrs. McCarthy was
married to Timothy Hanley, and their children are
as follows : Jerry, who is a ranchman, lives at Bill-
ings, Montana; William, who is a ranchman of Ne-
braska ; Abbie, who lives with her parents ; Robert,
who is a physician and surgeon of Billings, Mon-
tana, was graduated from the Creighton Medical
College of Omaha, Nebraska, with the degree of
Doctor of Medicine ; and Jennie, who is a teacher
in the public schools of Butte, Montana.
Doctor McCarthy attended the public schools of
O'Neil, Nebraska, and was graduated from its high
school course. For a time he followed mining in
Colorado, coming to Butte from that state in 1892,
and was employed by the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company until 1898, when he m.itriculated in the
Creighton Medical College and after completing the
regulation four years' course was graduated in 1902
with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. Meanwhile,
during the summer terms, he attended the Fre-
mont Normal School of Fremont, Nebraska, and
for two seasons was professor of chemistry and
physiology in that institution. During 1903 Doctor
McCarthy was interne in the Presbyterian Hospit'il
at Omaha, Nebraska, and then came direct to Butte
and has since been engaged in a general practice,
specializing to a certain extent in surgery. In the
years following his graduation Doctor McCarthy
has taken many post graduate courses, for he is .1
close student and keeps himself abreast of modern
thought in his profession. Not oidy has he studied
at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Chi-
cago, but also in medical institutions of London and
Paris, Europe, and of Baltimore, Maryland, New
York City, New York, Cincinnati, Ohio, St. Louis,
Missouri, and Rochester, Minnesota, specializing on
surgery. He has not missed taking a course each
year since securing his degree, and his efforts are
rewarded by the reputation he has been able to
establish as a surgeon, which extends not only over
Montana but adjoining states. For some time he
has been connected as surgeon with Saint James
Hospital of Butte. He is a member of the Silver
Bow Medical Society, the Montana State Medical
Society, the American Medical Association, the
Butte Country Club, Butte Council No. 668, Knights
of Columbus, of which he is a fourth degree knight,
Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, and Butte Aerie No. 11, Fraternal
Order Eagles. His offices are at Nos. 5, 6, 7 and 8
Owsley Block, and his residence is at No. 823 West
Park Street. Doctor McCarthy is a very heavy
holder of real estate in different parts of Montana,
all of his interests being centered in this state.
Politically a democrat, he was elected from Silver
Bow County as a delegate to the national conven-
tion of his party held at St. Louis, Missouri, in
1916. Like his father he is a Roman Catholic.
In addition to his extensive practice Doctor Mc-
Carthy is also a director in a number of business
enterprises of Butte, and is in every way a promi-
nent citizen who has the welfare of this region
at heart, and is exceedingly generous in his support
of its interests.
Doctor McCarthy was married at Omaha, Ne-
braska, in 1905 to Miss Julia Stafford, a daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. Michael Stafford. Michael Staf-
ford was a pioneer of the Missouri Valley and
served as superintendent of construction of the
Chicago & Northwestern Railroad through that part
of the West. He is now deceased, but his widow
survives him and resides at Omaha, Nebraska. Mrs.
McCarthy was graduated from a collegiate course
with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. Doctor and
Mrs. McCarthy have a daughter, Mary, who was
born on November 7, 1910.
When this country entered the great war, Doctor
McCarthy tried to enlist, but was turned down on
account of his physical condition. After a second
examination he received his commission as captain
on May 15, 1918, and was sent to Fort Benjamin
Harrison in Indiana as captain of the development
battalion, and was later made president of the board
of demobilization. On December 18, 1918, he was
mustered out of the service and, returning to Butte,
resumed his practice.
Doctor McCarthy is a man who is always show-
124
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ing kindness both to individuals and institutions,
and is interested in all that pertains to modern
progress in the highest sense of the word. He is
inspired by high ideals and gifted beyond the or-
dinary in his professional attainments, and it is
probable that his health has been impaired by the
absorbing strain of his duties.
Erick a. Erickson is a formally ordained minis-
ter of the Lutheran Church and first came to Mon-
tana in his capacity as a minister. He organized
the church of his denomination at Big Tirnber, but
about ten years ago accepted a call from his minis-
terial duties to resume his former profession as a
teacher, and has since been superintendent of the
city schools. He is a skillful teacher, an educator
of broad mind and long experience, and has made
the Big Timber school system one of the best in
the state.
Mr. Erickson, though born in Norway, May 28,
1873, is an American by training and has lived in
this country since early infancy. His father, Arne
Erickson, was born in 1834 in Norway, and mar-
ried in that country Johanna Larson. She was
born in 1835. They were farmers in Norway and
the father served in the regular Norwegian army.
In 1875, when Erick was two years old, the family
came to the United States and settled at Mona in
Northern Iowa, where Arne Erickson was a pioneer
farmer. In 1879 he pioneered to Dakota Territory,
locating on a farm in what is now Cass County,
North Dakota. From there he moved to Grand
Forks and homesteaded 160 acres and a timber
claim of 160 acres at Reynolds. He still lives on his
homestead there, though now retired from the re-
sponsibilities of the farm of 320 acres which he
owns. He has been a republican voter many years
and is a loyal member of the Lutheran Church.
His wife died at Reynolds, November 6, 1918.
Most of their family of children are farmers or
farmers' wives. Ele is the wife of B. Ellison, a
farmer at Reynolds. Martin is one of the promi-
nent business men of Reynolds, a farmer, banker,
former member of the Legislature and former
county commissioner. Lena is the wife of E. K.
Grove, and they live on the old homestead at Reyn-
olds. Annie lives at Reynolds, widow of S. O.
Myhre. and she owns the farm on which she lives.
Amund was a farmer at Reynolds and died in 1917.
Erick A. is the sixth in age. Ole was also a farmer
and died at Reynolds in 1911. Jennie is the wife
of E. G. Brant, a rancher at Conrad, Montana, and
Charles, the youngest of the family, is also on a
ranch at Conrad.
Erick A. Erickson acquired his early education
in the public schools at Grand Forks,' graduating
from high school in 1888. He received a Normal
diploma in i8go from the University of North Da-
kota at Grand Forks, and for several years taught
in Grand Forks County. In 1896 he entered Augs-
burg Seminary and College at Minneapolis, where
he completed the regular college course and re-
ceived the A. B. degree in 1898, and then continued
in the theological school and was graduated Bache-
lor of Theology in 1901.
As a minister of the Lutheran Church Mr. Erick-
son spent four years at Bellingham, Washington,
after which he was professor of pedagogy and psy-
chology in the Normal School at Madison, Minne-
sota. In 1905 he came to Billings as a pastor of
the Lutheran Church and a few months later was
called upon to organize a Lutheran Church at Big
Timber. When the church was constituted he re-
mained as pastor and in that capacity was identi-
fied with the life of this community "until 1909.
Mr. Erickson became superintendent of city
schools in the fall of 1909. In the spring of 1919,
just ten years later, his contract was renewed for
another three year period. He has the supervi-
sion of a staff of nine teachers, and the enrollment
in the Big Timber schools is 285 students. In 1909
he was also appointed a member of the County
Educational Examining Board, and has filled that
office continuously. He is a member of the Mon-
tana State Teachers' Association, and is widely
known over the state through his work as an in-
structor in the Teachers' State Training School
at Bozeman during the summers. He is a gifted
penman, and penmanship is usually one of the
subjects assigned him in the summer normals.
Mr. Erickson lives in a modern home which he
owns on McLeod Street. He is a republican, is
affiliated with Big Timber Lodge No. 25 Knights of
Pythias and is a member of the Sons of Norway.
In 1902, at Bellingham, Washington, he married
Miss Mary Mahlun, daughter of S. J. and Ingaborg
(Austing) Mahlun. Her parents live at Reynolds,
North Dakota, where her father is a retired farm-
er. Mr. and Mrs. Erickson have had five children :
Alvin, born March 14, 1905 ; Hilma Johanna, born
January 11. 1907; Leonard Melius, born December
24, 1908; Elmer Martin, born November 26, 1910;
and Arnold, born May 24, 1916.
John H. Stephens, the present sheriff of Fergus
County, is a native of old Fort Logan, represents
pioneer Montana stock, and his own career has
been one of varied eventfulness, experience and
service.
Hp was born May 9, 1878, a son of Albert J. and
Fannie E. (Hillis) Stephens. His father, who was
born in Pennsylvania, left home at the age of four-
teen and spent all the rest of his life in the Far
West. His first experience was in the mining dis-
trict of Colorado around Pike's Peak. Later he
went to California and arrived in Montana in the
historic year 1863, first locating at Bannock City as
a gold prospector. From there he went to Diamond
City, was a miner for some time, and then engaged
in the butcher business and located a ranch in the
Smith River Valley, two miles from Fort Logan in
Meagher County. In 1874, at Diamond City, he
married Fannie E. Hillis, who was born in Indiana.
They moved to a ranch in that year and Albert
Stephens was engaged in the cattle business for
many years, until 1903. He then sold his ranch and
cattle and moved to Cannon Ranch near White
Sulphur Springs, where he died in February, 1917,
at the age of seventy-nine. His widow is still living
on the old ranch at White Sulphur Springs, and is
now seventy-one years of age. Albert Stephens
during the '80s served as county commissioner
of Meagher County. He was one of the first
members of the Masonic Lodge at Diamond City
E'ld in politics v.-as a democrat.
John H. Stephens was the second of eight chil-
dren, six of whom are still living, four sons and
two daughters. He acquired his early education in
the grade schools of Lewistown, and attended busi-
ness colleges at Davenport, Iowa, Kalamazoo,
Michigan, and Helena, Montana. In 1892 he located
in Fergus County and was a stockman until 1900.
He then farmed for two years and in 1902, entered
the Osteopathic College at Kirksville, Missouri,
taking the full course and practicing for two years
at Dillon and White Sulphur Springs. In 1906 he
returned to Fergus County and located a home-
stead, where he engaged in farming and stock raising
near Roy until 1913. He then remained in Roy
engaged in the livery and grain business, and in
^^K^jCfJLc^,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
125
Xovember, 1916, the votes of a majority of the
people of Fergus County called him to the office
of sheriff. He was re-elected in 1918, and has given
a thoroughly efficient administration of that im-
portant post. Mr. Stephens is a member of Lewis-
town Lodge No. 37, Free and Accepted Masons, and
Judith Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks. Politically he is a republican.
On March 20, 1900, he married Lillian E. Cook.
She was born in Vermont, a daughter of George W.
and Emily H. (Orvis) Cook, a well known family
of Lewistown. Mr. and Mrs. Stephens have eight
children, named Edith L., George H., Joseph C.,
Ruth, John H., Jr., Robert L., Alary C. and Lucile.
■Reuben E. Coy, manager of the Mountain State
Telephone and Telegraph Company, with headquar-
ters at Laurel, is one of the experienced young
business men of Yellowstone County, and his" abili-
ties are held in high esteem not only by the offi-
cials of his company, but also by his fellow citi-
zens. He was born at Independence, Wisconsin,
March 23, 1884, a son of E. S. Coy and grandson
of Abraham Coy, a pioneer farmer of Wisconsin
who homesteaded there, and died at Independence,
that state, in 1907.
E. S. Coy was born in Minnesota in i8j6, but
was reared in and about Independence, Wisconsin.
For a number of years he was engaged in a mer-
cantile business at Independence, and also engaged
in farming, but he is now a rural free delivery
carrier out of Independence. Politically he is a
republican. For fifteen years he served Independ-
ence as constable, and was city marshal for about
fifteen years, always taking a very prominent part
in civic affairs. The Methodist Episcopal Church
holds his membership and has his loyal support.
He was married at Independence, Wisconsin, to
Barbara Cook, born in Wisconsin in 1864, and their
children are' as follows : George A., who resides
at Laurel, Montana, is night train desk man at
the yard offices of the Northern Pacific Railroad
Company; and Reuben E., whose name heads this
-review.
Reuben E. Coy attended the public schools of
Independence, Wisconsin, until he was fifteen years
old, when he was graduated in the high school
work. In 1900 he entered the employ of the tele-
phone and telegraph company at Independence, but
at the expiration of two years left to become tele-
graph lineman for the Northern Pacific Railroad
Company, working over the entire system until
1909, being during that period one of the two men
thus employed. His first trip to Montana was
made in 1902, and during the time he was work-
ing as lineman he was frequently sent into the
state, and was so pleased with conditions here that
he located at Laurel in April, 1909, establishing
himself in a clothing business, but closed it out
in the fall of igio to enter the employ of the
Mountain State Telephone and Telegraph Com-
pany as exchange manager of the Laurel Exchange,
comprising Laurel, Bridger, Joliet, Fromberg and
Columbus, Montana. Mr, Coy has eighteen em-
ployes, under his supervision, and the exchange at
Laurel is located on Main Street. Politically Mr.
Coy is a republican and served on the school board
for five years. He affiliates with the Congrega-
tional Church. Fraternally he belongs to Corin-
thian Lodge No. 72, .Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, of Laurel : and Arcadia Chapter. Royal
Arch Masons, of .Arcadia. Wisconsin. A booster
for Laurel, he is an active member of the Com-
mercial Club. Mr. Coy owns a comfortable mod-
ern residence on Fifth Avenue, corner of Third
Street.
In September, 1909, Mr. Coy was united in mar-
riage with Miss Sarah Schaffner at Independence,
Wisconsin. She is a daugther of J. J. Schaffner,
a retired farmer. Mrs. Coy is a graduate of the
Independence High School and attended the State
Normal School at Stevens Point, Wisconsin. There
are no children. Mr. Coy is a splendid type of
alert young western business man, aggressive, com-
petent and effective, interested in his community
and anxious to give it the best of service. It is
such men as Mr. Coy that build up the newer por-
tions of the country and set an example in civic
usefulness the older localities would do well to
follow.
Mrs. Mary Collier Johnson. The Anaconda
Business College is one of the most reliable institu-
tions of its kind in this part of the West, audits
courses are designed to give the students a practical
knowledge of the fundamentals of commercial life
so as to prepare them to step from the schoolroom
into good paying positions. The institution is the
outgrowth of the ideas and efforts of its owner, Mrs.
Mary Collier Johnson, an educator of wide and
varied experience and a woman of unusual business
capacity.
Mrs. Johnson was born at Houghton, Michigan,
and is a daughter of Daniel Sullivan, and grand-
daughter of Timothy S. Sullivan, born in County
Cork, Ireland, who came to the United States and
after spending some time at Boston, Massachusetts,
became a pioneer of the mining regions of northern
Michigan, being one of the first to operate the Isle
Royal mine of the Northern Peninsula of Michigan.
His death occurred at Houghton, Michigan.
Daniel Sullivan was born at Boston, Massa-
chusetts, in 1831, and he died at Tombstone, Ari-
zona, in 1915. .'Vfter his marriage which took place
at Houghton, Michigan, where he had been reared,
Daniel Sullivan was one of the pioneer prospectors
of Pioche, Nevada, and then in the early '70s went
to Tintic, Utah, and on into the Black Hills of the
Dakotas in 1876. Still later he prospected at George-
town and Leadville, Colorado, and was one of the
very first to reach Tombstone, Arizona, which was
established in 1879. and there he spent the rest of
his life. Mr. Sullivan prospected for gold, silver
and copper and made a fortune, but like so many
of the prospectors re-invested in other mining prop-
ositions. Politically he was a republican. His wife
Mary was born at Swansea, Wales, in 1849, and
died at Tintic, Utah, in 1874. Their children were
as follows: Katherine, who married P. F. Clifford,
a merchant of Butte, Montana ; Mary, who married
R. R. Johnson, lives at No. 23 Main Street. Ana-
conda, he being clerk for the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company; Margaret, who married W. E.
Carpenter, superintendent of a mine in Humboldt,
.'\rizona. and D. S. who lives at Tonopah, Nevada,
where he also has mining interests.
Mrs. Johnson attended the public schools of Mich-
igan and Arizona, and then became a student of the
University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, taking a three
years' course. Following that she attended the De-
troit Business College of Detroit, Michigan. For
the subsequent eighteen years she was engaged as
a teacher in the public schools, for sixteen years of
that time being connected with the Lake_ Linden.
Michigan, High School as assistant principal. In
1901 her attention was turned to the West, and she
came to Montana, spending her first two ]?ears in
the state as an instructor of the public schools of
Butte. .\ woman of broad vision with great faith
126
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in Anaconda, she decided to give practical expres-
sion to it by establishing a business college, and
in 1904 founded the Anaconda Business College at
No. 23 Main Street, where the entire second floor
is occupied. Pupils come to this college from the
city and surrounding district, and her methods and
thoroughness are commended by all who employ
her graduates. She is very active as a member of
the Anaconda Woman's Club, and was elected the
first Republican County Central Committee woman
of Deer Lodge County, which office she now holds.
R. R. Johnson came to Montana in 1888, and after
a year spent at Butte, became associated with the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company and has been
a resident of Anaconda ever since. A democrat of
influence he was elected on his party ticket as a
representative to the Thirteenth General Assembly
of Montana from Deerlodge County. Mr. and Mrs.
Johnson have no children.
John B. Coppo. Strength of purpose, intelli-
gently directed, generally brings about a gratifying
material advancement. The man who. discovering
the calling for which he is best fitted, forges ahead,
undeterred by obstacles, undismayed by the chances
and changes of life, is the one who reaches his ulti-
mate goal. Such a man through his very prosperity
proves his worth, for it is impossible for anyone
to reach any height of good fortune if he shirks
duty, or seeks to lay upon other shoulders the re-
sponsibilities his own should bear. Great centers
of industry develop men big of heart and brain,
for competition acts as a stimulus and brings out
the best in a man. John B. Coppo, member of the
co-partnership operated under the name of the Butte
Plumbing Company, is a man who honors Butte
by his residence in the city, and is honored by
it in the success to which he has attained.
John B. Coppo was born at Calumet, Houghton
County, Michigan, on September 23, 1879, a son of
John A. Coppo. The birth of John A. Coppo took
place in 1845, at Ponte Canavesse, Piamont, Torino,
Italy, and his death occurred at Butte, Montana, on
April 20, 1919. Reared in his native place, he early
developed a desire to see new places, and even as
a boy he traveled through Switzerland, France and
Germany, working as an apprentice to the tinsmith-
ing trade, and later becoming a journeyman tinsmith.
This gave him a variety of experiences, for, accord-
ing to the custom of the times and country, he and
his employers walked from place to place, crossing
the Alps on foot by way of Mount Saint Bernard.
Having tasted of the pleasures of adventure, it
was but natural that he should take a further
chance, and in 1872, John A. Coppo came to the
United States and located at Calumet, Michigan, and
there followed mining for two years. Leaving
Michigan, he went into the Black Hills during the
rush to them after the discovery of gold, and was
there from 1878 to 1879, but then returned to Calu-
met, and for the next ten years was engaged in its
mines. He then came to Montana and continued to
work as a miner, being in the employ of the Butte
& Boston Company, under Captain Hoatson as
superintendent and Charles Palmer as general man-
ager, and it was when he was so employed that his
death occurred. Upon locating in this country Mr.
Coppo declared his intention of becoming a citizen,
and after due process of law received his papers,
and thereafter lived according to the rules and regu-
lations of his adopted country and gave an intelli-
gent support to the candidates of the republican
party. The Roman Catholic Church had in him an
earnest and faithful member.
In 1874 he was married at Calumet to Madaline
Rigano, who was born in 1852, and she survives
him and makes her home at Butte. Their children
were as follows : Lena, who is the wife_ of John
Lamuth, lives on their ranch in Brown's Gulch.
Silver Bow County, Montana, and John B., whose
name heads this review.
John B. Coppo attended the public schools of
Calumet and Butte, remaining in high school through
the sophomore year. He then entered the Butte
Business College and after taking the regular course
was graduated therefrom in 1897. When only fifteen
vears old he began working as office boy for J. R.
Reed, and then was with the World Messenger Com-
pany, but it was not until December 15, 1895, that
he entered upon his real career, when on that date
he began his apprenticeship to the plumbing trade
with the Eschle Plumbing & Heating Company, with
which he remained for nine years, becoming a jour-
neyman plumber after six years of apprenticeship.
Desiring to see a little of the country, Mr. Coppo
worked at Boise City, Idaho, and Caldwell, Idaho,
and then, in 1904, embarked in business in that
city, but sold it in 1906 and returned to Butte,
where until May, 191 1, he was engaged in working
at his trade. He then formed a co-partnership with
William De Workin, under the name of the Butte
Plumbing Company, and this association is still
maintained. The establishment is located at No. 205
South Main Street, and the firm carry on a general
heating and plumbing contracting business. Among
many other important contracts they have carried
out may be mentioned those of the Emmerson and
Washington schools, and the Knights of Columbus
and Young Men's Chirstian Association buildings,
in which the plumbing and heating installation
stand as monuments to their skill and fidelity in
living up to the spirit as well as letter of their
obligations.
The political convictions of Mr. Coppo make him
a democrat. In his younger days and up to the
year of 1900 he devoted his time and efforts to for-
warding the great American sport, "base ball," being
manager of Butte's best team in 1898, but in 1899
and 1900 worked as umpire in the Butte City League.
.•\s a lover of sport and feeling that his base ball
days have gone, he now devotes his time in fishing
in summer and plays the good old Scotch game of
curling during the winter months. Born and reared
in the Roman Catholic Church, he continues a mem-
ber of it through sincere conviction. He belongs
to Butte Council No. 668, Knights of Columbus, in
which he has been made a third degree knight, and
also a Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, of which he is exalted ruler.
Mr. Coppo owns his modern residence at No. 401
South Excelsior Avenue, and he and his partner own
the building in which their business is located.
On June 19, 1905, Mr. Coppo was married at
•Pocatello, Idaho, to Miss Elizabeth Ray, a daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. Patrick Ray. Mr. Ray was one
of the pioneer miners of Virginia City, Nevada,
from whence he later came to Butte, and there he
died, but Mrs. Ray survives him and is living at
Butte. Mrs. Coppo died on December 5, 1913, with-
out issue. On August 24. 191:;, Mr.' Coppo was
married to Mrs. Blanche (Bagley) Sulliv-an, a
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Bagley of Butte,
where Mr. Bagley is engaged in mining. Mr. and
Mrs. Coppo have a daughter, Mary Montana, who
was born on April 5, 1917. By her 'former marriage
Mrs. Coppo had three children, namely: Gertrude
Ann, who was born in 1904, is attending the Butte
Busmess College, and Glenn Joseph, who was born
in 1906, and Blanche, who was born in 1908, are
both attending the McKinley High School. Mr.
^A^ h^i^iri- o^lrx^,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
127
Coppo enjoys the complete and absolnte confidence
of his business associates. Integrity has been the
watchword of his whole career and is the funda-
mental attribute of his character. He is honest
with himself and with all men, and sincere in word
and deed.
John B. Ritch. The career of John B. Ritch
in Fergus County has extended over a period of
thirty-five years, during which time he has been a
prospector, miner, range-rider, cattleman, public offi-
cial and repository of big business interests. At
present he is one of the prominent and influential
business men of Lewistown, with e.xtensive connec-
tions in commercial and financial circles.
Mr. Ritch was born December 31, 1868, in North
Carolina. He was but fifteen years of age when
he left the parental roof and made his way to the
State of Texas, where he secured employment on a
cattle ranch and subsequently rode the open range
in the Lone Star State. His advent in Montana oc-
curred in 1885, in which year he entered the Judith
Basin of Fergus (then Meagher) County in the
role of ^ range rider, later engaging in mining
and the newspaper business. He was elected clerk
of the Tenth District Court, a position in which
he served for eight consecutive years. Since then
he has been variously connected with big business
interests, making his headquarters at 409 West
Main Street, Lewistown. His home here is at
310 South Fifth Avenue. Mr. Ritch is a demo-
crat has wielded some influence in the ranks of
his party in Fergus County.
In 1902 Mr. Ritch was united in marriage with
Miss Minnie Rehder, and to this union there have
been born two children : Myrtle Judith and John B.,
Jr.
Edw.^rd Fabian was a man whose good, honest
work and citizenship contributed many things of
value to Fergus County, and his name is one to be
held in long and respectful memory in that com-
munity. His family still live near Lewistown, and
one of the sons made a brilliant record in the
famous Rainbow Division during the World war.
Edward Fabian was born in Alsace Lorraine,
France, October 12, 1850, a son of Blaise and
Frances (Schnebelen) Fabian. He was the second
in a family of seven children. He acquired his
education in France, and at the age of twenty
entered the army and served during the Franco-
Prussian war of 1870-71, battling against Prussian
aggression in that war as did his son nearly fifty
years later. He lost a finger in one battle.
After the war he worked in his father's vineyard
until 1880, when he came to the United States on
a steamship to New York City and thence went by
rail to Bismarck, Dakota, and by steamer reached
Montana at Fort Benton. From there he crossed
overland by ox team to Marysville, where his brother
Alexander was mining. He spent about a year in
that locality and then moved to Helena, working
in the grocery store of Charles Lehman. On July
22, 1882, Mr. Fabian married .\nna Mary Laibacher.
She was born in Switzerland February 20, 1854.
After their marriage, which was celebrated in
Helena, they worked for M. Beach on a farm until
October, when Mr. Fabian went back to the mines
at Helena.
In Julv, 1883, they took their belated wedding
trip, making a visit to France, where he remained
until 1884. and then returned to Montana, his wife
joining him about a year later. He was on the
sheep and cattle ranch of Mr. John Brooks on Salt
Creek until his wife returned in 1885, and -then for
Vol. n— 9
a time he was in the employ of Mr. Frank Day. In
1886 Mr. Fabian bought a home on the Kendall
Road near Lewistown, and turned his talents to the
art of gardening, a business in which he excelled.
He raised large quantities of fresh produce and
fruit for the Lewistown markets and was actively-
engaged in that business and acquired a competence
until his death on June 12, 1915. He first had a
log house on his little farm, but in 1914 constructed
a modern home, which he was permitted to enjoy
only a short time but which his widow and family
still occupy. He was a member of St. Leo's Catholic
Church.
Mr. and Mrs. Fabian had five children: Helen
Elizabeth, who died in infancy, Charles Edward, the
soldier son, Joseph Alexandei, Henry, and Freda.
Charles Edward enlisted October 5, 1917, and was
made a part of the Fourth Division in December,
1917, serving with the Thirty-Ninth Infantry. He
left for France in April, 1918, and was placed with
the Second Army Corps and saw much of the hard
fighting along the Marne. In September, 1918, he
was placed in the Motor Dispatch Division, and
after the signing of the armistice went with his
command to the Rhine in Germany and is still with
the Army of Occupation.
James H. Jordan. Those Americans who can
trace back to colonial ancestry have every reason
to be proud of their lineage, and of the fact that
members of their family have been associated with
the constructive work of their country in all of
its periods. This wonderful nation did not spring
into being over night, but is the outgrowth of a
series of epochs and of the character of the people
of each. Without the heroism, sagacity, broad vi-
sion and shrewd judgment of the country's foun-
ders and developers there would not today be any
mighty United States of America, but a couple of
straggling colonies over which warring European
nations would be wrangling. Therefore each one
who does have the right to claim one or other of
these forebears does so with gratitude, and as he
matures and gains nroper appreciation of his privi-
lege, tries to so shape his life and policies that i:i
the epochs to come his descendants may in turn
point back with pride to him.
Long before the American colonies threw off the
yoke of the mother country and 'aid the founda-
tion of the present government, representatives of
two families, the Jordans and the Chases, came
to the shores of the New World from Ireland, and
from the dates of their several landings took an
aggressive and effective part in the history of their
adopted country. Their descendants are worthy of
them and what they accomplished, and one of the
present day who has the blood of both in his veins
is James H. Jordan, at Laurel, Montana, whose
mother was born a Chase.
James H. Jordan was born in Vernon County,
Wisconsin, ."^pril 20, 1866, a son of R. W. Jordan
and Sarah M. (Chase) Jordan. R. W. Jordan was
born in Connecticut, where the family had lived
for several generations, in 1830, and he died in
Butler County, Iowa, in, 1877. Growing up in his
native state, R. W. Jordan learned there to be a
farmer and followed that calling all of his life.
In 1855 he sought better opportunities for his
growing ambition in Vernon County, Wisconsin,
of which he was a pioneer, but as that section de-
veloped his inclination led him further west, and
in 1872 he went to Butler County. Iowa, where
he rounded out his useful life. From the organi-
zation of the republican party Mr. Jordan found
in its principles a reflection of his own, and gave
128
HISTORY OF MONTANA
it his hearty support. Early joining the Congre-
gational Church, throughout his a£ter life he lived
up to its creed and contributed generously of his
means and time to further its influence. As a
Mason he was equally well known, and in every
respect measured up to the highest standards of
American manhood. His wife was born m Orleans
County, New York, in 1835, and survives him, now
making her home in Vernon County, Wisconsm.
Their children were as follows: Warren A., who
was a farmer, died at Lenox, Taylor County, Iowa,
aged thirty-six years ; Rosa, who married G. C.
Bishop, a retired farmer of Vernon County, Wis-
consin ; John S., who is manager of a lumber yard,
lives in North Dakota; and James H., whose name
heads this review.
When he was only twelve years old James H.
Jordan left the parental roof to become a clerk
in a grocery store at Dubuque, Iowa, where he
remained until 1886, then returning to Vernon
County, Wisconsin, where he was engaged in farm-
ing for eighteen years, and he was then in North-
ern Wisconsin for eighteen months. For the sub-
sequent four years he was engaged in conduct-
ing a mercantile business at Retreat, Vernon Coun-
ty, Wisconsin, and then, in 1910, came to Laurel,
Montana. It was his connection with the Govern-
ment, for which he did general surveying, that
brought him to Laurel, and this growing commu-
nity so appealed to him that when, three years
later, he severed his relations with the surveying
department he arranged to go with the Northern
Pacific Railroad Company so as to remain in this
part of the country, continuing with the latter for
four years. For the next year he was a member
of the sales force of a mercantile establishment,
and then was called upon to assume the duties
of the office of city clerk, to which he was elected
in 1917 and re-elected in 1918, with offices in the
city hall. Mr. Jordan has had experience in pub-
lic office, as he was township clerk at Sterling,
Vernon County, Wisconsin, for three years, in all
of his campaigns being the candidate of the re-
publican party, for, like his father, he has always
espoused its teachings. Both by inheritance anl
conviction he is a member of the Congregational
Church. Not only is he a member of Laurel Lodge,
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, but is now past
grand of it, and he also belongs to Laurel Camp,
Modern Woodmen of America. Mr. Jordan has
demonstrated his faith in the future of Laurel and
Yellowstone County by investing in a comfortable
modern residence at the corner of Fifth Street and
Wyoming Avenue, and a 320-acre ranch nine miles
southeast of Laurel.
In 1887 Mr. Jordan was united in marriage with
Miss Marcia Wightman, a daughter of Andrew
B. and Melinda (Austin) Wightman, farming peo-
ple who became pioneers of Wisconsin. Mr. Wight-
man is now deceased, but his widow survives and
makes her home in Clark County, Wisconsin. Mr.
and Mrs. Jordan became the parents of the fol-
lowing children: Hazel, who married C. E. Gil-
breath, lives on Mr. Jordan's ranch ; Ruby, who
married H. T. Winters, a ranchman, and they
live near Laurel; and Lin, who is attending the
Laurel High School.
The advancement of Mr. Jordan is somewhat
remarkable for he is essentially a self-made man,
and his educational opportunities were exceedingly
limited. Possessing, however, natural ability and
quickness of perception, from childhood he has
been able to make his own way, and make that
way a good one, and those who have come into
contact with his methods recognize that they are
practical and effective. His record as city clerk
is clean and satisfactory in every way, and he is
able to take care of a large amount of the busi-
ness of the municipality, applying to the affairs ot
his office the same alertness that has characterized
him all his life. Both he and his wife are popular
socially and have gathered about them a congenial
circle of friends. As has been mentioned above
in this article, it is such men as Mr. Jordan who
can claim to be .real Americans, and of him it can
also be said that like his ancestors he is worthy of
the land which gave him birth.
Arthur C. Knight, M. D. Holding prestige in
the ranks of his profession by reason of superior
natural ability, aided by a thorough training, wide
experience, an acute comprehension of human nature
and broad sympathy, Dr. Arthur C. Knight, is firmly
established in the confidence of the people of Phil-
ipsburg. Although engaged in practice here only
since the beginning of 1919, Doctor Knight has
shown himself such a thorough master of his call-
ing as to win an appointment as surgeon for the
Bimetalic Mining Company, the Philipsburg Mining
Company, and the Gem Mining Company. During
the great war he was one of the medical men who
left an excellent practice to serve his country, and
returned to private life with an honorable record
as a soldier and patriot.
Doctor Knight was born in Harrison County,
West Virginia, August 24, 1881, a son of John C.
Knight, grandson of Valentine Knight, and great-
grandson of Gustavious Knight. The Knights orig-
inated in England, from whence representatives
came to the American Colonies and settled in Vir-
ginia. Gustavious Knight was born in Virginia and
became a pioneer of what is now Harrison County,
West Virginia. During the War of 1812 he served
his country as a soldier. His son, Valentine Knight
was born in Virginia in 1826, in what is now Har-
rison County, West Virginia, and died there in
1909, having been a farmer all of his life.
John C. Knight, father of Doctor Knight, was
born at Byron, Virginia, in 1853, and now lives near
Clarksburg, West Virginia. He was reared on a
farm at Byron, but after his marriage settled on
a farm in Harrison County, where he has been
occupied with agricultural pursuits all of his life.
He is a democrat, but not active in politics. The
Baptist Church has held his membership for many
years. John C. Knight was married to Aldena
Queen, who was born in Lewis County, Virginia,
in 1858, died near Clarksburg, West Virginia, in
1888. Their children were as follows : Doctor
Knight, who was the eldest born ; and Ernest E.,
who is assistant state superintendent of schools
lives at Charleston. West Virginia.
Doctor Knight attended the public schools of his
native county, the State Normal School at Glen-
ville, West Virginia, from which he was graduated
in 1902, and then, after he had taught school for
two years, became a student of the West Virginia
University at Morgantown for two years. He then
entered the College of Physicians and Surgeons at
Baltimore. Maryland, from which he was graduated
in 1909 with the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and
a member of the Greek Letter Fraternity Phi Beta
Pi, and he is also a member of Pi Kappa Alpha.
In 1909 Doctor Knight entered the Montana State
Hospital at Warm Springs as assistant physician,
and six months later was made assistant superin-
tendent, and held that position until 1913, when he
was appointed by Governor Stewart as state super-
intendent of the hospital, and continued as such for
a year. Doctor Knight then entered upon a general
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1139
practice in which he was very successful, but as
before stated left it to serve his country, and was
commissioned a first lieutenant on September 17,
1917, was called to active duty, January 16, 1918,'
spendmg six weeks in the medical officers training
camp at Camp Greenleaf, Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia
From there he was sent to Camp Wadsworth, witli
the Third Pioneer Infantry at Spartansburg, South
Carolina, but was detached from it on June 15, 1918,
to serve on the camp examining board. On Sep-
tember 19, 1918, he received his promotion to 9.
captaincy, and was ordered overseas as a casual
officer, arriving at Brest, France, on November 22,
1918, after the signing of the Armistice. Doctor
Knight was immediately assigned to base hospital No.
214, and there assisted in putting the wounded sol-
diers in such shape as to enable them to return to the
United States. He returned to his own country with
a detachment of sick and wounded, landing in New
Vork City on February 9, 1919, and was mustered out
of the service on February 11, following which he
came back to Montana, and accepting the appointment
of surgeon to the three companies above referred to,
located at Philipsburg, where he is also engaged
m a general practice, with offices on Broadway.
Doctor Knight is a republican. Brought up in a
religious home atmosphere, he early joined the
Methodist Episcopal Church. Well known in Ma-
sonry, Doctor Knight belongs to Mount Mariah
Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Butte,
Montana; Butte Consistory in which he has taken
the thirty-second degree; and Bagdad Temple,
Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine of
Butte. He is also a member of Butte Aerie No.
II, Fraternal Order of Eagles, and the Maccabees,
also of Butte. A believer in professional co-opera-
tion. Doctor Knight belongs to Silver Bow County
Medical Society, the Montana State Medical So-
ciety, and the American Medical Association.
On April g, 191 1, Doctor Knight was married at
Butte, Montana, to Miss Mathilde Le Roy, a daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Le Roy, residents of
Brooklyn, New York, where Mr. Le Roy is an
accountant. Mrs. Knight died March 2, 1917, leav-
ing a daughter, Dorothy C, who was born June
25. 1915-
Doctor Knight's success is not the result of any
happy chance ; luck has played no part in his ad-
vancement. At the beginning of his career he was
compelled to meet and overcome the same obstacles
which arise in the path of every young practitioner.
These, however, succumbed to bis constant study,
his indomitable perseverance and the force of his
ability, well applied, and he may today take a par-
donable pride in the fact that he owes his present
position and prosperity solely to his own industry
and eflfort.
John Charles Maguirk. The visitor to Butte is
liable to be impressed by the miles of well paved
streets, but he may not know that the credit for
this high class of work is due to John Charles Ma-
guire, general paving contractor, who has done prac-
tically all of the paving at Butte, Missoula and Lew-
istown since 1913. He is essentially a product of
the West, having been born at Ogden, Utah, on
September 14, 1882, a son of John Maguire. The
birth of John Maguire occurred in County Done-
gal, Ireland, in 1843, and his death at Ogden. Utah,
in 1902. His father, grandfather of John Charles
Maguire, came to the United States from County
Donegal, Ireland, about 1857, and settled first in
Vermont, from whence he moved to Iowa, where
he owned and operated a farm on the Grand River.
In 1867 he came West to Utah, and was engaged
in a mercantile business at Ogden, where his death
occurred. He was a democrat. A life long mem-
ber of the Roman Catholic Church, he was active
in religious affairs in each community in which
he resided. His wife bore the maiden name of
Conwell, and she, too, died at Ogden, Utah.
Jolm Maguire was a veteran of the war between
the states, in which he enlisted in 1865, and follow-
ing his honorable discharge be returned to his fa-
ther's farm on Grand River, Iowa. When his par-
ents went to Ogden, Utah, Jolin Maguire accom-
panied them, and, like his father, engaged in mer-
chandising, but later engaged in mining and handling
real estate, developing into one of the successful
pioneer^ of that city. Also like his father, he was
a democrat, and served as a member of the City
Council of Ogden. By inheritance and conviction
he was a Roman Catholic. For some years he be-
longed to the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and
was at one time president of the local lodge at
Ogden, and he also belonged to the Catholic Knights
of .-America. John Maguire was united in marriage
with Mary McGuire and she survives him and lives
in Butte, Montana. Mrs. Maguire was born in
County Roscommon, Ireland, in 1845. She and her
husband had children as follows : Philip, who was
an accountant, died at San Francisco, California,
when he was thirty-five years old; Sarah, who mar-
ried Con Smith, a rancher, lives at Boulder, Mon-
tana; Agnes, who married Fred W. Burns, a mine
operator, lives at San Diego, California; Mary, who
married Dr. R. C. Monalian, a physician and sur-
geon of Butte, Montana; Alice, who is unmarried,
lives at Butte with her mother; John Charles, whose
name heads this review; Nellie, who lives with her
mother, conducts an X-Ray laboratory; Grace, who
is also with her mother, is engaged in teaching in
the Butte public schools ; and Charles, who lives at
Butte, is a salesman for the L. S. Cohn Cigar
Company.
John Charles Maguire attended the public schools
of Ogden, and completed the sophomore year of
the Ogden High School, and then for the subse-
quent year was a student of the Intermountain Busi-
ness College, from which he was graduated in 1899.
Mr. Maguire then went to work with his uncle,
Don Maguire, a mine owner in northern Utah,
and remained with him for two years, leaving him
to go into the office of the general foreman of the
Union Pacific Railroad Company at Ogden. A year
later, so satisfactory was his record, he was pro-
moted to be passenger yard foreman at the Union
Station, Ogden, and held that position for two years.
For the subsequent eighteen months Mr. Maguire
was at Goldfield, Nevada, mining both over and un-
derground, and in this way learning the business,
and then, in the winter of 1906, he came to Butte,
and worked in the old Parrot Mine, and also in the
office of the Great Northern Railroad. Once more
he returned to Ogden, and during 1907 was in the
Sierra Madre district as a contract miner engaged
in driving a tunnel. In 1908 he formed a partner-
ship with V. P. Strange, and from then until 1913
was engaged in a general contracting business,
which was incorporated in 1909 as the Strange-
Maguire Paving Company, and gained a well-merited
celebrity in paving work. In igio Mr. Maguire had
charge of the paving contract at Klamath Falls,
Oregon, and during 191 1 and 1912 had charge of a
similar contract at Missoula, Montana. In the spring
of 1913 he severed his connections with the Strange-
Maguire Paving Company and located at Butte,
since which time he has been an independent con-
tractor of paving work. In addition to his con-
tracts at Butte, Missoula and Levvistown, Mr. Ma-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
guire has operated at Pocatello. Blackfoot, Idaho
Falls, Rexburg and Saint Anthony, Idaho. H.s offices
are conveniently located at No 615 Daly Baiik
Build.ng. and his residence is at No. .260 West Gold
Street Butte. He is an independent democrat^ Like
an of" the members of his family he ,s a Roman
Catholic, and he belongs to Ogden Council No. ^^^,
Knights of Columbus, of which he is a th>rd degree
knight; Ogden Lodge No. 719. Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, the Silver Bow and Country
clubs of Butte, and the Judith Club o* L-,7'|,t°7.
Montana. Mr. Maguire is a member of_the Pac ffic
Highway Association and is vice president of the
Silver Bow National Bank, and is otherwise mter-
^^'6nTa™tT9n, Mr. .Maguire was married to
Miss Constance Smurthwa.te, a daughter of C. A.
and Margaret (Hope) Smurthwaite. residents o
lalt Lake City, Utah, where Mr. Smurthwaite 1
a wholesale dealer in grain. Mrs. Maguire was
graduated from the Ogden High School The
children of Mr. and Mrs. Maguire are as follows;
Constance Patricia, who was born on August zg,
1013, and Frances Donna, who was born on Uecem-
ber 27 1917. Mr. Maguire is one of the influential
men of Silver Bow County, and well known through-
out a wide region as a sound and dependable citizen,
and one worthy of the highest consideration. Hi^
various contracts stand as a monument to his skill
and reliability, and his connection with any project
insures it proper completion, for he will not to erate
anything but the best of workmanship and a living
up to the spirit as well as the letter of a contract.
Frederick A. Bell, assistant cashier of the Em-
pire Bank & Trust Company of Lewistown, has
had a thorough training as a banker and was for-
merly identified with large northwestern banks at
St. Paul, Minnesota.
He was born in St. Paul, May 15, 1883, a son of
Frederick and Maria (Huxtable) Bell. His father,
who was born in Durham, England, in 1858, came
to this country when nine years of age with his
mother and was reared and educated in St. Paul.
He was for some years connected with the Nayes
Brothers & Cutler, wholesale druggists house ot
St Paul, and later with the Ryan Drug Company
of that city. Later he became a paint dealer and
several years ago retired and is now living, at the
age of ' sixty-one, at Tacoma, Washington. His
wife was born in New York State and died in
1885, at the age of twentv-five. Her two children
were Frederick A. and Edward, the latter dying
in infancy. Frederick Bell, Sr., is a democrat and
a member of the Masonic fraternity.
Frederick A. Bell received his education in the
public schools of St. Paul, including the high
school, and at the age of seventeen went to work
for the American Exchange Bank of St. Paul.
Subsequently he was with the Second National
Bank of St. Paul and then returned to the American
National Bank, the successor of the American Ex-
change Bank. On the score of ability and hard
work he was advanced to the position of paying
teller, and continued his duties until igip, when he
was made a deputy in the office of the county
treasurer of Ramsay County. Mr. Bell came to
Lewistown and on January 2. IQII, became teller
with the Empire Bank and Trust Company, and
since October 14, I<)I7, has been assistant cashier.
He is a democrat in politics and is affiliated with
Lewistown Lodge No. 37. Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Mason, and Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal
Arch Mason. He is also an active member of the
Chamber of Commerce. .
On June 27, 191 1, Mr. Bell married Miss Louise
Marie Martinson. She was born at St. Peter, Min-
nesota, daughter of John and Ellen Martinson.
She has one brother, Edward Martinson. Mr. and
Mrs. Bell have two children, Vinette Ellen and
John Frederick.
Paul Behrenijt, proprietor of the Auto Machine
Shop of Billings, is one of the substantial men of
the city. He was born near Berlin, Germany, Sep-
tember 26, 1870, a son of Joachim Behrendt, also
.born near Berlin in 1833, and he died in Germany
in 1894, having always lived in his native land.
Early in life he was a farmer, but later became a
veterinarian for the German Government, on a
government breeding farm. Like other Germans
of his period, he gave the required military service
in the regular German army. The Lutheran Church
had in him a devout member. Joachim Behrendt
was married to Dorothy Ronnebeck, born, reared
and died near Berlin. Their children were as fol-
lows : Agnes, who is deceased ; Rudolph, who lives
near Berlin; Herman, who is a teacher in Germany;
Paul, whose name heads this review ; Theodore,
who conducts a sporting goods store at Billings,
Montana, came to the United States in 1895 ; Louise,
who lives in Germany; and Martha, who is also
living in Germany.
Paul Behrendt attended the public schools of his
native land and there learned the machinist trade.
In October, 1894, he came to the United States, and
for the first four years lived at San Francisco,
California, where he worked at his trade, leaving
that city for Livingston, Montana, where for two
years he worked for the United States Government
in the Yellowstone National Park during the summer
months, and during the winter ones he was with
the Northern Pacific Railroad. In 1900 Mr. Behrendt
came to Billings and established a repair shqp,
which has expanded into an automobile machine
shop and supply house, located at Xos. 2413-241;
First Avenue, North, of which he is the sole pro-
prietor. He gives emplojment to six hands, and
turns out excellent work. His modern residence,
located at No. 211 North Twenty-Sixth Street, is
owned by him. Mr. Behrendt is a republican. He
belongs to tlie Lutheran Church.
In 1903 Mr. Behrendt was married at Billings to
Miss Freida Brey, a daughter of Henry Brey, both
of whom were born at Hamburg, Germany, where
Mr. Brey still resides. Mr. and Mrs. Behrendt have
the following children : Paul, who was born in
1905 ; Eleanor, who was born in 1907 ; Helen, who
was born in 1909 ; Marguerite, who was born in
1912 ; Louise, who was born in 1915 ; and Richard,
who was born in 1918. A carefully trained work-
man, Mr. Behrendt is able to render an efficient
service, and to extract from his employes the best
of their work. His success is entirely due to his
industry and sound business sense, and is well
merited.
Albert A. La Bar. Dating back to colonial days
is the La Bar family, which was then founded in
this country by a representative who left France,
then in a disturbed condition, and sought freedom
beyond the seas. Since then members of this hon-
ored family have been associated with the develop-
ment of different sections, some of them leaving
the initial place of settlement, Pennsylvania, for
Iowa, North Dakota, California, Montana and other
states, all of them occupying places of trust and
responsibility and- holding the respect of their fel-
low citizens. Laurel, Montana, is the home of one
of the younger members of this family. Albert A.
La Bar, who is capably managing the lumber yards
($^:^t>c^ /^/^Lj^yU^^O:::^^^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
131
of the Thompson Lumber Company, Incorporated,
of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Albert A. La Bar was born in Palo Alta County,
Iowa, June 18, 1880, a son of E. G. La Bar, now
living on his fruit ranch at Portersville, California.
E. G. La Bar was born at Philadelphia, Pennsyl-
vania, in 1841, and was reared in that city, later
going to Iowa and engaging in farming in Palo
Aha County until 1885, when he removed to Trail
County, North Dakota, being one of the pioneer
farmers of that section. In 1913 he went to Porters-
ville, California, where he owns and conducts a
valuable orchard ranch of considerable proportions.
In politics he is an independent. E. G. La Bar was
married to Matilda Ingbretson, born in Norway in
1846, and their children are as follows: Carrie,
who married Olaus Lee, a hardware merchant of
Roth, North Dakota; Albert A., who was the sec-
ond in order of birth; Cora, who is married, lives
with her husband, a locomotive engineer, at Glen-
dive, Montana, where he owns a homestead ranch;
.Samuel, who has a homestead near Custer, Mon-
tana ; and Eva, who is at home with her parents.
Albert A. La Bar has been very carefully edu-
cated, first in the rural schools of Trail County,
North Dakota, and the high school of Hillsboro,
\orth Dakota, after which he was a student of
( irand Forks College at Grand Forks, North Da-
kota, for two years, completing his educational
training at the state agricultural college at Fargo,
North Dakota, where he was for two seasons.
Leaving college, Mr. La Bar put to practical use
the instruction he had there obtained by engaging
in farming in Trail County until he was twenty-
tliree years old. His inclinations, however, were
for a business career, and he formed connections
with the Valley Lumber Company at Taft, North
Dakota, which continued for two years, during
which time he was manager of the company. He •
then held for four years the same position with
the Tolna, North Dakota, branch of the same
company, leaving it in igio to engage with the
O'Neil Lumber Company at Kalispell. Montana. On
January 28, 191 7, Mr. La Bar located at Laurel,
Montana, coming here to become general manager
for the Laurel yards of the Thompson Lumber
Company, Incorporated, of Minneapolis, Minne-
sota, which position he still retains. The offices
and yards are on Main Street.
In 1904 Mr. La Bar was married to Miss Mar-
tina Lee, at Hillsboro, North Dakota. She is a
daughter 'of O. C. Lee. now deceased, although his
widow survives him and lives at Kalispell. Mon-
tana. Mr. and Mrs. La Bar have the following
children: Almeda, who was born January 14, 1907;
Elaine, who was born February 12, 1910; and Alem,
who was born June 4, 19T4. Mr. La Bar is a re-
publican. He belongs to Tolna Lodge. Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, of Tolna. North Dakota.
One of the best lumbermen in this part of the state,
Mr. La Bar is conducting the aiifairs of his com-
pany with efficient alertness, and the annual volume
of business is showing a gratifying increase. He
is essentially a western product, and is typical
of the aggressive, progressive spirit of his part
of the country, which is producing so many worth-
while men and women. Still in the heyday of his
youth and enthusiasm, he has already achieved
business distinction, and the future spreads prom-
isingly before him. Although a newcomer to Laurel,
he has the best interests of the city at heart, and is
justly numbered among its most representative men
and public-spirited citizens.
Henry J. Fau.st. The people of a commonwealth
cannot be too careful in their selection of men to
represent them in the assemblies of their state for
in tlie hands of these legislators rests the welfare
of the interests of all classes. The power is vested
in them to enact laws which will work for weal
or woe, according to their characters, and to even
amend the constitution. Fortunately for Montana
the greater number of its representatives in both
houses have been men of the highest character and
standing, whose pride in their state and its develop-
ment has made them put aside all personal consid-
eration and work together to further improve con-
ditions and provide for new questions which are
bound to arise in any section. One of the men who
measures up to the highest standards both as a
state representative and private citizen, and who
has in his office been of inestimable value to his
district and state, is Henry J. Faust, a merchant
of Drummond.
Henry J. Faust was born in Chisago County,
Minnesota. March 25, 1867, a son of Elias P. Faust,
born in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, near tlie
border, in 1828, who died in Chisago County, Min-
nesota, in 1885, He remained in his native land
until he was twenty-six years of age, during whicli
time he gave his country the obligatory military
service, and then in 1854 left it for the United
States. After landing in this country, he came
direct to Chisago County, Minnesota, and there took
up a homestead of 160 acres of land and became
a successful farmer. In time he added to his orig-
inal farm until he owned 330 acres of valuable land
and died on his property. From the time he secured
his papers of citizenship he was a republican, and
was elected on his party ticket assessor of Chisago
Township, Chisago County, for fifteen successive
terms, his sterling integrity being universally ad-
mitted. He was also elected road supervisor, and
was otherwise prominent. In addition to all these
activities he was popular as an auctioneer, and his
services as such were claimed whenever any sales
of importance were held for miles around. The
Lutheran Church had in 'him a faithful member.
Like so many of his fellow countrymen, Elias P.
Faust was not liackward in giving his adopted coun-
try the benefit of his former military training and
was a soldier in the Union army from 1863 until
the close of the war between the North and the
South. He married Christina Johnson, who was
born in Sweden in 1830, and she died in Chisago
County, Minnesota, in 1902. Their children were
as follows : Lou, who died unmarried at Ovando,
Montana ; Mabel C. who married Charles A. Jak-
ways. a retired rancher of Missoula, Montana ; and
Henry J., whose name heads this review, wlio at-
tained to maturity, and nine who died m infancy.
Henry J. Faust attended the rural schools of his
native county, and the high school at Marine Mills
on the St. Croix, Minnesota. Following this for
two years he was a student of Gustavus Adolphus
College at St. Peter. Minnesota, and completed his
studies with a business course at the Anoka Business
College of .'Vnoka, Minnesota, from which he was
graduated in 1885. Although he passed the exam-
ination for teachers and received a certificate
entitling him to teach school, he never made use
of it, preferring a business career.
The first connection Mr. Faust had with mer-
cantile life was as a clerk in a store at Lindsfrom.
Minnesota, where he also served as assistant post-
master, and he continued this association for three
years. In 1890 he came to Montana and for the
first six months was a clerk for Weinstein & Com-
132
HISTORY OF MONTA^TA
pany, merchants of Philipsburg. At the expiration
of that period he was sent to Drummond, then
barely beginning its existence, as check clerk and
relief agent for the Northern Pacific Railroad and
held that position for two years. In the meanwhile
he was forming connections and building up an
acquaintance, and when he formed a partnership
with C. A. Jakways, his brother-in-law, and estab-
lished the firm of Jakways & Faust, general mer-
chants of Ovando, Montana, he found these of con-
siderable value. The firm, founded in 1892, con-
tinued as a partnership until 1904 when the business
was incorporated as the Blackfoot Commercial Com-
pany, with Messrs. Faust and Jakways and E. C.
Johnson as stockholders and officials. The company
branched out so as to include the handling of, real
estate and this became so important that the com-
pany sold tlie mercantile interests, but still operate
extensively in realty. Mr. Faust still holds his
interest in this concern.
In the meanwhile Mr. Faust was appointed post-
master of Ovando, and served for ten consecutive
years as such, and for twelve years was United
States commissioner, rendering the Federal Govern-
ment a faithful and efficient service in both offices.
In August, 1915, Mr. Faust came to Drummond
and purchased the interests of the Featherman Mer-
cantile Company, associating with him in his new
venture Charles M. Bassett, renaming the concern
the Faust-Bassett Company, which caption it still
retains. This is the leading department store of
Drummond and Granite County, and is conveniently
located on the corner of Main and Broad streets.
A stalwart republican, Mr. Faust has long been
a leader in his party, and was elected on its ticket
as a representative to the lower house of the State
Assembly from Powell County in 1902, and again
in 1918, from Granite. In the last session he served
on the Highways, Education, State Institutions,
Public Health, Libraries, Trades and Commerce,
Horticultural and Equal Suffrage committees, and
introduced and had passed the bill allowing extracts
for culinary purposes to be sold in Montana. In
every way possible he served his constituents and
made a record that will be a valuable campaign
document if he cares to continue in public life.
Mr. Faust belongs to Ruby Lodge No. 36, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, of which he is senior
warden ; Hope Chapter, No. 10, Royal Arch
Masons of Philipsburg: Ivanhoe Commandery,
Knights Templar of Deer Lodge ; Hellgate Lodge
No. 383, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of
Missoula ; and George Thomas Camp. Sons of
Veterans, of Deer Lodge. He is president of the
Drummond Commercial Club and has been very
active in its work and is a booster for Greater
Drummond. In addition to his other interests he
is president of the Drummond Light & Power Com-
pany, a director in the Drummond State Bank, owns
a modern residence in Drunynond, his store build-
ing which is the largest structure in the city, and
520 acres of valuable ranch land in the Blackfoot
Valley.
Mr. Faust's son, Marvin Dwight, who was born
in 1002 at Ovando, Montana, was graduated from
the Mount Vernon High School at Mount Vernon,
Washington in the spring of 1919. at that time being
honored by being made salutatorian of his class.
This young man who is exhibiting considerable bril-
liancy, is now a student in the University of Mich-
igan at Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Frank H. Le Sage. As the largest city of Mon-
tana Butte offers exceptional opportunities to aggres-
sive business men in almost everv line of endeavor.
and one of them who is taking advantage of these
openings is Frank H. Le Sage, president and manager
of the National Supply Company. He was born
at Eagle Harbor, Michigan, on June 9, 1882, a son
of Joseph Le Sage, now residing at No. loio Nevada
Avenue, Butte.
Joseph Le Sage was born at Eagle River, Mich-
igan, on June 8, 1863, and was there reared, edu-
cated and married. His parents were pioneers of
this region, having come from the East. The fam-
ily is of French-Ge:man descent, representatives of
it coming to the Michigan settlement. After work-
ing in the saw-mill of Eagle River for a time Joseph
Le Sage moved to Eagle Harbor, Michigan, con-
tinuing his connection vifith the saw-mill industry.
In 1885 he came to Montana, and was one of the
pioneer miners of this region, and is still engaged
in this occupation, being now mining engineer for
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company. In politics
he is a democrat, but he has never cared to enter
public life. The Roman Catholic Church holds
his membership.
The maiden name of the wife of Joseph Le Sage
was Barbara Otis, and she was born in Germany
on March 12, 1863, and was brought to the United
States in 1864 by her parents, Frank and Gertrude
Otis. Frank Otis was born in Germany in 1834, and
died at Butte, Montana, in 1904, his widow surviv-
ing him and making her home at Butte. In 1864
Frank Otis located at Eagle Harbor, Michigan,
where his daughter Mrs. Le Sage was reared and
married, and there he conducted a brewery. In
1883 Mr. Otis came to Butte, Montana, and con-
tinued to work as a miner until his death. Joseph
Le Sage and his wife have the following children :
Frank H., who is the oldest ; May, who married
William Turner, pumpman for the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company, resides at No. 1210 East
Galena Street, Butte; William, who is a miner for
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, resides with
his parents ; Hattie, who married Walter Dedrick,
lives at San Diego, California; Charles, who is a
carpenter for the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany, lives with his parents ; and Frances, who is a
telephone operator, resides with her parents. The
sixth child, Joseph, died at Butte when eighteen
years old.
Frank H. Le Sage attended the public schools
of Butte and the Butte Business College, from
which he was graduated in 1912. In the meanwhile,
when only fifteen years old, he began working for
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, but two
years later left it for the Butte Electric Company,
now the Montana Power Company. Starting in as
an oiler, through steady application and hard work
he rose to be engineer and still later to be chief
electrician at the station. After ten years with
tliat company he connected himself with the Butte
Electric Supply Company as foreman, remaining
with it from 1909 to 1914. In the latter year Mr. Le
Sage organized the National Electric Company and
incorporated it. and handles everything in electrical
goods. The ofiices and store are at No. 204 West
Park Street. From somewhat small beginnings Mr.
Le Sage has builf up one of the largest concerns of
its kind in Western Montana. The officials of the
company are as follows : Frank H. Le Sage, pres-
ident and manager; and Mrs. Frank H. Le Sage,
secretary and treasurer.
In his political views Mr. Le Sage finds the
principles of the democratic party in accordance with
his ideas in national matters, but when it comes to
local affairs he usually votes independently. Fra-
ternally he belongs to Butte Lodge No. 240, Be-
nevolent and Protective O.'der of Elks. He owns
.^^^.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
133
his modern residence at No. 938 California Avenue
and other real estate at Butte.
In 1907 Mr. Le Sage was married at Butte to
Miss Edna Haney, born at Creston, Iowa, a daugh-
ter of Charles D. Haney, who was born in Pennsyl-
vania in- 1846, and died at Butte in 1904. After
being reared and educated in Pennsylvania, and
shortly after attaining his majority, Mr. Haney went
to Creston, Iowa, where he was married, and whert
he became foreman at the freight house of the
Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad. In 1904
he came West to Butte, where his death occurred.
He was a democrat and a member of the Congre-
gational Church, and was a very religious man and
active supporter of the church. ' His fraternal rela-
tions were those connected with his membership
with the Odd Fellows, Modern Woodmen of America
and Woodmen of the World. He married Martha
Rusk, who was born in New York State in 1864,
and she survives him and lives at Los Angeles,
California. The children born to Charles D. Haney
and wife were as follows : Frank D., who is with
the Northern Pacific Railroad, lives at Billings, Mon-
tana ; Mrs. Le Sage ; Erla, who married James P.
Hennessy, lives at Los Angeles, California ; and
Robert D., who died at the age of twelve years.
Mrs. Le Sage was educated at the public schools
of Creston, Iowa, and went through the sophomore
year of the high school course, when she entered the
Creston Conservatory of Music, from which she
was graduated in 1904, and is a skilled instrumental
musician. Coming to Butte. Montana, in 1904 with
her parents, she taught music to private pupils
until her marriage. She is now very often called
upi n to use her talents at public concerts and special
entertainments. An active member of the Methodist
Episcopal Church, she oftentimes officiates at the
organ and donates her services in musical affairs
connected with the church. Mr. and Mrs. Le Sage
have one son, Frank D., who was born on Septem-
ber .?8, 1910. Mr. and Mrs. Le Sage are the center
of a very congenial social circle, and Mrs. Le Sage
occupies a high position among the musical people
of Butte. As a business man Mr. Le Sage's ca-
pabilities are unquestioned and his prosperity is the
result of his own efforts and farsightedness.
Henry B. Gibson. During the past twenty years
the court proceedings of the Tenth Judicial District
of Montana have been recorded by Henry B. Gib-
son, official court reporter. In this long period he
has witnessed and placed on record hundreds of
trials, many of which have been history-making in
their character. Few men are better kjiown among
the members of the legal profession and the judi-
ciary, and his accurate, painstaking and expeditious
labors have been commented upon frequently in_ a
complimentary way by men high up in the councils
of the state.
Mr. Gibson was born at Creston, Ogle County,
Illinois. December 8, 1870, a son of Emery Menzo
and Henrietta (Buss) Gibson, being the second
of three sons born to his parents. His father
was born in New York State, January 25, 1846, and
as a mere lad went to Creston, Illinois, where he
met and married Miss Buss, who had been born
in England, May 5, 1850. When he was a lad
of but sixteen years Emery M. Gibson had run
away from home and his widowed mother and
enlisted in the L^nion army, fighting with the One
Hundred and Fifth Regiment, Illinois Volunteer
Infantry, under Generals Thomas and Sherman, in
all the' skirmishes and battles of_ his command.
At the close of the war he was given his honor-
able discharge and returned to Ogle County, where
he was variously employed until elected county
treasurer, a position which he retained for several
terms. In 1896 he _ went overland to California
and located in San Diego County, where he engaged
in the apiary business, and continued therein for
twenty years. Eventually he went to Utah, where
he is at this time engaged in coal mining. He is
a mernber of the Grand Army of the Republic and
in politics is a stanch republican. The death of Mrs.
Gibson occurred in 1896.
Henry B. Gibson attended the public schools of
Ogle County, Illinois, and after learning stenog-
raphy, at tlie age of fifteen years, secured employ-
ment with H. H. Cardell, a lawyer at Perry, Iowa.
Later he went to Des Moines, Iowa, where he
worked for the Green Bay Lumber Company, and
subsequently was employed by the same concern
in their office at Rhinelander, Wisconsin. In 1890
Mr. Gibson came to Helena, Montana, where he
entered the offices of the Northern Pacific Railway
as stenographer in the transportation department,
but was subsequently transferred to the telegraphers
and general ticket agent's office. Upon leaving the
employ of the Northern Pacific he was employed
for about one year in the office of Atty. Gen.
Henry J. Haskell, following which for about six
months he was employed by the First National
Bank of Helena. When he left the employ of that
institution he returned to the Northern Pacific
as telegraph operator and assistant ticket agent, and
remained in those capacities until 1S99. In Sep-
tember of that year Mr. Gibson was appointed
court reporter for the Tenth Judicial District, lo-
cated at that time at Fort Benton. In December,
IQOO, when the court was changed to Lewistown,
Mr. Gibson took up his residence here and has
continued in the same capacity to the present time.
He is a member of Lewistown Lodge No. 37,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Lewistown
Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks. He is a republican in his political senti-
ments.
On December 14, 1898, Mr. Gibson was married
to Miss Fredericka Nord, who was born in Canada,
and to this union there have been born five children,
of whom four are living: Dudley B., who while
attending high school volunteered in the Students'
Army Training Camp in October, 1918. and was
honorably discharged in December, 1918; Evelyn
and Edward Nord. twins, attending high school;
and Emery Menzo, also a high school student.
S.\MUEL C. Weaver. Lewistown experienced the
loss of one of its best and most aggressive citizens
in an automobile accident that instantly killed Samuel
C. Weaver, head of the Judith Automobile Company
and a popular and prominent business man.
Mr. Weaver, whose death occurred while driving
his car between Judith Gap and Harlowton on
February 7, 1919, had been a resident of Montana
for over a quarter of a century. He was born at
Myrtle Creek in Douglas County, Oregon, February
II, 1873, son of James B. and Sarah Ann (Wright)
Weaver, the former a native of Tennessee and the
latter of Missouri. His father was an early settler
in Missouri, went overland to California in 1850.
and from there moved to Douglas County, Oregon,
where he married and where he spent most of his
remaining years as a hotel man, merchant and
farmer. He died in 1906. at the age of seventy-two,
and his wife died in 1882.
Samuel C. Weaver acquired his education in the
public schools of Oregon and was eighteen years
of age when in 1891 he came to Montana and began
riding the range. He was a cowboy four or five
134
HISTORY OF MONTANA
years, and then engaged in the liquor business at
Lewistown and from that took up real estate and
latterly engaged in the automobile business under
the title Judith Automobile Companj', with a garage
in Lewistown. He was also interested in a number
of other local business affairs.
Mr. Weaver was popular, not only in social but
in business circles. His reputation as a man of
his word was universally recognized and he con-
aucted his affairs on a broad gauge plan which com-
manded the respect and admiration of all with
whom he came in contact. Small or petty ways in
business he could not tolerate, and he was a strong
believel- in the maxim of "live and let live." He
held his business and personal honor on a high
plane with the natural resulting consequence that
his associates always felt that they could bank on
him at any time.
In the words of one of the local newspapers :
"Sam Weaver was one of the best known and best
liked men in Fergus County. He was a keen sports-
man and for many years had been prominent in the
state trap shooting tournaments." He was affiliated
with Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, and in politics was inde-
pendent. Two of his brotliers live at Lewistown,
James A. Weaver, deputy game warden, and Edward
"Weaver. Another brother, William, lives at
Geraldine and George lives at Chinook.
March 11, 1896, Mr. Weaver married Myrta E.
Duncan. She was born in Caldwell County, Mis-
souri, a daughter of William and Refugio (Slone)
Duncan, both natives of Missouri. Mrs. Weaver
was the younger of two children.
O. G. Kassnee. It has been truly said that there
is no royal road to fortune, but that each man must
advance step by step along the highway of life.
Some retard their advancement by resting too long
by the way; others seek to discover treasure in
bypaths, but the one who keeps straight ahead,
never shirking work or avoiding responsibilities, is
the one who reaches the goal and has the satisfac-
tion of knowing that his success is his own and
that he does not owe it to any assistance rendered
him. The City of Laurel has as one of its lead-
ing merchants a man who has become one of the
leaders in his special line not only for this but
other cities in the state, and has won a deserved
place among the substantial citizens of his county.
This man is Otto G. Kassner, grocer and hard-
ware merchant, member of the Laurel Commercial
Club and one of the most alert boosters for the
city. Like so many of the successes in business
life in our western cities, Mr. Kassner is a young
man, being in the very prime of life, but he is
experienced and sagacious in handling the problems
of his trade and those of the municipality.
Otto C. Kassner was born in Blue Earth, Fari-
bault County, Minnesota. April 11, 1880, a son of
Edward Kassner, born in Germanv in 1839, and
died at Blue Earth, Minnesota, in '1886. He was
reared, educated and married in Germany, his wife,
also a native of Germany, bearing the maiden name
of Pauline Shimmel. Entering the German army,
he gave his country the compulsory military serv-
ice, and upon his return from the army resumed
his farming which it had interrupted. In 1875 he
brought his family to the United States, and com-
ing to Minnesota secured land at Blue Earth and
wrested a farm from nature amid pioneer condi-
tions and privations. A lover of liberty and free-
dom, the republican party's platforms offered him
a materialization of his ideals, and from the time
he was naturalized until his death he voted its ticket.
His wife was born in 1844 and survives him, and
makes her home at Sauk Rapids, Benton County,
Minnesota. Their children were as follows: Emma,
who married Albert Matthews, a general workman,
resides at Minneapolis, Minnesota; Pauline, who
married Gus Matthews, now deceased, is the owner
of a large farm, but lives at Blue Earth, Minne-
sota ; Matilda, who married Albert Buegler, an ex-
tensive farm owner, resides on their farm at Sauk
Rapids, Minnesota; Otto G.. who name heads this
review ; Helen, who married Henry Levnau, died
at Sauk, Rapids. Minnesota, in 1912, but he sur-
vives and is now baggagemaster on the Chicago,
Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad at Minneapolis,
Minnesota ; and Lilly, who married Arthur Kelem,
a barber, resides at Grand Forks, North Dakota.
Otto G. Kassner attended the grammar and high
schools of Blue Earth, Minnesota, and then became
a student of the St. Cloud, Minnesota, Business
College, completing his course in that institution
in 1897. Following that he entered a clothing store
at Blue Earth as a clerk, where for five years he
was thoroughly grounded in practical salesmanshij),
using his experience to secure him a better posi-
tion in a similiar establishment at Appleton, Min-
nesota. He then went to Macoun, Saskatchewan.
Canada, and spent three years there in a general
store.
Returning to the United States, Mr. Kassner in
1912 bought an interest in the general store known
as the Funk-Wold Company of Laurel, the. name
being then changed to the Wold-Kassner Company,
but he severed his connection with it January 13,
1916, and established himself in a hardware and
grocery business on Main Street. Between then and
.\pril, 1919, his business expanded to such an ex-
tent that he was obliged to buy a large building
to house it, his new establishment being also on
Main Street. This building is 30 by 130 feet, and
he also owns a large warehouse in the vicinity of
his store and a residence which he occupies. His
knowledge of selling methods, and his desirable
connections, which enable him to buy to advan-
tage, have resulted in his building up a fine trade
and establishing him as one of the most influential
merchants in this part of Montana.
In 1904 Mr. Kassner was married at Mankato,
Minnesota, to Miss Tinna Sonnek, a daughter of
XIr. and Mrs. Albert Sonnek. the latter of whom
died in the spring of 1919, although the former
survives and lives at Minnesota Lake, Minnesota,
being now a retired farmer, but formerly very
active as a pioneer agriculturalist of Minnesota. Mr.
and Mrs. Kassner have three children, namely ;
Kermit, who was born May 7, 1906 ; Donald, who
was born in 1908; and Willard, who was born in
1912.
Mr. Kassner belongs to the Roman Catholic
Church, and to Billings Council No. 1259. Knights
of Columbus, of which he is a third degree knight.
From the time it was organized .he has been very
active in the Commercial Club of Laurel, and he
also belongs to the Billings Midland Empire Club.
Having found his opportunity at Laurel, Mr. Kass-
ner has great faith in Montana, and is anxious to
educate others in the possibilities of this state, and
especially of Laurel and its vicinity. He believes
that the West is the place for the young man, and
that each year will bring more of those who de-
velop into worthwhile citizens to Laurel and other
Montana cities, and through them and their efforts
will additional capital be brought for investment
in local enterprises.
A stanch republican, Mr. Kassner has always
supported the principles for which its best element
HISTORY OF MONTANA
135
has always stood, and he is a great admirer of the
late Colonel Roosevelt.
George W. Young, D. D. S. Among the lessons
which war conditions are emphasizing is the im-
portance of sound teeth. This is not a lesson which
ought to be new in our country, unless the proverb
as to the honor of prophets in their own country
applies; for American dentists have occupied the
front rank throughout the world for many years.
But the significance of teeth and diseases incident
to them has only comparatively recently been real-
ized by science. It is, however, realized now, and
no competent diagnostician overlooks this fertile
source of disordered health. A practical rule for
all to follow is to have the teeth examined period-
ically and make sure that no obscure focus of in-
fection exists. In wartime the drastic standards of
health demanded by military efficiency required the
most careful supervision of the teeth, and the scien-
tific dentist has become a recognized adjunct of mil-
itary organization. This should carry weight with
the civil population, for liealth in peace is worth
considering. War must not have all our efficiency.
Good teeth are an essential of good health. In
man's constant warfare against disease the dentist
fights in the front trenches. One of the skilled men
of this learned calling who is engaged in the general
practice of his profession in Granite County, is Dr.
George W. Young, of Philipsburg.
Doctor Young was born in County Middlesex,
Ontario, Canada. September 23. i860, a son of
George Young, who was born in County Limerick,
Ireland, in 1822. and died on his farm in County
Middlesex, Ontario. Canada, in 1897. He left Ire-
land with his parents in 1823, his father Charles
Young having been commissioned to survey the
La Chene Canal, but died of pneumonia contracted
while making this survey, in 1827, and George
Young was taken by his namesake uncle and reared,
they living in the vicinity of Ottawa. Canada, until
the lad was sixteen years old. He then began w^ork-
ing at the trade of a carpenter, and followed it at
London, Hamilton, Kingston and Woodstock, Can-
ada, and built the market at London. Canada. After
his marriage, he located on a farm he had bought
in County Middlesex. Canada, and there he rounded
out 'his useful life. He was a conservative in poli-
tics, and firm in his support of its policies. The
Church of England held his membership. The
maiden name of his wife was Catherine Bateman,
and she was born in Caradoc Township, Middlesex
County. Ontario, Canada, in 1827, and died in
Middlesex in 1894. Their children were as follows:
Mary E., who died in Middlesex, in 1898: Charles
H., who is a horse dealer of Glencoe. Ontario. Can-
ada ; Doctor Young, whose name heads this review ;
Harriet Hester, who married S. E. Bowler, a farmer
of Salmon, Idaho; Thomas H., who is manager of
the Scales Work Qf Toledo, Ohio; J. L., who is
a dentist of New York City; John B., who came to
Montana in 1891, died on his ranch at Belt, Mon-
tana; and Catherine E., who married K. E. Parson,
a hardware merchant of Beaver Dam. Wisconsin.
After being graduated from the rural schools of
his native county, and the Strathroy High School
of the same county, completing his courses in the
latter in 1880, George W. Young taught the school
which he first attended, for a year. In 1883 he came
to the United States, and after spending a short
time at Chicago, Illinois, traveled through twenty-
seven states being engaged at carpenter work. He
then returned to County Middlesex, but in 1889
came back to the United States, and after a short
stay at Great Falls, Montana, was in Helena for
two years, where he studied dentistry and worked
at Iiis trade. Doctor Young then engaged in a prac-
tice with his brother, J. L. Young at Granite, Mon-
tana, for a year, when he moved to Philipsburg,
and since December 15, 1891, has been engaged in
practice here, being the pioneer of his profession
at the county seat, now living today. His dental
parlors are in the Sayrs Block. Doctor Young is
a democrat and served as a member of the city
council. He belongs to Granite Camp No. 323,
Woodmen of the World at Philipsburg; Court Al-
gonquin No. 3369, Independent Order of Foresters
of Philipsburg; and to the Philipsburg Commercial
Club. He owns a modern residence on the corner
of Sutter and California streets.
On May 26, 1892, Doctor Young was married
to Miss Martha Paradise, at Granite, Montana.
She was a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Moses Para-
dise, both of whom are now deceased. Mr. Paradise
was a wagonmaker at Elizabethtown, New York.
Mrs. Young died in 191 1, leaving two children,
namely : Catherine, who is at home ; and Glenn, who
served during the great war as a marine, and was
in the service for seventeen months. In 1915 Doctor
Young was married to Miss Lucy Paradise, his
sister-in-law, the ceremony being performed at
Butte, Montana. They have no children.
Robert H. Rains. As the largest mining center
of the world, Butte naturally attracts to it men of
the highest caliber, whose inclinations and abilities
have led them to take a constructive interest in
those activities founded upon mental production or
business lines which are the outgrowth of such
production. One of the alert, dependable and enter-
prisuig young men of this city is Robert H. Rains,
president of the Rains Metallic Packing Companv,
who has not only gained an enviable position in his
specfal line, but has a bright future before him and
is laying extensive plans for a much larger expan-
sion than he has hitherto effected.
Robert H. Rains was born at Silver Cliff, Colorado,
on March 12, 1885, a son of W. H. Rains, who was
born in July, 1857, at Queensland, Ohio. The Rains
family was founded in this country during its colonial
epoch, representatives of it coming from Scotland
and England to Massachusetts at a very early day.
Henry E. Rains, grandfather of Robert H. Rains,
was born in New Jersey in i8og, and he moved to
Ohio in young manhood and became active as the
ov/ner of large saw-mill and flour-mill interests.
His death occurred in Ohio in 1893. On his moth-
er's side of the house Robert H. Rains traces back
to the same family tree as former president of the
United States John Quincy Adams.
Until he was eighteen years of age W. H. Rains
lived in Ohio and attended its public schools, but
at that time he came West to Leadville, Colorado,
and became manager of a mine. In 1878 he moved
to Silver Cliff, that same state, still operating as a
mine manager. His efforts proved very successful
and at one time he was worth $500,000, but the de-
cline in the value of silver stock reduced his fortune
so as to practically wipe out all his profits. Always
a supporter of the republican party, he was elected
on its ticket as a member of the City Council of
West Cliff, Colorado, which is located one mile from
Silver Cliff, but he is now living in the latter city.
W. H. Rains was married to Cynthia Jennie Adams,
born at Sedan. Kansas, in 1862, and they became
the parents of the following children: Robert H.,
whose name heads this review ; Henry E., who was
a stationary engineer at Cripple Creek, Colorado,
died of the influenza in 1919; Celia Ann, who mar-
ried Morey E. Jones of -Aurora, Illinois ; Leafa.
136
HISTORY OF MONTANA
who died on July 12. 1899, aged four years; Leta,
who was graduated from the Cripple Creek High
School, lives with her parents; and Sidney H., who
is in the moving picture show business at Cripple
Creek, Colorado.
Robert H. Rains was educated in the public
schools of West Cliflf, Colorado, and the Canyon
City High School, until he was sixteen years old,
when he left school to begin work as a stationary
engineer at Cripple Creek. Colorado, where he re-
mained until 1007, when he came to Butte. He is
the inventor of a metallic piston ring packing for
machinery, specially designed for use in pumps,
hoists, compressors and all steam machinery. This
invention has a nine-year record of successful opera-
tion in Cripple Creek, where it was used in mining
machinery. In order to manufacture it Mr. Rains
incorporated his company at Butte in October, 1919,
and it is backed by Montana capital. The officers
of the company are as follows : Robert H. Rains,
president; Judge Sydney Sanner, vice president;
Elmer O. Binder, secretary; and Daniel Rafferty,
treasurer. This company was formed for the pur-
pose of putting Mr. Rains' invention on the world's
market, and Judge Sanner is the legal adviser and
business director, and is assisted in this work by
his partner J. L. Templeton. Mechanical experts
say that this is the best appliance ever devised for
the purposes for which it is used. With the excep-
tion of one concern, Mr. Rains' invention is now
used by all of the large mining companies of Mon-
tana. Judge Sanner's offices are at No. 402 Miner
Building, Butte, and Mr. Rains' office and residence
are at No. 317 South Dakota Street, Butte. Mr.
Rains is a republican. He belongs to the Woodmen
of the World.
In addition to his Butte company, Mr. Rains is
promoting a mining company at Corbin, Montana,
to develop five claims he owns just east of the old
Aha Works.
On December 30, 1918, Mr. Rains was united in
marriage with Miss Annie E. Lohrer at Helena.
Montana. She is a daughter of Albert and Holda
(Birkley) Lohrer, of Corbin, Montana, pioneers
of the state. Mrs. Rains was graduated from the
Jefferson County High School at Boulder, Montana.
Mr. and Mrs. Rains have one daughter, Cecelia, who
iwas born on December 16, 1919.
Daniel Rafferty, treasurer of the Rains Metallic
Packing Company of Butte, is one of the men of
Montana who is proving that success is the fruition
of intelligent effort and indomitable persistence in
the pursuit of ideals. Of course before there can
be accomplishment there must be vision, and after
that, long, hard work. He comes from the land
of high ideals, enthusiasm and willingness to work,
for he was born in County Armagh, Ireland, on
March 9, 1881.
The father of Daniel Rafferty was also Daniel,
and his birth occurred in the same place as that of
his son, during the year 1836, and he died there
in 1896, having been a farmer all his life. He was
a consistent member of the Roman Catholic Church.
His widow, who survives him and lives in County
Armagh, was born there in 1844, and bore the
maiden name of Mary Brawley. Their children
were as follows : Katherine, who is the widow of
James Robinson, an officer of the Irish Constabulary
stationed at Belfast, Ireland, lives at Dublin, Ire-
land ; John, wlio lives at Monaghan. Ireland, is an
insurance agent; Sarah, who is a graduate nurse,
served as such for the British Government during
the great war in France, was seriously wounded and
now lives at Edinburgh, Scotland ; William, who
was employed in the tube manufacturing works
at Coatbridge, Scotland, died there in igo8; Daniel,
whose name heads this review; James, who lives
at Darby, Pennsylvania, has been in the employ of
the Baldwin Locomotive Works for the past fifteen
years ; Minnie, who is unmarried, is a dressmaker
of Clonas, North of Ireland; Bridget, who is un-
married, lives with her mother ; and two who died
young. The paternal grandfather was John Rafferty,
and he was born, reared, married and spent his
entire life in County Armagh, where he was engaged
in farming. The maternal grandfather was John
Brawley. and he was born in County Armagh in
1813. and died there in 1893, having been a farmer
of that region all of his life. On both sides of the
house Daniel Rafferty's ancestors were County
Armagh people for many generations.
Daniel Rafferty attended the parochial schools of
his native county until he was seventeen years old.
at which time he left Ireland for Liverpool, England,
and spent eight months in a cabinet-making estab-
lishment of that city. From there he traveled on
into Scotland and worked at Glasgow and Lenox-
shire for about six years, during which period he
was connected with the iron and steel industry.
Mr. Rafferty then went to Greenock. Scotland, and
spent three months in a large shipbuilding plant,
when he became motorman for the electric street
car company and held that position for eighteen
months. Returning to Ireland, he paid his old
home a visit, and then went to Liverpool, England,
and embarked from there for the United States,
landing in New York City.
For the first year after his arrival in this country
Mr. Rafferty was employed in the Baldwin Locomo-
tive Works of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and then
for four months he was in the employ of the
Philadelphia Traction Company. His next employ-
ers were Gimbles Brothers, and he remained with
them for six months. Mr. Rafferty then came to
Montana and arrived at Butte on July 3, 1909, and
from then on has operated in and about Butte,
leasing a number of mines, generally in partnership
with J. L. Templeton, and has become very success-
ful. Since April 19, 1919, he has been piston expert
for the Rains Metallic Packing Company, and he
also holds the offices of treasurer and director
of this corporation. In politics Mr. Rafferty is a
republican. He belongs to the Roman Catholic
Church. LTnmarried, he makes his home at No. 507
North Main Street. A man of courage and initiative.
Mr. Rafferty has steadily advanced until he is today
one of the leading men in his special line, and is
also recognized as a mine operator of considerable
importance.
Harry L. Fitton. Having served his fourth
term as city clerk of Lewistown, Harry L. Fitton
is now a partner in the Lewistown Marble & Granite
Works. He is an expert accountant, a man of
thorough training and experience, having formerly
been an educator, and is a citizen whose public
spirit leads him to make ready response to whole-
hearted co-operation with every movement affecting
the welfare of his home city.''
Mr. Fitton was born on his father's farm in
Dane County, Wisconsin, April 1=;, 1887, a son of
James H. and Elizabeth G. (Broderick) Fitton.
His parents were both natives of Dane County,
Wisconsin, the county seat of which is the City of
Madison. His father was born October 16. 1855,
and his mother August 21, 1858. They were mar-
ried November 7, 1884. and of their three children
Harry is the oldest. His sister Valeria E.. died
October 26. 1918, wife of Herbert Gorman, and the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
137
younger sister is Velma V. James H. Fitton has
long been a prominent farmer, stock raiser and
dairyman in Southern Wisconsin, making a specialty
of Shorthorn cattle. He has served as chairman
of his township board, is a democrat and a mem-
ber of the Congregational Church.
Harry L. Fitton acquired a good education in
local and high schools and took special courses
in the University of Wisconsin. He taught his
first term of school at the age of seventeen and at
nmeteen was made principal of the schools of
Mount Horeb, Wisconsin. He filled that office
creditably for four years and in the spring of igio
left Wisconsin and came to Lewistown, Montana.
Here he took charge of the books for the Depart-
ment Store of Charles Lehman & Company at
Lewistown, serving until August 3, 1912. On the
5th of August of that year he was appointed citv
clerk under John L. Marshall, mayor, and has served
continuously by reappointments in May, 1913, 1915
and 1917- During the war Mr. Fitton was untiring
in doing what he could in behalf of the soldiers
and war auxiliary movements, especially the Red
Cross. He filled out many papers for soldiers free
of charge. His wife has been prominent in Red
Cross work, being now county superintendent of
a department of that great organization, and holds
a badge of honor for over 800 hours of work.
Mr. Fitton is a democrat in politics, and is exalted
ruler of Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks. In Masonry he is
afliliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 37, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and is now serving his
third term as secretary of the Lodge. He is a
member of Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch
Masons ; Lewistown Commandery No. 14, Knights
Templar ; Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Helena: and he and his wife are both members
of Marie Chapter No. ,^6, of the Eastern Star.
Mr. Fitton married Miss Adella F. Schantz. She
was born at Villisca, Iowa, daughter of Carl J.
and Christine (Holmes) Schantz, Her parents are
natives of Sweden and both are still living, her
father being a farmer in Page County, Iowa. He
is a republican and a member of the Swedish
Lutheran. Church. Mrs. Fitton is the fourth in a
family of nine children, all of whom are still living.
RuFus B. Thompson. When in the high tide of
his activities Rufus B. Thompson was one of the
monarchs of the sheep industry of Montana. His
flocks numbered thousands and thousands of head,
and grazed over uncounted hills and valleys. He
was also well known as a banker of Lewistown,
where he lived for a number of years and where
his death occurred December 6, 1914.
He was of old New England ancestry and was
born at Colchester. Vermont, June 16, 1857, a son
of Samuel and Marion (BuelD Thompson. His
parents were both natives of Vermont. He was
the second of three sons. His father was a Ver-
mont farmer, voted as a whig and republican and
was a devout member of the Methodist Church.
Rufus B. Thompson spent his early life on his
father's rugged New England farm, and alternated
with the work of home by attending school in winter
sessions until he was about twenty-one years of age.
He then came West, the first stage of his journey
taking him to St. Paul. Minnesota. From there he
proceeded by stage to Bismarck, Dakota Territory,
and thence by steamer up the Missouri River to
Fort Benton. He first saw Montana about forty
years ago, when nearly all the territory was still
in a pioneer condition. From Fort Benton after
some time he went overland by ox and horse team
to the Judith Basin, and was one of the first settlers
on Willow Creek south of the Snow Mountains,
where he took up Government land and began the
sheep industry. He saw his flocks expand and in-
crease and his business grow until he frequently
had from 15,000 to 20,000 head on range at one
time. In 1896 he established a feeding station for
sheep at Seward, Nebraska, and also owned a home
at York in that state. In 1906 he bought a fine
home in Lewistown, and spent the rest of his days
in that city. He sold his last interests as a sheep
man in November, 1914, only a few weeks before
his death.
Mr. Thompson was a man of sturdy integritj' and
could not be moved from the strict path of hon-
orable personal dealings by any inducement. In
fact this was one of his dominant characteristics.
He believed that all men should live up to their
contracts to the fullest, no matter how the financial
outcome resulted. In the conduct of his extensive
business interests he took a broad view, and his
dealings were always characterized by a strict sense
of justice to all parties concerned. He never would
enter into a business arrangement with any one
unless convinced that both sides to the deal would
participate in the financial returns, and was always
inclined to lean towards the side of generosity in
all of his business arrangements.
He was also a man of leadership in public affairs
and twice represented his district in the State Legis-
lature. He was also a member of the School Board
several terms. Mr. Thompson was one of the
organizers of the Empire Bank & Trust Company
of Lewistown, and when the organization was com-
pleted on March 30, 1907, he was elected first
president and filled that office until January 16,
1909. He was affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hiram
Chapter No. 14, Royal Arch Masons, Lewistown
Commandery No. 15, Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. Politically
he was a republican.
Mr. Thompson married Miss Imogene Jacobs, a
native of Dane County, Wisconsin, and a daughter
of George and Katherine Almira (Warren) Jacobs.
Her mother was a native of Vermont. Her father,
who was born in Germany, came to this country
when seventeen years of age by sailing ship to New
York, and thence came west to Iowa, whence he
became a farnier and where he spent his last years.
He was a whig in early life and later a republican.
Mrs. Thompson was the fourth in a large family
of thirteen children, eight of whom are still living.
Her own children number three, the first, Jesse Fay,
dying in infancy. Marion A. is the wife of Frank
Ottman, living on the old Thompson homestead,
and they have two daughters. Rufus B., Jr., married
Susie Martin and has one daughter.
Lawrence S. Stevens, M. D. The medical pro-
fession made a record during the late war that
will not soon be forgotten. Countless numbers of
the profession left well established connections to
enlist in the service of their Government when they
had every excuse that could be tendered for re-
maining at home. Their work was of the utmost
importance, not only at the front, but in the train-
ing camps, where through their skill and experienced
knowledge the embryo soldier was prepared for the
titanic struggle before him by making him fit physi-
cally as well as strategically. The members of this
learned profession who made the sacrifice of their
material welfare to serve their country will not
be forgotten by their fellow citizens, but in the
years to come will be pointed out as men who placed
138
HISTORY OF MONTANA
their patriotism above the dollar mark, and to whom
the fine physical condition of the country's soldiers
is largely due. One of these loyal physicians and
soldiers worthy of special mention in a work of
this high class is Dr. Lawrence S. Stevens of Laurel,
Montana.
Doctor Stevens was born in Cedar County, Mis-
souri, October 29, 1881, a son of Dr. B. F. Stevens
and grandson of Lawrence Stevens, the latter born
in Indiana 'in 1812, and belonging to an old and
honored family in this country, the original emi-
grant coming from England to Virginia prior to
the American Revolution. Lawrence Stevens be-
came a pioneer farmer of Appanoose County, Iowa,
where he died in 1888. His wife bore the maiden
name of Fletcher, and she, too, was born in Indiana.
Dr. B. F. Stevens was born in Indiana in 1837,
and he died in Cedar County, Missouri, May 1,
1882. He was reared in Iowa, but moved to Mis-
souri in young manhood, after having been gradu-
ated from the Medical College of Keokuk, Iowa,
with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. During
the Civil war he enlisted in the service, during
1864, and was sent against the Indians in Nebraska.
Politically he was a democrat. For many years
he was well known as a Mason. His wife, who
bore the maiden name of Emma Akin, was born
in Kentucky in 1853, and she died in Polk County,
Missouri, in 18S8. Their children were as follows:
Frank, who is a rural mail carrier, resides at
Quincy, Missouri ; Locie. who married W. E.
Vaughn, a ranchman, resides near Judith Gap, Mon-
tana; and Dr. Lawrence S.
After attending the rural schools of Missouri and
the academy of Lowery City, Missouri, Lawrence
S. Stevens in 1900 went to Western Canada and
for the subsequent six years was engaged in deal-
ing in real estate, but in that year matriculated in
the medical department of the Universiy of Kan-
sas City, Missouri, from which he was graduated
in 1910 with the degree of Doctor of Medicine,
and that same year located at Fort Stockton, Texas,
where for four years he was engaged in a general
practice. In 1914 he came to Montana and until
September, 1916, was in practice at Bridger, th.it
state, leaving it for Laurel. In July, 1918. Doctor
Stevens entered the United States service and was
sent to the Medical Officers Training Camp at Fort
Riley, Kansas, in the meanwhile being commis-
sioned first lieutenant in June, 1918. He was as-
signed to the Sixteenth Sanitary Train of the Six-
teenth Division at Camp Kearny, California, com-
manding Ambulance Company Two Hundred and
Sixty-three. He was mustered out March 26, 1919,
and returned to Laurel to resume his practice. His
offices are in the McCauley Spencer Building on
Main Street. Doctor Stevens is local surgeon for
the Northern Pacific Railroad Company. During
1918 Doctor Stevens was president of the Montana
State Health Officers Association, and he belongs
to the Yellowstone County Medical Society, the
Montana State Medical Society, the American Medi-
cal Association and is active in all of these organi-
zations. Fraternally he belongs to Bridger Lodge,
-Ancient Free & Accepted Masons, and Bridger
Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He is
very active in the Laurel Commercial Club. Politi-
cally he is an independent democrat.
In 1909 Doctor Stevens was united in marriage at
Fall City, Nebraska, to Miss Matilda H. Hill, born
in Iowa, who attended the Clinton High School of
Clinton, Iowa, and who is a graduate registered
nurse. Doctor and Mrs, Stevens have the following
children : Iva Constance, who was born December
2g, 1910; Donna Mae. who was born January 3,
191 2; and Virginia, who was born September 9,
1916. An experienced medical man. Doctor Stevens
enjoys a wide-spread popularity, and is recognized
as one of the most efficient men in his profession.
Personally he has a large following, winning and
holding friends through those characteristics which
make for the highest standard of American citizen-
ship.
WiLBER I. PoyvER, M. D., physician and surgeon
and vice president of the First State Bank of
Philipsburg, is one of the best known men of Gran-
ite County. He was born at Farmington, Oakland
County, Michigan, September 17, i860, a son of
Thomas H. Power, and grandson of Jared Power,
who was born in Chautauqua County, New York,
in 1806, and died in Oakland County, Michigan.
The Powers trace tlieir ancestry back to William
the Conqueror, and came from England to the
American Colonies long before the Revolution.
Thomas H. Power was born near Farmington,
Michigan, in 1830, and he died at Pontiac, Michigan,
in 1902. He spent his whole life in Oakland County,
and his mature years as a farmer. A republican
of the old school, he was elected on his party ticket
to several of the township offices, and was very
prominent in his community. He married Lydia
B. Stockwell, who was born in Redford Township,
Oakland County, Michigan, died at Pontiac, Mich-
igan, in 1884. Their children were as follows :
Charles S., who is an oil operator, lives near Ossa-
watomie, Kansas ; Walter J., who is a retired
farmer, lives at Pontiac, Michigan; Doctor Power,
whose name heads this review; Harry, who died
at the age of fourteen years ; Frank, who died at
the age of eighteen years; and Louis, who is an
overseer for Henry W. Ford, lives at Detroit, Mich-
igan. After the death of his first wife, Thomas
H. Power was married to Flora Perkins, who was
born at Birmingham. Michigan, died at Owosso,
Michigan, in 1919. They had one son, Frank, who
lives at Pontiac, Michigan, where he is working as
an automobile mechanic.
Wilber I. Power attended the rural schools of
Oakland County, and the Pontiac, Michigan, High
School, and then became a student of the State
Agricultural College at Lansing, Michigan, from
which he was graduated in 1885. In the meanwhile
he earned sufficient money for his courses by teach-
ing school in Oakland County and at Grand Rapids,
Michigan, and was graduated from the Detroit Col-
lege of Medicine in 1889, with the degree of Doctor
of Medicine. While at the Agricultural College
he was a mem'ber of the Greek Letter Fraternity
Delta Tau Delta. For the subsequent year Doctor
Power was at St. Mary's Hospital at Detroit. Mich-
igan, and then in 1890 he came West to Granite.
Montana, where he was engaged in a general prac-
tice for two years. He then located permanently
at Philipsburg, building up here a fine medical and
surgical practice and has the distinction of being the
pioneer in his profession in this city. He took a
post graduate course in the New York City Post
Graduate School in 1899, specializing on general
medicine. Doctor Power has his offices in the Doe-
McLeod Building on Broadway. Like his father,
a republican. Doctor Power has served as coroner
of Granite County for two terms and is now county
physician, and city health commissioner for Philips-
burg. For one term he was mayor of Philipsburg,
and was the candidate of his party for state senator,
but on account of the overwhelming democratic
majority in this district, was defeated, although be-
cause of his personal popularity he ran way ahead
of his ticket, in one election losing by only two
HISTORY OF MONTANA
139
votes, and the second time he ran, by five. He be-
longs to Flint Creek Lodge, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, of which he is past master, hav-
ing served liis lodge as master two terms; Hope
Chapter No. lo. Royal Arch Masons, which he
served as high priest for three terms; Pearl Chap-
ter No. 14, Order of Eastern Star, of which he
is past patron; Granite Camp, Woodmen of the
World ; Lincoln Homestead No. 559, Brotherhood
of American Yeomen. Both as a private citizen
and as chairman of the Granite County Chapter
of the Red Cross, Doctor Power took a very active
part in the war work, and in the Red Cross drives
put Granite County over the top. Although not a
member, he is serving the Philipsburg Presbyterian
Church as a trustee. He is vice president and a
director of the First State Bank of Philipsburg, and
has been interested in the mining industry for many
years, and has been very successful in his ventures
in this line. Doctor Power owns a modern res-
idence at Philipsburg, where he maintains his home.
In i8q2 Doctor Power was married at Granite,
Montana, to Miss Mary Williams, a step-daughter
of Thomas Trevaille once postmaster of Granite,
Montana, but now deceased. Mrs. Power died at
Philipsburg in 1897 without issue. In 1898 Doctor
Power was married second to Mrs. Marietta (Stock-
well) Sewell, a daughter of Alva and Phoebe
(Smead) Stockwell. Alva Stockwell was a com-
mission merchant, who died at Paola, Kansas, but
Mrs. Stockwell survives .and lives at Paola. Doctor
and Mrs. Power have no children, but Mrs. Power
has a son by her first marriage, namely : H. F.
Sewell, who is an attorney of Conrad, Montana.
Doctor Power is one of the most representative men
of this part of Montana, and is ranked among the
eminent practitioners of his profession.
Charles E. O'Neill. The law is known as a
stern mistress, demanding of her devotees constant
and unremitting attention and leading her followers
through many mazes and intricacies before she
grants them success at her hands. This incessant de-
votion frequently precludes the idea of the success-
ful lawyer indulging in activities outside of the
straight path of his profession, especially if his voca-
tional duties are of large and important nature.
Then again, some men have been led into the prac-
tice of the law through their connection with some
other interests which necessitated a knowledge of
the law along certain lines, and when this knowledge
was gained, a desire was awakened to study still fur-
ther and make the profession a life work. This lat-
ter ft-as the case of Charles E. O'Neill, one of the
successful attorneys of Butte, who became a lawyer
through his initial studies with reference to bank-
ing law.
Charles E. O'Neill was born at Marshall, Missouri,
on February 22. 1889. a son of William P. O'Neill.
The latter was born in Canada in i860, and is now
residing at Miles City, Montana. While still a child
he was brought to Missouri by his parents, and
there he was reared, educated and married, and
became a farmer of Marshall, Missouri. In 1907
he came to Montana and has since been a resident
of Miles City, having extensive farming interests in
its vicinity. He is a republican in politics and a
Roman Catholc in religious faith. William P.
O'Neill married Julia Devaney, born in Missouri in
1865. a daughter of John Devaney, born in Ireland
in 1814. His wife was also born in Ireland and they
were married in Missouri, where both died, he in
1900 and she in 1901. They were farming people.
The children born to William P. O'Neill and his wife
were as follows : Stella, who married Dr. F. P
Mahon of St. Louis, Missouri, a dental surgeon ;
Charles E., who was second in order of birth ; Ray
Francis, who is a railroad employe of St. Louis,
Missouri ; and Florence, who married George Ach-
maker, formerly an importer of New York City,
but now a resident of St. Louis, Missouri.
Charles E. O'Neill was reared at St. Louis and
attended its schools, and in 1906 came to Miles City,
Montana, and spent a year on a ranch in its vicinity.
He then took a commercial course at the Butte
Business College, specializing in stenography and
bookkeeping, and in August, IQ07, entered the Butto
Commercial Bank, with which he learned the bank-
ing business, remaining with that concern until
January i, 1909, when he entered the First National
Bank of Butte and continued with it until January
I, 1919, a period of ten years. During this time he
became thoroughly posted with reference to bank-
ing of all kinds and banking law, and was admitted
to the bar on June 11, 1919. He at once entered
upon a general practice, and his offices are at Nos
71-72 Owsley Building. Mr. O'Neill is independent
m his political views. He belongs to the Roman
Catholic Church. Fraternally he is connected with
Butte Council No. 668, Knights of Columbus, in
which he has been made a third degree knight, and
the Knights and Ladies of Security. At one time
he belonged to the Butte Country Club.
In 191 1 Mr. O'Neill was married at Butte to Miss
Kathryn C. Sullivan, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
John J. Sullivan, both of whom are deceased, he
having been a miner of Butte and a member of the
police force, and came to the city during its pioneer
epoch. Mr. and Mrs. O'Neill have three children,
namely : Edalene Frances, who was born on Novem-
ber 6, 1913; Helen, who was born January 22, 1915;
and Jack Charles, who was born on November 8.
1916. Although one of the recent additions to his
profession, Mr. O'Neill has already proved his abil-
ity and is looked upon as one who will rise high
in it, for he possesses the characteristics necessary
for such advancement, being bold, independent and
fearless, scorning petty tricks, fighting in the open
for what he believes to be right. A man of sound
judgment who weighs carefully both sides, he is
certain of rendering impartial justice.
Harold C. Tilzey, serving his fourth term as
county surveyor of Fergus County, has been a
resident of Montana nearly seventeen years and is
a civil engineer of long and thorough practical
experience and training.
He was born on his father's homestead in Osborne
County, Kansas, June 10, 1881, the oldest of the
five children of Samuel and Minnie M. (Pitt)
Tilzey. His father was born in England December
31, 1854, and came when a child with his parents
to America, making the journey by sailing ship and
landing in New York. From there the family
went West to Iowa, where they were pioneers,
and subsequently were identified "with the pioneer
settlement of Kansas. Samuel Tilzey grew to man-
hood in Kansas, engaged in farming in Osborne
County for a number of years, and later became
a buyer and shipper of cattle and hogs to the Omaha
market. He was a republican in politics. His
wife was born in Iowa September 28, 1861, and they
were married in Kansas.
Harold C. Tilzey grew up in Northern Kansas
and Southern Nebraska, and attended grammar and
high schools at Geneva in the latter state. He
has a military record, having enlisted when eighteen
years old, September 20, 1899, in Company F of the
Thirty-Ninth Regiment of United States Volunteers.
He enlisted for a period of two years and was
140
HISTORY OF MONTANA
sent to the Philippines under command of Col.
Robert L. BuUard. He was made corporal of Com-
pany F and served a little more than a year, being
given his honorable discharge October 13, 1900.
After his return Mr. Tilzey went to work in a
hardware store at Geneva, and in 1902 came to
Lewistown, Montana, and joined the Civil Engineer-
ing Department of the Montana Railway Company.
In the fall of 1904 he went to California and was
in the Civil Engineering Department of the Western
Pacific Railway Company for one year. On return-
ing to Montana he was employed on the survey of
the transcontinental line of the Chicago, Milwaukee
& St. Paul, and his duties on that great trunk
line required his time until the spring of 1908. He
then took up the private practice of civil engineer-
ing at Moore in Fergus County, and in November
of the same year was elected for his first term
of county surveyor of Fergus County. He was
re-elected in 1910 and then followed an interval
in which he was again engaged in private practice.
He was again elected county surveyor in 1916, and
by re-election in 1918 is serving his fourth term.
He is now serving as secretary and treasurer of
the Montana Society of County Surveyors. He
is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benev-
olent and Protective Order of Elks, is a member
of the Judith Club and Chamber of Commerce
at Lewistown and in politics is a republican.
June 8, 1907, he married Anna M. Toomey, a
native of Nebraska. Their five children are Kath-
erine, Harold C, Jr., Dorothea M., Anna Beatrice
and Eflfa M.
Grant Robinson, postmaster at Lewistown, is a
thorough Westerner, a native of California, and
has been a miner and rancher, public official, and
actively identified with the various affairs of Mon-
tana nearly thirty years.
He was born in Humboldt County, California,
September 14, 1865, a son of William S. and Electa
Lavina (Albee) Robinson. His father was born in
Virginia in 1827 and died in 1905, was reared and
educated in his native state, and in 1850 went to
the California gold fields. After some experience
as a miner he turned his attention to farming and
stock raising and lived in California the rest of
his life. During the war he was a Union democrat.
He was affiliated with the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. His wife was born in Michigan and
died in 1918, at the age of seventy-two. They had
eleven children, four sons and seven daughters,
nine still living, and Grant Robinson was the second
in age.
Grant Robinson acquired his education in the pub-
lic schools of California and worked as a ranch
hand during his early manhood. Coming to Mon-
tana in 1891 he located in Fergus County, and on
May 12, 1897, was united in marriage to Ethel
Culver, a native of Iowa. Her parents, George and
Caroline Culver, came to Montana in 1891, settling
on East Fork, near Lewistown. Mr. and Mrs.
Robinson have one son, William Culver Robinson,
who was born in igo6.
In igoi Mr. Robinson bought a ranch on East
Fork and operated it until 1908, in which year he
was elected county treasurer and by reelection served
four years. Mr. Robinson received his appointment
as postmaster of Lewistown on May 20, 1913, and
b> reappointment in 1917 is in charge of the office
for a second term. He is a member of Lewistown
Lodge No. Z7, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Lewistown Commandery No. 14, Knights Templar,
and Algeria Temple of Helena, Montana. He is also
a member of Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks.
Benjamin Lincoln Price. One of the convinc-
ing young attorneys of Yellowstone County, Montana,
who possesses a distinct impulse toward the hu-
manities among the leaders of thought, and has
always been an inspiration for activities of the best
sort, is engaged in the general practice of his pro-
fession at Laurel. He is a man not readily deceived
in men or misled in measures, and is therefore an
ideal person for public preferment, which fact his
fellow citizens have recognized, for they placed him
in the executive chair of their city government. Mr.
Price was born in Wabash County, Illinois, July 12,
1882, and for a man of his 3'ears has achieved much.
His paternal grandfather, William Price, born in
Delaware in 1825, sought better opportunities for
expansion by turning his face westward, as did his
grandson some years later, and located at an early
day in its history in Wabash County, Illinois, where
he spent the remainder of his life, dying there in
1897, having in the interval passed through some
trying experiences as a pioneer of that region.
Aittv coming to Illinois he was married, the first
name of his excellent wife being Melissa.
One of the sons of William and Melissa Price
was Benjamin F. Price, born in Wabash County,
Illinois, in 1852, and he became the father of Ben-
jamin Lincoln Price, whose name heads this review.
Benjamin F. Price was engaged in farming in
Wabash County, Illinois, for many years, but is now
living retired at Mount Carmel, Illinois. In politics
he is a republican, and during 1900 was one of the
census enumerators for his community. The Chris-
tian Church holds his membership and is a bene-
ficiary of his generosity. Mr. Price is well known
as a Mason. He was married to Olive Angeline
Duty, born in Wabash County, Illinois, in 1858, and
they became the parents of the following children :
Flora B., who died at the age of two years ; Harmon
E., who is a physician and surgeon of Stockton,
California, is a graduate of the Eclectic Medical
Institute of Cincinnati, Ohio; Benjamin Lincoln,
who was third in order of birth ; Emma, who mar-
ried Clyde Lester, an oil operator, resides at Allen-
dale, Illinois; Alfred M., who is a resident of Laurel,
Montana, is now serving in the Army of Occiipation
at Luxemburg; Pearl, who married E. H. Dickson,
a farmer, resides at Laurel, Montana ; William F.,
who is a farmer, resides at Laurel, Montana; John
D., who is in the radio branch of service in the
United States Navy ; Olive, who is in the surgeon
general's office at Washington, District of Colum-
bia ; and Virgil, who is in the United States Navy.
Benjamin Lincoln Price after attending the rural
schools of Wabash County, Illinois, attended the
university at Valparaiso, Indiana, from which he
was graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Law.
Appreciating the opening ofifered the alert young
man in the West, Mr. Price came to Montana, and
in the fall of 1908 established himself at Laurel,
wkere he has since remained. Having been brought
up in a home dominated by republican sentiments,
he naturally affiliated himself with that party, and
by his associates was placed on its ticket for mayor
of Laurel in 191 7, and elected by a gratifying ma-
jority. He served as chief executive of the city
during 1917 and 1918 and gave his municipality
a clean and businesslike administration. As a mem-
ber of the Commercial Club of Laurel he takes
part in tlie movements to better and advance the
city, while professionally he belongs to the county
and state bar associations. Laurel Lodge, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, has in him one of its
^^
^a^M^ (j^ ,i^^^.^c.<2.^—
HISTORY OF MONTANA
141
most enthusiastic members. Mr. Price owns con-
siderable property at Laurel and in Yellowstone
County, including a comfortable modern residence
on Sixth Avenue, and the building in which his
office and a newspaper and bindery plant are lo-
cated at Laurel, and a ranch of 600 acres of valuable
land outside the city.
On January 6, 1909, Mr. Price was united in mar-
riage with Miss Ibbie J. Fearheiley, at Mount Car-
mel, Illinois. Mrs. Price is a daughter of Jacob
and Anna (Aborn) Fearheiley, residents of Mount
Carmel, Illinois, Mr. Fearheiley being a farmer.
Mr. and Mrs. Price have three children, as follows :
Lois E., who was born April 26, 1912; Byron L.,
who was born July 10, 1915; and Harold, who was
born December 20, 1918. Mr. Price is a man who
possesses those qualities which are conspicuous in
the characters of the best citizens, and in his pro-
fession is admittedly one of the leading attorneys
of Yellowstone County.
Lawrence Hauck. There are two lines of indus-
try in any community of sufficient size to command
outside attention, which exert an influence not easy
to over-estimate, banking and the issuance of a
newspaper. Through the medium of the first the
stability and continuance of all business is assured,
and the latter gives expression to the prevailing
sentiment with reference to affairs both foreign
and domestic, and bears an important part in shap-
ing public opinion upon vital matters. When both
these lines of such paramount importance are rep-
resented by one man, his value to his fellow citizens
is a recognized asset, and his stand on any question
is taken as authoritative. Lawrence Hauck, pres-
ident of the First State Bank of Philipsburg, and
editor and proprietor of the Mail, the oldest journal
of this region, fully measures up to the standards
above set forth, and is one of the most representa-
tive citizens of his part of the state.
Lawrence Hauck was born at Schweinfurt, Ger-
many, December 22, 1867, a son of John and Lena
(Koetzner) Hauck, also natives of the same place,
the family having been located in that part of Ger-
many for many generations. John Hauck was em-
ployed by the Imperial Government as roadmaster.
Of his four children, Lawrence Hauck was, the sec-
ond in order of birth.
Lentil he was fifteen years old Lawrence Hauck
remained at home and attended the schools of his
native city. On August I, 1883, he took passage
for the United States, and upon his arrival in this
country made his way direct to Montana. Although
but a iad in years, he had been taught habits of in-
dustry and had no difficulty in securing employment
in a ranch in Deerlodge County, on which lie re-
mained ■ for three years. During that period he
saved his money, instead of wasting it as did the
majority of his associates, and when he had a suffi-
cient amount used it for a course in Deerlodge Col-
lege, earning what he needed in excess of his sav-
ings by hard labor during vacations and between
terms. Having thus acquired, entirely tlirough his
own, unaided efforts, a thorough training in the
language and other essentials of his adopted coun-
try, which extended over three years, Mr. Hauck
worked for a year as a clerk and salesman for the
leading green grocer of Philipsburg, L. W. Shodair.
His experience with this concern enabled him to as-
sume the duties of bookkeeper for Filing & Buford,
general merchants of Virginia City, Montana, which
he continued to discharge for three years. Mr.
Hauck then returned to Philipsburg as head book-
keeper for the Freyschlag, Huffman and Company,
proprietors of a large general merchandising con-
cern, of which he also became a stockholder. Until
this company discontinued business in 1894, Mr.
Hauck remained in his responsible position, and at
that time went with the First National Bank of
Philipsburg, and was one of its efficient employes.
This bank then liquidated, and Mr. Hauck purchased
an interest in The Mail, his associates at that time
being the Bryan brothers, but subsequently Mr.
Hauck became the sole proprietor. Always a strong
republican, Mr. Hauck took so aggressive a part in
local affairs that he was the logical candidate for
city treasurer and was elected to that office in Au-
gust, 1899, by a gratifying majority, and held it for
one term. During that same year he was appointed
postmaster of Philipsburg ind was reappointed,
holding the office for eighteen years and giving to
the people of Philipsburg an efficient and satisfactory
administration. For about twelve years he served
as chairman of the county central committee of his
party and led it to many a notable victory. His fra-
ternal connections are with the Masonic order, he
being a member of Flint Creek Lodge No. 11, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons and Hope Chapter
No. 10, Royal Arch Masons.
Another achievement of Mr. Hauck which de-
serves special mention was his promotion of the
First State Bank of Philipsburg, and his develop-
rnent of this into one of the sound financial institu-
tions of the countj'. The bank was organized in
1912 with Mr. Hauck as its executive head, and Dr.
VV. I. Power as vice president and in 1918 E. E.
Springer was appointed cashier. According to the
last statement of this bank, its capital stock is $25,000;
surplus and undivided profits, $70,000; individual
deposits subject to checks, $330,000, with total de-
posits of $560,000. The total resources of the bank
are over $600,000. The bank is located on the cor-
ner of Broadway and Sansom Street.
On August 28, 1893, Mr. Hauck was united in
marriage with Miss Dora Kroger, a daughter of
Charles and Anna Kroger of Philipsburg. Mr. and
Mrs. Hauck have five children, Herman, who was
born November 18, 1894. He is now associated
with his father in the publication of The Mail ;
Catherine, attending the University at Missoula;
Elsie and Dora, attending high school, and John at-
tending public school.
As an editor Mr. Hauck has always displayed a
fearless strength in handling public matters, and
his reliability and clear, forceful manner of pre-
senting facts have made his journal the exponent of
his party and community. Unimpeachable and honor-
able as he is known to be, his stand upon any ques-
tion is recognized as the correct one by the better
class of citizens and few movements of any kind
are inaugurated before he is consulted. A section
which has a man of such strength of character in
it as Mr. Hauck is sure to progress, and much of the
present civic development of Philipsburg and Gran-
ite County is due to Mr. Hauck's energy and public
spirit.
Charles E. Blankenhorn, M. D. Genius may
be the motive power of success, but many who take
the trouble to study the lives and leading character-
istics of the men of the country who have accom-
plished something are led to believe that experience
and sound judgment must be combined with natural
inclination to produce the best results. In the
majority of cases where a man has risen above
his fellows it will be found that his rise has come
gradually through persistent fighting in spite of
all opposition. There are many qualities which help
to form the character, such as self-reliance, con-
scientiousness, energy and honesty, and they all work
142
HISTORY OF MONTANA
together to produce the highest standing and most
satisfactory rewards. The above is certainly true
of the career of Dr. Charles E. Blankenhorn, spe-
ciahst at the Murray Hospital of Butte.
In no other profession is the true character of a
man brought out so prominently as that of medicine,
and as he really is, so is he held by his professional
associates and colleagues. All who have the honor
of Doctor Blankenhorn's acquaintance admit that he
is respected, honored and beloved not only by his
associates, but by those to whom he has long been
a ministering friend. Although Doctor Blanken-
horn is still in the very prime of young manhood,
he has so kept pace with the march of irnprovement
and by personal experiment and investigations, as
well as study and exhaustive reading, that he is
classed with the most efficient and dependable of
his profession. He is one of the physicians and sur-
geons of Montana who went into the service of
their country when it had need of them, and his
record as an officer is equal to that he is making
in times of peace.
Doctor Blankenhorn was born at L'Anse, Mich-
igan, on April 3, 1889, a son of Charles Peter
Blankenhorn, born in 1847. A butcher by trade,
Charles P. Blankenhorn lived at L'Anse, Michigan,
and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, dying in the latter city
in 1909. During the war between the states he
served in the Union army, and Doctor Blanken-
horn's action in e;ilisting during the late war was
in accordance to his father's teachings and example.
From the time he cast his first vote Charles P.
Blankenhorn supported the candidates of the re-
publican party. For many years the Methodist
Episcopal Church had in him a faithful and liberal
member. A Mason, Mr. Blankenhorn rose in his
fraternity until he was a Knight Templar. He
married Sarah Sageman, born in 1848, who survives
him and lives at Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Their
children were as follows: Alice, who married L.
B. Armstrong, a traveling sales manager, lives at
Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Harry, who died at the age
of fourteen years ; Rose, who lives with her mother :
Louise, who died in Milwaukee February 2, 1920;
and Dr. Charles E.
Doctor Blankenhorn was graduated from the
grammar and high schools of L'Anse, Michigan,
completing his courses in the latter in 1907. A year
later he matriculated at the University of Michigan
at Ann Arbor, Michigan, and was in that institution
for two years. After the death of his father he
entered the LTniversity of Marquette at Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, and was graduated therefrom in 1913,
with the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and as a
member of the Greek Letter college fraternity Phi
Rho Sigma.
From June 30, 1913, ""til June 13. I9I4, Doctor
Blankenhorn gained valuable experience as an interne
in the Murray Hospital of Butte, and then entered
upon a general practice with Dr. George \y. Clay
at Malta, Montana, this association being maintained
until Doctor Blankenhorn enlisted in July, 1917. for
service during the great war. He was commissioned
a first lieutenant and was sent overseas_ with the
Sixteenth Ambulance Corps, Second Division, arriv-
ing in France in February, 1918. Li July, 1918, he
was invalided home, and was mustered out of the
service on December 10. 1918. Returning to Mon-
tana, he became a physician of the Murray Hospital,
specializing in a genito-urinary practice. He has
taken post-graduate work at Rochester, New York,
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Chicago, Illinois, per-
fecting himself in the specialty he has selected for
West Granite Street. In political matters he is
an independent, not being willing to tie himself down
by party connections. The Methodist Episcopal
Church afifords him a medium for the expression
of his religious views. He belongs to Malta Lodge
\o. 57, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of
Malta, Montana ; Helena Consistory of Helena:,
Montana, in which he was made a thirty-second
degree Mason ; and Algeria Temple, .'\ncient Arabic
Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of Helena. His
professional affiliations are those he maintains with
the Silver Bow Medical Society.
In 1914 Doctor Blankenhorn was married at
Helena. Montana, to Miss Grace Jones, a daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. M. P. Jones. Mr. Jones is a rancher
and stockman of Malta, Montana, but Mrs. Jones
is deceased. Mrs. Blankenhorn was educated at
the Montana State University at Missoula. Montana,
and the State University of the State of Washington.
Doctor and IMrs. Blankenhorn have two children,
namely: June, who was born on June 4, 1916; and
Charles Edward, who was born on February 14,
1918.
Doctor Blankenhorn's strongly marked personal
characteristics and decided ability have made him
popular in medical circles, and wherever he is known
he is held in high esteem. His professional service
has ever been discharged with a keen sense of con-
scientious obligation, and his work is bringing him
ample and very gratifying recompense.
Jeffersox H. Akins. In any developing com-
munity, whether it be emerging from the wilder-
ness or being transferred from village into city
the changing conditions offer splendid returns for
foresight and business sagacity. The merchant who
has the faculty to foresee the strategic commercial
situation may claim a conquest just as he who
shrewdly secured advantage in martial strife. It
was largely through his ability to recognize where
trade would develop that placed Jefferson H. Akins
upon the high road to business success and pro-
minent position, and for the past eighteen years his
Golden Rule Store has been one of the leading
establishments of its kind at Lewistown.
Mr. Akins is a product of the agricultural com-
munity .of Cedar County, Missouri, where he was
born on his father's farm September 16, 1867, a
son of John and Mary Jane (Halbert) Akins. His
father was born in Tennessee in 1835, and died
at Humansville, Missouri, in 1910, at the age of
seventy-five years, and his mother, a native of
Missouri, passed away there in 1914, being seventy-
six years of age at the time of her demise. They
were the parents of ten children, of whom nine
are living, and Jefferson H. was the seventh in
order of birth. John Akins was still a lad when
his family decided to remove from Tennessee to
Missouri, and his boyhood was passed in the latter
.state, where his young manhood experienced the
scenes and incidents occurring during the troubulous
days leading up to the final outburst which culmi-
nated in the great Civil war. As a farmer and
breeder of stock he passed his industrious and
useful career, and when he passed away his com-
munity lost a good citizen. He was first a whig
in his political views and later a republican, and
throughout his life was a faithful and liberal mem-
ber of the Baptist Church, of which Mrs. Akins
was also a member.
Jefferson H. .^kins attended the public schools of
Cedar County. Missouri, and remained on the home
farm until he reached the age of twenty years. Up
to this time his experiences had been entirely of
an agricultural nature, principally in assisting his
HISTORY OF MONTANA
143
lather, but now he received his introduction to mer-
cantile affairs as a clerk in the gieneral store of his
brother, T. J. Akins, at Humansville, Missouri, his
salary being $25 per month. Mr. Akins continued
to assimilate experience and to perfect himself in
business methods until 1896, when he embarked
in a general merchandise business at Fair Play,
Missouri, remaining in that community until 1900,
with a fair degree of success. He next spent
one year at Deer Lodge, Montana, and in 1901
came to Lewistown, which has since been the scene
of his activities and his success. The Golden
Rule Store, as his establishment is known, has
grown from modest proportions to be one of the
leaders in its line in the city, carrying a full stock
of up-to-date goods, which are attractively arranged
and moderately priced. As a business' man Mr.
.^kins has shown himself possessed of marked
qualifications, and his courteous treatment of his
patrons has done much to attract business to his
establishment and to make him personally popular.
He is well known in Masonic circles, being a mem-
ber of Lewistown Lodge, No. t,7. Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons; Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal
.\rch Masons ; Lewistown Commandery No. 14,
Knight Templar; and Algeria Temple. Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at
Helena ; and is also a member of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows. His political faith causes
him to support republican candidates and principles.
On June 10, 1894, Mr. Akins was united in mar-
riage with Miss Louise Cresap. who was born in
Saline County, Missouri, daughter of William P.
and Julia (Porter) Cresap, who had six children,
Mrs. Akins being the eldest. Mr. Cresap, who was
a farmer, a democrat, and a member of the Meth-
odist Episcopal Church, died at the age of seventy-
six years, and his widow is now living with her
daughter and son-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Akins. Five
children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Akins :
Bohnda, Jerre H., Marion, Willard and Bruce.
Bohnda is the wife of R. E. Dockery, who enrolled
at Camp Lewis in the U. S. service in September,
1917. He had received his commission as second
lieutenant of field artillery, but surrendered this
commission in order to go to France as one of the
200 men selected for advanced artillery work at
the front. He has since received his second lieu-
tenant's commission and is now with the Seventy-
Seventh Artillery known as the "New York's Own,"
in France.
G. E. Settergren. One of the solid and reliable
young business men of Laurel, Montana, is G. E.
"Settergren, city treasurer and proprietor of the
leading furniture and undertaking establishment in
this section of the state, and he has won his place
in public confidence through his own unaided efforts.
He is a man who deserves the approval of his asso-
ciates, for his career has been marked by upright-
ness, industry and thrift, and he has discharged the
duties of the several offices to which he has been
elected with fidelity and ability. Mr. Settergren
was born at Litchfield. Minnesota. January 7, 1882.
a son of C. J. and Matilda Settergren, natives of
Sweden, the former born in 1831 and the latter in
1834. They were reared, educated and married in
Sweden, where he was a farmer. In t866 they
came to the United States, and after a year spent
in Indiana, came on west to Minnesota, where he
engaged in farming, but later built a tannery at
Litchfield, Minnesota, and conducted it for fifteen
years. Selling that tannery, he built another at
Baldwin, Wisconsin, and a third at Cokato, Minne-
sota, after selling the one at Baldwin. Finally he
Vol. 11— 10
sold his last tanner}-, retired and spent his last days
at Litchfield, Minnesota, where he died in 1900. In
politics he was a republican. The Episcopal Church
held his membership. He and his wife had the fol-
lowing children : Charles, who is in a real estate
business at Baldwin, Wisconsin; G. A., who is a
retired hardware merchant of Litchfield, Minnesota ;
F. E., who is a hardware merchant of Baraboo, Wis-
consin; J. W., who is a hardware merchant of
Grove City, Minnesota ; Mary, who is the twin sister
of J. W., married Joseph McCarty, a car inspector,
and lives at Lewistown, Montana ; Matilda, who
married A. W. T. Anderson, a merchant of Emi-
grant, Montana; and G. E., whose name heads this
review. The m.other died in 1908.
G. E. Settergren attended tne public schools of
Cokato, Minnesota, and Minneapolis, Minnesota, and
also took a business course at a night school. He
learned the fundamentals of business life as a clerk
in the store of Settergren Brothers at Litchfield,
Minnesota, where he remained during 1899, and
then, in 1900, came to Montana, and continued clerk-
ing for a year more at Livingston, this state. He
then found an opportunity to put to practical use
the knowledge he had acquired at business college,
and acted as a bookkeeper for a year. For the
subsequent two years he conducted a mercantile
business at Gardiner, Montana, and then in 1905
moved to Laurel, where he was in a general mercan-
tile business until the fall of 1906. At that time he
assisted in organizing the Laurel Trading Company,
which he served as president until 1908, when he
sold his interests and embarked in his present busi-
ness, expanding it until he has the largest and most
perfectly equipped furniture and undertaking estab-
lishment in this part of Montana. He owns the
building in which his store is located, which has a
first floor area of 30 x 100 feet, with a large balcony,
and a warehouse in the rear, which is located at
the corner of First Avenue and First Street, as well
as a modern residence in which he maintains his
home. Mr. Settergren owns an interest in a furni-
ture store at Columbus, Montana.
In 1905 Mr. Settergren was married at Litchfield,
Minnesota, to Miss Delia Swanson, a daughter of
C. O. Swanson, a retired contractor of Litchfield.
Mrs. Swanson is now deceased. Mr. and Mrs.
Settergren have three children, namely : Maxwell,
who was born January 6. 1907 ; Doris, who was born
January 8, 1910 ; and Marguerite, who was born
March 15, 1913. In politics a stanch republican, Mr.
Settergren has been called upon to represent his
party upon several occasions, and is now discharging
the responsible duties pertaining to the office of city
treasurer. He is also on the school board, and has
served as a member of the City Council of Laurel.
Brought up in the Episcopal Church, he has long
been one of its communicants. Fraternally he is a
member of Laurel Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons ; Billings Consistory and Algeria Temple,
Ancient Arabic Order Noble's of the Mystic Shrine ;
Laurel Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows:
and Laurel Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
As one of the enthusiastic members of the Laurel
Commercial Club he has been instrumental in draw-
ing outside capital to the city and in bringing the
importance and desirability of the city before the
public, as well as arousing a proper amount of
civic pride among its residents. As a business rnan
he is upright and honorable, and in the undertaking
branch of his establishment he displays those quali-
ties so necessary in one who is called in at the
saddest moment, and upon whose skill and sympa-
thetic handling of affairs depends the dignity of the
occasion. He takes a pride in keeping abreast ot
144
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the times in his equipment, and guarantees that all
.the fittings and ceremonies will be of a nature to
show the deepest respect to the dead and furnish
comfort to the sorrowing relatives.
M. Savage is junior partner of the Perkins-
Savage Lumber Company of Billings, to which city
he came in the fall of 1914 from Napoleon, North
Dakota.
His father, M. Savage, was one of the early
pioneers in Minnesota Territory. He was born in
County Cork, Ireland, in 1823, came to the United
States in 1S4S, at the age of twenty-five, lived in
Boston for a time, then worked in the South in
Tennessee and in Indiana, where he married, and
in 1S54 settled on the Minnesota frontier in Scott
County, and he spent the rest of his life as a farmer.
Mr. Savage moved to South Dakota and died at
South Shore in that state. He was a democrat
and a Catholic. His wife, Mary Long, was born
at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1845, and died at Milbank,
South Dakota, in 1913. Their children were:
Richard, a resident of Milbank, South Dakota;
Nellie, wife of H. W. Pratt, a rancher and sheep
man and proprietor of a large laundry at Delta,
Colorado; M. Savage, Jr.; James, a rancher at
Ingomar, Montana ; and John W., who was a con-
tractor and died at Milbank, South Dakota, in 1905.
M. Savage was educated in the rural schools of
Scott County, Minnesota, and at the age of sixteen
left his father's home and farm and made the best
of circumstances and opportunities. He acquired
a good education, largely through practical experi-
ence. For three years he was a farmer in South
Shore, South Dakota, taught school in that state
for six years, and from iQoo to 1905 was a buver for
the Northwestern Elevator Company at South" Shore.
Following that he spent one year with the North
Dakota Horse and Cattle Company at Rugby, North
Dakota, and from the spring of igo6 until August,
1913. was actively engaged in the hardware business
at Napoleon, North Dakota, also in the grain and
bankjng^ business, following which he spent a year
in \yinding up the affairs of the firm.
Since coming to Billings he has been an active
partner in the Perkins-Savage Lumber Company,
Montana. Mr. Savage resides at 321 North Thirty-
first Street. He is a republican in politics, a mern-
ber of the Catholic Church and a third degree
Knight of Columbus, affiliated with Bismarck Coun-
cil, and also belongs to Billings Camp of the
Modern Woodmen of America and Napoleon Lodge
of the Brotherhood of American Yeomen. In 1902,
at Webster City, Iowa, he married Miss Teressa J.
Kelly, daughter of John L. and Catherine (Bonner)
Kelly. Her father was a farmer in Iowa for many
years and died while living retired at Webster City,
where her mother is still living.
Carl B. Ross. It is only natural that the younger
communities of the country should attract to them
men just entering upon their business careers as
they have the courage and enthusiasm which seek
an outlet into unchartered seas. In those sections
where but little has yet been accomplished, oppor-
tunities are many and the young man can hew out
his own way unrestricted by the traditions of those
who have already blazed a path. Granite County
has many of these alert, competent young men who
are putting into their work every ounce of their
strength and determination, and one of them is Carl
B. Ross, cashier of the Granite Countv Bank of
Hall.
Carl B. Ross, was born at Leesburg, Indiana, Au-
gust II, 1892, a son of M. Ross, and a member of
one of the old-established families of this country,
which traces back to English and Scotch origin,
and was founded in the Colony of Virginia in pre-
Revolutionary times. M. Ross was born in Indiana
m 1855, and was there engaged in farming for many
years, before he retired. In 1910 he came to Mon-
tana and for a time operated in Hill County as a
rancher, but once more retired and is now living at
Chester. He is a democrat in his political belief
and resolute in adherring to his convictions. The
Methodist Episcopal Church affords him a medium
for the expression of the religious side of his na-
ture. His wife, who was Miss Elizabeth Adaline
Taylor prior to her marriage, was born in Indiana
in i860. Their children are as follows : J. J., who is
a farmer of Joplin, Montana; Laotha, who married
E. P. Scott, a rancher of San Jose, California;
George W., who is a rancher of Chester, Montana;
Laomer, who served in the World war, being over-
seas in the medical department for two years, was
recently mustered out of the army, and is now at
home with his parents; Carl B., whose name heads
this review; and Virgil, who is a rancher of Chester,
Montana.
Carl B. Ross attended the schools of Leesburg,
Indiana, and the Chester, Montana, high school,
from which he was graduated in 1912, following
which he entered the Inverness, Montana, State
Bank as assistant cashier, and held that position for
two years, and then began ranching, and was so
engaged when he was mustered into the service in
April, 1918, and was sent to Fort Missoula, where
he was in training until December, 1918, at which
time he was mustered out.
Returning home he was made secretary and cash-
ier of the Granite County State Bank o'f Hall, en-
tering upon the discharge of his duties in January,
I9I9._ He is one of the most efficient men in his
line in this part of Montana, as well as one of the
most popular. Like his father he is a democrat and
Methodist. He belongs to Ruby Lodge No. 36, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, of Drummond,
Montana, and the American Legion. In addition to
his connection with the bank at Hall, Mr. Ross is a
director of the Drummond Light & Power Com-
pany.
On January I, 1920, Mr. Ross married Frances
Kennedy, a daughter of M. Kennedy, a promi-
nent miner of Butte, Montana. Like the majority
of the young men of the country, he cheerfully
turned from the paths of peace when the country
needed his services, and only the signing of the
armistice prevented his seeing active service.
John J. Burke, a native of Butte, was born June
30. 1891, a son of James Burke, who emigrated from
Ireland to New York City, from there going to
Panama and Mexico, then up the coast to California,
finally becoming a pioneer mining man of Idaho and
Montana, and dying in Butte, Montana, June 25,
1896. leaving besides his son, a widow and one
daughter, now Mrs. Julia McMullen.
.^fter attending public and parochial schools, Mr.
Burke attended the Butte High School for a period'
of three years, at the end of which time he entered
the employ of the Hennessy Company, Centerville
Branch, as a credit man. Leaving that company in
1009. he became associated with the Butte Water
Company, where he was employed for seven years.
In 1916 he was appointed manager of the New
Method Laundry Company at Butte, and later be-
came vice president and director, positions which
he still holds. In 1918 Mr. Burke enlisted in the
L'nited States army service as a private in the Coast
Artillery Corps, was mustered out and returned to
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Butte in Januar.v, 1919, when he was appointed as-
sistant cashier of the Silver Bow National Bank,
later being elected a director of that institution,
which position he occupies today.
He is prominent in business circles, being a mem-
ber of the Butte Chamber of Commerce, Butte Ro-
tary Club, Butte Advertising Club and Laundry-
owners' National Association.
Fraternally he is a member of the Butte Council
No. 668, Knights of Columbus (of which he was
treasurer for a number of years), Butte Lodge No.
240, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and
is also identified with the Silver Bow Club, Rocky
Mountain Rifle Club, Army League, Navy League,
American National Red Cross and American Legion.
Mr. Burke is unmarried and lives with his mother
at 302 West Porphyry Street, Butte.
Edward R. Roehl, a resident of Montana since
1912, is one of the leading automobile dealers
of the state, with headquarters at Lewistown, where
he is head of the Roehl Motor Company.
Mr. Roehl was born on a ranch in Saline County,
Nebraska, December 28, 1884, a son of William
F. and Paulina (Fandery) Roehl. His parents are
now living at Friend, Nebraska, the father at the
age of seventy-three and the mother at sixty-nine.
Edward is fourth in a family of si.K children, four
of whom are still living, three sons and one daughter.
His father came to this country when a small boy
and grew up and was married in Wisconsin. He
became a pioneer in Nebraska, buying government
land and becoming an extensive stock raiser and
cattle feeder and shipper. He also served on the
school board and has been an active republican for
many years.
Edward R. Roehl grew up on the Nebraska farm,
spending the first twenty years of his life there.
Before coming to Montana he was a successful
advertising man in the employ of several well
known publications in the Middle West. He first
traveled for the Iowa Homestead, one of the chief
farm journals of the Middle West. Later he
represented the Capper publications of Topeka, Kan-
sas, in the commercial and livestock advertising
department.
On coming to Montana in 1912 Mr. Roehl located
at Lewistown and engaged in the automobile busi-
ness, selling Ford cars. In September, 1917, he sold
his interest in the first firm and organized the Roehl
Motor Company, handling a full line of auto-
mobiles and motors. He is head of a very success-
ful and thriving business.
Mr. Roehl married. February 14, 1912, Miss
Merna Aller. She was born on her father's farm
in Saline County, Nebraska. They have one
daughter, Judith. Mr. Roehl is affiliated wfth
Lewistown Lodge No. 37. Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch
Masons, Lewistown Commandery No. 14, Knights
Templar, and .Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine
at Helena. Politically he is a republican.
Jo R. North, in the real estate business at Billings
since 1894, has been a prominent factor in the
affairs of that city and has contributed much to the
prestige of the family name in Montana.
Mr. North was born at Adel, Iowa, October 27,
1876. His ancestors came from England and were
colonial settlers in Virginia and were of the same
family as Lord North. Thomas R. North, father
of J. R.. was born in Ohio in 1838, went as a young
man to Iowa, was married in that state, and had a
long and active practice as an attorney at law in
several states. He moved to Warsaw, Indiana, in
1908, and is still living there, retired. During the
Civil war he served as a Union soldier but in poli-
tics has been a democrat. He served as mayor of
the town of Adel in Iowa and is a member of the
Presbyterian Church. Thomas R. North by his
first marriage has a daughter, Sarah M., living at
Medford, Oregon, widow of John H. Whitman, a
former abstractor. For his second wife he married
Naomi Stewart, who was born in 1842 and died at
Medford, Oregon, in 1888. Her children were :
Etta, unmarried, and living at Racine, Wisconsin;,
Austin, a business man at Billings; J., also a resi-
dent of Billings ; Alice, living at Philadelphia, Penn-
sylvania, widow of Thomas Milliken, a former mer-
chant; Jo R. ; and Oto, associated with his brother
Jo in the real estate business at Billings. Thomas
R. North married for his third wife Laura B.
Abbott, who was born in Ohio and is the mother
of a daughter, Ava, living at Warsaw, Indiana, wife
of Frank T. Simcoke, a railway mail clerk.
Jo R. North attended the public schools of Adel,
Iowa, graduating from high school in 1894, in which
year he came to Billings. In 1897-98 he returned
to Iowa to attend the Capital City Business College
at Des Moines. He spent one year in a clothing
store at Adel and acquired his preliminary experi-
ence in real estate in that town. He arrived at
, Billings in July, 1894, and at that time established
his present line as a real estate man. He handles
city properties, loans and insurance, and is president
of North Bros., Incorporated, the other officers
being Gertrude North, vice president, and Oto North,
secretary and treasurer. This firm owns 2,500 acres
of ranch lands in Yellowstone, Stillwater and
Sweetgrass counties, besides various lots and dwell-
ings in Billings. Mr. North individually and his
firm are among the large property owners in the
city. Mr. North has done much to open up the
surrounding territory and individually owns 440
acres of ranch lands and much local property, in-
cluding his modern home at 129 Avenue D. His
offices are at 212 North Broadway.
Mr. North is a republican, a member of the Pres-
byterian Church, the Billings Midland Empire Club,
the Billings Golf and Country Club, and is affiliated
with Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks.
June 6, 1899, at Adel, Iowa, he married Miss
Letha M. Cook, daughter of John W. and Mary
(White) Cook. Her parents live at Billings, where
her father is engaged in the transfer and storage
business and is a large land owner in Montana.
Mrs. North is a graduate of the Adel High School.
Their only son, Everett W., was born August 13,
1906.
Leo a. Hexter. A young man of eminent ability
and discrimination. Leo A. Henter, of Broadview,
has had broad and valuable experience in banking,
and while employed in this business has developed
great aptitude for dealing with financial matters.
He was born at Conway, North Dakota, January 22,
1891. of German ancestry on both sides of the
house.
His father. Frank Henter, was born in 1836, in
Germany, and was there a resident until eighteen
years of age. Immigrating then to the United States,
he lived for a short time in Chicago, after which
he spent a few years at St. Paul and at St. Cloud,
Minnesota, where he wooed and won a fair bride.
Removing from there to North Dakota, he became
a pioneer settler of Fargo, building the first hotel
on Broadway and erecting one of the first two
houses of that thoroughfare. Three years later he
took up a homestead claim at Conway, North Da-
14(3
HISTORY OF MONTANA
kota, and in the thirty- four years that he occupied
it made improvements of value and note. He now
owns 640 acres of highly improved land, including
his origmal homestead property, but is living retired
from the activities of life at Henderson, Minnesota.
He is identified with the democratic party in poli-
tics, and is a member of the Roman Catholic Church.
He married Johannah Schmitt, who was born in
Germany in 1839, a daughter of William Schmitt,
who emigrated with his family from Germany to
St. Cloud, Minnesota, where his children were
reared and educated. Of the eleven children born
of their union, two died in infancy, the others
being as follows : John, a farmer, died in St. Paul,
Minnesota, aged forty-five years; Anna, wife of
Peter Norton, a farmer in Conway, North Dakota;
Frank, engaged in farming at Conway; Christ, of
Broadview, Montana, a farmer; Michael, of St.
Cloud, Minnesota, is in the employ o£ the Great
Northern Railway Company; Peter, a well known
agriculturist of Broadview, Montana; Joseph, also
engaged in farming at Broadview; Isabel, living
with her parents ; and Leo A.
Acquiring his preliminary education in North Da-
kota, Leo A. Henter first attended the rural schools
01 Walsh County, later taking a course of study at
the agricultural college in Fargo, and in 1908 grad-
uated from a business college in St. Paul, Minne-
sota. Returning to the parental homestead, he
assisted his father on the farm for a year. On
August 8, 1909, Mr. Henter embarked in the bank-
ing business at Lankin, North Dakota, beginning at
the foot of the ladder of attainments as bookkeeper
and stenographer. Proving himself worthy of pro-
motion, he was transferred to Eckman, North Da-
kota, and was there assistant cashier of the First
State Bank until 1915. Removing then to Lambert,
Montana, Mr. Henter was for two years assistant
of the First State Bank of that place, and the
following year was deputy bank examiner, a posi-
tion to which he was appointed by Governor Stew-
art. Locating at Broadview in March, 1918, Mr.
Henter has since served ably and acceptably as
vice president of the Mutual State Bank, of which
he is also manager. This bank has a capital stock
of $20,000, and a surplus fund of $20,000, it being
one of the substantial institutions of the county.
and its officers are as follows : Herman Lehfeldt.
president ; Leo .'\. Henter, first vice president ; \Vi\-
liam Spidel, second vice president ; and N. C.
Shepard, cashier. Mr. Henter has also other inter-
ests of a business nature, being vice president of
the Broadview Hardware Company, and owning a
ranch situated twelve miles west of Broadview.
Politically he is a democrat, and religiously he be-
longs to the Roman Catholic Church. Fraternally
he is a third degree Knight in Minot Council No.
1 150, at Minot, North Dakota; and is a member of
Fordville Lodge, Brotherhood of American Yeomen,
at Fordville, North Dakota.
Mr. Henter married in 1914, at Bottineau, North
Dakota, Miss Irene Nelson, a daughter of Charles
and Margaret Nelson. Her father, who was in the
livery and draying business for many years, died
while yet in the prime of life, and her mother is
now living at Grand Forks, North Dakota. Mr. and
Mrs. Henter have one child, N'irginia Isabel, born
March i, 1917.
.Albert Tinklep.\uch, president of the Granite
County Bank and retired ranchman, is one of the
substantial men of Hall, and well known all over
Granite County. The Granite County Bank is an
all-round financial institution, with commercial,
savings, trust and real estate loan departments ; a
personal service bank, and is built on congenial,
democratic lines. It makes people feel at home. It
earns good-will and holds it, and feeling its obliga-
tions, fulfills them. This bank was established in
1913 as a state bank, and has a capital stock of $20,-
000 and an adequate surplus. Its officials are : Albert
Tinklepaugh, president; Jesse H. Henderson, vice
president ; and Carl B. Ross, cashier. The directors
are: Albert Tinklepaugh, Alex Wight, Gust Johnson,
J. A. Featherman, H. J. Kolbeck, Jesse H. Hender-
son and Alfred Johnson.
Albert Tinklepaugh was born in County Brant,
Canada West, June 8, 1845, a son of William N.
Tinklepaugh, and grandson of Peter Tinklepaugh, a
native of Pennsylvania, who died in Steuben Coun-
ty, Indiana, in 1848. The Tinklepaugh family came
to Pennsylvania from Germany, some time prior to
the American Revolution. William N. Tinklepaugh
was born in Pennsylvania in 1821, and died in what
was then Deerlodge County, but is now Granite
County, near the present site of Hall, in 1895. After
he reached maturity in his native state he went to
New York City and learned the trade of cabinet-
maker, and following it in different places, was a
resident of Indiana, Wisconsin, Minnesota and the
Dominion of Canada, residing in the latter country
but a few j-ears. In 1890 he came to the present
Granite County, and remained here until claimed by
death. In politics he was a republican. A strong
Baptist he was always an active supporter of the
local denomination of his faith wherever he lived.
His wife bore the maiden name of Mary Swift and
she was born in New York State in 1823. Her death
occurred at Hall in 1898. Their children were as
follows : Albert, whose name heads this review :
Charles, who came to Montana in 1873, was one of
the pioneers in this part of the state and is now a
ranchman of Drummond ; Levi, who died in Minne-
sota at the age of twenty-four years; Ellen M. ; who
resides at Rollins, Montana, is the widow of the
late Perr3' Engles, a veteran of the war between
the states, who died in a soldiers' home at Thompson
Falls, Montana ; Morton, who was a rancher in the
vicinity of Hall, died in 1893; and Lodema, who
married Duncan Dingwall, pioneer merchant of
Drummond, Montana, where they reside.
Albert Tinklepaugh went to school in Wiscon-
sin, and left home when he was seventeen years and
si.x months old to enlist in the defense of his country
in the Sixty-Sixth Minnesota Volunteer Infantry, in
1863, and served from then on until the close of the
war. That period of stress and hardship made
men out of mere boys, and following his discharge
Albert Tinklepaugh went to Minnesota and was en-
gaged in ranching in that state until 1880, when he
came to Montana and bought 160 acres of railroad
land, to which he later added 40 acres, in the vi-
cinity of the present site of Hall, and here he was
engaged in ranching until 1914, when he sold his
property, and has since lived retired. He has been
president of the Granite County Bank since 1915.
and his association with this institution gives it added
solidity.
In 1868 Mr. Tinklepaugh was married at Preston.
Fillmore County, Minnesota, to Miss Christie Car-
nagie. a daughter of John and Jane (McGowan)
Carnagie. both of whom are deceased. Mr. Carnagie
was a farmer and machinist during his younger
years, but later on in life became a jeweler. Mr.
and Mrs. Tinklepaugh became the parents of the
following children: Eva M., who married F. W.
Herririg, a locomotive engineer, now deceased, lives
at Philipsburg. Montana; Freeman, who is a gen-
eral worker of Hall; and Maude, who died at the
age of twenty-seven years.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
147
Mr. Tinklepaugh belongs to Ruby Lodge No. 36,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and to Burnside
Post, Grand Army Republic of Philipsburg. An
unsafe bank is a reflection upon the intelligence of
a community. People cannot carry their money
on their persons for the transaction of large busi-
ness deals. They have to have banking institutions,
and the community which allows the use of the
word "bank" by any other than a regulated institu-
tion is reckless. Judged by this, tlie people of Hall
have displayed proper foresight in giving their sup-
port to a bank of the character of the Granite Coun-
ty Bank, which is an institution fit for tlie confidence
of its depositors and those otherwise transacting
business through its medium. The present sound
conditions of this bank is due to the efforts of the
men connected with its operation, and they take
pride in the fact that its patrons regard it as their
ideal of a financial institution.
LuciAN Heath Sutton is a native son of Mon-
tana, and is a young business maii of much enter-
prise and has given his home city of Hamilton its
chief theatrical and amusement assets. Mr. Sutton
has been in the theater business for several years,
and his experience in business affairs has been rather
wide and extended, showing his versatile gifts.
He was born at Helena, November 12. 1892. His
father, George L. Sutton, was born in Brooklyn,
New York, in 1862, was reared in that city, and in
1890 came to Montana. He lived at Helena, later at
Bozeman where he was manager of the Bozeman
Hotel, and in 1897 moved to Tacoma, where he con-
tinued the hotel business. Since 1914 he has been
a hotel man in Seattle. He is a republican and a
member of the Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks.
Lucian Heath Sutton was the only cliild of his
parents. His mother was Elizabeth Hamm, who was
born in Missouri in 1869 and died at Helena in
1893. Mr. Sutton grew up in the home of his ma-
ternal grandparents. His grandfather William
Hamm was born in the Province of Ontario, Canada,
in 1843, of English ancestry and tlie son of a Metho-
dist minister in Ontario. William Hamm was a
widely known and prominent Montana pioneer. He
grew up in his native province, was married in Mis-
souri, and in the early days came to Montana, first
to Fort Benton and then to Helena. He was a prac-
tical lumberman, and as head sawyer was connected
with a number of lumber mills in the forests of the
Bitter Root Valley and all over Montana. Later he
settled at Helena where he owned a residence, and in
1909 retired to Tacoma. In 1916 he established a
home at Hamilton, where he died September 3, 1919.
In 1898 he served as a constable in Helena. He was
a republican in politics. William Hamm married
Margaret Rhodes, wlio was born in Missouri in 1852
and is now living at Hamilton.
Lucian Heath Sutton acquired his early education
in the public schools of Helena, finished the sopho-
more year in the Montana Wesleyan University in
that city, and in 1907-08 attended Helena Business
College. The first year after leaving school he was
employed in the offices of Wallace, Brown & Gaines,
a prominent firm of lawyers of Helena, then division
counsel for the Northern Pacific Railway. For six
months he was with the Griffin W'heel Company at
Tacoma, Washington, following which he was ste-
nographer and law clerk for E. C. Day at Helena
eighteen months, and for three years, beginning in
1912, was in the grain brokerage business at Seattle.
In 1915 Mr. Sutton became private secretary to T. F.
Ryan, president of the Ryan Fruit Company.
Mr. Sutton opened the Grand Theater, formerly
the Lucas Opera House, at Hamilton, in November,
1916. Under liis management this has become one
of the leading amusement places in Western Mon-
tana. In September, 1917, he also acquired the Star
Theater. He conducted these houses alternately,
one as a summer theater and the other for the
winter season. In May, 1919, after extensive re-
modeling he reopened the Star as the Liberty
Theater, an exclusive motion picture house. This
is the best equipped and best patronized theater
in Ravalli County.
Mr. Sutton is affiliated with Ionic Lodge No. ^S,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hamilton Chap-
ter No. 18, Royal Arch Masons, Crusade Com-
mandery No. 17, Knights Templar, Ravalli Lodge
No. 36, Knights o.f Pythias, and Ravalli Aerie No.
1693, Fraternal Order of Eagles.
February 8, 1910, at Townsend, Montana, Mr. Sut-
ton married Miss Isabella M. Hartwig, daughter
of W. J. and Isabelle (Burke) Hartwig, residents
of Helena, where her father is proprietor of ihe
Antlers Theater. Mr. and Mrs. Sutton have three
children: Lucian Heath, Jr., born May 12, 191 1;
William J., born December 12, 1912; a'nd Isabella
M., born August 23, igi6.
Daniel James Burke. During the last twenty
years Daniel James Burke, now a resident of Lewis-
town, has built hundreds of miles of steam and
electric railways and has done contracting all over
the Northwest country. Large corporations know
that the organization of Daniel J. Burke is capable
of carrying out any contract it undertakes, and
Mr. Burke would be fully justified in feeling pride
and satisfaction in the great volume of business
he has transacted.
His career has been one of real self achievement,
beginning in humble circumstances and today en-
joying a splendid position in the business affairs of
Montana. He was born on a farm in Wallace
Township, LaSalle County, Illinois, six miles north
of Ottawa, September 9, 1864. His father, Thomas
Burke, who spent his active life as an Illinois
farmer, was born in Roscrea, Tipperary, Ireland,
in 1837, son of Daniel and Catherine (McGrath)"
Burke, who came to .America in 1840 and were
pioneers in the locality north of Ottawa, Illinois,
where Daniel J. Burke was born. Thomas Burke,
who died -April 13, 1901, at the age of sixty-four,
his death being the result of an injury received
by the kick of a horse, was married November i,
i860, at St. Columba's Catholic Church in Ottawa]
to Mary O'Shea. She was the mother of four
children : Catherine, who died at the age of twenty-
two months: Daniel J.; John J., who was born
November 20, 1865, and lives at Marseilles m
LaSalle County, Illinois; and the fourth child died
at its birth with its mother on October 8, 1868.
when she was twenty-eight years of age. Thomas
Burke married for his second wife on February i
1872, Mary McCluskey.
Daniel James Burke spent his life on a farm in
Northern Illinois, and secured a limited education
in the country schools. Soon after reaching his
majority he left Ottawa, on February i, 18S6, went
to Friend, Nebraska, in the fall of the same year
to Schuyler, Nebraska, and on being without capita!
and with an experience largely limited to the farm
he accepted whatever employment he could get.
In the spring of 1890 he was made night police
at Schuyler, and after a year was appointed chief
of police and street commissioner, an office he filled
creditably for two years.
The work that paved the way for his larger
business career began in 1893, when he was made
148
HISTORY OF MONTANA
special agent and claim agent for the Burlington
Railroad at Alliance, Nebraska. He was with that
railroad until February, 1900, with headquarters
at Alliance. At that date he opened a small lumber
yard at Bayer, Nebraska. Mr. Burke on March 17,
1900, bought a thirty-team grading outfit from
Mile Elmore, then working at Vance, Nebraska,
for the Burlington Railroad, and since that date
has followed railroad building. His operations
as a railroad contractor have been in the states of
Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, Iowa, Idaho and
Montana. The first contract he handled was for
the Burlington and Missouri River Railway, part
of the Burlington system. He did work for the
same company in Iowa, and on April 14, 1906, moved
the first dirt at Carterville on the new transconti-
nental line of the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul.
This was on the line between Mobridge and the
coast. He was actively engaged on this construc-
tion until 1909. Mr. Burke then moved his con-
tracting organization for the building of the North-
ern Pacific line between Rosebud and Miles City, as
far as the Bozeman Tunnel. In 1912 he built the
Gallatin Valley Electric Railway, now part of the
Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul system. He also
constructed the electric railway between Bozeman
and Salesville, a distance of twenty miles.
Mr. Burke has had his home and business head-
quarters at Lewistown since 1912, and since then
has constructed 123 miles of railroad in Fergus
County alone. He has also added to the resources
of Lewistown as a business city, having erected
a first class public storage and warehouse building
at a cost of $75,000. He is one of the heavy stock-
holders in the First National Bank and served the
bank as director in 1917-18. He belongs to only
one organization, the Elks Lodge No. 961, at
Alliance, Nebraska. He is a democ.rat and in religion
a Catholic.
Horace A. Weld. Prominent among the rep-
resentative citizens of Yellowstone County is Horace
A. Weld, vice president and cashier of the First
National Bank of Broadview. Possessing an un-
limited amount of energy and business sagacity,
he has the keen perceptive faculties and the grasp
of mind that has enabled him to meet great emer-
gencies in the fields of finance, as was proved" by
his masterly handling of the various Liberty Loan
and other drives during the recent World war.
Coming from thrifty New England stock, he was
born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, January 29, 1867,
a son of J. O. \Veld. His grandfather, Orin Weld,
born in 1S07, died at Coleraine, Vermont, in 1849,
in that part of New England in which the immigrant
ancestor of the Weld ' family settled on coming
from Wales to the United States in colonial days.
J. O. Weld was born in 1835, in Coleraine, Ver-
mont, and among its rugged hills grew to a sturdy
manhood. As a young man, anticipating the advice
of Horace Greeley, he made his way to Minnesota,
and while in the employ of J. Dean built the pioneer
saw mill of that now flourishing citj'. Subsequently
embarking in business for himself, he was there
successfully engaged in mercantile pursuits for a
quarter of a century. He is now living retired
from active cares, his home being on the' shores
of the beautiful Lake Minnetonka at Alound, Min-
nesota. He invariably casts his ballot in favor
of the republican party, and is a member and
liberal supporter of the Fourth Baptist Church.
Fraternally he is a member of the Masonic organ-
ization, being the oldest Mason in the state, and
the only surviving charter member of Minneapolis
Lodge No. 19, at the present time, however, belong-
ing to Plymouth Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted
Order of Masons. For the past fourteen years
Plymouth Lodge has celebrated the anniversary of
his being raised to the sublime degree of Master
Mason. He married, in Minneapolis, Minnesota,
Eliza Ann Moore, who was born in Holyoke, Mas-
sachusetts, in 1840, and to them four children have
been born, as follows: Jennie V., wife of Wil-
liam P. Cleator, of Minneapolis, a member of the
Sawyer-Cleator Lumber Company; Ellen, who mar-
ried Carey Emerson, a whole sale grocery broker
at Minneapolis, died in middle life ; Horace A. ;
and Frankie O., who died in. infancy.
Soon after his graduation from the Minneapolis
High School in 1884, Horace A. Weld secured
a position as messenger boy in the City Bank of
Minneapolis, and proving himself faithful to his
duties in that capacity he was promoted to teller,
which position he held eleven years. For two years
thereafter he was teller and detail man at the
Northwestern National Bank of Minneapolis. In
188S Mr. Weld made a decided change of occupa-
tion and residence, going to Alaska, where for a
year he was affiliated with the Ladue Gold Mining
and Developing Company, later being engaged in
mercantile pursuits on his own account for seven
years.
Locating at Seattle, Washington, in 1896, Mr.
Weld was employed in the purchasing and forward-
ing industry for eighteen months, after which he
was there associated with the National Bank of
Commerce for two years, having charge of the
savings department. Subsequently, in partnership
with Stanley Scearce, he started the First National
Bank of Ronan, Montana, and served as its cashier
until 1911. Mr. Weld then became affiliated with
the First National Bank of Carrington, North
Dakota, where he remained as assistant cashier for
four years. Coming from there to Broadview,
Montana, in January, 1916, he organized the First
National Bank of Broadview, which has a capital
stock of $25,000 and a surplus fund of $5,000, the
officers of the bank being as follows : C. L. Grandin,
of Minneapolis, president; and H. A. Weld, vice
president and cashier.
Active in public affairs and an influental member
of the republican ranks, Mr. Weld served as town
treasurer at Carrington, North Dakota, and is now
a member and president of the Broadview Council.
During all of the Liberty Loan drives during the
late war he was at the forefront, serving in each
instance as chairman of the local committees, and
each time going over the top. As chairrnan^ of
the Council of Defense he willingly gave his time
and personal attention to the duties devolving upon
him in that capacity, sparing himself not at all.
and it was largely due to his strenuous efforts that
this district met with such a great measure of
success in its various war activities. He was
chairman of both the War Savings Stamps and the
War Chest drives and an active member of the
Board of Control and Finance and of the War
Chest Fund, his financial ability and discernment
rendering him especially qualified for the position.
Air. Weld is a member of the Fourth Baptist
Church of Minneapolis, and is identified with the
Masonic fraternity, being a Royal Arch Mason.
While in Alaska he was Arctic Chief of the Arctic
Brotherhood of Alaska, the largest fraternal organ-
ization in that section of the country, and has
among his choicest treasures a very handsome gold
and diamond watch charm presented to him by the
lodge as past Arctic Chief. During his career he
has accumulated considerable property, owning a
ranch of 640 acres situated seven miles west of
jO^j-^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Rapelje, Montana, and an attractive residence in
Broadview.
Air. Weld married, in 1907, at Minneapolis, Min-
nesota, Lettie A. Wertman, a daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. W. T. Wertman.
S.^MUEL E. Dove came to Montana in 1904 as
principal of the Billings High School. After a
year or two he found an opening in business, gave
up educational work, and is now one of the promi-
nent residents of Huntley, being cashier of the
Huntley State Bank.
Mr. Dove was born in Shelby County, Illinois,
January 17, 1876. He is of Virginia colonial an-
cestry, his paternal ancestors having come out from
England. His great-grandfather, Henry Dove, was
born in Virginia and in pioneer times with his small
stock of money and goods crossed the mountains
and homesteaded at Carroll in Fairfield County,
Ohio. He died at Carroll in 1876. Elijah Dove,
grandfather of the Huntley banker, was born at
Carroll. Ohio, in 181 1 and spent all his life on the
farm originally taken up and cleared bv his father.
Three years before his death he moved to Shelby-
ville. Illinois, and died there in 1806. His wife was
Mary Small. She was also born in Carroll, Ohio,
and died there in 1876.
W. L. Dove, father of Samuel E., was born in
Ohio in 1843 and when a young man went to
Shelby County, Illinois. He married in that county
and spent the rest of his life as a farmer. He
died in 1886. Politically he was an mdependent
and was a member of the United Brethren Church
and one of the local preachers of that denommation.
W. L. Dove married Eliza A. Warner, who vvas
born in Shelby County, Illinois, in 1853 and died
there in 1886, the same year as her husband. Samuel
E Dove is the oldest of four children ; Mrs. Julia
Maddox is the wife of a farmer at Rapidan, Vir-
ginia; James U. is general sales manager tor the
Swayne Robinson Machine Company at Richmond,
Indiana; and the voungest is Delia, wife of Charles
Christ, a farmer at Canal Winchester, Ohio.
Samuel E. Dove spent his early life on a farm,
but acquired a liberal education, beginning at the
rural schools in Shelby County, Illinois, continuing
in the Preparatory School at Greencastle, Indiana,
and followed that with a course of college work
in DePauw University at Greencastle. He was
graduated with the degree Ph. B. in 1901. He
achieved the scholarship honor of membership in
the Phi Beta Kappa and is a member of the social
fraternity Phi Delta Theta. During 1901 Mr. Dove
was a night school teacher, spent two years with
the schools of Kendallville. Indiana, one year m the
Rock Island, Illinois, High School and in 1904
took up his work as principal of the High School at
Billings. He remained there two years and then
engaged in the mercantile business at Bdlings and
on the Billings Bench. He has been a resident of
Huntley since 1907 and was a merchant in that little
city until 1913- He has since been cashier of the
Huntley State Bank, which was established August
27 1907, with a state charter. This bank has a
capital of $20,000 and surplus and profits of $14,000.
The officers of the bank are T. A. Snidow, of Bil-
lings, president; Albert E. Platz, of Billings, vice
president; and Mr. Dove, cashier.
Mr Dove is a member of the State and American
Bankers Association, and owns an irrigated ranch
of 180 acres on the Billings Bench. He is a director
of the Bankers Loan and Mortgage Company ot
Billings He helped establish the Methodist Epis-
copal Church at Huntley in 1909. has since been
its treasurer and is a member of the Board of Trus-
tees. He is a republican and affiliated with Billings
Midland Club.
In June, 1903, Mr. Dove married Miss Nellie
Landes at Greencastle, Indiana. She died in March,
1904. In 1906, at Des Moines, Iowa, he married
Miss Josephine Bly, daughter of J. W. and Mary
(Miller) Bly, both now deceased. Her father was
a merchant and farmer at Des Moines. Mrs. Dove
is a graduate of Drake University with the degree
Ph. B. They haye two daughters, Virginia, born
June 23, 1908, and Marjorie, born March 6, 1910.
RiBOT J. Valiton is one of the progressive
young merchants of Montana, is manager of the
Golden Rule department store at Philipsburg, is a
university graduate, and in his active career has
shown much of the commercial genius inherited from
his ancestors.
His father was the late Peter Valiton, a Mon^
tana pioneer, whose life was one of the many ad-
ventures, vicissitudes, and in the end a great volume
of success. Peter Valiton, who died at Deer Lodge
in August, 1914, was born in Southern France, De-
cember 13, 1832, a son of Peter Valiton. His peo-
ple were French Huguenots. Peter Valiton, Sr.,
was a French farmer and in 1850 came to the United
States and located near Dubuque, Iowa, where he
died in 1858. His widow spent her last years with
her son Peter and was killed by a train at Deer
Lodge June 6, 1889. Peter Valiton, Jr., grew up
on his father's farm in France and had a limited
education. He was not yet nineteen years of age
when he came to the United States in 1850 and he
knew not a single word of English. He lived near
Dubuque, Iowa, for about two years, and in 1855
went to Northern Kansas, where he acted as man-
ager for a government contractor and owner of a
trading post and freighting outfit. Kansas at that
time was in the midst of the border warfare and a
part of the great west. In 1859 Peter Valiton had
charge of two wagon trains going overland to
Colorado. In i860 he opened a store in Colorado
and the following year conducted a restaurant in the
mining town of Denver. In the summer of 1862
accompanied by his widowed mother he started for
the "Salmon river country" but was deterred from
coming to Montana at that time by reports of In-
dian hostilities. He went on to Virginia City, Ne-
vada, conducted a restaurant for a year or so. and
lost practically all his money by mining speculation.
He made several ventures in mining both in Ne-
vada and after coming to Montana, but they were
almost entirely unprofitable. Early in 1865 he again
started from Denver as wagon master of a freight-
ing train for Virginia City, Montana. He soon
opened a store in Confederate Gulch at Diamond
City, and his success as a merchant soon brought
him a substantial capital. Peter Valiton was one
of the pioneers of Deer Lodge, where he located
in the fall of 1867. His best success was made as
a rancher and stockman. .'Xt one time he used
about 10,000 acres in connection with stock raising.
He was also member of a large wholesale and re-
tail grocery house at Butte and in a commercial
way his name was widely known over the state. He
was never in politics, voted as a democrat, and was
a member of the Masonic order and was a French
Protestant. In 1875 he married Catherine Epler, a
native of Michigan. She died in November. 1877-
In 188:; Peter Valiton married Miss Anna N. King,
who was born at Morristown. New Jersey, in 1852.
and is now living at Los Angeles. California. She
was the mother of four children: Francis, deceased;
Peter, a resident at Poison, Montana ; Carnot. a mer-
chant at Los .\ngeles: and Ribot J.
150
HISTORY. OF MONTANA
^ Ribot J. Valiton was born at Deer Lodge, Mon-
tana, November 2, 1891, and attended the public
schools there. He went east for his advanced edu-
cation, graduating from the high school at Ann
Arbor, Michigan, in 1910 and then taking the regu-
lar classical course in the University of Michigan,
where he received his A. B. degree in 1914. Re-
turning to Montana he engaged in the mercantile
business at Philipsburg and has advanced to the
management of the Golden Rule department store.
He is also a director of the Philipsburg State Bank
and owns a modern home in that city.
Politically he votes as an independent. He is a
member of the Episcopal Church and is affiliated
with Flint Creek Lodge No. II, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Hope Chapter No. 10. Royal Arch'
Masons at Philipsburg, Pearl Chapter No. 14, Order
of Eastern Star.
In 1915 at Annapolis, Maryland, Mr. Valiton mar-
ried Miss Rosamond Hopkins, daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. Harry Hopkins. Her father is a banker
at Annapolis and is assistant state comptroller of
Maryland. Mr. and Mrs. Valiton have one son, Ri-
bot J., Jr., born October 27, 1918.
Hon. William Wallace McDowell, who for the
past eight years has presided over the Montana
Senate as lieutenant governor, and for four years
previous was twice Speaker of the House, has made
politics incidental to a very active business career
at Butte, where he has his home. Mr. McDowell
comes of a distinguished Southern family, his great-
grandfather having been one of the generals in the
Revolutionary war who signed the Mecklenburg
Declaration of Independence. The McDowell an-
cestors came to this country on the ship "Mary and
Ann" in 1729, first settling in Pennsylvania and
later moving to Virginia, North Carolina and Ten-
nessee.
William Wallace McDowell was born at Trenton.
Tennessee, January 22, 1867, son of John H. and
Emma McDowell. He is well educated, attending
and graduating from Union City College, Tennessee,
in 1887. Mr. McDowell came to Butte in 1S96 and
for over twenty years has been prominently identi-
fied with the mining and farming interests of the
state. He is a director of the Miners' Savings Bank
& Trust Company at Butte, and also president of
the Reynolds & McDowell Company of that city.
A democrat by principle, as well as by inheritance
and family tradition, Mr. McDowell soon after coin-
ing to Montana interested himself in the affairs of
his party. He worked for the benefit of political
conditions for many years' and never sought any
office for himself until he was unanimously chosen
as a legislative candidate in 1908 In the following
session he was elected Speaker of the House of
Representatives, and was again selected as Speaker
two years later. In 1912 he was unanimously nomi-
nated for lieutenant governor at the Democratic
State Convention, and was elected that fall. Four
years later he was again nominated for lieutenant
governor, this time in the primaries, and was again
elected.
Mr. McDowell is affiliated with the Masonic fra-
ternity, the Elks, Woodmen of the World, and is
a member of the Silver Bow Club and the Butte
Country Club. Mr. McDowell married in 1912 Mrs.
Mary Lee Sturges of Chica.go, They reside in
Butte.
Charles Hancock. In every progressive com-
munity in the country are found men who have
worked their way from modest beginnings to lead-
ership in the professions, in business life and in
public affairs, and in the controlling of the veins
and arteries of the traffic and exchanges of the
country. Montana, as a young and growing state,
has its full share of self-made men, and at Lewis-
town one who has advanced himself to a recognized
position of preference in the drug and jewelry
trade is Charles Hancock, owner of the establish-
ment known as Hancock's Drug and Jewelry Store.
Mr. Hancock was born at Lansing, Allamakee
County, Iowa, June 6, 1886, a son of Fremont
Walter and TiUie (Hufschmidt) Hancock, both
natives of the same locality and both still living,
the former at the age of sixty-three and the latter
aged sixty-five years. Fremont W. Hancock was
engaged in the jewelry business at Lansing, Iowa,
until 1893, in which year he removed to Bozeman,
Montana, where he has since been employed by
H. A. Pease & Company as a watchmaker. He is
a member of the Masonic fraternity and a democrat
in his political adherence. Charles Hancock, the
second of three children, was educated in the
public graded and high schools of Bozeman, Mon-
tana, and at the age of eighteen years started to
learn the jewelry business with H. A. Pease &
Company. After spending about ten years with
that concern he came to Lewistown, Montana, where
he engaged in the drug and jewelry business in
partnership with J. A. Kelley, under the firm style
of Kelley & HaHCOck. This association continued
until 1916, in which year Mr. Hancock purchased
his partner's interest, and since that time the busi-
ness has been conducted under his sole proprietor-
ship, as Hancock's Drug and Jewelry Store. The
establishment, located at No. 318 West Main Street,
is largely patronized, and under Mr. Hancock's
capable management has become one of Lewistown's
prosperous business places. Its proprietor bears
the best of reputations in business circles as a
man of sound and unswerving integrity, and his
genial and courteous personality has succeeded in
winning for him many friendships among his
customers.
Mr. Hancock was married January 26, 1910, to
Miss Alice Piedalue, who was born at Frenchtown,
Missoula County, Montana, a daughter of Dr. Jo-
seph Piedalue, a well-known practicing physician
and surgeon of Bozeman. Mrs. Hancock was the
eldest of five children. Mr. Hancock is fraternally
affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks, and also holds mem-
bership in the Judith Club. He is a member of the
Chamber of Commerce, and like other progressive
and constructive business men shares in worthv
movements for the general welfare. He is a re-
publican, but has not taken an active part in political
affairs.
William W. McNaughton is an expert machinist,
has covered his trade in many different capacities,
and is one of the exceptional men using their
skill and e.xperience in managing a complete service
for automobile owners. He has a well equipped
service station and garage at Billings, and is one
of the leading automobile men of the state.
Mr. McNaughton was born at Arundel, Quebec,
Canada, April 22, 1S83. His father, Naughton
McNaughton, of Scotch ancestors, was born in
Canada in 1858, has followed the trade of carpenter
during his active life and is now a resident of Cal-
gary, Alberta. He married Mary Green, who was
born in Canada in i860 and died at Arundel in 1887.
There were children as follows : Naughton, a
farmer of Fallon ; William W. ; and David, who was
recently mustered out of the army after one year
of service in this country and France. Nauglitnn
JOHN II. XK\VI-1.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
McNaughton married for a second wife Beatrice
Coughlin, also a native of Canada. She is living
at Fallon, Montana, and was one of the first women
to take up a homestead there. She is the mother
of one daughter, Inez Evelyn, who is living at
Fallon, and is the widow of William Binnie, who
was a first lieutenant in the army, and was on his
way to France with the ill-fated transport Tuscania
when that boat was torpedoed.
William W. McNaughton was educated in the
public schools of Minneapolis, leaving school at
the age of sixteen and spending one year with the
steel and rolling mills at Columbia Heights, Min-
nesota. He learned the bicycle business in Minnea-
polis, followed it a year and a half and for the
next four years served a thorough apprenticeship
at the machinist's trade at Minneapolis. In 1905
he turned liis skill to automobiles, and has been
a skilled and practical expert in all things pertain-
ing to the making, repairing and operating of
automobiles for over ten years. After leaving
Minneapolis Mr. McXaughton went to Beloit, Wis-
consin, then to ■ Marquette, Michigan, returned to
Minneapolis in 1907, and first came to Montana as
a machinist with the Northern Pacific Railway at
Livingston, Montana. From tliere he removed to
Butte, spending eight months with the Butte Novelty
Works, six months with the Silver Bow Automobile
Company, drove a car for Henry Albertson one
year, and in 191 0 located at Wibaux, Montana, where
for three years he was an automobile machinist,
and then after another interval at Minneapolis of
eight months came to Billings March 14, 1914. For
two years he traveled out of Billings representing
the Oakland Motor Company. He was a partner
of E. W. Keene in the Montana Automobile Com-
pany of Billings until July, 1917, then until the fol-
lowing year was with the Haskell Automobile Com-
pany, and in 1918 opened the Buick service station,
leasing the old Haskell shop. This establishment
is located at 2004 First Avenue, North.
Mr. McNaughton is a democrat. April 21, 1909,
at Butte, he married Miss Ellen McDaniel, a daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. J. C. McDaniel, who live at
442 Lincoln Street, Minneapolis. Her father is a
carpenter. Mr. and Mrs. McNaughton have two
children, Kenneth, born May 10, 191 ', and Jean,
born November 18, 1913.
Louis Ernest Gordon has been a resident of
Montana for a quarter of a century. He is an expert
machinist, stationary engineer and electrical worker
and is now at the head of the leading plumbing,
heating and electrical business in Powell County
at Deer Lodge.
Mr. Gordon was born at Somerset in St. Croix
County, Wisconsin, May II, 1872. His grandfather
James Gordon was a native of Scotland, and settled
in Nova Scotia, Canada, in 1804. He died at Roden,
Nova Scotia. He was a man of strong religious
tendencies, and also possessed many good traits in
a literary way. In his later years he was blind, and
found employment for his leisure in writing poetry.
Alexander Gordon, father of the Deer Lodge
business man, was born at Roden, Nova Scotia, in
.825, lived there through his boyhood years, was
married at Halifax, and soon afterwards removed
to Boston, Massachusetts, where he became a ship
builder. He was one of the pioneer settlers at old
St. Anthony Falls, now the City of Minneapolis. As
a contractor he did some of the pioneer building work
there. In i860 he removed to Somerset, St. Croix
County, Wisconsin, where he continued his business
as a contractor and builder. During the Civil war
he enlisted in the Union army, but was rejected
on account of a physical defect. Besides his regu-
lar business he invested his surplus funds in farm
lands, and acquired some valuable farming prop-
erty. He sold out his interests in Wisconsin in 1903
and then removed to Fort Frances, Ontario, Canada,
where he lived retired until his death in 1913. As an
American citizen he was a democrat and was honored
with several township offices and always took a keen
interest in local affairs. He was reared a member
of the Methodist Church. Alexander Gordon mar-
ried Harriet K. Evans, who was born at Windsor,
Nova Scotia, in 1830, and died at Fort Frances in
1914. A brief record of their children is as follows :
James A., collector on the toll bridge across the
Rainy River at International Falls, Ontario; F. A.,
a game warden at Glenwood Springs, Colorado,
where he died in 1907; W. S. Gordon, whose where-
abouts have not been known to his family for the
past thirty years ; M. M. Gordon, living at the
old home at Fort Frances ; H. K., a farmer at Grand
Prairie in Saskatchewan, Canada ; Louis E. and O.
H., clerk in a hotel at International Falls.
Louis Ernest Gordon acquired his education in the
public schools of Somerset, Wisconsin. At the age
of sixteen 'he became a wage earner, packing shingles
in a saw mill. When eighteen he went to St. Paul
and learned his trade as a steam and electrical en-
gineer and w-as a resident of that city until May,
1893. Then for a few months he was employed by
the Citizens Electric Light Company of Leadville,
Colorado, and in 1894 came to Deer Lodge, Montana,
to take the operating charge of the Deer Lodge
Electric Light Company. He was at that post two
years, then traveled all oyer Montana running hoist-
ing engines, saw mill engines and stamp mill engines
until 1901. In that year he returned to Deer Lodge
and opened a plumbing, heating and electrical shop,
continuing the business alone for seven years. For
the next eight years he was a partner of the heat-
ing and plumbing department of the O'Neill Hard-
ware & Plumbing Company, and in 1917 resumed
business on his own account, with a complete shop
and equipment for plumbing, heating and electrical
installation. His offices are on Missouri Avenue,
and his business is now the chief of its kind in
Powell County.
Mr. Gordon is a member of the Electrical Work-
ers Union, is independent in politics and has been
councilman at Deer Lodge for three terms, and is
affiliated with Lodge No. 14, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons at Deer Lodge, Valley Chapter No.
4, Roval Arch Masons, Zabud Council No. 2, Royal
and Select Masters, and Deer Lodge Camp No. 345
Modern Woodmen of America. Mr. Gordon re-
sides at 609 Milwaukee Avenue, having a good mod-
ern home. He married at Deer Lodge Miss Jennie
Harris, a daughter of Henry and Delia (Carroll)
Harris, now deceased. Her father was an early
day shoemaker at Deer Lodge.
John H. Newell. Of that brand of pioneers
whose names deserve to be written in gold on Mon-
tana's pages of history, those who explored and
proved the vanguard of civilization in Montana in
the early sixties, very few remain. One of these
few is a retired rancher at Roberts, John H. Newell.
Mr. Newell, who fifty years ago was on terms
of acquaintance and friendship with many of the
men who had made history in Montana, was born
at Findlay. Hancock County, Ohio, March 18, 1842.
The Newells as a family came from England and
settled in Virginia in colonial times. Many of them
have met every test of patriotism. Both the grand-
fathers of Mr. Newell lost their lives as soldiers
in the War of 1812. The parents of John H. Newell
152
HISTORY OF MONTANA
were Thomas and Hannah (Rowe) Newell. His
father was born in Virginia in 1807, grew up at
Lancaster in Fairfield County, Ohio, and was mar-
ried there, his wife having been born in Fairfield
Count}' in 1814. Later he moved to Hancock
County, Ohio, about 1837, and in 1852 transferred
his home to Piatt County, Illinois, where he died
in 1857, his wife having passed away in 1856. He
was a farmer, and played a pioneer part in the
development of the several localities mentioned.
Politically he was a democrat, served as a member
of the State Militia, and was a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. He and his wife had
a large family of children: William, who was a
farmer and miner in Colorado and Southern Mis-
souri and died at Joplin in the latter state; James
H. who was a mine owner and died in Barton
County, Missouri; Thomas J., a business man who
died in Oklahoma City; Joseph, who enlisted in
1861 in an Illinois Regiment and was killed in one
of the battles of 1863; John H., who is fifth in
age ; George, who served in the Civil war and
died soon afterward from hardships of army life;
Caroline, now deceased; Samuel, a retired farmer
living at Clinton, Illinois; Almeda, wife of T. C.
Graden, a stockman at Amarillo, Texas; and Frank,
a farmer in Kansas.
John H. Newell acquired a common school educa-
tion in Ohio and Illinois. He was fifteen years old
when his father died, and after that he worked for
three years as a farm hand in Piatt County, Illinois.
He went west to Denver in i860, and during the
next three years was a prospector and miner in
diflferent parts of Colorado. He was one of those
attracted by the news of discoveries in Montana,
and on February 18, 1863, arrived at Bannock.
After a brief stay there he went to the famous
diggings of Alder Gulch, near Virginia City, and
was a member of that historic community for two
years.
Though he came to Montana in the role of a
miner and prospector, Mr. Newell's chief activities
in the state has been farming and ranching. From
Alder Gulch he moved into the Gallatin Valley, being
one of the early settlers near Bozeman, and farmed
and ranched there steadily for thirty-two years.
He took up a preemption of 160 acres, and grazed
his stock over a large amount of public domain. In
1897, having sold his property in Gallatin Valley,
Mr. Newell moved to Roberts, and acquired 320
acres of land in that vicinity. He sold his farm in
1918 and is now enjoying a well earned retirement.
In politics he is a democrat, but his life has been
quietly spent with no noteworthy participation in
politics or public affairs.
On January 3, 1866, at Virginia City in Madison
County. ^lontana, he married Miss Lucy Harris,
daughter of Robert and Elizabeth (Green) Harris.
Her father was a carpenter and likewise a pioneer
of Montana. Mrs. Newell after forty-five years of
married life died March 27, 1911. She was the
mother of nine children, the oldest, John, dying at
the age of fourteen and a half months ; Mary,
unmarried, and living at Stockton, California;
George, a farmer and teamster at Red Lodge ; James,
a business man of Stockton. California ; Samuel, a
farmer near Stockton, California ; Joseph, who has
a farm in Custer County, Montana ; Minnie, wife
of James Williams, a rancher and stock man in
Gallatin County, this state ; Thomas Cleveland, owner
of a meat market at Roberts; and Grover, whose
home is in Wyoming.
Charles Frank Juttner has gained a prominent
rank among Montana lawyers, and is one of the
very able members of the Butte bar.
He was born at Menominee, Michigan, February
28, 1876, son of Joseph and Mary (Marshalick)
Juttner. His parents established their home at
Menominee when that city was in its infancy, and
reared a family of ten children there. These chil-
dren are all still living. Joseph Juttner the father
died at Menominee in 1891.
Charles Frank Juttner g^rew up in his native city
and received two diplomas from the Menominee High
School, one in June, 1894, and the other in June,
1896. The following year he spent in the literary
department of the University of Michigan, and then
continued his studies in the law school until graduat-
ing LL. B. in June, 1900.
As a boy at Menominee he had some military
training as a member of Company F of the Fifth
Regiment Michigan Militia from 1891 until 1893.
He held the non-commissioned rank of corporal.
While in university the Spanish-American war broke
out and at the call of President McKinley for vol-
unteers he enlisted with the Ann Arbor company,
Company A of the Thirty-First Michigan Infantry,
and remained in service about a year until the close
of hostilities. He was a corporal in this company
when honorably discharged. He then resumed his
v/ork at the university, made up for the lost time
and graduated with his class.
After his admission to the bar Mr. Juttner re-
turned to Menominee to practice and was elected
prosecuting attorney of Menominee County in 1902.
Along with his private practice he has taken some
interest in politics in Montana, though strictly with-
in the limits of his profession. In 1916 he was
the nominee of the republican party of Silver Bow
County for district judge of the Second Judicial
District. And in 1918 for that of county attorney
of Silver Bow. Mr. Juttner is an active Mason,
being affiliated with Mt. Moriah Lodge No. 24,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Deer Lodge
No. 3. Royal Arch Masons. Montana Commandery
No. 3, Knights Templar, all at Butte, and also
the Bagdad 'Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Butte.
Mr. Juttner married Miss Lily M. Sweet. They
were married in Butte July 25, 1917, the ceremony
being performed by Rev. "Charles A. Cook, pastor
of the First Baptist Church. Mrs. Juttner is a
daughter of Henry J. and Rose Sweet, who were
early settlers in Montana. Her father died at Butte.
Mrs. Juttner was born in that city, was educated
in the Butte public schools, and during her married
life has continued an active interest in church work
as a member of the First Baptist Church of Butte
and is a member of the choir.
Perry F. Brown. Prominent among the concerns
which are lending practical encouragement to the
hay and grain industry of Montana is the P. F.
Brown Company, of Lewistown, than which no
enterprise has done more to bring these staple
products of the state before the public and the trade
all over the country. Without a market the products
of any community are valueless, local interest comes
to a standstill and deterioration sets in ; on the
other hand, with a live market causing a demand,
business progresses and the community, urged and
encouraged to greater effort, prospers proportionate-
ly. It has been the self-appointed duty of Perry
F. Brown, head of the P. F. Brown Company, to
promote the hay and grain business of Montana
and to find a market.
Mr. Brown was born at Ipswich, Edmunds County,
Dakota Territory (now South Dakota), December
?. 1884, a son of Frank E. and Ella A. (Brown)
Brown. His father was born at Norwich, Chenango
County, New York, January 30, 1853, and was
educated in his native state, where he grew up on
HISTORY OF MONTANA
his father's farm. He subsequently learned the
drug business and after his marriage migrated to
the territory of Dakota, wliere he took up a home-
stead in the vicinity of Ipswich, Edmunds County.
He also conducted a drug business at Aberdeen,
and later at Mitchell, but in 1914 removed to Dewey
County, South Dakota, where he established him-
self in the cattle business. Mr. Brown breeds full-
blooded Hereford cattle, and at this time has more
than 100 head in his herd. He is a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church and is independent in
his political views. Mrs. Brown, who was born
in Pennsylvania, died in 1885, at the age of thirty-
three years, leaving five children, of whom three
are living.
The fourth in order of birth of his parents'
children, Perry F. Brown received his education
in the public schools of South Dakota and Wes-
leyan College at Mitchell. He first engaged in
the grain business at Mitchell in 1903, and during
the next eleven years carried on extensive opera-
tions among the dealers and agriculturists of North
and South Dakota and Minnesota. In 1914 he
changed his base of operations to Lewistown, where
he has since built up a large and prosperous trade,
under the firm style of P. F. Brown Company,
dealing in grain, hay and seeds, with offices at
No. 421 Bank Electric Building. This concern
forwards grain and hay all over the country and
bears an excellent reputation in trade circles. It
did not take Mr. Brown long after his arrival to
realize that Montana needed a market for its out-
put, and toward this end he has worked consistently
and constructively. His firm, through one of its
members, belongs to the Minneapolis Chamber of
Commerce, and personally he has a number of
important business connections, in addition to being
associated with civic and fraternal bodies. He
maintains an independent stand upon political ques-
tions, using his own judgment in regard to the
choice of candidates irrespective of party lines.
Mr. Brown was married August i, 1903, to Miss
Bessie Clarke, who was born in Kansas, a daughter
of J. W. and Laura (Swain) Clarke, natives of
Wisconsin and the parents of eleven children, of
whom Mrs. Brown was the seventh born. The
Clarke's formed one of the pioneer families of
Minnesota, having first located in Blue Earth
County, where they passed through the periods
of Indian warfare in the late '60s. Later they
removed to Stafford County, Kansas, where they
were also pioneer agriculturists, but eventually took
up their residence at Mitchell, South Dakota, where
Mr. and Mrs. Clarke are now living in comfortable
retirement. Mr. and Mrs. Brown are the parents
of one son, Clarke Fisher, who is attending school.
Carl Detlef Hagge, manager of the Thompson
Yards, Incorporated, at Billings, Montana, has been
identified with the lumber business since the outset
of his career, and during the time which has elapsed
has had wide and varied experience in numerous
comrhunities. He has become well and favorably
known to the trade throughout this part of the
country, and his activities have brouglit him into
association with many of the leading men in the
industry, among whom he is adjudged a well-in-
formed, astute and thoroughly competent business
man, of substantial standing and sound principles.
Mr. Hagge was born at Arcadia, Iowa, March
,=;, 1884, a son of Hans and Rosa (Eggen) Hagge.
His grandfather, Detlef Hagge, was born in 1827, in
Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and as a youth fought
in the war of 1848. Coming to the United States
in 1870, he located in Iowa, where he was for
ten years engaged in agricultural pursuits, and then
retired from active affairs and settled down to
enjoy the fruits of his early labors. Now, at the
remarkable age of ninety-two years, he is still a
resident of Arcadia, Iowa, and, for his years, very
well preserved. Hans Hagge was born in 1856, in
Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and was fourteen
years of age when he accompanied his parents to the
United States, being reared in Clinton and Carroll
counties, Iowa. He was married in the former
county and then engaged in farming in Carroll
County, but in 1893 removed to Crawford County,
in the same state, where he continued his agricul-
tural operations until his retirement in 1905. Since
then he has made his home at Charter Oak, where
he is one of his community's most substantial and
highly respected citizens. Politically a democrat, for
many years he has been active in civic and political
affairs in his community, has held office for a long
period, and at this time is a member of the board
of supervisors of Crawford County. Mr, Hagge
married Rosa Eggen, who was born in 1862, in
Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and who died at Sioux
City, Iowa, in 1906, and they became the parents
of three children: Minnie, the wife of Herman
Hinrichsen, a farmer of Charter Oak, Iowa; Carl
Detlef; and Anna, the wife of John Gregory, a
farmer of Charter Oak.
Carl Detlef Hagge attended the district schools
in the vicinity of his father's farm in Crawford
County, and following his graduation from the high
school at Charter Oak in 1901 returned to the
home farm for one year. Not contented with the
prospects of life in the country and farming as a
regular vocation, he decided to fit himself for a
business career and accordingly pursued a course
at the Fremont (Nebraska) Business College, in
1902 and 1903. He again returned to the farm,
but in the fall of 1904 started to work in a lumber
yard at Charter Oak, where during a short initial
experience he was introduced to the business. Next
he went to Aberdeen, South Dakota, where he
spent a short period in the general offices and then
began visiting the various ofBces of the company as
office help and extra yard man, and in the following
•year had advanced so far that he was promoted
to be outside yard foreman at Aberdeen, a capacity
in which he acted until May, 1907. At that time
he entered the employ of the McCaull-Webster
Lumber Company at Aberdeen, as manager of the
yard of that concern, but in November of the same
year transferred his services to the Phoenix Lum-
ber Company as manager at Strasburg, North
Dakota, where he remained until the spring of 191 1.
His next location was at EUendale, North Dakota,
where he was employed by the same concern as
manager, and in March, 1914, when this company
sold out to the Wells-Thompson Company, he con-
tinued with the new firm. In November, 1914,
he was sent to Jamestown, North Dakota, as
manager of the yards at that point, and continued
with the new firm when the Wells-Thompson Com-
pany disposed of their holdings to the Thompson
Yards, Incorporated. In May, 1918, Mr. Hagge
was sent to Billings, Montana, as manager ot tlie
yard and offices, which are situated at Thirtieth
Street and Minnesota Avenue, this being the largest
yard in Southeastern Montana, and one of the
finest and best equipped to be found anywhere.
The present officers of the concern are: president,
George P. Thompson ; vice president, W. H. Boner ;
treasurer, F. E. Weyerhaeuser; and secretary, F.
H. Thatcher. The executive offices are at Min-
neapolis, and the firm has about 200 branches
throughout Iowa, Minnesota, South Dakota, North
Dakota and Montana.
Mr. Hagge is a democrat in his political support.
154
HISTORY OF AIOXTANA
and a member of the Presbyterian Church. He
belongs also to the Employers Association, the
Billings Midland Club and Ashlar Lodge No. 29,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. His modern
residence is located at No. 307 Yellowstone Avenue.
In 1913, at Ellendale, North Dakota, Mr. Hagge, was
united in marriage with Miss Lulu Webb, a daugh-
ter of Richard and Emma (Glenn) Webb, of Lind-
say, California, where Mr. Webb is the owner of
an orange grove. Two children have blessed this
union: Dorothy, born October 26, 1914; and How-
ard, born December 4, 1916.
Edwakd Sears. As electrical and district master
mechanic of the Milwaukee Railway, with 600 men
under his superivision, and the technical expert in
charge of all the lines of the Milwaukee System
in the divisions where electric power prevail, Edward
Sears is one of the most prominent railroad operat-
ing oiilicials in Montana.
He had a long and thorough training and many
e.xceptional qualifications for his present work. He
holds the degree mechanical engineer from Purdue
University at Lafayette, Indiana, havmg graduated
from that well known technical institution in 1899.
The same year he entered the service of the Denver
& Rio Grande at Denver, Colorado, and spent three
years in the railway shops, not as an ordinary ap-
prentice, but in a sort of post-graduate course in
practical railroading, being given an opportunity to
learn everything in railroad work. After this in
ig02 he went with the New York Central Railway
at the DeWitt Roundhouse, East Syracuse, New
York, being general foreman there one year. Then
for several years until 1 906 he was a roundhouse
foreman at various localities on the Hudson River
division of the New York Central.
His chief training ground for his present work
was as general foreman of the electrification depart-
ment of the New York Central on the Hudson River
and Harlem Division, a post he filled from 1906
to 1913. From 1913 to 1916 he was superintendent
■of equipment for the Portland, Eugene & Eastern
Railway at Portland, Oregon. This is now part of
the Southern Pacific system. In 1916 Mr. Sears
came to Deer Lodge, Montana, as electrical and
district master mechanic of the Chicago, Milwaukee
& St. Paul Railway, in charge of all the electrified
territory, and with offices at Deer Lodge.
Mr. Sears was born at Williamsville, Michigan,
June 5, 1874. He is of English ancestry. His
grandfather Edward Sears was born at Darford,
England, in 1804, was a land owner in England, but
in 1863 sold his possessions and came to the United
States, living for three years at Waukesha, Wiscon-
sin, thence moving to Williamsville, Michigan, where
he was a successful farmer. He died at Williams-
ville in 1880. He married Ann Searles, a native of
Dartford, England, who died at Williamsville, Mich-
igan. Henry Sears, father of Edward, was born at
Dartford, England, in September, 1849, and was
fourteen years of age when brought to this coun-
try. At Williamsville, where he married, he fol-
lowed the business of contractor and builder, and put
up many of the homes of the early settlers. In
1882 he moved to Redfield, South Dakota, buying
a stock ranch, and was a farmer and stockman there
until 1902, when he sold out his property and re-
turned to Williamsville, where he owns _ a large
amount of farm property and is now practically re-
tired. He is a republican and a member of the
Church of England. Henry Sears married Miss
Ocena Rinehart, who was born at Williamsville,
Michigan, in 1852. Edward, Edith and .A.rthur are
their three children, the first two being twins. Edith
is the wife of W. F. Parker, who is paymaster for
the Western Steel Car & Foundry at the Hegewisch
shops at Chicago. Arthur is in the automobile busi-
ness at Cassopolis, Michigan.
Edward Sears grew up on his father's ranch in
South Dakota, attending the public schools of Spink
County and the high school at Doland and from
there entered Purdue University to take his technical
course in mechanical engineering. Mr. Sears is
financially interested in a farm of 350 acres in Mich-
igan. Since coming to Deer Lodge he has bought
a modern home at 205 Fifth Street. He is an in-
dependent voter, is a member of the Congregational
Church, is affiliated with Beaverton Lodge of Ma-
sons in Oregon, with the Scottish Rite Consistory at
Portland, with the Portland Temple of the Mystic
Shrine, and is a member of Valley Chapter No. 4,
Royal Arch Masons at Deer Lodge. He is also a
member of the Deer Lodge Chamber of Commerce.
In 1904 at East Syracuse, New York, Mr. Sears
married Miss Catherine McVee, daughter of Mr and
Mrs. John McVee of East Syracuse, the latter now
deceased. Her father is a veteran engineer of the
New York Central Railway. Mrs. Sears is a grad-
uate of the Teachers Normal School of Syracuse.
To their marriage was born one daughter Edith on
February 3, 1906.
Albert Edward Stripp. M. D. Opening to its
devotees an extremely wide range of usefulness, the
profession of the physician and surgeon is a many-
sided one, and that particular phase which accom-
plishes the more than splendid work of preserving
God-given life, says nothing of the world of sorrow
that is banished or of the happiness and continued
love which is re-enthroned through health restored
at the exercise of that divine art. It is indeed a
divine art, and those who study it, mellowed and
enriched as they are through their association witli
unmasked humanity, are possessed of a priceless
ability to answer the command to "heal the sick."
The medical fraternity of Billings has long been
noted for the splendid talent possessed by its mem-
bers, among whom one who has come to the fore-
front in recent years as a general practitioner of
medicine and surgery is Dr. Albert Edward Stripp,
who has followed his vocation here since 1916.
Albert E. Stripp was born at Aylmer, Province of
Ontario, Canada, April 11, 1877, a son of William
Slade and Rosamond (Clayton) Stripp. The Stripp
family originated in England, from which country
Thomas Henry Stripp, the grandfather of Doctor
Stripp, emigrated to (Zanada, settling at Bowmaii-
ville, Ontario, as a pioneer. In his declining years
he retired from agricultural pursuits and took up
his residence at Charlevoix, Michigan, where his
death occurred. William Slade Stripp was born in
1840, at Bowmanville, Ontario, Canada, and was
reared and married in his native province. His
inclination turned toward commercial pursuits, and
he became a well-known wholesale fruit dealer, a
business which in 1885 brought him'to Michigan, he
taking up his residence at Charlevoix. While there
he was attracted to the lumber business, in which
he eventually embarked, and in which field he
achieved excellent success. At the time of his re-
tirement he removed to Long Beach, California, and
there his death occured March 20, 1919. Mr. Stripp
was a well known Mason and a republican voter.
He' married Rosamond Clayton, who was born in
1844, at Aylmer. Canada, and died at Charlevoix.
Michigan, in 1898, and they became the parents of
four children, as follows: William C, who is
engaged in the lumber business at San Francisco.
California; .\lbert Edward, the second in order of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
155
birth: Frederick S., superintendent of tlie Metro-
politan Life Insurance Company of Spokane, Wash-
ington; and Rosa, the wife of Henrv Kanagy, a
ranchman of Long Beach, California.
Albert Edward Stripp attended the public schools
of Charlevoix, Michigan, where he was graduated
from the high school in 1894. After engaging in
farming for two years he was attracted to the
■ Great Lakes, where he served for a time as a sailor,
but eventually realized the need for further educa-
tion and accordingly entered Kalamazoo (Michigan)
College, where he pursued a three-year course. At
the end of that time he entered upon his medical
studies, and after a four-year course in the medical
department of the University of Michigan was
graduated in 1904 with the degree of Doctor of
Medicine. To further prepare himself he next spent
one year as an interne in the hospital of the Uni-
versity of Michigan, and this was followed bv one
and one-half years of work in the Michigan Asylum
for the Insane at Kalamazoo. With this preparation
and experience he entered upon the practice of his
chosen calling at Charlevoix, but after one and one-
half years, in 1908, came to Laurel, Montana, where
he was engaged in practice until 1916. While located
there he rose to a high place in his profession and
served as surgeon for the Northern Pacific Railroad,
which operates large shops at that point, and the
experience thus gained has proved of inestimable
value. He was also one of the foremost citizens
of the city, took a prominent part in civic affairs,
and served efficiently as mayor for four years. In
1916, in order to increase the scope of his profes-
sional activities and to have a wider field in which
to display his talents, he came to Billings, where
he has since carried on a general practice in medicine
and surgery, with offices in the Electric Building,
suite No. 217. His clientele has grown steadily since
his arrival and he is now accounted one of the
leading physicians of the city, having the confidence
of his patients and the esteem of his fellow-
practitioners. He is a member of the Yellowstone
County Medical Society, the Montana Medical Soci-
ety and the American Medical Association, and also
holds membership in the Billings Midland Club.
Fraternally he is affiliated with Laurel Lodge, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons; Billings Lodge
No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks;
and Laurel Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
He has a number of important business connections
and is president of the Twetlty-Mile Basin Oil and
Gas Refining Company. His political views cause
him to support the republican party. Doctor Stripp
and his family belong to the Congregational Church
and reside in their pleasant home at No. 302 Bur-
lington Avenue.
In 1909, at Billings, Doctor Stripp married Miss
Montana Tschudy, daughter of O. A. and Georgi-
etta (Nord) Tschudy, the latter of whom resides at
Billings. Mr. Tschudy, who was manager of the
Billings Club, is deceased. Doctor and Mrs. Stripp
are the parents of two children : Georgia Rose,
born in August, 1910, and Albert Edward, Jr., born
in March, 1912.
Patrick Dalton, superintendent of the Converter
-lepartment of the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany, is not only held in high esteem by his company,
but also in the community in which he resides, and
is numbered among the substantial citizens of Ana-
conda. He was born at St. Louis, Missouri, February
28, 1863, a son of James Dalton. James Dalton was
born in Ireland in 1820, and was killed in the Civil
war during 1862, having come to th« United States
in young manhood, locating at St. Louis, Missouri,
and there worked as a foundryman and moulder.
In 1861 he enlisted in a Missouri Volunteer Infantry
regiment and was killed on the Mound City gun-
boat. In politics he was a strong democrat. The
Roman Catholic Church held his membership and
he died firm in its faith. James Dajton was married
to Ellen McNinery, who was born in Ireland in
1820, and died at St. Louis, .Missouri. Patrick
Dalton was the only child of his parents, and was
born after the death of his father, his mother not
long surviving.
Until he was sixteen years old, Patrick Dalton
received a pension from the Government of $8 per
month, and was reared by his uncle, John Dalton
of St. Louis. After passing through the grammar
schools of St. Louis, Patrick Dalton took the high
school course, and was graduated therefrom in 1878.
at which time he began working for Evans, Howard
Company, dealers in brick tile, sewer pipe and sim-
ilar products, remaining with this concern from the
time he was seventeen until he was twenty-three
j'ears of age. Mr. Dalton then came West, arriving
at Butte, Montana, in the spring of 1886, and worked
for the Parret Smelting Company for a year, leav-
ing Butte for Anaconda in 1887, and engaging with
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company. His first
work was preparing "matt" for shipment to Swansea,
Wales, but he was soon promoted to be converter
rnan, rising from that position to be foreman of
his department and then superintendent, which situa-
tion he still retains, discharging its many responsibil-
ities with practical ability. There are 350 men under
his supervision, and the output of his department
is 1,000,000 pounds daily when it is running to full
capacity. His offices are in the general office build-
ing of the Washoe Reduction Works, two miles
east of Anaconda. Like his father before him.
Mr. Dalton supports the principles of the democratic
party, and for the past twenty years, at different
times he has been elected to 'the City Countil of
Anaconda. He belongs to the Roman Catholic
Church, and Anaconda Council No. 882, Knights of
Columbus, and Anaconda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks. In addition to his
other interests Mr. Dalton is treasurer of the
Hidden Lake Mining Company. He owns a mod-
ern residence at No. 408 Pine Street, and other
real estate at Anaconda.
In 1893 Mr. Dalton was married at Anaconda
to Miss Catherine Reid, a daughter of Patrick
and Catherine Reid. who live in County Mayo.
Ireland, Mr. Reid being now a retired farmer.
Mr. and Mrs. Dalton have one daughter, Mary.
who was graduated from the Anaconda High Schoo'l.
is now teaching in the public schools of the city.
and living at home. Sound, reliatale and skilled,
Mr. Dalton is a valuable man to his company and
is held in the highest confidence by his community.
Thomas Thompson Taylor. Before locating in
Montana Thomas Thompson Taylor was for many
years identified with railway mail service, and his
abilities have advanced him to the position of a
superintendent in that service. In Montana he has
been a banker and is now vice president of the
Bank of Fergus County at Lewistown.
Mr. Taylor was born at Georgetown, Brown
County, Ohio, December 28, i85o, son of Gen.
Thomas T. and Antoinette Taylor. His father
was a distinguished officer in the Union army and
Mr. Taylor's only son was an officer in the Euro-
pean war. Gen. Thomas T. Taylor was born at
Freehold, New Jersey, November 15, 1836, and
died February 15, 1908. His wife was born at
Georgetown, Ohio, November 27, 1836, and died in
156
HISTORY OF MONTANA
September, 1916. They were married at George-
town. General Taylor was educated in Homedell
Institute at Monmouth, New Jersey, and was ad-
mitted to the Ohio bar and for about eight years
was a lawyer in that state. In April, 1861, he en-
listed in the Twelfth Ohio Infantry for the three
months' service. • Later he organized a company in
the Forty-Seventh Ohio Infantry, was elected cap-
tain, and for merit and excellence as a soldier was
successively advanced to the grade of major, lieu-
tenant-colonel, colonel and finally was commissioned
brigadier general. During the period of his first
enlistment he was in the West Virginia campaign,
and afterward participated in the battles of Fort
Donelson, Vicksburg, Chattanooga, Missionary
Ridge, the siege and capture of Atlanta and the
march to the sea. When the war was over he
returned to Georgetown, Ohio, and in 1S68 moved
to Edina, Kno.x County, Missouri, where he prac-
ticed law until 1874. In that year he went to
Hutchinson, Kansas, and while in Kansas served in
the House of Representatives and in the State
Senate. In 1893 General Taylor became general
counsel for the Kansas City, Watkins & Gulf Rail-
way, with home and offices at Lake Charles, Lou-
isiana, where he lived until his death. He was a
thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, an Odd
Fellow, a member of the Loyal Legion and an
active republican.
Thomas Thompson Taylor was the second of
eight children, seven sons and one daughter, all
living but one. He grew to manhood in Kansas and
was educated in Washburn College at Topeka and
Oberlin College in Ohio. During 1886-S8 he was
engaged in the real estate business at Hutchinson,
Kansas. In 1889 he entered the United States postal
service as railway postal clerk and subsequently
was advanced to chief clerk of the railway mail
service at Fort Scott, Kansas, and finally as super-
intendent of the mail service at Kansas City. On
resigning this position, after nearly twenty years
of service, in 1908 Mr. Taylor located at Lewi.«-
town, Montana, where he became assistant cashier
of the Bank of Fergus County. Since 1916 he has
been vice president of that institution. He served
as a trustee of the Lewistown schools nine years,
is a Mason and Knight of Pythias and a repuialican
in political affiliations.
September 25, 1801, he married Florence Warr.
She was born at Hanaford, West South Wales.
They have two children, Thomas Thompson, Jr.,
and Lillia Marie, the latter the wife of John D.
Waite of Lewistown. The son, Thomas T., Jr.,
was educated in the Westport High School of
Kansas, in the LTniversity of Kansas and the Uni-
versity of New York, and for about a year was
an employe of the Bank of Fergus County at
Lewistown. May 12, 1917, he entered the First
OflScers Training Camp at the Presidio in California,
and was commissioned a second lieutenant in Au-
gust. He was assigned to the Ninety-First Division
at Camp Lewis, and subsequently was made first
lieutenant of the Three Hundred and Sixteenth
Ammunition Train. He went overseas with the
Ninety-First Division and had just reached the
front the day the armistice was signed, November
II, 1918.
Guy C. Myers. Among the men of Billings who
are distributing their energies and talents among
several lines of endeavor and meeting with an
equal share of prosperity in all, one who has
achieved success in the loan business and as a rancher
is Guy C. Myers. Coming to this city in October,
191 1, as manager of the commercial department of
the Montana Power Company, he early recognized
the opportunities at hand for successful participa-
tion in enterprises connected directly or indirectly
with the soil, and his subsequent career has been
one in which his accomplishments have served to
place him among the substantial men of his com-
munity.
Mr. Myers was born at Green Bay, Wisconsin,
June 25, 1886, a son of Charles A. and Elizabeth
(McLaughlin) Myers. The Myers family originated
in Holland, from which the original progenitor
immigrated to America during the colonial days,
and the name soon was well established in Pennsyl-
vania, in which state the grandfather of Guy C.
Myers was born in 1827. From Pennsylvania he
journeyed as a pioneer into Indiana and subsequently
became one of the earliest settlers of Danville,
Illinois, where he was the proprietor of the first
hostelry of that city, the Pennsylvania House, well
known in its day for the distinguished character of
many of its guests, among whom was Abraham Lin-
coln. Mr. Myers died at Danville in 1889. Charles
A. Myers was born at Danville, Illinois, in 1864,
and was there reared and educated, but as a young
man went to Green Bay, Wisconsin, where he had
charge of the emigration department for the North-
western Railway. He was married at Green Bay,
where he resided for a number of years, but in
1894 went to Chicago, where he entered the service
of the Chicago & Alton Railway, in the same capa-
city as noted above. From 1907 to 1910 he occupied
a like position with the New York Central Lines at
New York City, but in the latter year retired from
active pursuits and returned to the city of his
birth, where he passed away in 1912. He was a
republican and prominent in his part}', and a devoted
member of the Presbyterian Church. Mr. Myers
married Elizabeth McLaughlin, who was born in
1867 at Escanaba, Michigan. She survives her hus-
band and is a resident of Chicago, Illinois, and they
had two children : Guy C, of this notice ; and Mar-
guerite, who is unmarried and resides with her
mother.
Guy C. Myers was educated in the public schools
of Green Bay, Wisconsin, and Chicago, Illinois,
following which he took a course at Culver Military
Institute, Culver, Indiana. He left that academy
in 1905, at the age of nineteen years, at which
time he entered the service of the Danville Street
Railway and Light Company as outside man, and
later, through consecutive stages, was promoted to
the position of manager of the commercial depart-
ment. In this capacity, in October, 191 1, as above
noted, he came to Billings with the Montana Power
Company, continuing with that concern until 1916,
when he resigned his position to enter the farm and
city loan business, a line in which he has made
rapid advancement. He maintains offices at 208
Securities Building and has developed substantial
connections among the leading financial houses of
Billings, and a clientele as representative as it is
important. While carrying on a successful business
in the city Mr. Myers has also taken advantage of
the opportunities offered in the country, and at
this time is the owner of an irrigated farm of 640
acres located in Mussellshell County, where_ he has
250 head of cattle. His residence is maintained
in the Hedgemer Apartments. Seventh Avenue and
Twenty-eighth Street. Politically Mr. Myers is^ a
republican. He is a member of Billings Lodge No.
113, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Bil-
lings Consistory, and is an ex-member of the local
lodge of Elks, and holds membership also in the
Billings Midland Club. His name will always be
HISTORY OF MONTANA
found on the list of supporters of worthy public-
spirited enterprises.
Mr. Myers was married December 27, 1913, at
Billings, to Miss Amy Bennighoff, daughter of the
late Andrew H. BennighofI, former manager of the
Grand Hotel, Billings, who died December 1, igi2.
Mr. and Mrs. Myers are the parents of one child,
Marguerite, born in Februar}-, 1915.
John B. Truscott has spent most of his life at
Deer Lodge, is a university graduate, and for the past
five years has been an active merchant, managing the
largest firm of implement dealers in Powell County.
Mr. Truscott was born at Beatrice, Nebraska, Oc-
tober I, 1880. His grandfather was born in Corn-
wall, England, in 1801, and on coming to this country
settled in Iowa, where as a millwright he erected a
number of mills throughout that state. He died at
Clarinda, Iowa, in 1887. His wife was Ann Benny,
a native of England, where they were married, and
she also died in Clarinda.
Arthur L. Truscott, father of John B., was born
in Lee County, Iowa, in 1851, was reared there,
was married in Appanoose County, that state, and
soon afterward moved to Beatrice, Nebraska, and
in 1883 came to Deer Lodge, Montana. The same
summer he went to Anaconda and resided there
until 1900. He is a republican and is affiliated with
Deer Lodge Camp Modern Woodmen of America.
Arthur L. Truscott married Addie Williams, a native
of Iowa, who died at Anaconda in February, 1886.
Emma, the oldest of their children, is the wife of
John Greenhaigh, a retired merchant at Lincoln, Ne-
braska. John B. is the second in age, and Raymond
W. the youngest is superintendent of schools at
Loveland. Colorado.
John B. Truscott acquired his early education in
Anaconda. After leaving college he returned to
Deer Lodge, engaged in ranching for a time, and
then bought out the Cockrell Commercial Company,
the business now being incorporated as the Cockrell
Implement Company. C. H. Williams is president
and Mr. Truscott is vice president, and treasurer.
The firm sells implements all over Powell County and
keeps a complete stock housed in their store building
and large warehouse adjoining. The business is at
409 North Main Street. Mr. Truscott is a republi-
can, and resides at 119 North Main Street. On Au-
gust 20, 1919. Mr. Truscott married Jessie Oliver,
a daughter of Harry Oliver of Deer Lodge.
Frank E. Williams has been continuously
identified with the county clerk's office at Billings
for the last twelve years, and is serving his fourth
consecutive term as chief and head of that office.
Mr. Williams was born in Central Illinois, near
Springfield, June 19, 1883, a son of Edward M. and
Anna M. (Hampton) Williams. The Williams fam-
ily is of Welsh ancestry, and members of it were
colonial settlers in Maryland. Edward M. Williams
was born in Springfield, Illinois, in 1847 and has
spent all his life in that vicinity. He is now a
retired farmer living at Illiopolis, a village that has
honored him with the office of mayor several times.
He is a republican, a member of the Christian
Church, and of the Knights of Pythias. His wife
was born in Mechanicsburg, Illinois, in 1847. They
had two sons, Charles O.. who served in the Na-
tional Army and returned from France in the spring
of 1919. and Frank E.
Frank E. Williams acquired a public school educa-
tion at Illiopolis, including the high school course,
and received his business training in the Gem City
Business College at Quincy. Illinois. Immediately
on leaving school in 1905 Mr. Williams came to
Billings, and for two years was an accountant with
Yegen Brothers. In 1907 he was appointed deputy
clerk, and filled that position until elected county
clerk and recorder in the fall of 1912. He was
reelected in 1914, 1916 and in 1918 for a term of
two years each.
During the war Mr. Williams served as chairman
of the local draft board and thus carried the double
burden of official responsibilit5'. He is a republican
and a member of the Presbj'terian Church, belongs
to the Midland Club, and in Masonry is affiliated
with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Billings Chapter, Royal Arch Masons,
is also a member of Billings Star Lodge No. 41,
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and Billings
Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
In 1912, at Billings, Mr. Williams married Miss
Margaret E. Robertson, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Thomas Robertson of Kiester, Minnesota. Her
father was a farmer, and both he and his wife are
now deceased. The three children of Mr. and Mrs.
Williams are Franklyn Elizabeth, born June 24,
1915; Marion, born November 5, 1916; and Margaret,
born November s, 1916.
Judge J. K. Miller was an early traveler, a par-
ticipant in pioneer activities and a pioneer lawyer in
Minnesota, California and Montana. For nearly
thirty years his home has been in the Flathead
Valley, and in recent years he has lived quietly at
his home in Columbia Falls.
He was born near the historic Town of Vincennes
on the Illinois side of the Wabash River, March 14,
1850, a son of John and Mary (Kennedy) Miller.
His parents were of pioneer stock from early co-
lonial times. His early opportunities in school were
limited, and the sound scholarship of his mature
career has been due to a lifelong habit of study,
reasoning and observation. When he was four years
of age he lost his mother and the panic of 1857
having bankrupted his father and scattered the fam-
ily, he was reared by an older sister to the age of
thirteen. He then left home and wandered far be-
fore he came to the beautiful Flathead country. He
worked on farms in Illinois, Michigan, in the Michi-
gan and Minnesota lumber woods, rafted timber
down the Mississippi, and was a teamster on the
Yellowstone expedition under General Stanley three
years before the Custer massacre. In 1874 he was
admitted to the bar at Glencoe, Minnesota, prac-
ticed law six years in that state, for two years was
a lawyer in California, making a specialty of mining
law, and next came to Montana and for seven years
engaged in mining and law practice at Helena.
Judge Miller came to the Flathead country in
1891 and continued his professional work and other
interests until about ten years ago, when he estab-
lished his family home in beautiful Glacier Park,
filing on a homestead and proving up. He and his
wife spend the summer months in that beautiful
location.
He married Miss Emma C. Wood at Montevidio,
Minnesota, January i, 1878. She was born at St.
Charles, in Winona (lounty, Minnesota, January 7,
1859, a daughter of J. G. and Millie (Brainard)
Wood. She was educated in the public schools of
Minnesota and in the high school at Rockford, Illi-
nois. The only child of Mr. and Mrs. Miller was
Mary Amelia, who was liberally educated in school
and at home, was a teacher for two years at Kalis-
pell, and when life was most promising for her
soon after her marriage she died.
Judge Miller was once a candidate on the popu-
list ticket for judge in Flathead County. Beyond
158
HISTORY OF MONTANA
that lie has not considered practical politics as a
vocation, for which he was fitted by nature. He
has been a favorite speaker on many occasions, and
has also reduced many of his thoughtful studies to
writing. A synopsis and abstract of some of his
writings have been published in a small booklet
entitled "After the War," and some of his discus-
sions betray a very keen analysis of fundamentals
that vitally affect the structure of civilization in
America as elsewhere. The wedded life of Judge
Miller has been ideal, and to an unusual degree they
have been bound together by common sympathies
and aims.
Judge Henry J. Grimes, judge of the City Police
Court of Butte, has been a resident of that city
twenty years, and until recently did an extensive
business as a contractor and builder.
Judge Grimes, whose experience in the West and
Northwest covers a long period of years, was born
in the Town of Stafford, Staffordshire, England,
February 17, 1859. His father George Grimes was
born in 1830 and died in Octobe.r, 1869, spending
all his life at Stafford. He was a shoemaker by
trade, a liberal in politics, a member of the Church
of England, had military training with the English
Volunteers, and was a member of the Manchester
Unity Association and the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. George Grimes married Susannah
Atkin, who was born at Cambridge, England, and
died in Stafford in 1889. Of their three children
Judge Grimes is the second. Julia who died at the
age of twenty-eight at Walsall, England, was the
wife of Alfred Silcock. a painter and decorator. The
other daughter Mrs. Edith Seabold, whose husband
wa.s a hotel proprietor, died at Bakersfield, Cali-
fornia, in 191 1.
Henry J. Grimes was educated in the public schools
of his native town and spent six years as an
apprentice to a carpenter and joiner and worked at
that trade in England. October 24, 1886, he reached
Utica, New York, where he worked at his trade,
and from January, 1887, until 1891 was a resident
of the capital city of Albany. After that until
1897 he was in the contracting and building busi-
ness at Salt Lake City, Utah, and for a year or so
was similarly engaged at Salmon City, Idaho. Judge
Grimes located at Butte in March, 1899. For the
first ten years he was employed as a journevman
carpenter and then entered contracting and ' con-
tinued that business until elected city police judge
in April, 1919. Two years of this time, however, he
spent on his ranch six miles from Butte. He sold
his ranch property in 1917.
Judge Grimes is a republican in politics, a member
of the Christian Science Church and is consul com-
mander of Butte Camp No. 1^3, Woodmen of the
World.
He owns a modern home and employed his own
skill in remodeling it at 740 Maryland Avenue.
Judge Grimes married at Shrewsbury, England, in
1880, Miss Charlotte Faulkner, daughter of John
and Sarah (Mickelwright) Faulkner. Her parents
both died in England and her father was in the
cutlery business.
One of the soldiers whose record Montana loves
to honor is that of Harry J. Grimes, son of Judge
Grimes. He was born April 27, 1895, is a graduate
of the Butte public schools and an automobile ma-
chinist. May 28, 1917, soon after the outbreak of
the war he volunteered and was in training at Fort
George Wright, Spokane, Fort Vancouver, Wash-
ington, from June until December, was then sent
to Camp Greene, North Carolina, and after one
week in Camp Merritt in May, 1918, was sent over-
seas. He was in Company A of the Fourth Engi-
neers in the Third Army Corps and saw active
service in six of the great drives in which the
American Expeditionary Forces participated, in-
cluding Chateau Thierry, St. Mihiel, Second Battle
of the Marne, the drive at the Vesle River, and the
Argonne Forest fight. After the armistice he was
sent to Coblenz, Germany, and remained on duty
there from December, 1918, until July, 1919. He
returned and was discharged as a first class private
August 8, 1918. He was promoted to first class
private soon after enlistment.
Philipp Laux, whose experience as a Montana
business man covers a period of thirty years or
more, has had his home at Lewistown during the
greater part of this period, and has erected some
of the prominent structures in the business district
and owns one of the finest homes in the city.
He was born April I, 1861, in the southern part
of Germany, a son of John W. and Catherine
(Jung) Laux. His father was a miner in his
younger days, later a farmer, and spent all his life
in Germany. Both parents are now deceased.
Philipp was the oldest of six children, one daughter
and five sons, five of whom are living.
He acquired his education in Germany, learning
the blacksmith's trade. He came to America and
to Montana in the spring of 1885. He was first
located at Helena, where his first employment was
in a stone quarry. During the winter he cut cord-
wood and in the spring of 1886 went to Cotton-
wood and was employed as a blacksmith with
Charles Leahman & Company. He worked for this
firm until November, 1889. While in Montana he
had made the acquaintance of Miss Katie Abell,
who was also a native of Southern Germany. In
November, 1889, she went back to Europe with
some of her relatives and friends, and Mr. Laux
followed her and on February 9, 1890, they were
married in the old country and on the 12th of
February boarded a steamship for the United States.
On their return to Montana they located at Lewis-
town, where Mr. Laux took employment with his
brother John, a contractor and builder. John Laux
constructed the stone work of the Fergus County
Courthouse in 1890. He was associated with his
brother in a number of enterprises. In 1888 they
had bought 125 head of cattle at $20 a head. In
1891, being without range for this stock, Philipp
Laux engaged in the butcher business at Lewistown
in order to dispose of the cattle. He continued
this for about two and a half years, until the stock
had been sold. He then engaged in the blacksmith
business and with other parties bought a brewery.
Selling this he entered the general merchandise
business, and after disposing of his interests in
that line took up real estate and building. In 1892
he put up the Laux Building, and has erected a
number of other substantial structures in Lewis-
town. In 1913 he built the Fergus Hotel, a modern
hotel that is a credit to the city. His fine home,
constructed in 1917, cost $13,000, and is one of the
best residences of the city. Mr. Laux is a repub-
lican, a member of the Catholic Church and the
Knights of Columbus.
Mr. and Mrs. Laux have a family that do them
credit. Eleven children were born to them, and
those living are four sons and six daughters. John
W., the oldest, has been a teacher and is now
studying for the priesthood in the Jesuit College
at Spokane, Washington. Philipp is a plumber by
trade. George Lee is a member of the U. S.
Marines, with the rank of corporal, and is now
HISTORY OF MONTANA
159
acting sergeant major. The fourth child is Eliza-
beth. The daughter Francisca for three or four
months during 1918 worked as a cook on a ranch,
that being her contribution to the patriotic move-
ment to assist the nation to harvest the maximum
of crops during war times. Her sister Cecelia, now
in high school, was likewise a volunteer worker
during the war, and rode a binder during the
harvest season of 1918. She is a talented musician,
a pianist, and in school has a standing of ninety-five
per cent in her studies. The younger children are
Catherine, a high school girl, Stella, Margaret and
Joseph.
F. H. B.ALLOU. The men coimected with the opera-
tion of the Great Western Sugar Company are
undoubtedly possessed of special qualifications in
their several lines, for this corporation has made
it a point to draw to it those calculated to give
the best of their abilities, so that association there-
with is proof of successful carrying out of a life
work. This company recognizes the value of new
blood in its force, and is given to promote men
who are young enough to still feel the urge of
enthusiasm and to be under the influence ot recent
collegiate training. The assistant chief engineer
of the Montana Division of this concern is one ot
the alert, aggressive young men of Billings who has
won his successive advancements because he has
earned them and not on account of undue influence
of outside parties.
F H Ballon belongs to an old family of this
country, the original founder having journeyed from
France to England, and thence to New England
during the colonial days. Later member of the
family went to New York State, and there the
paternal grandfather was born and educated for
the Presbvterian ministry, serving in it the remainder
of his act'.ve life and dying at Clarence New YoHc.
He married a Miss Bissell. The birth of F. H.
Ballou occurred at Independence Iowa, July 30,
1884. and he is a son of F. B. Ballou, who wa^
born at Gainesville, New York, but went to Inde-
pendence, Iowa, in young manhood, and was there
married to Ellen Fisk Hubbard, born at Ashtabula,
Ohio in i8s8. Following his marriage he was gen-
eral agent for the McCormick Harvesting Machine
Company at Independence until 1898, but in that year
moved to Waterloo, Iowa. There he conducted a
business of his own, manufacturing gasoline engines
until his death in September 1918, his wife havmg
died at Waterloo in 1904. Jheir children were as
follows: F. H., who was the elder ; and Lois, who
is unmarried and lives at Billings Montana. F. K
Ballou always voted the republican ticket. He
was a consistent member, vestryman and active
worker of the Episcopal Church and assisted in
building up several parishes. Well known as a
Mason, he had atfained to the Thirty-Second Degree,
Scottish Rite, and the Commandery, and was always
interested in the growth of these orders.
F H Ballou was reared at Independence, iowa,
and during his boyhood attended its schools, being
graduated from the Waterloo High School m 1903,
following which he entered the State Normal School
at Cedar Falls, Iowa, where he studied mathematics,
chemistry and phvsics during 1903 and 1904. tie
then became a student of the Stevens Institute 01
Technology at Hoboken, New Jersey, from which he
was graduated in 1908, with the degree of Mechan-
ical Engineer. Mr. Ballou belongs to the Greek
Letter college fraternity Tau Beta Pi.
Following his graduation Mr. Ballou entered the
employ of the American Sugar Refining Company
at Jersey City. New Jersey, as engineer, and for
Vol. n— 11
two months was engaged in testing boilers. He was
then transferred to the Great Western sugar plant
at Eaton, Colorado, and spent a year as a student
in engineering, after which he was placed in the
engineering department at Fort Collins, Colorado,
where the chief engineering department was located.
In 1910 he was promoted to the position of traveling
engineer from that plant, working as such until
1913, when the company transferred the headquar-
ters of the chief engineering department to Denver,
Colorado, and Mr. Ballou changed his route to
operate from the new location. In 1916 he was
further advanced by being sent to the Billings plant
to assume the duties pertaining to the position of
assistant chief engineer of the Montana division,
comprising the plants at Billings and Missoula,
Montana, and Lovell, Wyoming. Mr. Ballou has
full charge of the engineering department of the
Billings plant, with eight men under his direct super-
vision. The plant is located one mile south of
Billings. Mr. Ballou has supervision over all of
the engineering work of the three plants, and is
discharging his responsibilities in a manner highly
creditable to him. ^ , .
In 1913, while living at Fort Collins, Colorado,
Mr. Ballou was united in marriage with Miss Edna
Baker, a daughter of Alfred and Ada L. (Rich-
ardson) Baker, the former of whom is now de-
ceased, having been a farmer during all of his
active years. Mrs. Baker survives her husband
and lives at Fort Collins, Colorado. Mr. and Mrs.
Ballou have two children, namely: Frederick, who
was born December 21. 1914; and Edna, who was
born September 29, 1918. Like his father, Mr.
Ballou is a republican. Reared in the faith ot
the Episcopal Church, he is now a valued member
of St. Luke's Episcopal Church of Billings. He
belongs to Fort Collins Lodge, Knights of Pythias,
the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the
Cosmopolitan Club of Billings and the Billings Mid-
land Club. The Ballou residence is at No. 118
Yellowstone Avenue, Billings, where a helpful home
atmosphere is maintained and a gracious hospitality
dispensed, both Mr. and Mrs. Ballou being ideal
hosts, who enjoy gathering their friends about them.
Henry H. Nell, assistant superintendent of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company Reduction
Works, is one of the experienced officials of this
great corporation, who has earned his promotion
through his own efforts, and is what may be termed
a self-made man in the best sense of the word. He
was born in Reading Township, Adams County,
Pennsylvania, November 11, 1857, a son of Abraham
Nell, and grandson of Henry Nell. The Nell family
oric^inated in Germany, but was established in Penn-
svlvania during the Colonial epoch of this country s
history: The great-grandfather of Henry H. Nell,
was also named Henry, and he established a home-
stead in Reading Township, Adams County, Penn-
sylvania, where he died, his property descending to
his son, Henrv Nell, who spent his life on this farm,
and here died. Abraham Nell, father of Henry H.
'Nell was born on this same farm in 1816, and he
also spent his life upon it, and here passed away
in 1895 A strong republican he never failed to
uphold his political principles, and he was equally
fearless in supporting his religious convictions
through the medium of the Lutheran Cluirch, 01
which he was a conscientious member. His wite.
who bore the maiden name of Catherine Hess was
born at Hanover, Pennsylvania in 1810 and she
died on the homestead in 1894. Their children were
as follows : Adam, who was general agent for the
Johnston Harvesting Company, died at Churchtown,
160
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Pennsylvania in 1911; Levi, who is living retired at
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, was formerly foreman of
the steel plant at Steelton, Pennsylvania, and county
commissioner of Dauphin County, that state; Matilda,
who died at the age of twenty-seven years, in -1880,
was living on the homestead, and had never mar-
ried; George, who is a farmer of York County,
Pennsylvania; Amanda, who is the widow of John
Zinn, a liveryman, lives at East Berlin, Pennsylvania;
Henry H., whose name heads this review ; Abraham,
who died in 1908, at Boulder, Colorado, had mining
interests there and owned a saw-mill; Emeline, who
died in infancy; Catherine, who married O. W.
Eppley, a farmer residing near Carlisle, Pennsyl-
vania; Sarah, who married William O. Walton, re-
sides in York County, Pennsylvania, where he is en-
gaged in farming; William, who died in childhood;
and John, who died at the age of twenty-two years.
Henry H. Nell attended the common schools of
his native township, and remained on his father's
farm until he was twenty-two years of age, leaving
it in 1880, to come west to Denver, Colorado, to en-
gage with the Union Pacific Railroad. In 1888 he
located at Butte, Montana, as an employe of the
Union Pacific Railroad, and remained with it in a
clerical capacity, from February, 1888, to October,
1889, in the latter month coming to Anaconda as
traffic clerk for the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany. It was not long before he was promoted to
be supply clerk, then was made assistant superin-
tendent of the reduction department of his company,
which responsible position he still holds. His offices
are in the general office building of the Washoe Re-
duction Works, two miles east of Anaconda. Like his
father, Mr. Nell is a republican. He was baptized in
the Lutheran Church, and reared in its faith. Fra-
ternally he belongs to Denver Lodge, Ancient Free
and accepted Masons; Anaconda Chapter, Royal
Arch Masons; Montana Commandery, Knights
Templar of Butte, Montana; and Algeria Temple,
Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine,
of Helena, Montana. He is also a member of the
Anaconda Gun Club, which for the past twenty years
he has served as secretary and treasurer, and is
a charter member of the Anaconda Club. For some
time he has been secretary and treasurer of the
Baltic-Combination Mining Company, and active in
its conduct. Mr. Nell resides at the old Upper
Works of Anaconda.
In November, 1887, Mr. Nell was married at Den-
ver, Colorado, to Miss May F. Hobiord, a daughter
of Robert and Mabel (Allen) Hosford. Mr. Hos-
ford was a harnessmaker, and died at MonroeviUe,
Ohio. Mrs. Hosford survives and makes her home
at Denver, Colorado. Mr. and Mrs. Nell have one
daughter, Mabel lone, who married Milton A. Reid,
chief chemist of the Washoe Sampler of the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company al Butte, Montana.
A thoroughgoing man. Mr. Nell commands the con-
fidence of his associates, and is recognized as a sub-
stantial resident of Anaconda, in whose prosperity
he takes a deep interest. His support can be counted
upon of all measures looking toward constructive
civic improvements.
Frank A. Lenz. born in Danzig, Germany, Feb-
ruary 13, 1862, came to the United States February
22, 1881, applied for first citizenship papers in New
York within ten days from his arrival on this side
of the ocean, and was admitted to citizenship in
Louisville. Kentucky, October 3, 1887. He worked
as a laborer and helper at various trades for some
months until his better education apparent through
his language drew the attention of his employers,
from which time on he held positions of clerk,
bookkeeper, draughtsman, reporter, assistant editor,
editor, teacher, and writer. In 1886 he engaged in
newspaper work in Louisville, Kentucky, through
which he became acquainted with the officials and
members of the bar of that city and of Jefferson
County, through which acquaintance he found an
opening to enter upon a study of law at the office
of Mr. Newton G. Rogers, a prominent attorney
of Kentucky.
On the 17th day of October, 1888, he married
Miss Louise Kamuf of Owensboro, Kentucky, and
of the ten children born to them, they raised eight,
five boys and three girls to manhood and woman-
hood. The two oldest boys, Paul G. and Frank J.
were eleven months in France with the American
Expeditionary Forces in the late war. The older
one, Paul, was severely wounded in the Battle of
St. Mihiel, November i, 1918.
Mr. Lenz did not finish his law studies until
March, 1897, when he was admitted to practice in
the Circuit Court of Jefferson County, Kentucky.
A little more than two years later he was admitted
to practice before the Court of Appeals of Ken-
tucky and soon thereafter in the Supreme Court of
the United States at Washington, District of
Columbia.
He came to Montana in 1896, and was admitted
to the practice of law in this state in 1897. Where-
eyer he was located he soon became prominent by
his interest in municipal, state and national affairs,
having formed a strong attachment for the demo-
cratic party.
He was often sent out on the stump, especially
in German communities of opposite leaning and
has shown some power of persuasion in some of
these'.
Mr. Lenz was one of the four-minute speakers and
a diligent member of the Advisory Board to the
local draft boards of Butte and Silver Bow County.
Peter Alexander Pender came to Montana
twenty years ago as a railway telegraph operator,
was in the employ of Montana railroads in different
capacities for a number of years, and subsequently
joined the Montana Oil Company and is now man-
ager of the business of that corporation at Billings.
Mr. Pender was born at Chatham, Ontario, Canada,
August 22, 18S1. His father, James Pender, born
in Scotland in 1855, came to this country when a
young man and located at Chatham, Ontario, where
he married and where for many years he was pro-
prietor of the Magnolia Hotel. He has lived retired
from business since 1901. He is a Presbyterian.
James Pender married Jessie Reid, who was born
in Scotland in 1856 and came to this country with
her parents at the age of six years. The Reid
family also located at Chatham, where Mrs. James
Pender died in 1904. Her children were : Mary,
wife of Matt Lydon, a farmer at Thamesville, On-
tario; Ann, unmarried and her father's housekeeper;
Peter A. ; Bessie, at home with her father ; Mar-
garet, who died in 1913, at the age of twenty- four;
and Ursula and Agnes, both at home.
Peter A. Pender acquired his education in the
public schools of his native city, graduating from
high school in 1898. After a course of study that
made him a practical telegrapher he worked in
telegraph offices in Chicago and in Winnipeg,
Canada, and in July, 1899, came to Billings, spending
six weeks in the telegraph office as an operator.
He was located at Livingston five months, at Co-
lumbus, Montana, two years, and for two years was
general clerk in the Division Freight and Passenger
Offices of the Northern Pacific Railway at Butte.
Mr. Pender for twelve years was traveling freight
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and passenger agent for the Burlington System,
covering the entire State of Montana. He left the
railroad in 1917 to join the Montana Oil Company
as salesman, and after six months was made man-
ager of the Billings branch.
The plant and offices over which he has super-
vision are located on First Avenue, East, and
Twentieth Street, North. On September i, igig,
the Montana Oil Company was taken over by the
Mutual Oil Company, with headquarters at Kansas
Citj-, Missouri. About twenty-five stations in Mon-
tana are supervised by Mr. Pender and are located
in Montana from Livingston east and in the extrepie
Northeastern portion of Wyoming.
Mr. Pender is a very popular business man and
member of a number of social and civic organiza-
tions, including the Midland Empire Club of Billings,
the United Commercial Travelers, the Rotary Club,
Butte Lodge of Masons, Bagdad Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Butte, and Butte Lodge No. 153,
Woodmen of the World. He is independent in
politics and is affiliated with the Presbyterian Church.
His home is at 217 L.ewis Avenue. Mr. Pender
married in 1902, at Columbus, Montana, Maude
Penman, daughter of David and Margaret (.•\yres)
Penman, both now deceased. Her father, a native of
Scotland, came to the United States, landing at
Baltimore, worked in the Pennsylvania coal fields
for a number of years, and was a pioneer miner in
Montana. He came to this state in 1892 and opened
the Cokedale Coal Mines. The last seven years of
his life he spent as a hotel proprietor at Columbus,
where he died.
Arthur L. d"Autremont. The true western
spirit of progress and enterprise is exemplified in
the career of Arthur L. d'Autremont, whose energe-
tic nature and laudable ambition has enabled him
to advance steadily to a leading position in com-
mercial circles at Lewistown, where he is now
the president of the Fad Shoe and Clothing Com-
pany. He has made his home and centered his
activities here since 1900, and during the time that
has intervened has had his genuine worth recognized
in the high regard of his fellow citizens.
Arthur L. d'Autremont was born on his father's
farm in Calhoun County. Iowa, April 14, 1872, a
son of Louis A. and Laura E. (Race) d'Autremont.
His father, a native of Pennsylvania, was a young
man when he migrated to Calhoun County and
took up his residence in a more or less unsettled
region. There he developed a good farm on the
prairie and continued to be engaged in agricultural
pursuits until his death in 1907, at the age of sixty-
seven years. He was a man of industry and integ-
rity, and had the full esteem and respect of those
with whom he came into contact. In political
matters he was a democrat. His widow, who sur-
vives him at an advanced age and resides in Iowa,
is a native of Switzerland.
The third in a family of nine children, Arthur
L. d'Autremont was reared on his father's farm
and secured his education in the district schools of
Calhoun County. While all the surroundings of
his boyhood and youth were of an agricultural
character, they bore no influence upon him in his
choice of vocations, for when he reached his major-
ity he began his connection with commercial affairs,
securing a position as clerk in a general store at
Lohrville, Iowa, in his home community, and sub-
sequently acted in a like capacity in establishments
at other places. In the meantime he was carefully
conserving his earnings and assimilating all the
knowledge possible as to business methods, customs
and values, and by 1904 felt ready to embark in
business on his own account. Looking over the
field, he decided upon the thriving and fast-growing
community of Lewistown as the scene for his initial
venture, and he has never had reason to regret
his choice. His first establishment was a modest
one, devoted entirely to the sale" of footwear, but
the energy and enterprise of the proprietor, com-
bined with his initiative and modern ideas, attracted
the trade of the public in such a way that he was
encouraged to add a stock of clothing and furnish-
ings. Thus came into being the Fad Shoe and
Clothing Company, with Mr. d'Autremont's brother
Bert as a partner. The store at Nos. 413 and 415
West Main Street is now classed as one of the
best in the state. Mr. d'Autremont is accorded
a place among the energetic business men of Lewis-
town, where he has a number of business and civic
connections. He is a republican in his political
inclinations, and his fraternal affiliations are with
Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks, and Lewistown Council No.
1508, Knights of Columbus.
Mr. d'Autremont was married October 3, 1905,
to Miss Mary Eppers, and they have had five
children, of whom four are living: Lucille, Irene,
Marie and Albert L., Jr.
Leon Shaw began his career as a railroad and
commercial telegrapher, acquired a knowledge of
the newspaper business while taking dispatches
for the Associated Press, and for upwards of a
quarter of a century has been identified with Mon-
tana journalism. He is managing editor and man-
ager of the Billings Gazette, one of the most widely
circulated and influential papers in the state.
The Billings Gazette was established as a weekly
in 1884, and has been published as a daily since
1901. It is republican' in politics and is the official
paper of Yellowstone County. There are five daily
editions, the midnight, morning, noon, afternoon
and evening editions. Every mail train leaving
Billings takes the latest edition with the latest tele-
graph news, and the Gazette is read and is a molder
of opinion all over Montana, Wyoming and North
Dakota. The daily circulation aggregates nearly
14,000 copies. The Gazette carries both the Asso-
ciated Press and the United Press dispatches. The
officers of the Gazette Printing Company are : J. E.
Edwards, president : S. M. Wood, secretary and
treasurer ; and Leon Shaw, editor. •
Mr. Shaw was born at Olathe, Kansas, June 28,
1871. His grandfather, Samuel Shaw, was born in
Scotland in 1803. and when a young man came to
America and was one of the first settlers in the
Sangamon River Valley of Illinois. He was a suc-
cessful pioneer farmer in that locality and became
a personal friend of Abraham Lincoln. .\11 five
of his sons served as L^nion soldiers. The names
of these sons were Samuel. Timothy, William,
James and Archibald. Timothy was the first Illi-
nois soldier killed in the war. Samuel Shaw finally
retired to Dixon. Illinois, where he died in 1893.
Archibald Shaw, father of the Billings editor,
was born in Illinois in 1838 and was reared and
married in his native state. He served as a L^nion
soldier during the last two years of the war in an
Illinois regiment, and was mustered out with the
rank of lieutenant. Following the war he moved
to Olathe, Kansas, where he engaged in the live
stock business until his death in 1888. He repre-
sented Johnson County in the State Legislature,
was a republican and an Odd Fellow. .Archibald
Shaw married Kate Holbrook. who was born at
Boston. Massachusetts, in iS^i and is now living
at Long Branch, California. They had three sons :
162
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Leon; Roy, who died at the age of five years;
and Henry, a resident of Kansas City and pub-
licity agent for the Kansas City Grand Opera Com-
Leon Shaw was graduated from the Olathe High
School in 1888, one of his classmates being former
Governor H. S. Hadley of Missouri. He was tele-
graph operator at Birmingham, Alabama, in the
early days of that city for the Kansas City, Bir-
mingham & Memphis Railway. Later he was with
the Western Union Telegraph Company at Fort
Scott, Kansas, and his experience as a telegraph
operator took him to Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee,
Chicago, St. Paul and to Helena, Montana, in 1892.
As a Western Union man he was assigned the duty
of taking the Associated Press dispatches, and
later he became associated with practical news-
paper work on the Helena Record and Helena
Record-Herald. He was also with the Butte Miner,
and returning to Helena was telegraph and asso-
ciate editor on the Record-Herald for eight years.
Mr. Shaw also knows something of practical
farming and ranching in Montana. While a news-
paperman he bought a farm in the Sweet Grass
country, lived on it and developed it for five years
and still owns 150 acres of irrigated land in that
locality.
Mr. Shaw came to Billings to join the
staff of the Billings Gazette in 1916. In November
of that year he was made editor of the daily morn-
ing paper. He has been active in republican poli-
tics and was elected to represent the Helena dis-
trict in the State Legislature during the tenth
session, 1906-07. While in the Legislature he intro-
duced and secured the passage of the bill creat-
ing the Montana Railroad Commission. Mr. Shaw
served four vears as president of the Montana
Telegraphers' ' Union. He is affiliated with the
Congregational Church and is a member of Helena
Lodge No. 3, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
at Helena, Billings Consistory of the Scottish Rite,
Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena, and
is a former member of the Elks.
In 1892, at Anamosa, Iowa, he married Miss
Carrie Gill, daughter of E. J. and Leah Gill, the
latter now living at Lucine, Nevada. Her father,
who is deceased, was also a Civil war veteran.
H. L. CuMMiNGS has been identified in different
lines with the business enterprise of Livingston for
the past fifteen years, and is now proprietor of one
of the most complete garage establishments in south-
ern Montana.
He was born in Peru, Clinton County, New York,
August 21, 1857. His grandfather, Henry Cumming.=.
was born in the Province of Ontario, Canada, and
spent his life there, dying in 1858. George Cum-
mings, father of H. L., was born in Ontario in 1834,
but was reared and married in Peru, New York,
afterward moved to Lake Placid in Essex County,
that state, and died there in 190!. He followed dif-
ferent lines of employment. He was a republican
and a very zealous member of the Methodist Church.
He married Elizabeth Kent, who was born in Platts-
burg, New York, in 1837 and died at Lake Placid in
1900. The oldest of their children is C. H. Cum-
mings, also a resident of Livingston, referred to
more particularly in the following paragraphs. The
second is H. L. 'Cummings. George is a farm hand
in Alberta. Canada, and Elizabeth is the wife of
Hiram McKee, a farmer at Morrisville, Vermont.
H. L. Cummings received his education in the
public schools of Peru, New York, and at tVie age
of eighteen began earning his living as driver ot a
t^m and at other employments. In 1874 he went to
Blackbrook, New York, was a farmer and in the
lumber business, and in 1886 established himself in
business at Lake Placid, where for three years he
was a merchant and then a carpenter and builder.
He came west to Livingston in 1904 and for two
years continued the carpenter's business, after which
he established a livery and coal business and black-
smith shop. He conducted this under the name
H. L. Cummings & Son for eight years. Owing to
the increasing patronage of his establishment due
to the importance of the automobile industry, he
has since concentrated his attention on a modern
garage at the corner of Lewis and Third streets.
He owns the building. 80x100 feet, and does a gen-
eral garage and repair business. He handles acces-
sories and is local representative for the sale of the
Chevrolet car.
Mr. Cummings is a republican, is a trustee of the
Methodist Church at Livingston, a member of the
Livingston Chamber of Commerce and a stockholder
in the Park Milling Company and in the Park Crearn-
ery Company. He is affiliated with the Masonic
Lodge at Lake Placid, New York. Mr. Cummings
owns a modern home at the corner of Third and
Lewis streets.
In 1879, in Clinton County, New York, he mar-
ried Miss Elizabeth Allen, daughter of Frank and
Dina (Watson) Allen, both now deceased. Her
father was an iron worker. Mr. and Mrs. Cummings
have four children. Lyman H., the oldest, was born
in New York state in 1881, and for a number of
years has been associated with his father in business.
He married Rosanna Merrill and has two children,
Franklin and Mae. Christina, the second child of
Mr. and Mrs. Cummings, is the wife of E. H. Newell,
a merchant at Livingston. Loretta married William
Shorthill, a street car conductor at Portland. Ore-
gon. Martha, the youngest of the family, is a junior
in the Park County High School.
C. H. Cummings, older brother of H. L. Cummings,
was born at Peru, New York, February 19, 1853,
had a public school education there, became a con-
tractor and was superintendent of a lumber yard at
Blackbrook and Lake Placid. New York. On com-
ing to Livingston in 1904 he moved to a ranch twelve
miles south of town, but in the spring of 1919 sold
this property and is now engaged in the real estate
business at Livingston. His home is at 515 Lewis
Street. He is a democrat, a member of the Metho-
dist Church and a Mason. C. H. Cummings married
at Peru, New York, in 1873. Miss Sarah Ormsby,
daughter of Bradford and Clara (Line) Ormsby,
both of whom died at Peru. New York, where her
father was a farmer. Mrs. Cummings died at Liv-
ingston in 1908 and all her children died in infancy.
In 1909 Mr. Cummings married Mrs. Sarah (Dur-
san) Westcott, a daughter of David and Mary (Mc-
Kee) Durgan. Her father was also a farmer at
Peru, New York. C. H. Cummings has reared an
adopted son. William, taking him when he was a
year old. He finished his education in the State Ag-
ricultural College at Bozeman and is now engaged in
ranching at Reed Point, Montana.
A. A. Sheuerman who has been a resident of
Butte for about ten years has built up and developed
an important and extensive business with that city
as his headquarters in theater advertising. Mr.
Sheuerman has been in the advertising business off
and on since early youth, and has an extensive 'ic-
quaintance with newspaper and other advertising
mediums in the Northwest.
He was born at The Dalles, Oregon, January
17. 1886. His father J. Sheuerman. who was born
in Germany in 1857, came to this country when a
HISTORY OF MONTANA
163
young man, and was married in The Dalles, where
he lived for a number of years and was in business
as a buyer of hides and wool. He continued in the
same line at Pendleton, Oregon, after 1889, and since
igoo has had his home at San Francisco. He still
conducts his business as a wool buyer in the dis-
trict around Pendleton, Oregon, and Walla Walla,
Washington. As a young man he enlisted and
served for a time in the regular army, participating
in some Indian compaigns in the West. He is a
democrat and a member of the Masonic fraternity
and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. J.
Sheuerman married Matilda Wolf, who was born
in this country in 1861 and died at Portland, Oregon,
in i8g6. Her father Bernard Wolf was a native of
Germany, was a hide and wool buyer at The Dalits,
Oregon, many years and died in that city in i8y8.
J. Sheuerman and wife had two children, A. A.
and Carrie. The latter is the wife of Emile Cerf,
a merchant of San Francisco.
A. A. Sheuerman acquired his education in the
public schools of Pendleton and San Francisco,
graduating from the Pendleton High School. At
the age of sixteen he went to work earning his own
living. The first year he was employed in different
capacities with the Pendleton East Oregonian and
Pendleton Tribune, That constituted his earliest
experience in the newspaper business. Then for six
months he worked for Bare Bros, in their furniture
store in San Francisco and another six months
worked in the scouring mill of a San Francisco
wool plant. Mr. Sheuerman was circulation manager
for several well known northwestern newspapers,
being with the Pendleton Tribune a year and a half,
with the Walla Walla Statesman three months and
the Pendleton Tribune six months. For three
months he was business manager of the Baker
City Herald in Oregon, and during that time owned
a half interest in the paper. The next year he spent
as advertising salesman for the Portland Journal,
and for one year covered seventeen western states
as a traveling representative of the Pendleton
Woolen Mills. He then rejoined the staff of the
Portland Journal as advertising salesman, but after
six months began selling theatrical advertising on
the Orpheum and Sullivan & Considine circuits in
the Northwest. He has been engaged in theater
advertising at Butte since November i, igog. His
offices are in the Phoenix Building. He is also half
owner and vice president and director of the Hippo-
drome Company, lessees of the People's Theater
of Butte.
Mr. Sheuerman is a member of the Butte Adver-
tising Club, Silver Bow Club, and is past president
of Baron de Hirsch Lodge No. 420, Independent
Order of B'nai B'rith. and a member of Butte Lodge
No. 240 Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
Politically he is independent. Mr. Sheuerman, who
resides at 16 North Clark Street, married at Butte
August 31, 1910, Miss EstTier R. Cohn, daughter of
M. G. and Emma (Kuhn) Cohn, residents of Butte.
Her father is a retired commission merchant. Mrs.
Sheuerman is a graduate of the Butte High School.
Elmer J. Mo. It is generally conceded that
Elmer J. Mo has done an enormous amount of
constructive work in Sweetgrass County, supplying
the faith, enthusiasm and also the pioneer example
and enterprise by which a large and important sec-
tion of fertile Montana lands have been colonized,
developed and brought to the front as an agri-
cultural proposition.
Mr. Mo by profession is a banker. In fact he
began life as an accountant. He is a master of
technical business detail as well as a master execu-
tive. He was born at Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, Octo-
ber 12, 1884. His father, Hans Mo, is still living at
Sleepy Eye, was born in Norway in 1849 and came
to the United States in 1865. He worked as a farm
hand at Hanska, Minnesota, and for several years
was employed in a store at Sleepy Eye. In 1881 he
became vice president of the State Bank of Sleepy
Eye, and now for many years has been president
of that institution. He has also served as mayor
of his home town, is a republican, a very active
worker in the Lutheran Church and is affiliated
with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and
Ancient Order of United Workmen. Hans Mo
married Annie Stockstead, who was born in Norway
in 1854. Elmer J. is the oldest of their children.
Rolf has been in the Big Timber country since
1916 as a rancher. Pearl is the wife of Saxe Somer-
ville, who was with the Expeditionary Forces in
France. Alice is a talented young woman, a graduate
of Rockford College in Rockford, Illinois, finished
her education in the Minneapolis School of Dramatic
Art and is now etigaged in chautauqua and lyceum
work with the University Lyceum Players.
Elmer James Mo graduated from the high school
of his native town in Minnesota in 1903, spent six
months in a commercial school at Mankato and for
three months studied law in the night school of the
University of Minnesota af Minneapolis. For two
and a half years he was employed by Ross & Davis
as utility man in that firm's chain of banks in
North Dakota. His work was somewhat in the
nature of traveling auditor. In igo8, when he was
twenty-four years of age, he was employed by
another firm to organize a bank at Crandall, South
Dakota. He also served as accountant for the
Williston Drug Company at Williston, North Dakota.
On returning to Sleepy Eye he was assistant cashier
of the State Bank of that town during 1910-11.
Mr. Mo arrived at Big Timber October 19, 1912.
For a year and a half he was assistant cashier in
the Citizens State Bank and in January, igi4, organ-
ized the Scandinavian American Bank of Big Timber.
For one year he was its cashier and then until
January i, igi7, was vice president, when he sold
his banking interests. In the meantime he had made
this one of the strong and reliable institutions, a
bulwark of financial opportunity. He had been
working to realize an ideal in the development of
what is known as the Gibson country around Gibson
and Melville, and gave much of his time to the
development of a large ranch in that vicinity. His
operations have broadened in real estate, the loan
and insurance business until he is now head of one
of the largest organizations of the kind in the
southern part of the state. He has brought hundreds
of farmers to this section of Montana, and many
thousands of acres have been sold through the
medium of his influence and business organization.
He individually owns 2,000 acres of ranch land in
Sweetgrass County. He has an office building on
McLeod Street, and also a modern home on the
same thoroughfare.
Mr. Mo is president of the Sweetgrass Abstract
and Audit Company. He was a member of the
Legislature in 1919, being elected from Sweetgrass
County in igi8. During that session he served as
a member of the banks and banking, conservation of
resources and fishing and game committees. He is
a member of the Lutheran Church, aflSliated with
the Lodge of Elks at Watertown, South Dakota,
being a life member, and also belongs to Big Timber
Lodge No. 25, Knights of Pythias. In 1906, at
Fergus Falls, Minnesota, he married Miss Alice
Schlief, a native of Wisconsin. They have two
164
HISTORY OF MONTANA
children, Hazel, born November s, 1912; and Rolfa,
born June 6, 1916.
R. J. Johannes, whose connection with the coal
business extends back over a period of twenty-three
years, is a man of wide experience, keen apprecia-
tion gf values, thorough knowledge of the industry
which he represents and excellent business judg-
ment. While he has been located at Billings only
since 1918, the reputation which he established at
Helena during his long career in that city preceded
him to this city, where, as sales agent for the
Kooi Coal Company and the Bear Creek Field, he
occupies a position of importance in the coal trade
and has added to the standing which is his by
right of past achievements.
Mr. Johannes was born at Humboldt, Michigan,
January 17, 1870, and is a son of Nicholas and Lena
(Geitzen) Johannes. His father, born in Germany
in 1823. was reared in that country and came to
the United States in young manhood, his first
location being at Port Washington, Wisconsin,
where he married Lena Geitzen, also a native of
Germany, born in 1839. Subsequently they removed
to Humboldt, Michigan, where Mr. Johannes fol-
lowed his trade of wheelwright, as he did also,
later, at Ishpeming, Michigan, and finally at Helena,
Montana, where he arivved August 15. 1880, and
where he was the pioneer wheelwright of the city.
He continued to be similarly engaged throughout
the remainder of his life, and being an industrious
man and good manager when he died in 1900 was
possessed of a comfortable competence. He was
a democrat in politics, and he and Mrs. Johannes,
who died June 18, 1908, at Helena, were members
of the Roman Catholic Church.
The only child of his parents, R. J. Johannes
was educated in the public schools of Ishpeming,
Michigan and the parochial school at Helena, Mon-
tana, added to which was a course in the Helena
Business College, which he left in 1888. In the
meantime, during the summer months of the years
1886, 1887 and 1888, he had ridden the range as
a cowboy. After leaving business college Mr. Jo-
hannes secured a position in the Helena Post Office
Department as a letter carrier, a position which he
retained five years. In 1893 he entered the services
of the Royal Milling Company of Great Falls,
Montana, as salesman at Helena, and in this position
gained valued experience in the art of selling goods.
During 1894-5-6 he was salesman for the T. C.
Power Company of Helena, the largest implement
dealers in Montana, and in 1897 turned his attention
to the coal business, conducting a retail and whole-
sale yard at Helena until May r, 1918. Mr. Johannes
during this time came into contact with numerous
large interests in the fuel industry, and as he gained
experience became impressed with the opportunities
open for a man of his knowledge and experience
as a sales agent. In the year mentioned he re-
ceived an attractive offer, and eventually disposed
of his holdings and came to Billings, where, in
September, 1918, he entered upon his duties as
sales agent for the Kooi Coal Company for Mon-
tana and North Dakota, and for the Northwestern
Improvement Company of Red Lodge, Montana, the
largest coal company in the Northwest. Mr. Jo-
hannes covers with his sales the entire territory
between Fargo, North Dakota, and Portland, Ore-
gon, and his transactions are immense and im-
portant in character. He is one of the best known
figures in the coal trade in the state at this time
and has innumerable acquaintances among t'he large
operators. His offices at Billings are located at
No. 210 Hart-Albin Building. He is a great be-
liever in the future of Montana lands, and at
present is the owner of 165 acres of splendid ranch
property on the Little Blackfoot River, which he
operates as a stock ranch. In this direction, also,
he has been successful, having managed his prop-
erty with rare business shrewdness and admirable
foresight. Mr. Johannes is a republican, but has
not cared for the doubtful honors of public life,
although he is quick to respond to any worthy
appeal and stanchly supports all movements which
show themselves worthy of his co-operation. He
belongs to the United Commercial Travelers, and
he and Mrs. Johannes belong to the Roman Catholic
Church.
Mr. Johannes was married March 26, 1914, at
Fort Benton, Montana, to Miss Clara Torkelson,
daughter of Mrs. Kate Torkelson, of Madison,
Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Johannes reside in
Helena, Montana.
William Wallace Gail. One of the best known
men in the state in advertising, newspaper and po-
litical circles is William Wallace Gail of Billings.
He was born at East Aurora, Erie County, New
York, June 29, 1880, a son of Dr. William H. Gail,
and grandson of Reverend Gail, a pioneer clergy-
man of the Methodist Episcopal Church in West-
ern New York. Doctor Gail was born at East
Aurora, New York, in 1840, and he died at Buffalo,
New York, in 1916, having spent his life in his
native state. During the Civil war he gave his
country a soldier's service as surgeon of the One
Hundred and Twenty-ninth New York Volunteer
Infantry, and upon his return home resumed his
practice at East Aurora, continuing it from 1865
to 1912. when he retired. He was a graduate of
the Albany Medical School, from which he 'se-
cured his degree of Doctor of Medicine. Politi-
cally he was a democrat. For years he was affili-
ated with the Episcopal Church. He was well
known as a Mason. The maiden name of his wife
was Julia Wallace, and she was born in Scotland
in 1846, and died at East Aurora in 1890. Their
children were as follows ; Florence M., who mar-
ried James B. McCreary, who is a broker in stocks
and bonds of Buffalo, New York, but during the
great war went to France as a worker in the Young
Men's Christian Association ; Clarence W., who is
with the American Ship Building Company and
resides at Cleveland, Ohio; and William W., whose
name heads this review.
William W. Gail attended the grammar and
high schools of East Aurora, being graduated from
the latter in 1894, and he later became a student
of Cornell University, New York, from whicli
he was graduated in 1905. with the degree of Bache-
lor of Arts. In his senior year he was elected to
the scholarship fraternity. Phi Beta Kappa. Early
exhibiting literary leanings, Mr. Gail became edi-
tor-in-chief of the Cornell Era, a literary monthly
magazine, and he was also assistant in the de-
partment of sociology and statistics at the uni-
versity. In 1905 he won the Guilford English essay
prize at Cornell.
In 1905 Mr. Gail went to Cripple Creek, Colorado,
as a reporter on the Cripple Creek Times, and
in 1908 was made its managing editor. The year
following Mr. Gail left Cripple Creek for Colorado
Springs to become telegraph editor and editorial
writer on the Colorado Springs Gazette, and subse-
quently was connected with the Evening Herald
and Evening Telegraph, both of that city. On
December i, 1913, Mr. Gail came to Billings to
become editor of the Billings Gazette, continuing
in that position for three years, when he resigned
HISTORY OF MONTANA
165
to establish himself in a general advertising busi-
ness under the name of the Billings Advertising
Company, of which he is the sole proprietor. This
business has grown until it is now one of the largest
of its kind in Montana, its operations covering
a wide field in this and other states. His offices
are at 211-212 Stapleton Block. Mr. Gail carries
on a general advertising agency and advertisement
writing, and specializes on publicity work. In ad-
dition to the work of his agency Mr. Gail is editor
and manager of the Midland Empire Farmer, a
monthly farm paper.
.A. stalwart republican, Mr. Gail is very active
in politics, now serving as chairnaan of the Re-
publican County Central Committee, to which office
he was elected in the fall of 1918. When the Mid-
land Empire Fair Association was organized the
services of Mr. Gail wers secured as publicity man-
ager, in which capacity he has continued ever since.
He is chairman of the publicity committee of the
Billings Midland Club and vice president of the
Rotary Club. He was one of the two representa-
tives of the United States on the Resolutions Com-
mittee at the International Rotary Convention held
at Kansas City, Missouri, in 1918.
Mr. Gail has always been very active in athletics,
especially in base ball and tennis. While at Cor-
nell University he was an instructor in the gym-
nasium, and after going to Cripple Creek he played
semi-professional ball. At Colorado Springs he
became playing manager of the Colorado Springs
Ball Club, and served as such for five years. He
has won numerous tennis championships, includ-
ing the singles and doubles championship at Chau-
tauqua, New York, in 1902, and the city champion-
ship at Colorado Springs in 1913 as well as the city
championship of Billings in 1917.
.As a speaker, both serious and humorous, Mr.
Gail is known all over Montana, and is in great
demand at banquets and conventions, as well as
during political campaigns. When Billings enter-
tained Colonel Roosevelt, October 5, 1918, Mr. Gail
was chairman of the "Roosevelt Day" committee,
and presided at the auditorium when "our great-
est American" addressed 10,000 people, which oc-
casion was his last public appearance. Mr. Gail also
originated the movement which resulted in bring-
ing Judge Hughes from Fargo, North Dakota, on
a special train to speak at Billings, this perhaps
being the first and only instance of the breaking
of the itinerary of a presidential candidate. While
at Colorado Springs he took a very active part
in local affairs, being one of the organizers of the
progressive party of Colorado in 1912. He man-
aged the annual convention of the Montana State
Newspapers Association at Billings in 1915. which
was the largest in the history of the organization,
as well as the most eflfective. He was a leader
in the publicity work of the war activities of the
state, acting as state publicity director for the first
Young Men's Christian .Association drive and was
permanent chairman of the county publicity organi-
zation of the Liberty Loan drives and the War
Chest, and later of the War Loan organization.
As one of the Four Minute Men speakers he did
effective work in the various war drives. In fact
during the period this country was in the war,
Mr. Gail devoted the major portion of his time
and energies to patriotic activities.
On March 25, 1905, Mr. Gail was united in mar-
riage with Miss Virginia Irene Gunderman at
Ithaca, New York. She is a daughter of John and
Stella Gunderman, now residents of Billings, Mr.
Gunderman being connected with the Billings Ga-
zette. Mrs. Gail is a graduate of the Ithaca, New
York, Conservatory of Music. The children born
to Mr. and Mrs. Gail have been as follows : Wal-
lace Henry, who died at the age of ten years ; Wil-
liam Morrison, who was born in 1909; and Robert
VVoodard, who was born in 191 1. The family resi-
dence is located on a ranch on the Billings Bench,
four miles northeast of Billings.
Julius Williams, engaged in the farm loan and
real estate business at Columbus, knows the north-
western country as only a native son can, and has
been a practical farmer, banker and real estate man
in Minnesota, the Dakotas and Montana.
He was born at Sacred Heart, Minnesota, July 6,
1879. His father, Ole K. Williams, was born in
Norway in 1849, and was four years old when his
parents came to the United Spates and settled out
on the northwestern frontier in Goodhue County,
Minnesota. He grew up and married there and spent
his active career as a farmer. In 1874 he moved
to Renville County, Minnesota, and in 1907, having
retired from the farm, moved to Taylor, North
Dakota, where he resides today. He has been ac-
tive in republican politics and was county com-
missioner of Renville County several terms and also
township clerk. He is a member of the Lutheran
Congregational Church. Ole Williams married An-
nie Simonson, who was born in Norway in 1843 and
died at Taylor, North Dakota, in 191 1. Their chil-
dren were : Cornelius, engaged in the farm loan and
real estate business at Bismarck, North Dakota ; Em-
ma, wife of Will Thorn, a general merchant at
Minneapolis; Julius; Julia, a twin sister of Julius,
is the wife of Christ Rechtfertig, a wholesale mer-
chant at Minneapolis ; Stan, a merchant at Warren,
North Dakota ; Ole, in the hardware business at
Warren, North Dakota ; Theolenia, wife of Edward
E. Ziner, a rancher at Dunn Center, North Dakota.
Julius Williams lived on his father's farm in Ren-
ville County, Minnesota, to the age of twenty. He
attended common schools there and then for one
year farmed independently and at the age of twenty-
one moved to Rolla, North Dakota, where he engaged
in the land loan business for five years. After that
he was in the banking business at Taylor. North Da-
kota, where in 1908 he established the Farmers and
Merchants State Bank and was its president until
1914. Mr. Williams came to Montana in 1914 and
for the first year was in the real estate and loan
business at Billings and since 1915 his headquarters
for an extensive business have been at Columbus.
He is sole proprietor of the J. Williams & Company.
Incorporated, with offices on Third Street, handling
fity properties, ranches and farm loans, one of the
best equipped organizations of its kind in the Yellow-
stone Valley. Through Mr. Williams' Company
over 100,000 acres of land have been bought and sold
since he came to Montana. He personally owns
about 8,000 acres of ranch land in Stillwater, Yel-
lowstone, Musselshell and Sweetgrass counties, also
a dwelling house at Columbus and his own modern
home.
While at Taylor, North Dakota, he served _ six
years as a member of the town council. He is a
republican, a Lutheran, and is affiliated with Still-
water Lodge No. 65, .Ancient Free and .Accepted
Masons. Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Helena, Billings Chapter No. 6. Royal Arch Masons,
Aldemar Commandery No. S of the Knights Temp-
lar, and Billings Consistory of the Scottish Rite. He
is also a member of the Elks at Dickerson. North
Dakota, and the Modern Woodmen of .America at
Taylor in that state. He is an active and pushing
member of the Columbus Commercial Club.
Mr. Williams married at Sacred Heart, Minne-
166
HISTORY OF MONTANA
sola, Mav 13, 1905. Miss Mary Opdahl, daughter of
Mr. and 'Mrs. T. J. Opdahl of Sacred Heart. Her
father is a retired farmer. The children of Mr.
and Mrs. Williams are four in number, Orville, Ruth,
Marvin and Marjorie. Orville is in seventh grade,
Ruth, in sixth and Marvin, in the second grade of
the public schools at Columbus.
Fr.ank H. Cooney is the president of Cooney
Brokerage Company of Butte. This business was
founded twenty-five years ago by Mr. Cooney and
his brother, and from year to year they have devel-
oped their facilities and organization to a perfect
service between many prominent manufacturers and
the wholesale houses in Montana and other portions
of the Northwest. The annual volume of business
for a number of vears has run into the millions.
Frank H. Cooney has been a resident of Montana
nearly thirty years. At the age of fourteen he was
being paid "four dollars a month as delivery boy in
a grocery store in Ontario. Those who know him
now in his comparative matu ity of nearly fifty
years recognize as one of his dominating character-
istics an unlimited capacity and desire for hard
work. It was hard work that brought him his ea.dy
knowledge and experience of business, and the
success of the Cooney Brokerage Company has been
largely due to the fact that he has climbed steadily
from the very bottom of the commercial scale.
He was born at Norwood, Ontario, December Ji.
1872. son of John W. and Mary (O'Callaghan j
Cooney. His father was a native of New York
State and his mother of Ireland. Frank H. Cooney
is one of four brothers, all of whom have gained
prominence in business affairs. His educational
advantages were confined to the parochial schools
of Ontario, and besides the experience already noted
as delivery boy in a grocery store he worked for a
time with his father, who was in the nursery busi-
ness. He was not yet nineteen years of age when
he came to Butte in July, 1891, and during the next
three years did much to equip himself for inde-
pendent effort as an employe in a retail grocery
store and afterwards in the wholesale department
of the Davidson Grocery Company.
In 1894 he and his brother Howard C. established
the firm Cooney Bros., and in 1896 incorporated as
the Cooney Brokerage Company, merchandise
brokers. While the business headquarters of this
firm are in Butte. Mr. Frank H. Cooney is a resident
of Missoula, and for a number of years has owned
and managed extensive farm and livestock interests
in the Bitter Root Valley. He is a member of the
Elks Club of Missoula, the Silver Bow Club at
Butte, the Country Club of Missoula, and the
Knights of Columbus, and is a democrat.
December 27, 1899, he married Miss Emma May
Poindexter, daughter of P. H. Poindexter of Dillon,
Montana. They are the parents of sev£n children:
Francis H., John Philip, Mary Margaret, Walter
Poindexter, Tyler Thompson and Virginia Eliza-
beth, twins, and Gage Rodmon.
Almon Clark Spencer, of Billings, is a native
of Montana, having been born at White Sulphur
Springs in Meagher County March 16, 1879. His
family originated in England, but was founded in
the Province of Ontario, Canada, prior to the
American Revolution, and Spencer\-ille, Canada, was
named for an ancestor of Judge Spencer, and the
latter's grandfather was born in the Province of
Ontario.
His father, Almon Spencer, was born in Ontario
in 1838, where he resided until 1865. He then
removed to Helena, Montana, where he was engaged
m the mercantile business until the early '70s,
being associated in his enterprise with T. C. Power,
former United States senator from Montana. He
was for a long time also engaged in conducting a
butchering and mercantile business at Diamond City,
being one of the early residents of that pioneer
settlement. He later removed to White Sulphur
Springs, being the first merchant to locate at that
place. The business he there established has con-
tinued ever since, and is now operated under the
name of Anderson, Spencer & Company. Shortly
before his removal from Canada to the United
States he was married to Margaret Ann Stitt, also a
native of Ontario. The children of this marriage
are Gideon Kennedy, a merchant and banker of
White Sulphur Springs; Irene, wife of C. F. Schaffa-
zick, of Spokane, Washington, manager and part
owner of the Columbia Store Company, operating
stores at Denver, Salt Lake City and Spokane ;
Herman W., -of Los Angeles, California, who is
connected with J. B. Long & Company, one of the
largest cattle concerns operating in the Northwest;
and A. C. Spencer, the subject of this sketch. The
father died at Long Beach, California, in the spring
of 1909, and the mother at White Sulphur Springs
early in the year 191 5.
Judge Spencer attended the public schools at
White Sulphur Springs and the Helena High School,
from which institution he graduated in 1898. He
was for one year a student in the University of
Minnesota, and thereafter entered the Law Depart-
ment of the University of Michigan, from which
he was graduated in 1902, after a three-years' course,
with the degree of Doctor of Law. From that
time until the spring of 1904 he was engaged in the
general law practice at White Sulphur Springs,
being associated with N. B. Smith, who has since
retired from the practice.
In 1904 Mr. Spencer removed to Red Lodge in
Carbon County, where he was associated in a gen-
eral law practice with the late Sydney Fox, who
thereafter served as judge of the same district over
which Judge Spencer now presides. Upon the death
of Judge Fox in the spring of 1913 Mr. Spencer
continued in private practice by himself until June
I, 1915, when he was appointed judge of the Thir-
teenth Judicial District, comprising the counties of
Yellowstone, Carbon and Big Horn. In the gen-
eral election of 1916 he was elected to the same
office for a term of four years. Prior to his eleva-
tion to the bench he served as county attorney of
Carbon County and city attorney of the City of
Red Lodge.
In the fall of 1917 he removed from Red Lodge
to Billings, where he now resides at No. 3410
Second Avenue, North. In addition to his home
he has acquired a wheat ranch a few miles north
of the city, thereby entitling him to be classed
as an "agriculturist." He is also a stockholder in
the Anderson-Spencer Mercantile Company above
mentioned, and in the Central State Bank of White
Sulphur Springs.
Judge Spencer was married in July, 1915, at Deer
Lodge, Montana, to Miss Emma Johnson, daughter
of George Johnson, a prominent stockman of that
locality. There are no children of this marriage.
Politically Judge Spencer is a staunch supporter
of the democratic faith, to which his father became
a convert shortly prior to his death, he having been
a republican until the election of 1896. His father
was one of the pioneer Masons of Montana, and he
has followed the ancestral footsteps in this direc-
tion to the extent that he is a member of Diamond
City Lodge No. 7, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons ; Carbon Chapter No. 20, Royal Arch
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Masons ; Aldemar Commandery No. 5, Knights
Templar, of Billings: and Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of
Helena. He is also a member of Beartooth Lodge
of Elks No. 534: the Billings Golf and Country
Club: and the Billings Midland Club. He is like-
wise an active member of the Montana State Bar
Association, and the Yellowstone County Bar Asso-
ciation.
His distinguishing characteristic as a trial judge
is his extreme fearlessness and his determination to
follow what he conceives to be the law, regardless
of the personality of the parties interested or the
effect of his decision. He is in no sense a "policy
jurist." The natural result of this course of pro-
cedure, coupled with his excellent judicial tempera-
ment, is a most enviable record in the office which
he occupies, and the percentage of cases in which
he has been reversed upon appeal is most remark-
ably small.
Albert E. Platz. Occupying a place of promi-
nence in the business life of Yellowstone County,
Albert E. Platz, of Billings, has achieved success
in the various lines of industry with which he has
been associated, his keen foresight and tenacity
of purpose having proved his chief assets while
working his way upward to a leading position
among the grain dealers of the state and in financial
circles. A son of the late Albert E. Platz, Sr., he
was born at Racine, Wisconsin. June 10, 1876.
His grandfather, Frederick Platz, was born, in
1808, in Alsace, France, where he worked with his
father in the leather industry during his earlier
years. Immigrating to the United States, he located
in Racine, Wisconsin, where he established a tan-
nery, which he operated until his death in 1884.
A pioneer of Wisconsin, going there long before
there were any railroads in the state, he watched the
development of the country with great interest and
performed his full share of the required pioneer
labor.
Albert E. Platz, Sr., was born at Racine, Wis-
consin, in 1841, and as a young man learned the
tanner's trade with his father. Removing with
his family to La Crosse, Wisconsin, in 1878, he
embarked in the leather business as a manufacturer
of harness, and having build up a lucrative busi-
ness continued thus employed during the remainder
of his active life, passing away in igo8. A re-
publican in politics, he served in various local offices.
He attended the Congregational Church, and was
a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. During the Civil war he enlisted as a sol-
dier, but being skilled in the manufacture of leather
was sent home from the army to work at his trade
in order that he might supply the Government
with such leather goods as might be needed by the
soldiers. His widow, whose maiden name was
Margaret Heck, is now a resident of La Crosse.
Three children were born into their household, as
follows: Minnie, who died in La Crosse at the
age of thirty years: M. F., also of La Crosse, is
secretary of a syrup company : and Albert E.
Completing his earlv studies at the La Crosse
High School, Albert E. Platz entered Lake Forest
University, remaining in that school two years,
until 1899. The following two years he worked
for his uncle. William Platz, a leather manufacturer
and dealer. Changing his occupation in 1901, Mr.
Platz assumed charge of the lumber department
of a mining company at Black Lake, Idaho, in the
Seven Devils mining district, and was there for
five yea-s. Returning then to Wisconsin, he located
at La Crosse, and for a year was employed as a
traveling salesman. Coming to Billings, Montana,
in 1909, Mr. Platz established himself in the lumber
business, having his headquarters at Huntley. Dis-
posing of his lumber interests in 1916, he embarked
in the grain business, becoming president of the
Treasury State Grain Company, which owns a
chain of five elevators in Montana, they being
located as follows: Red Lodge, Fox, Roberts,
Boyd and Coombs. Mr. Platz is kept busily em-
ployed, his offices being located in the Lincoln Hotel
Block. In addition to his grain interests he is
serving as vice president of the Rapelje National
Bank and of the Huntley State Bank. He owns a
residence at 1020 North Thirty-first Street, and
has a financial interest in one of the business build-
ings of Billings. Fraternally he is a member of
Billings Lodge No. 113, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, and socially belongs to the Billings
Midland and Empire Club. Politically he is
an independent republican.
Mr. Platz married, in 1913, at La Crosse, Miss
Emma Gund, a daughter of Henry Gund, a promi-
nent business man of La Crosse, and his wife,
Eleanor (Johnson) Gund. Mr. and Mrs. Platz
have no children.
C. O. Halgrims. a prosperous merchant of Broad-
view, noteworthy for his good citizenship and
many excellent traits of character, C. O. Halgrims
is actively identified with both the mercantile and
agricultural affairs of Yellowstone County, own-
ing and managing a general store, and supervis-
ing the management of his homestead property,
which is located three miles west of his store.
A son of Ole Halgrims, he was born in Dane Coun-
ty, Wisconsin, September 7, 1865. His grand-
father, Ole Halgrims, spent a large part of his
life in Norway, where he was a farmer and tim-
ber owner. After his retirement from active pur-
suits he came to the United States and spent his
last days in Dane County, Wisconsin, passing away
at the venerable age of seventy-two years.
Ole Halgrims was born and brought up in Hal-
engdal, Norway, his birth occurring in 1829. Be-
coming familiar with the various branches of agri-
culture when young, he took up farming for his
life work. Coming to this country in 1843, he
settled in Rock County, Wisconsin, and subse-
quently there took up land and engaged in the
pioneer labor of clearing and improving a farm
from the wilderness, doing the work with oxen.
In 1882 he removed with his family to North Da-
kota, becoming a pioneer settler of Trail County,
where he continued his work, taking up a home-
stead clairn and again redeeming a farm from its
pristine wildness. Very successful in his under-
takings, he continued his agricultural labors until
his death, which occurred in Mayville, North Da-
kota, in 1907. He was affiliated with the republi-
can party, and a member of the Lutheran Church.
His wife, whose name before marriage was Anna
Kopsing, was born at Eggdal. Norway, in 1832, and
died on the home farm, at Mayville, North Da-
kota, in 1914. They were the parents of five chil-
dren, as follows: Barbara, wife of .'\ndrew Ander-
son, a farmer at Mayville, North Dakota; Thomas,
for many years a farmer, died in Trail County,
North Dakota, at the comparatively early age of
forty-eight years : H. (3., occupying the old home-
stead in North Dakota : Ingery, wife of C. Gullicks,
a retired farmer of Mayville: and C. O., the sub-
ject of this sketch.
Having received his preliminary education in
the public schools of Mayville, North Dakota, C.
O. Halgrims has since materially added to the
168
HISTORY OF MONTANA
knowledge there obtained by intelligent reading,
keen observation, and broad experience. Living
vvfith his parents until nineteen years old, he was
well trained in the various branches of agricul-
ture under his father's (instruction, and subse-
quently, as clerk in a store at Mayville, became
familiar with the art of buying and selling. Start-
ing in life on his own account, Mr. Halgrims was
engaged in mercantile pursuits at Sharon, North
Dakota, for fifteen years. Coming from there to
Montana in 1908, he took up a homestead claim of
160 acres lying three miles west of Broadview,
and in its improvement has found both pleasure
and profit. In 1914 he bought a store in Broad-
view, the purchase including the building in wTiich
it is housed, and in partnership with his son Thomas
has since been successfully engaged in the mer-
cantile business, having built up an extensive and
remunerative trade, extending over a radius of
fifty- miles, his customers coming from far and
near. He does a general business, his store being
advantageously located on Main Street, and be-
ing the leading one of the kind in this section of
the county. In politics Mr. Halgrims is a stanch
republican, and fraternally he is a member of the
American Order of United Workmen and of the
Brotherhood of American Yeomen.
On May 21, 1891, in Vernon County, Wiscon-
sin, Mr. Halgrims was united in marriage with
Miss Emma Johnson, a daughter of Peter and
Bergetha Johnson, both of whom have passed to
the life beyond. Mr. Johnson, a farmer in Ver-
non County, was a republican in politics, and filled
many ofiicial positions during his active .years. Mr.
and Mrs. Halgrims have three children, namely :
Thomas, a graduate of the Mayville, North Dakota,
High School, and now in business with his father,
married Clara Van Cleve, and has two children,
Thomas, Jr., born in October, 1916, and Helen,
born m March, 1918; Bergetha, wife of Fred Fort-
ney, a machinist of Harlowtown, North Dakota,
and having supervision of the construction of roads
in Wheatland County, that state; and Adeline, now
married to Victor Luhfeldt, of Broadview, Mon-
tana.
Henry S. Mendenh.\ll is a building contractor,. ,
and since coming to Montana has operated extensive-
ly on his own account, building and selling homes.
He is one of the leading men in his line.
Mr. Mendenhall represents an old English family,
resident in America for many generations and was
born at Winslow in Pike County, Indiana, February
r6. 1879. His father, Joseph F. Mendenhall, was
born in Marion County, Ohio, in 1843, grew up there
and in Indiana, was married in Pike County of the
latter state, and was a contractor and builder and
also a farmer. In 1885 he moved from Pike County,
Indiana, to Christian County, Missouri, and in 1889
to Stone County in the same state. He lived there
until his death at Hurley in 1909. He was active in
civic affair.'-, in Stone County, serving as justice of the
peace, was a republican voter and a leading member
of the Christian Church. He was all through the
Civil war as a Union soldier, going in in i8(5i and
was a commander of mounted scouts under Sherman
during the march to the sea. Joseph F. Mendenhall
married Henrietta Deadman^who was born at Wins-
low, Indiana, in 1853 and died at Hurley in Stone
County, Missouri, in 1917. A brief record of her
children is as follows : J. H., owner of a garage at
Laurel, Montana ; Henry S. ; Grace, who died aged
eight years ; Clara, wife of Samuel Robinson, a
farmer at Crane, Missouri; Ada, who died in in-
fancy; J. F., a railroad employe in Crane, Missouri;
and Harry B., a farmer at School, Missouri.
Henry S. Mendenhall received his education in
the rural schools of Christian and Stone counties,
Missouri, and lived at home with his father until
he was twenty years of age. After that he farmed
for himself in Stone County, spent two years work-
ing for the Iron Mountain Railway in Missouri and
Arkansas, and from that turned his attention to
contracting and building. His experience in that
line covers a number of the western states. He
moved from Missouri to Texas, and from there
moved to Billings in 1913, where he continued as
a journeyman for several years, and since 1916 has
been in business for himself. Some of the leading
residences and business buildings of Billings are
products of his skill. He put up the school house in
District No. 26. All the residences erected by him
since coming to Billings have been sold. His own
home is at 108 Custer Avenue.
Mr. Mendenhall is a member of Crane Camp of
the Modern Woodmen of America and is a republi-
can. He married Miss Vollie E. Ailshie at Galena,
Missouri, in 1899. Her parents were James and
Mary (Deshazer) Ailshie, the latter deceased, while
her father is a farmer at Hurley. Missouri. Mr. and
Mrs. Mendenhall have two children. Earl Ross, a
high school student, and Ava, who is in grammar
school.
L. H. Spring, w^ho is county agricultural agent
for Ravalli County at Hamilton, has had a widely
diversified and practical experince in Northwestern
agriculture. He is a graduate of the Oregon College
of Agriculture and was business manager of ranches
in Eastern Oregon before he took up his present
work as expert counsel and adviser to the agricul-
tural interests of Ravalli County.
Mr. Spring was born at Rockford, Illinois, Feb-
ruary 7, 1885. His paternal ancestors came from
England and were early settlers in New York.
Grandfather William Henry Spring was born in
New York State in 1815 and was a pioneer in
Northern Illinois in 1846. Locating at Lindenwood
near the present City of Rockford he bought a farm
and lived on it until his death in 1887. That farm
is still owned by his only daughter Miss Ida May
Spring. William Henry Spring married Mary E.
Warren, a native of New York State, who died
at Lindenwood, Illinois, in 1910 at the age of eighty-
seven. ' -
Charles B. Spring, father of L. H. Spring, was
born in New York State in 1844 and was two years
of age when his parents moved to Illinois. Before
his marriage he bought a farm a mile northeast of
Lindenwood. and that place with many modern irn-
provements is still his home. Charles B. Spring is
a member and regular attendant of Union Church
in his community and is affiliated with the Modern
Woodmen of America and Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. He married Helen M. Bulkley, who
was born in 1851 at Rockford, Illinois. Her ancestry
goes back to Lord Burkley. a conspicuous figure
in the early maritime history of England. Her
father A. J. Bulkley was born at Saratoga, New
York, in 1828 and settled at Rockford. Illinois, as
early as 1846. He was a farmer and a soldier in
the Civil war. After the war he lived at Rockford,
for many years held the office of city weigh master.
He died at Rockford in 1905. A. j. Bulklev mar-
ried Ann Maria Hobart, who was a member of
one of the early colonial families, the "House of
Fairbanks" of this country. She was born in Aroo-
stook County, Maine, and died at Lindenwood. Illi-
nois, in 1908 at the age of seventy-two. Charles B.
^^UA^li^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Spring and wife had four children: L. H. Spring;
Samuel, a farmer at Rockford; Wilbur, who occu-
pies the homestead in Illinois ; and R. C, a farmer
at Mountain, Wisconsin.
L. H. Spring received his early education in the
rural schools of Ogle County, Illinois, graduated
from the Rockford High School in 1905, and as a
means of defraying the expenses of his higher edu-
cation spent two years working on a farm. He
entered the Oregon Agricultural College at Cor-
vallis, and graduated with the degree of Bachelor
of Science in Agriculture in 1910. As a youth he
had been an observer and student of sound agri-
cultural practice, and has re-enforced his experience
by the best and most advanced methods of scien-
tific farming. After leaving college he took charge
of a ranch in eastern Oregon for eighteen months,
and then managed another ranch for five years.
In November, 1916, he returned to the Oregon Agri-
cultural College, where he remained several months
taking a general review and doing research work
in animal feeding. Mr. Spring in June, 1917, went
to work for the Wittenburg King Company of Port-
land, Oregon, being agriculturist in their field de-
partment and also buyer and contractor. He re-
signed in January, 1918, to come to Hamilton, Mon-
tana, and begin his duties as county agricultural
agent. His offices are in the Chamber of Commerce
Building.
Mr. Spring still retains his membership in' the
Union Church at Lindenwood, Illinois. He is aftili-
ated with Ionic Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons.
In 1910, at Ontario, Oregon, he married Miss
Maye Webster, daughter of William and Sar.ih
(Stephens) Webster. Mrs. Webster lives with Mr.
and Mrs. Spring. Her father, now deceased, was
a business man at Fayette, Iowa. Mrs. Spring is a
graduate of the Fayette High School and was a
student in music for three years in the Upper Iowa
University at Fayette. The only child of Mr. and
Mrs. Spring is Helen Margaret, born June 19, 191 1.
Walter E. Bennett, passenger and freight agent
for the Northern Pacific Railway at Livingston, is
an old time telegraph operator and has a veteran's
record in the railway service of the North and
Northwest. He has been continuously with the
Northern Pacific nearly thirty years.
He comes of an old colonial family in the State of
Maine, of English origin. He was born at Guilford,
Maine, September 12, 1861, son of E. W. and Agnes
M. (Straw) Bennett. His parents spent all their
lives in Maine. His father was born in 1833 and
died in 1913, and followed the occupation of lumber-
ing and farming. He filled several township offices
as a democrat and was an active supporter of the
Methodist Church. His wife was bom in 1833 and
died in 191 1. Their two children were Walter E.
and Fred, the latter dying when only eight years
of age.
Walter E. Bennett graduated from the Guilford
High School in 1879, and in 1883 graduated from the
East Maine Conference Seminary at Buckport. Dur-
ing the next two years while clerking in the store
of H. Douglas & (Tompany at Guilford he spent all
his leisure hours mastering the art of telegraphy.
In 1885, having attained considerable skill with the
telegraph key, he entered the service of the Mil-
waukee Railway as a telegraph operator, and until
1891 worked for that road at Algona, Clear Lake
and Garner. When he joined the Northern Pacific
in 1891 his first post as telegrapher was at Rosebud,
Montana. Two months later he was moved from
that station and given dififerent assignments along
the Yellowstone Division. From 1892 until 1900 he
was railway agent at Big Timber, then for three
months was cashier in the offices at Butte, another
three months was stationed at Belgrade, and in 1901
look up his present duties as freight and passenger
agent at Livingston. He has entire charge of the
railroad's business at Livingston.
Mr. Bennett has never married. His time and
energies have been completely absorbed by railway
work. However, he is well known in fraternal cir-
cles, is affili?.ted with Livingston Lodge No. 32,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Livingston
Chapter No. 7, Royal Arch Masons, St. Bernard
Commandery No. 6, Knights Templar, Livingston
Consistory No. I of the Scottish Rite, in which he
has attained the thirty-third degree, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is also
a member of Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks
and in politics is a republican.
Clinton Head. The record of successful busi-
ness men needs no introductory preface among the
citizens of the community in which their prosperity
has been gained, and Clinton Head is undoubtedly
a member of the class just referred to. By his
strict personal integrity and honorable dealings,
combined with brilliant business qualifications, he
has become not only one of the leading merchants
of Yellowstone County's smaller communities, but
also one of the most highly respected citizens of
Pompey's Pillar.
Mr. Head was born at Bedford, Iowa, November
9, 1884, a son of W. T. and Cordelia (Burwell)
Head, and a member of a family which, originating
in England, was founded in America during colo-
nial times. W. T. Head was born at Streator, Illi-
nois, and was there reared and received a public
school education. He was married at Streator to
Cordelia Burwell, who was born in 1846 at Canton,
Ohio, daughter of a sister of the late President
William McKinley, and some time after their mar-
riage removed to Bedford, Iowa, where Mr. Head
engaged in the life insurance business. In 1913
he changed his place of residence to Laurel, Mon-
tana, where his death occurred two years later, in
the faith of the Methodist Episcopal Church, of
which Mrs. Head was also a member. He was a
democrat in his political adherence, and during the
Civil war fought as a soldier of the Union, having
enlisted in an Illinois volunteer infantry regiment.
Mrs. Head died at Bedford, Iowa, in 1910. They
were the parents of the following children: Lula
M., who is the wife of E. G. Moore, engaged in
the implement business at Pompey's Pillar; Clyde,
who is manager of operations of a large construc-
tion company operating in Oklahoma ; William, who
is a painter by vocation; Clinton, of this notice; and
Edward, recently mustered out of the U. S. army,
who is now a resident of Billings.
Clinton Head received his education in the pub-
lic schools of Bedford, Iowa, and at the age of
seventeen years gave up his high school studies
and secured employment in a store near Sheridan,
Wyoming. He worked there and at Sheridan for
seven years, and in IQ08 went to Monarch, Wyoming,
where he established himself in the mercantile busi-
ness. His success there was enough to encourage
him to widen the scope of his operations, and in
1017 he came to Pompey's Pillar, where he pur-
chased a general store. This is now the leading
commercial establishment in this part of Yellow-
stone Countv, and the trade has been built up
through real business ability and untiring enter-
prise, coupled with courtesy and an afifable. agree-
able manner which has gained him many friends.
170
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In addition to his business Mr. Head is the owner
of a modern residence. He is accounted one of
his community's live business men and public-spirited
citizens, and readily gives his support to all good
movements. His politics make him a democrat,
and his religious faith is that of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. Fraternally Mr. Head is affi-
liated with Monarch Lodge, Knights of Pythias.
In 1910, at Sheridan, VVyoming, Mr. Head mar-
ried Miss Beulah Bateman, daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. E. M. Bateman, residents of Monarch, where
Mr. Bateman is fire boss in a coal mine. To this
union there have come three children: Lucille, born
December 31, 1911; Luella, born February 24, 1914;
and Laurine, born May 20, 1917.
Frederick R. Munger has been chef and steward
for some of the most noted hotels and cafes in the
Middle and Far West, and is now proprietor of a
high-class restaurant at Lewistown. Mr. Munger
has spent practically all his active life in this line
of business, and has a natural aptitude and ability
for translating raw materials into perfect bills of
fare, and has equal ability in managing the sys-
tem and complicated running of large hotels and
cafes.
Mr. Munger was born in Detroit, Wayne County,
Michigan, October 21, 1878, a son of Thomas Ma-
son and Martha A. (Patton) Munger. His father,
also a native of Wayne County, Michigan, was a
farmer and was also active in public affairs, serv-
ing as deputy sheriff of Wayne County for over
ten years, most of the time as turnkey in the county
jail at Detroit. He was a democrat in politics.
He died in March, 1904, at the age of si.xty-five.
His wife was a native of Chicago, and is still liv-
ing at the age of sixty-seven. They were married
in Detroit and had three children, Frederick R.
being the youngest.
Frederick R. Munger grew up on his father's
farm in Wayne County, Michigan, and attended
public schools there. At the age of sixteen he
went to work for the Gore Hotel Company in
Chicago, spending about a year with them and
then acquiring a valuable apprenticeship with the
Fred Harvey hotel system. He was located in
Dodge City, Kansas, and at various other points
along the Harvey system of railroad hotels. Later
he became connected with the Sherman House at
Chicago as chef in the cafe, and presided over the
kitchens when the famous College Inn adjunct
of the Sherman House was opened. In the spring
of 1904 he went to St. Louis, Missouri, and. asso-
ciated with others, opened the Parliament House,
one of the best known and most liberally patron-
ized cafes on the grounds of the Louisiana Pur-
chase Exposition. Fie remained in St. Louis as
chef and steward for one of the prominent hotels,
and in 1907 came to Helena, Montana, and entered
the service of the Grandon Hotel as steward for
about two years. He then engaged in the restau-
rant business for himself at Helena, and since 191 1
has been proprietor of a prominent restaurant of
Lewistown.
Mr. Munger married March 10, 1904, Miss Nora
L. Donavon, a native of Rockford, Illinois, and
the youngest of two sons and two daughters of
Dennis and Julia (Leary) Donavon. Her parents
were both born in Ireland. Her father died in
1885 and her mother is now living at Chicago.
Mr. and Mrs. Munger have one son, Frederick R.,
Jr. Mr. Munger is independent in politics and is
active in Masonry, being affiliated with Morning
Star Lodge No. 5, .\ncient Free and .'\ccepted Ma-
sons, at Helena, Hiram Chapter No. 14, Royal
Arch Masons, at Lewistown, also Lewistown Com-
mandery No. 15, Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena and the
Scottish Rite Consistory.
Henry E. Smith. There is no greater construct-
ive work than the proper training of the rising gen-
eration, and those who are engaged in it are deserv-
ing of highest credit. Some of the finest men and
women of the country have and are devoting tfieir
lives to this important calling, and one of them de-
serving of special mention because of his ability and
fidelity to the highest ideals of his profession is
Henry E. Smith, superintendent of schools of Three
Forks. He was born at Rewey, Wisconsin, Janu-
ary 28, i88g, a son of H. J. Smith, born in New York
State in 185 1, but reared in Wisconsin. H. J. Smith
was married at Dodgeville, Wisconsin, to Eliza Walk-
er, born in New York State in 1854, and they had
the following children born to them : Thomas, who
is yardmaster for the Northwestern Railroad, lives
at Adams, Wisconsin ; Frank, who is a miner of
Mifflin, Wisconsin ; Gertrude, who married C. D.
Streeter, a railroad conductor, lives at Huron, South
Dakota; Homer, assistant professor of education.
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis; Henry E.,
who was the fifth in order of birth; Guy, who died
at the age of seven years; and Frood, who enlisted
in May, 1918, in the United States army for service
during the great war. served in France in the Sixth
Division of Infantry and became a second lieutenant.
Until 1915 H. J. Smith was section foreman of the
Northwestern Railroad at Rewey, Wisconsin, but
in that year was pensioned and moved to Dodgeville,
Wisconsin, where fie still resides, employed as flag-
man for the railroad. He is a republican. Through
the medium of the Methodist Episcopal Church he
finds religious support and he is active in the local
denomination of that body. For a number of years
he has been a Mason.
Henry E. Smith attended the public and high
schools of Rewey, Wisconsin, being graduated from
the latter in 1908, and then for two years taught in
Grant County, his native state, in the second year
being made principal of a graded school. In order
to further perfect himself Mr. Smith then took
a course at the Platteville Normal School, from
which he was graduated in 1912, and since then has
been attending the summer schools at the University
of Wisconsin, also taken correspondence courses, and
after spending a year at University of Wisconsin, re-
ceived his degree in 1920. Between 1912 and 1914 Mr.
Smith was principal of the high school at Vernon,
Wisconsin, and then for a year was principal of one
of the city schools of Reno, Nevada, resigning to
accept the superintendency of schools of Three Forks
in the fall of 1915. He has 2 schools, 11 teach-
ers and 335 pupils under his supervision, and is
noted for his efficiency and his influence over his
pupils, who are gaining from him not only a tech-
nical knowledge of the various subjects, but a broad
outlook on life and a realization of the responsibili- '
ties of citizenship. Professionally Mr. Smith belongs
to the State Teachers' Association, the Gallatin
County Teachers' Association and a member of Gal-
latin County Education Examining Board. His fra-
ternal connections are with Three Forks Lodge, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, and Three Forks
Chapter No. 29. Royal Arch Masons. He is a valued
member of the Three Forks Congregational Church.
Like his father, he is a strong republican, although
he has limited his political work to supporting tlie
efficient and dynamic candidates and principles of his
party. The Smith family residence is at No. 319
Second .'Avenue. East, and is owned by Mr. Smith.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
171
On September 2, 1914, Mr. Smith was married to
Miss Floy Rose, a daughter of B. B. Rose, a mer-
chant of Three Forks. Mrs. Smith was graduated
from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, Wis-
consin, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. Mr.
and Mrs. Smith have a daughter, Audrey, who was
born December 27, 1918. They are delightful people
socially, and in the intellectual atmosphere of their
home an impetus is given to movements looking to-
ward the uplift of their community and the advance-
ment of humanity.
H. L. Currier. The best history of a community
or state is the one that deals most with the lives
and activities of its people, especially those who,
by their own endeavor and indomitable energy, have
forged to the front and placed themselves where
they well deserve the title of progressive men. In
the following paragraphs will be found the record
of one who has pushed steadily forward and at-
tained to a splendid success in one of the leading
mercantile lines and who has earned a reputation
as a man of rare business ability, sound judgment
and sterling integrity, qualities that have won for
him the universal confidence of the entire com-
munity.
H. L. Currier was born at Wautoma, Wisconsin,
on the 6th of July, 1881, and is the son of Byron P.
Currier, who now resides at Frazee, Minnesota.
The latter was born in 1855 in Brattleboro, Vermont,
where he was reared and educated. In youn& man-
hood he moved to Wisconsin, of which' he was a
pioneer settler, locating at Wautoma, where he be-
came a successful farmer. Eventually he moved to
Frazee, Minnesota, which has since been his home
and since 1914 he has been retired from active busi-
ness life. In politics, he gives his support to the
republican party, while his religious membership is
with the Congregational Church. Mr. Cufrier mar-
ried Amelia Pease, who was born in 1857 in Wis-
consin, and whose death occurred at Washburn,
North Dakota, where she and her husband lived
for about ten years prior to locating in Frazee.
H. L. Currier, the immediate subject of this sketch,
is the only child living, two others, a boy and girl,
dying at an early age.
H. L. Currier was reared under the parental roof
and secured his education in the public schools of
Wautoma. His school attendance was completed
at the age of sixteen years and he assisted his father
on the home farm until he was twenty years of age.
Then, for five years, he was employed in a farm
implement store in Washburn, North Dakota, where
he gained valuable experience as a salesman. His
next occupation was in an abstract office at Minot,
North Dakota, where he remained for three years.
Then, for a similar period, Mr. Currier was a travel-
ing salesman, selling stationery to the trade and
covering the states of Wisconsin. North Dakota,
Texas and New Mexico. During the following five
years he traveled out of Chicago, representing a
large automobile accessory house in the states of
Wisconsin, Minnesota and North Dakota. In 1914
Mr. Currier came to Montana as a representative
of the Studebaker .Automobile Company, of South
Bend, Indiana, with whom he remained until 1917.
In the latter year he became branch manager at
Missoula for the -Auto Warehouse and Service Com-
pany, handling Studebaker cars, until 1918. when he
became manager for the local office of the Missoula
Motor Company, which position he retained until
January i, 1919. In these various positions, Mr.
"Currier not only demonstrated extraordinary quali-
ties as a salesman, but also proved himself a man
of unusual executive and administrative ability and
gained an enviable reputation among those who were
familiar with his work. In January, 1919, Mr. Cur-
rier bought J. W. Reely's storage plant and imme-
diately organized a company known as the Security
Warehouse and Storage Company. This company
was incorporated, with the following officers : Pres-
ident, H. L. Currier; vice president, E. P. Currier;
secretary and treasurer, Adolph Wacker. The com-
pany's plant is located on West Cedar Street, along
the Bitter Root Railway tracks. They do a general
storage and transfer business, the volume of busi-
ness bein^ larger than any similar company in Mon-
tana outside of Butte. Mr. Currier has been very
successful in all his business ventures and owns
several residences and other real estate in Missoula.
Politically, he is a republican and, fraternally,
is a member of Minot Lodge, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, at Minot, North Dakota, and
Washburn Lodge, Knights of Pythias, at Wash-
burn, North Dakota. He is also a member of the
Missoula Chamber of Commerce and Rotary Club.
In August, 1918, at Conrad, Montana, Mr. Currier
was married to Emaline Messersmith, the daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. E. F. Messersmith, of Dickerson,
North Dakota. Mr. Messersmith was a pioneer set-
tler of Dickerson, having erected the first building
there, and for many years was a successful stock-
man and rancher, being now retired from active
labor. Mrs. Currier is a graduate of the North
Dakota State Normal School and prior to her mar-
riage she had taught school at Dickerson. She is
a lady of culture and charming personality and Mr.
and Mrs. Currier are popular members of the social
circles in which they move. Mr. Currier gives his
unreserved support to every movement for the gen-
eral good of the community and enjoys the good
will of all who know him.
John Bollinger is well known among the grain
growers of Yellowstone County, being manager
for the Powers Elevator Company at Pompey's
Pillar. He is a practical grain man, and has spent
all his life in the great harvest sections of the
Northwest.
Mr. Bollinger was the first white child born at
Harvey, North Dakota, on November 23, 1896. His
family was among the pioneers and homesteaders
of Dakota Territory. His grandfather, Adam Bol-
linger, was born in Germany in 1825, and on com-
ing to the United States went to the northwestern
corn fields and settled at Eureka, South Dakota.
His original homestead he still owns, and has ac-
cumulated 960 acres. He is still living at the ad-
vanced age of ninety-four, and makes his home
with his son Adam.
.Adam Bollinger, father of John, was born in 1874,
and is now living at Medina, South Dakota. After
his marriage at Eureka, South Dakota, he moved
to Harvey, established his home on a quarter sec-
tion of land, where he lived for four years. In
1900 he established the first general merchandise
store at Medina, and was also the first mayor of
that town and the first representative from that
section to the State Legislature. He is still active
as a merchant, and is the leading citizen of Me-
dina. He is a stand-pat republican in politics, an
active supporter of the Baptist Church, is affili-
ated with Jamestown Lodge of Elks and has exten-
sive farming interests in addition to his business
in town. Adam Bollinger married Marguerite Wohl.
who was born in South Dakota in 1875. John Bol-
linger was the oldest of their children. Rose is
unmarried, living with her parents; .Albert and
Adam both assist their father in his business; Til-
lie is a high school student, while Elizabeth and
172
HISTORY OF MONTANA
William, the youngest, are still in the grade schools.
John Bollinger linished his education m the high
schools of Medina and Jamestown, took a busmess
course at Fargo, North Dakota, in 1913, and spent
the following year at home with his father. He
then entered the service of the Powers Elevator
Company, beginning at the bottom of the ladder,
working five months at Killdeer, North Dakota,
and was then promoted to manager of the local
plants. He was there seven months, and on No-
vember 22, igi6 was assigned to his present duties
as manager at Pompey's Pillar, Montana. He re-
gards Montana as his permanent home, and is an
active factor in local affairs. He owns a modern
home at Pompey's Pillar.
Mr. Bollinger is a republican and a member of
the Baptist Church. On July 3. IQ'/, at Medina
he married Miss Emma Mullinax, a daughter of
Mark and Belle (Malcomb) Mullinax, both now
deceased. Her father was a Kentucky farmer.
Mr. and Mrs. Bollinger have two children, twins,
born September 20, 1918, named Donald and Dale.
Glenn B. Blakeslee. Among the comparatively
young men of Livingston who have forged to the
front no better or worthier example than that of
Glenn B. Blakeslee, the well-known merchant and
a representative business man, could be found. He
is known as a man of excellent judgment. Careful
in his calculations, resourceful in his dealings and
eminently honorable in his relations with others,
people have always reposed confidence in his word
and his integrity "has been above criticism.
Glenn B. Blakeslee was born September 9, 1881,
at Port Madison, Lee County, Iowa, and is a son
of John G. and Harriet (Russell) Blakeslee. John
G. Blakeslee was born at Shintown, Illinois, in
1841, and was there reared and educated. After his
marriage, which also occurred there, he took up a
homestead in Kansas, where he resided until the
birth of his first two children. He then moved to
Lee Countv, Iowa, and was engaged in the dairy
business until 1887, when he located in DeSoto,
Nebraska, and followed stockraising and farming.
In 1889 he located in Bennington, Nebraska, where
he operated a grain elevator and bought grain and
live stock. Two years later he went to Newport,
Rock County, Nebraska, and engaged in the corn-
mission business, handling live stock and hay. In
1893 he engaged in the commission business in
Omaha. Nebraska, but a short time later he went
to Oklahoma, where for two years he sold nursery
stock. In 1898 heattempted to enlist for the Spanish-
American war, but was rejected on account of his
age. In 1903 he came to Livingston, Montana, and
has made his permanent home with his son, H. D.
and Glenn B. Tohn G. Blakeslee married Harriet
Russell, who was born in 1844 in Shintown, Illinois,
and who died at Weaver, Iowa, in 1886. To this
union were born the following children : Lucy is the
wife of W. C. Bradford, of Livingston, and who is
foreman of a carpenter crew on the Northern
Pacific Railroad; Harry D., who is referred to
specifically elsewhere in this work; Edward, who
died in young manhood; John, who was drowned
at Weaver, Iowa, at the age of eight years; and
Glenn B. John G. Blakeslee is a republican in his
political views. He is to some extent engaged in
the real estate business, though is practically re-
tired from active life.
Glenn B. Blakeslee received his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools at Fremont, Nebraska,
supplementing this by attendance at the Fremont
Normal School, where he took a business course
under Professor William Clemmings. Leaving
school in 1899, he came to Livingston in January
of the following year and was employed as civil
engineer by the Northern Pacific Railway for a year.
Then for another year he was with the Winslow
Mercantile Company and for the same length of time
he worked in the store of Thompson & Brother.
In 1903 his brother Harry D. Blakeslee purchased
a partnership in what was then known as Houston
& Alkier's, buying Mr. Alkier's interest. When H.
D. Blakeslee entered the firm Glenn became asso-
ciated with the store, and about a year later he
bought Mr. Houston's interest. The firm was then
reorganized under the name of Blakeslee Brothers,
and continued until Glenn B. bought his brother's
interest, January i, 1914, becoming sole owner. He
has now one of the leading stores of Southern
Montana and does a business which would be credit-
able in a much larger city than Livingston. He
handles groceries, tinware, graniteware, crockery and
queensware, being the largest dealer in the latter
line in Montana. Prompt service, goods of quality
and square dealing are the elements which have
gained for Mr. Blakeslee the phenomenal business
which he now enjoys, a business which shows steady
annual gains. Mr. Blakeslee also has many other in-
terests, among which are the following : The lead-
ing general store at Wilsall ; a ranch of 190 acres,
known as the Riverside Ranch, located north of the
poor farm, 2^ miles east of Livingston; real estate
and mining interests at Cook City, Montana; the
washer and fan mill at Cokedale ; is a director and
the president of the National Mining and Develop-
ment Company of Cook City; a stockholder in the
Gardiner Cement Works; a stockholder in the Mon-
tana Fire Insurance Company of Butte; a stock-
holder in the Park Milling Company of Livingston,
the Montague Overall Factory, the Livingston Ice
Plant, the Montana Spring Wheel Company and the
Simplex .'^uto Wheel Company of Everett, Wash-
ington. He was also formerly a stockholder in the
Park Creamery, but has disposed of his stock in
that company. As a matter of fact Mr. Blakeslee has
given his financial and moral support to practically
every interest which has given promise of being of
material benefit to Livingston. In return he has
reaped bountifully himself and is enjoying a richly
deserved prosperitv.
In 1912, at Livingston, Mr. Blakeslee was married
to May Trowbridge, a graduate of the high school
at Delavan, Illinois, and the daughter of Frank and
Marietta Trowbridge, the former of whom is well
known throughout Southern Montana as a breeder
of blooded horses. To Mr. and Mrs. Blakeslee
have been born the following children: Marietta,
born September 8, 1914; Russell Glenn, August 8,
1916; Robert Franklin, April 29, 1919.
Politically Mr. Blakeslee gives his earnest support
to the republican party, while his religious affiliation
is with the Methodist Episcopal Church, of which
local organization at Livingston he has been a trustee
for the past five vears. Fraternally he is a member
of Zephvr Camp No. 151, Woodmen of the World,
Yellowstone Lodge No. 10, Knights of Pythias, and
Livingston Lodge No. 246, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks. He is also a member of the
Livingston Chamber of Commerce. He is strongly
attached to the citv of his residence and in which
he has concentrated his business activities, and he
now occupies an enviable place in the confidence of
his fellow citizens.
Harry D. Bi-akeslee. One of the leading citizeiis
and representative business men of Livingston is
Harry D. Blakeslee. His has been an active and use-
ful li'fe, but the limited space at the disposal of the
(
HISTORY OF MONTANA
173
biographer forbids more than a casual mention of
the leading events in his career, which will suffice
to show that earnest endeavor and honesty of pur-
pose, rightly applied and persistently followed, will
lead to success. He is a man of influence in local
affairs and is looked upon as a man in thorough
sympathy with any movement looking toward the
betterment or advancement in any way of his com-
munity, where he is regarded as worthy of the con-
fidence and respect accorded him by his fellow
citizens.
Harry D. Blakeslee was born at Fort Scott, Kansas,
December 27, 1873, and is the son of John G.
Blakeslee, who is referred to more specifically in
the sketch of Glenn B. Blakeslee, elsewhere in this
volume. He was educated in the public schools of
Weaver, Iowa, and accompanied the family on their
removal to DeSoto, Nebraska, where he also gained
some school training. In 1894 he graduated from
the Lincoln Business College at Lincoln, Nebraska,
and shortly afterward became a traveling salesman
for the Chicago Portrait Company, his territory in-
cluding Eastern and Northern Nebraska and South
Dakota. After following that vocation for five years
Mr. Blakeslee came to Livingston and for a few
months was employed in the mercantile house of
James Thompson. He then purchased a partnership
in what was then known as Houston & Alkier's, buy-
ing the junior partner's interest. At that time his
brother Glenn B. became associated with the store
and about a year later bought Mr. Houston's in-
terest. The firm was then reorganized under the
title of Blakeslee Brothers and so continued until
Harry D. sold out to his brother on January i, 1916,
the former taking the ranches owned by the brothers
and Glenn B. taking the store. Mr. Blakeslee now
owns 1,920 acres of land, all good ranch property.
Of this 480 acres are located sixteen miles north of
Livingston and Mr. Blakeslee also owns the water
right for this land. The remainder of his land is
located about five miles from Chico Springs, Mon-
tana, which land he rents. For several years Mr.
Blakeslee has been engaged as a track shipper, send-
ing hay, grain and potatoes in carload lots to large
cities, such as Chicago, Kansas City, Minneapolis
and Duluth, besides many smaller places through
Montana and other sections of the Northwest.
Mr. Blakeslee has long been numbered among the
active supporters of all local movements for the
advancement of the best interests of the community.
During the time he was connected with the store
here he was president of the Business Men's Credit
Association, and he was one of the organizers of
the Livingston Commercial Club, but resigned his
membership when he left the store.
In politics Mr. Blakeslee assumes an independent
attitude, and his religious membership is with the
Church of Christ, Scientist. Fraternally he belongs
to Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted .Masons, and to the Eastern Montana Con-
sistory of the Scottish Rite, in which he has attained
the eighteenth degree.
In 1901, at Fremont, Nebraska, Mr. Blakeslee mar-
ried Sarah Crosby, the daughter of J. M. and Martha
. E. (Hancock) Crosby. Mr. Crosby was a Union
veteran of the Civil war, and as a result of his
sufferings and privations while a captive in Libby
Prison he was practically an invalid during the re-
mainder of his life. He died at Schuyler, Nebraska,
in 1914, and his widow now makes her home with
Mr. Blakeslee and his wife. Mrs. Blakeslee at-
tended the Normal College at Fremont. Nebraska,
and for several years prior to her marriage she was
principal of the graded schools at Emerson, Ne-
braska. To Mr. and Mrs. Blakeslee have been born
the following children: Glenn, born October 15,
igo2, is a sophomore in the Park County High
School ; Imogene, born in May, 1904, is a freshman
in the same institution ; Donald, born in igo6, John,
born in 1908, and Gretchen, are in the public schools;
and Betty, at home.
John P. Schmit, of Luxemburger extraction,
was born at Port Washington, Wisconsin, March
II, 1864. He is the eldest of ten children. His
father, J. Michael Schmit, was born at Esch op der
Ulzicht in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg on
October 10, 1838, and his mother, who was Katha-
rina Hansen, was born at Everlingen in the same
duchy, October I, 1842. Mr. Schmit's parents came
to America with their respective families in 1846,
the Schmits settling on an eighty-acre homestead
near Holy Cross and the Hansens acquiring a
home in Port Washington, both towns being in
Ozaukee County, Wisconsin. Mr. Schmit's par-
ents were married on June I, 1863. The mother
died June 15, 1909, and the father on June ij, 1913.
John P. was educated in the public and parochial
Catholic schools of his home town. His first em-
ployment was as clerk and bookkeeper in a gen-
eral store. In August, 1885, he went westward,
remaining in St. Paul over winter and in the spring
of 1886 he went to Devil's Lake, North Dakota.
There he married Susie Weis on December 18,
1887, she going there from her native home to wed
him. Mr. Schmit was engaged in business at Devil's
Lake until October, 1890. On November 2, iSyu,
he arrived at Helena, Montana, with his wife and
two babies. Mr. Schmit soon after became en-
gaged in gold mining as manager for English and
American companies, and followed this occupation
in Montana, Oregon and California. In 1899 Mr.
Schmit resigned his position with the mining com-
pany to take up his home in Helena, where his
children were educated.
In 1901 he was appointed register of the state
land office by Governor Joseph K. Toole, and re-
mained in the position until April, 1908.
On August IS, 1910, Mr. Schmit entered the First
National Bank of Lewistown as assistant cashier.
For the past few years he has been active vice
president of this leading institution.
He built a nice residence at 821 W. Water Street
in the fall of 1910, where he has since resided with
his family. His three children, two sons and one
daughter, are married and also live here.
Mr. Schmit has always taken a keen interest in
public matters and is regarded as one of Mon-
tana's most forceful public speakers. He has always
been a democrat in politics, and is throughout a
thorough and intense American.
Jessee Frazer Forbes is president of the Fergus
Hotel Company at Lewistown. Of his ability as
a hotel manager perhaps nothing could speak in
stronger terms than the long period of his service
with the famous Fred Harvey Eating House and
Hotel System. With his brothers as associates he
has given to Lewistown one of the most creditable
hotels in the state.
He was born at Wathena, Kansas, May 25, 1885,
son of Benjamin N. and Frances (Jessee) Forbes.
His father, a native of Ohio, died in 1910, at the
age of seventy-two. while his mother was a native
of Missouri and died at the age of fifty-six. They
were married in Kansas, and their nine children,
seven sons and two daughters, are briefly noted as
follows: Clvde. who died in infancv; Clinton D. ;
Edward N.:' Pearl Marie, wife of C. H. Bauer;
Benjamin N., Jr., who enlisted at Great Falls, Mon-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tana, in February, 1918, in the Field Artillery serv-
ice, reached France in November, some days before
the signing of the armistice, and has since returned
to the United States and received his honorable
discharge March i, 1919, with the rank of corporal;
Jessee F. ; Annie; George Thomas, who enlisted in
December, 1917, was transferred to Camp Berkeley,
California, then to Fort Worth, Texas, as a flying
cadet, and was discharged after the signing of the
armistice; Wylie H. enlisted in 1917 in the ground
school of the aviation service at Atlanta, Georgia,
was commissioned a lieutenant, was transferred to
Dallas, Texas, then to Kelly Field at San Antonio,
and has since been given an honorable discharge.
Benjamin N. Forbes became a prominent farmer
and stock man in Doniphan County, Kansas, near
Highland. He was a merchant at Highland and
Wathena, was president of the Fruit Growers State
Bank at Wathena, and established a mercantile busi-
ness at Sterling, Colorado, known as the Wathena
Mercantile Company, of which he was president.
He was affiliated with Smithton Lodge No. I, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, was a Methodist
and a republican in politics.
Jessee Frazer Forbes secured his early education
in the grammar and high schools at Wathena, Kan-
sas, attended the St. Joseph Business University
in Missouri, and gained his first knowledge of busi-
ness as clerk in the First National Bank of St.
Joseph. Later he was made cashier of the Fruit
Growers State Bank at Wathena, remaining there
about two years. Following that he finished his
education with a course in the Kansas State Normal
College at Emporia. From that he entered the serv-
ice of the Fred Harvey Eating House System, being
first located at. Dodge City, Kansas, was made as-
sistant manager at Houston, Texas, later at Dallas,
Texas, and his work with that company until the
fall, of 1913 gave him splendid opportunities to
master the technique and system which has made the
organization of Fred Harvey famous throughout
the world.
Mr. Forbes came to Lewistown in the fall of
1913 and organized the Fergus Hotel Company, of
which he is president. George T. Forbes is vice
president and W. H. Forbes is secretary and treas-
urer. Mr. Forbes is a Mason, having been raised
to the lodge at Wathena, Kansas, later demitting
and becoming a member of Lewistown Lodge No.
37. He is also affiliated with Hiram Chapter No.
15, Roval Arch Masons, and with Lewistown Lodge
No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
He is a member of the Montana State Hotel Men's
Association and in politics is a republican.
J. Harry Schuch, chief engineer of the Butte,
Anaconda & Pacific Railway, is one of the highly
trained men of his profession in this region, and
he is rendering an efficient service not only to his
road but to the people which it supplies with trans-
portation facilities. Mr. Schuch was born near Wil-
liamsport, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, Novem-
ber 18, 1880, a son of Jacob Schuch and grandson
of Peter Schuch. Peter Schuch was born in Ba-
varia, Germany, in 1800, and died at Cogan Sta-
tion, Pennsylvania, in May, 1886. In 1841 he came
to the United States and located in Lycoming Coun-
ty, Pennsylvania, where he followed farming, al-
though he was a tailor by trade, and had worked
as such in Bavaria. From 1823 to 1829 he served
in the German army. His wife, who bore the
maiden name of Barbara Drum, was born in Ba-
varia, Germany, in 1807, and died at Cogan Station,
Pennsylvania, in June, 1886.
Jacob Schuch was born in Bavaria, Germany, Feb-
ruary 17, 1835, and died March 17, 1918, at Cogan
Station, Pennsylvania. He was brought to the
United States by his parents in 1841, and spent the
remainder of his life in Lycoming County, Penn-
sylvania. A democrat, he held all of the local offices
and took an active interest in public affairs. The
Lutheran Church held his membership. Jacob
Schuch was married to Regina Stoltz, born in Lycom-
ing County, Pennsylvania, March 3, 1839, who died
in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, July 14, 1917.
Their children were as follows: William, who is
a farmer of Morenci, Michigan; Charles, who is
a farmer of West Unity, Ohio; Emma J., who mar-
ried C. B. Bastian, a physician and surgeon of Wil-
liamsport, Pennsylvania; Peter L., who is a general
business man of Cogan Station, Pennsylvania, holds
the office of postmaster and conducts a general
store ; Phoebe E., who married Ed Williamson, a
farmer of Nesbit, Pennsylvania; Harriet B., who
married Willard Lusk, a merchant of Newberry,
Pennsylvania ; Catherine M., who died on December
31, 1916, at Newberry, Pennsylvania, was the wife
of William Marquardt, who survives her and lives
at Newberry, being a telegraph operator and dis-
patcher ; and J. Harry, who was the youngest born.
J. Harry Schuch attended the rural schools of
his native county and the Lycoming County Normal
School, from which he was graduated in 1900, and
then for the subsequent four years he was engaged
in teaching school in Lycoming County. He became
a student of Bucknell University at Lewisburg,
Pennsylvania, and was graduated therefrom in 1907,
with the degree of Bachelor of Science in civil en-
gineering. In September of that year he entered
the employ of the Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad,
and for two years was in its engineering depart-
. ment at Greenville, Pennsylvania, leaving that road
for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad,
where for two years he was a draughtsman in its
Lincoln, Nebraska, office. In February, 1912, he
came to Anaconda and for five years was assistant
engineer of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Rail-
way, when, in October, 1916, he was promoted to
the position of chief engineer, and still holds that
position, his office being in the general office build-
ing of his road on West Commercial Avenue,
.\naconda.
In 1915 Mr. Schuch was married at Anaconda
to Miss Nellie G. Daniels, a daughter of Phillip
and Anna (Schantz) Daniels, of Anaconda, of which
city Mr. Daniels is police magistrate. Mrs. Schuch
is a graduate of the Anaconda High School. Al-
though he votes the democratic ticket, Mr. Schuch
has never taken an active part in politics, prefer-
ring to give his time to the profession he follows.
The Presbyterian Church has in him an active mem-
ber. He belongs to Eureka Lodge No. 290, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, of Greenville, Pennsyl-
vania ; and the American Association of Engineers.
Mr. Schuch owns his own modern residence, at No.
715 Hickory Street, Anaconda. Being trained in
the theory and practice of his profession, Mr. Schuch
approaches his problems with a sure and steady
knowledge of the method to adopt in their solu-
tion. He is very much interested in the economic ,
and social welfare of men in the engineering pro-
fession, especially of the younger men who have not
had much experience. As a citizen he measures up
to high standards, and while his profession de-
mands the greater portion of his time, he can al-
ways be counted upon to support heartily and effec-
tively measures which in his judgment will prove
beneficial to his community, state or country. There
are few men of the state vvho stand any higher in
the confidence of his associates than he.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
175
J. E. Muzzv. A highly esteemed resident of
Broadview, Montana, and one of its substantial
merchants, J. E. Muzzy is actively identified with the
advancement of the mercantile and agricultural de-
velopment of town and county, and holds high
rank among the successful business men of his
community. A son of the late B. F. Muzzy, he was
born August 13, 1864, in Nicollet County, Minne-
sota, being a descendant, many generations re-
moved, of Miles Standish, a Mayflower passenger.
His grandfather, Calvin Muzzy, was born in New
York State in 1799, but after his marriage engaged
in farming in Erie County, Pennsylvania. Ambi-
tious to advance his material interests, he removed
to Illinois, becoming a pioneer of Dupage County,
Illinois, and later settling permanently in Minne-
sota, where he resided until his death, a few years
later. He married Betsey Meacham, who was born
in New York State, and died in Nicollet County,
Minnesota.
Born in 1820, in Erie County, Pennsylvania, B. F.
Muzzy grew to manhood on the home farm, and
while young was well drilled in agricultural labor.
Soon after his marriage he removed to Illinois,
locating not far from the now busy City of Chi-
cago, where he followed his independent calling
for a brief time. Not satisfied with his prospects
there, he migrated to Minnesota, and was there
engaged in farming for some time, first in Leseur
County and afterward in Nicollet County, continu-
ing a resident of that state from 1863 until 1903.
He made one more removal, going to Emmett,
Idaho, where he lived retired until his death in
1913, at the advanced age of ninety-three years.
B. F. Muzzy married in New York State, Persis
Templeton, who was born in that state in 1824, and
died in Emmett, Idaho, in 1912. Six children were
born into their household, as follows: Abbie, de-
ceased ; Julia, deceased ; F. H., whose death oc-
curred at Payette, Idaho, in April, 1918, was for
thirty years a rancher in Laramie County, Wyo-
ming, and in Idaho was a fruit grower; Ida, widow
of A. M. Howard, a ranchman, resides at Emmett,
Idaho; Carrie, who never married and died at the
age of thirty-seven years ; and J. E., the special
subject of this personal narrative.
Obtaining the rudiments of his education in the
public schools of Minnesota, J. E. Muzzy contin-
ued his studies at the State Normal School in Man-
kato, Minnesota, for three years. Entering upon
a professional career in 1888, he taught school for
3 vear in Leseur County, Minnesota, and a year
in 'Gallatin County, Montana. Going to Oregon in
1890, Mr. Muzzy was engaged in mercantile pur-
suits at Pendleton for two years. He then re-
turned to Minnesota, and for a year taught in the
public schools of North Mankato, and the ensuing
six years held a responsible position with a whole-
sale grocery company, after which he was for five
years bookkeeper and cashier for a large manu-
facturing company at Minneapolis.
In 1908, with characteristic enterprise and fore-
thought, Mr. Muzzy took up a homestead at Reeder,
North Dakota, and prior to the founding of the
town established himself in the mercantile business,
being the pioneer merchant of the place. Sell-
ing out at an advantage in 1910, he opened a gen-
eral merchandise store at Broadview, Montana,
and in its management has shown marked ability,
having a thriving and constantly increasing trade,
his patronage extending many miles in either di-
rection. He has valuable landed property, own-
ing a ranch of 160 acres in Ad?ms County, North
Dakota, and 320 acres of land lying six miles east
of Broadview, while on Donald Avenue, Broad-
voi. 11— 12
view, he owns a good modernly improved resi-
dence. Mr. Muzzy is a stockholder in the Mutual
State Bank of Broadview, and a director of the
Broadview Amusement Company. He is a stanch
adherent of the republican party, and a member
of the Baptist Church. He likewise belongs to
the Broadview Commercial Club, and is a mem-
ber of Broadview Lodge, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, and of Broadview Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America.
Mr. Muzzy married in 1898, in Minneapolis, Minne-
sota, Miss Cora Bittner, a daughter of August and
Barbara (Scheure) Bittner, neither of whom are
now living. Mr. Bittner was for many years a
prominent business man, and also a large land
owner. Mr. and Mrs. Muzzy have no children.
They are held in high regard throughout the com-
munity in which they reside, and their home is
ever open to their many friends.
Hon. John D. Waite. The high awards that are
securable in influence, character and fortune through
a life of honest industry and genuine probity, guided
and regulated by a sense of Christian obligation,
are illustrated in the life of the late Hon. John D.
Waite, Montana pioneer, prominent banker and
rancher, ex-state senator, and one of Lewistown's
most honored and respected citizens. With no ex-
traordinary endowment of faculty, unaided by in-
heritance or friendly assistance, he was content to
enter into the life which a rising community offered
in a humble station, and to follow up the oppor-
tunities that opened before him with steadiness and
industry, gaining, step by step, the rare fruits of well-
directed enterprise, until he found himself the pos-
sessor of an enviable fortune, the director of a vast
cattle ranch industry, a trusted repository of im-
portant interests, and the head of a family circle
which yielded the richest fruits of satisfaction of
which our human lot is capable, while it still re-
flects credit upon the wise and guiding hand that
trained its harmonious members to lives of useful-
ness and honor.
John D. Waite, who had been one of the pioneers
of Central Montana, who had been closely identified
with its interests for thirty-six years, and who had
been a central figure in every movement for its
advancement, was born in Saratoga County, New
York, October 17, 1858, and secured his education in
the public schools and Oberlin College, Ohio. In
1880, in company with a friend of his boyhood,
Frank E. Wright, he came west, and, having come
up the Missouri River by boat as far as Bismarck,
North Dakota, took the stage to Helena, where he
procured a saddlehorse and rode through to the
present site of Great Falls. Subsequently he con-
tinued his journey to the Judith Basin, where he se-
cured Government land and settled down to sheep
and cattle raising, an industry in which he was later
to acquire such position that at one time in his
career his bands of sheep numbered 30,000 head.
From his original homestead there grew in the
western Judith Basin, near Utica, the great Waite
ranches, some of the finest in the state, and his
cattle and sheep holding interests became among
the finest quality and most extensive in Central
Montana. He was for years a director in the Bank
of Fergus County, and in 1908 was elected its presi-
dent, a position which he continued to hold until
his death, which occurred at his ranch, July IS.
1916.
Aside from his financial and business interests,
which were numerous and important, Mr. Waite was
probably most prominent as the leader of the re-
publican party in Fergus County and one of the
176
HISTORY OF MONTANA
foremost republicans in the state. His splendid judg-
ment and strong personality marked him as a natural
leader not long after he had come to Montana, and
he was chosen a representative of his party and
elected from his county in the Territorial Legis-
lature before Montana was admitted to statehood,
and later served in the same capacity in the first
legislative assembly. He subsequently served as
state senator. In his various civic capacities he
showed such marked qualities of leadership and ex-
ercised such comprehensive judgment that he was
elected as the member from his state on the
Republican National Committee, where his service
was characterized by the same wisdom of council and
efficiency of action that had marked him in the
various walks of life. He was favorably con-
sidered by his party as its candidate for governor,
but declined the honor to give his time and attention
to his extensive commercial affairs. In politics he
was ever recognized as an honorable opponent, and
while sincerely believing in the principles of his
party he nevertheless accorded to every man the
right to entertain a different view. Among the
hundreds gathered at his funeral to pay their final
tribute of admiration and respect were many of
other political affiliations who felt that their former
adversary was their dearest friend.
.•\s a man Mr. Waite was of a genial, cheerful
disposition, ever ready to lend a word of counsel
and good cheer. His sympathies were as broad
as his acquaintance, extending to all the various
walks of life, and no person in need made appeal
to him in vain. The years allotted to him to live
were spent with a dual purpose : To make life rich
by his contribution of service and sacrifice, and to
enjoy in the fullest measure whatsoever was ac-
corded him. The world is wont to measure success
in life by wealth acquired, or social prominence or
political position. These are but gauges of qualities
which have enabled their possessor to overcome ob-
stacles and push aside hindrances. The true tests
of human greatness are the building up of char-
acter into symmetrical manhood, and the faculty
of contributing to the well-being of the community
in some of the many lines which affect the welfare
and perfection of society. When success in acquir-
ing fortune and power is employed to better the
condition of mankind, to establish and promote
worthy enterprises, the best ends of life are at-
tained and the surest guarantee of an honorable
reputation secured. While it is given to no one in
this mortal state to gain perfection, it can truly
be said Mr. Waite was not far from achieving a
truly successful life. In commenting editorially upon
his death a Lewistown newspaper said ; "Lewistown
is not alone in her grief over the passing of this
good man. He possessed admiring friends in every
portion of the state of Montana — ^friends who knew
him as a stalwart pioneer, a representative citizen
who had grown and expanded with it. They knew
him as a leader of men ; a man who was as gentle
as a woman and from whose kindly heart radiated
good cheer and good will toward his brother man at
all times. They will pause many times in coming
years to ponder over the good deeds he performed,
the usefulness of his citizenship, and thus they
will pay tribute to the man as tributes are paid all
good men who leave behind them worthy life ex-
amples. There are too few men of the type and
character of John D. Waite : and yet there are many
good men in the world. For what does it count
a man to live his life unless when he lies down to
his eternal rest he leaves behind him something
which will make other lives better. Fortunate will
be those who profit by the heritage of honor, fidel-
ity, good will and sturdy principle that this man
leaves. More may not be said of any man than
that he loved his fellow man."
In 1893 Mr. Waite became identified with the
Masonic fraternity and was elected a, member of
Lewistown Lodge No. 37, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. Subsequently he became a member of
Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch Masons, past
eminent commander of Lewistown Commandery No.
14, Knights Templar, and past potentate of Algeria
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine. The entire membership of his home lodge,
together with many visiting brothers, attended his
funeral and escorted his body to its final resting
place, where in accordance with the ritual of the
order of which he was a distinguished and honored
member the last rites were performed. The funeral
procession, which was headed by the Knights
Templar, was the largest ever held at Lewistown,
being practically a mile in length, which indicated in
a small way the high esteem in which Mr. Waite
was held in the community. In September, 1886,
Mr. Wait* was united in marriage with Miss Martha
Sloan, of Penn Yan, Jjlew York, and they became
the parents of five children : Donald S., who married
Hazel Belden and has two children, John D. and
Jean ; Judith, the wife of James E. Woodard, presi-
dent of the Bank of Fergus County, Lewistown;
John D., Jr., who married Lillian Taylor, joined the
United States Aviation Corps at Berkeley, California,
graduated in February, 1918. was then transferred
as an instructor to the aviation training field at
Chanute, Illinois, and was honorably discharged in
December, 1918; David Bradley, who enlisted in the
United States Signal Corps in May, 1918, left Fort
Leavenworth, Kansas, for France, and when last
heard from was with the Ninety-first Division, sta-
tioned at Grieves. France; and Leslie Stirling, a
student of the University of Michigan, who at the
time of the signing of the armistice was in training
with the Students Army Corps of that institution.
The home life of Mr. Waite was ideal and here
were shown the lovable characteristics of the man.
The happiest days of an active, vigorous life were
spent surrounded by his wife and children. His
place in the home and the community will always
remain unfilled. The hundreds who gathered to pay
a last tribute to their former friend felt that each
had sustained a personal loss. His life was a con-
tinual benediction, and his death marked the close
of a noble, beautiful career.
Albert W. Gates for a number of years has been
associated with and an influential factor in a group
of prominent business interests at Lewistown. He
is one of the executive officials of the Montana
Lumber Company and is interested in a number of
affairs both local and state.
He was born in Warren, Ohio, October i^, 1873,
the only child of Albert R. and Alice (Weeks)
Gates. His parents were also natives of Ohio. His
mother died in 1874. Albert R. Gates afterward
became prominent and well known in Montana.
He was a traveling salesman when he came to
Montana in 1877, making the journey by rail to
Ogden and thence by stage to Butte. For a time
he w^as associated with George Tracey at Helena
in the commission and brokerage business, han-
dling groceries. In 1888 he built the Grandon Block
in Helena, .which was afterward remodeled into
the Grandon Hotel, of which he was proprietor
until his death. He was also a prominent Mason
in this state, being a member of Algeria Temple
of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He was also
a member of the Montana Club, the Lodge of Elks
HISTORY OF MONTANA
177
at Helena, and in politics a republican. He died
in 1904, at the age of sixty-two.
Albert W. Gates received his early education
in the schools of Des Moines, Iowa, and is a grad-
uate of the Shattuck Military Academy at Fari-
bault. Minnesota. In 1892, when nineteen years
old, he went into the Bankers Life Insurance Com-
pany of Des Moines, was later with the Green Bay
Lumber Company at Des Moines, Iowa, for a num-
ber of years, and in 1900 established his headquar-
ters at Missoula, Montana, as traveling salesman
for the Missoula Lumber Company. He has put
in almost twenty years in the lumber business and
is an expert in practically every phase of the busi-
ness. In 1905 Mr. Gates came to Lewistown. He
began his work for the Montana Lumber Com-
pany as bookkeeper, later was first assistant gen-
eral manager, then secretary, aTid is now secre-
tary, treasurer and director. The Montana Lum-
ber Company is an organization that has retail lum-
ber yards in nearly twenty Montana towns. He
is also secretary and treasurer of the Montana
Home Building Company, and a stockholder and
one of the organizers of the Lewistown Brick and
Tile Company.
He is a man of public spirit and willing to be
identified in all movements for the general welfare.
He was one of the organizers and member of the
executive committee of the Boy Scouts at Lewis-
town. He was also one of the founders of St.
James parish of the Episcopal Church and has been
a vestryman since its organization. He is a char-
ter member of the Judith Club, is affiliated with
Lewistown Lodge No. 37. Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Lewistown Chapter No. 14, Royal
Arch Masons, Lewistown Commandery No. 14,
Knights Templar, and Algeria Temple of the Mystic
Shrine at Helena. Politically he is an active repub-
lican.
November .=. 1903, he married at Livingston,
Montana, Miss" Carrie J. Atkinson, a native of La-
fayette, Indiana. They have one son, Albert J.
Joseph M. Wolfskill. The primary business in-
dustry of Stillwater County is farming and ranch-
ing, and in the development of those basic resources
Joseph M. Wolfskill of Molt has taken an active
part for a number of years. Mr. Wolfskill still
has a large ranch, noted for its Shorthorn cattle,
but as a resident of Molt he is also proprietor of
the leading hardware and lumber business of that
town.
Mr. Wolfskill represents an old and prominent
pioneer family of the State of Missouri. Several
generations ago his ancestors came out of Germany
and were settlers in colonial Virginia. Mr. Wolf-
skill's great-grandfather. John Wolfskill, was born
in Virginia and became a physician and surgeon.
Early in the nineteenth century he moved west to
the territory of Missouri, and his father also went
to the western frontier and is buried at Salisbury.
Missouri. Dr. John Wolfskill practiced for many
vears in the Missouri River Valley and died at
Bedford, that state.
The grandfather of Mr. Wolfskill was George
W. Wolfskill, who was born in Howard County,
Missouri, in 1820. just about the time Missouri en-
tered the Union. IJe spent most of his life in that
state, but in the days of '49 went out to California
and was absent about ten years. He returned by
way of the Isthmus of Panama, traveling with a
pack mule, proceeding around by sea to New York
City and finally returned to his home m Missouri.
He'was a member of the Masonic fraternity and a
very active member of the Methodist Church. He
died at Bedford, Missouri, in 1904. His wife was
Margaret Elizabeth Harvey, who spent all her life
in Missouri.
The next generation of the family was repre-
sented by John James Wolfskill, who was born
near Bedford in Livingston County, Alissouri, in
1847, and spent all his life in the northern part of
the state as a farmer. For fifteen years he farmed
in Linn County, but with that exception he lived in
Livingston County and died there in 1904. He was
a democrat, was honored with several township
offices, was active in civic affairs, and was most
widely known, in fact had a state-wide reputation
■for the pure bred Hereford cattle and Percheron
horses which he raised on his farm. He was on
the official board and for many years a steward in
the Methodist Episcopal Church. John James Wolf-
skill married Margaret Elizabeth Harris, who was
born in Howard County, Missouri, in 1850, and
died in Livingston County, Missouri, in 1900. Their
children were six in number : Martha Jane, who
is the wife of Thomas Wells, and they live on the
old Wolfskill homestead in Missouri; Flora Grace
is the wife of David P. Reece, a farmer near Samp-
sell in Livingston County; Lulu who died at the
age of five years ; Joseph M., who is the only mem-
ber of the family in Montana; Charles, a farmer
near Bedford, Missouri; and William H., who died
at the age of two years.
Joseph M. Wolfskill was born April I, 1878, while
his parents were on a farm near Meadville in Linn
County, Missouri. He grew up and received his
education in the rural schools of Livingston County
and spent three years in the State Normal School
at Kirksville. On leaving school in 1898 he became
a farmer in Livingston County, but in 1900 came
to the Northwest. For six months he was billing
clerk in the railway office at Sheridan, Wyoming,
and in 1901 arrived at Great Falls, Montana. The
following four years were spent with the Neil Creek
Cattle Company, and for another three years he
was a farmer 'in the Gallatin Valley. Mr. Wolf-
skill became identified with the Lake Basin country
in 1908 when he homesteaded 160 acres, and this
is still a part of his numerous possessions. His
farm and ranch now constitute 480 acres, and he
makes a specialty of breeding pure-bred Shorthorn
cattle. For his prominence in this industry Mr.
Wolfskill is president of the Shorthorn Breeders'
Association of Acton, Montana. He still gives his
personal supervision to his farm and ranch, but
has not lived in the country since the spring of 1917-
He moved to Molt in igi8 and has a fine modern
home there. He established the first store in the
town, building a large structure for his hardware
stock and also conducts a fully equipped lumber
vard. It is one of the best concerns of its kind
in the eastern part of Stillwater County. Mr. Wolf-
skill is also a director in the First National Bank
of Molt and is president of its Commercial Club.
When he was twenty-one years of age he was
elected recorder of Livingston County, Missouri, on
the democratic ticket. The following year he re-
signed this office to remove to Wyoming. He is a
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Bill-
ings and is affiliated with Corinthian Lodge No.
■J2 Ancient Free and Accepted Masons at Laurel.
Mr Wolfskill married Miss Lucinda L. Houx at
Chillicothe, Missouri, in 1898. She is a daughter of
George L. and Florence (Cox) Houx. the mother
now deceased and the father a retired farmer at
Chillicothe. Mr. and Mrs. Wolfskill have one
daughter, Lucile, born June 17, 1916.
178
HISTORY OF MONTANA
William H. Casto, Jr., superintendent of the
leaching plant of the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany, is a product of the West, and through the
medium of the great corporation with which he
is connected, is given an opportunity to prove the
worth of the sons of the younger states of the
Union. He was born at Soldier, Idaho, April 29,
1889, a son of William Henry Casto, and a grand-
son of William Henry Casto, who died at Salt Lake
City, Utah, in 1890. During his younger years he
was a hatter, but later in life engaged in farming
in Salt Lake County, Utah. The Casto family came
to the United States from Spain during Colonial
days.
William Henry Casto, father of William H. Casto,
Jr., was born at Council Bluffs, Iowa, in 1848, and
in 1863 came to Montana in company with his uncle
John Casto, who reared him. Later he went to the
Wood River Country in Idaho to engage in min-
ing, and was thus engaged at Soldier when his son
was born. Still later he moved to Hailey, Idaho,
where he owned and operated a mine, moving in
1898 to Custer, Idaho, and was also engaged in min-
ing at that point. When he retired, he went to
Stanley, Idaho, where he still resides. He is a dem-
ocrat, and while living at Custer, Idaho, was on
the school board, but aside from that did not enter
public life. Mr. Casto was married to Blanche
Parrott, born in 1865, died at Hailey, Idaho, in 1895.
Their children were as follows : Raymond R., who
lives at Salt Lake City, Utah, where he is engaged
in assaying; Carrie, who married David Williams, a
farmer of Stanley, Idaho ; William H., Jr., whose
name heads this review ; Frank, who is in the United
States Army ; and Elmer, who is an automobile
machinist of Detroit, Michigan.
William H. Casto, Jr., was educated in the public
schools of Hailey and Custer, Idaho, the prepara-
tory school of the Utah Agricultural College at
Logan, Utah, from which he was graduated in 1907,
and the University of Idaho at Moscow, Idaho, from
which he was graduated in 1912 with the degrees
of Bachelor of Science and Mining Engineer. In
1912 he began to work for the government as sur-
veyor in the Forest Preserve Department, and in
the fall of that year engaged in mining at Mackay,
Idaho, for a short period. For a month he was
millman for the Utah Copper Mill at Garfield, Utah,
and then followed mining in Idaho until 191.3 when
in May of that year he came to Anaconda to become
assistant in the testing department of the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company. The value of his varied
experiences was recognized and the young man was
promoted, first to be a solution foreman, then gen-
eral foreman of the leaching plant, and finally to
be superintendent of this plant, which position he
still holds. His offices are at the leaching plant
of the Washoe Reduction Works, two miles east of
Anaconda. Mr. Casto has 120 men under his su-
pervision and is a very competent member of his
profession. He is an independent in his politics.
The Roman Catholic Church holds his membership
and he also belongs to Anaconda Council No. 882,
Knights of Columbus, of which he is a third degree
knight. Professionally he maintains connections
with the American Institute of Mining and Metal-
lurgical Engineers. His residence is at No. 321
West Fifth Street, Anaconda.
In 1916 Mr. Casto was married at Anaconda to
Miss Marie Marcille, a daughter of Joseph and
Charlotte (Brainerd) Marcille. Mr. Marcille was
a steam engineer for the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company, but is now deceased. Mrs. Marcille re-
sides with Mr. and Mrs. Casto. Mrs. Casto is a
graduate of the Anaconda High School and the
Spokane Business College of Spokane, Washing-
ton. The only child of Mr. and Mrs. Casto is
Blanche, who was born March 30, 1917. Like others
occupying positions of trust and responsibility with
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, Mr. Casto
stands very high in his community, and while his
responsibilities are of so engrossing a character as
to prohibit his giving personal attention to politics,
he can be counted upon to render efficient aid in
promoting and supporting any measure calculated
to prove of lasting benefit to Anaconda or Deer
Lodge County, and is justly numbered among the
worth-while men of this region. Mrs. Casto, both
as girl and matron, has become well known at Ana-
conda, and she enjoys an enviable social prestige
for which she is well fitted.
James E. Logan. A brainy, wide-awake man, full
of push and energy, James E. Logan occupies a
place of importance among the leading business
men of Billings, as sales manager of the North-
western Division of the Great Western Sugar Com-
pany, holding a position of great prominence and
responsibility. A son of R. M. Logan, he was born
November 16, 1879, at Rock Bluff, Nebraska. He
comes of distinguished stock, being a lineal descend-
ant of James Logan, the immigrant ancestor of that
branch of the Logan family to which he belongs,
who served for several years as William Penn's
private secretary, and later had the distinction of
being the first provinical governor of Pennsylvania.
It is needless to add that he was a Quaker in re-
ligion.
R. M. Logan was born in 1854 in Steubenville,
Ohio, and received his education in that place and
in Philadelphia. In early manhood he spent a year
in Marion County, Iowa, teaching school while
there and devoting all of his leisure time to the
study of law. Going from that place to Nebraska,
Mr. Logan lived for a year in Rock Bluff, after
which he practiced law in Ainsworth, Nebraska,
until 1893, meeting with good success. Removing
with his family to Delta, Colorado, in that year,
he resumed his law practice, continuing until the
present time, although he is now practically retired
from the profession. Taking an active part in poli-
tics, he is prominent in the democratic ranks, hav-
ing been among the leaders of his party in the po-
litical and civil aft'airs of Nebraska, and chairman
of the democratic state committee of Colorado for
a number of years.
R. M. Logan married, in Marion County, Iowa,
Irene \N'elch, who was born in Knoxville, Iowa, in
1856, and of their union three children were born, as
follows: James E., the subject of this sketch; John
Wesley, a cattleman in Utah; and Bessie, wife of
B. F. Reed, who is engaged in the practice of law
in Denver, Colorado.
Having acquired the rudiments of his education
in Nebraska, in the public schools of Omaha and
Ainsworth, James E. Logan accompanied his par-
ents to Colorado, and was graduated from the Delta
High School with the class of 1898. Desirous of
entering the legal profession, for which he was well
fitted, he entered the Hastings Law College at San
Franci.sco, California, and there continued his stud-
ies for 3;/^ years. Returning to Colorado, he was
employed in mining and ranching at Delta for some
time. In the meanwhile, in 1903, Mr. Logan became
associated with the Amalgamated Sugar Company
of Logan. Utah, as a student and chemist. In 1904
he accepted a position at Eaton, Colorado, as book-
keeper for the Great Western Sugar Company, and
later was promoted to the cashiership. Continuing
with the company, he subsequently served as cash-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
179
ier of two of the branches of that organization,
one being located at Brush, Colorado, and the other
at Fort Morgan. In 1906 Mr, Logan became cashier
for the company at Billings, Montana, and shortly
after was promoted to assistant secretary. In 1915,
upon the reorganization of the company, he was
again promoted, being made sales manager of the
Northwestern Division of the Great Western Sugar
Company, and has since performed the duties de-
volving upon him in that capacity with character-
istic ability and fidelity. Mr. Logan's ofifices are
just south of the city limits of Billings, and in
addition to having charge over two factories in Mon-
tana he has supervision of one in Wyoming. He
owns a pleasant home in Billings, at 309 North
Thirty-second Street, and has a well-kept ranch in
Colorado.
Mr. Logan has various business interests aside
from those connected with the sugar company, be-
ing president of the Billings Mutual Building and
Loan Association, which he organized in 1908;
president of the Logan-Wilson Mercantile Company
of Long Beach, California; and as a member of the
Billings Park Board has been very influential in
the starting and building of city parks and play-
grounds, enterprises of lasting benefit to the city
and of which he may well be proud.
Politically Mr. Logan is a republican, and active
in party ranks. Socially he belongs to the Billings
Midland Empire Club, and to the Billings Club.
Fraternally he is a member of Ashlar Lodge No.
29, Ancient Free and Accepted Order of Masons;
of Algeria Temple. Ancient Arabic Order Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine, at Helena, Montana; of Helena
Consistory ; and is a thirty-second degree Mason.
He is also a member of Billings Lodge No. 394,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
In April, 1906, at St. Joseph, Missouri, Mr. Logan
was united in marriage with Miss Alta Wilson, a
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. H. W. Wilson, residents
of St. Joseph, where Mr. Wilson is connected with
the Nave McChord Wholesale Grocery. Mr. and
Mrs. Logan have three children : James E., Jr.,
born April 30, 1907; Marie Irene, born May 17,
1909; and Bettie, born December 20, 1915. All of
the children were born in Billings.
William M. Abel, a resident of Montana over
thirty-five years, is a pioneer market man of Lewis-
town, and as a member of the firm Abel Brothers
commands and directs some very extensive resources
in and around that city, the firm being extensive
ranch proprietors and stock raisers in addition to
their retail meat business.
William M. Abel was born February 23, 1868, at
Nassau on the Rhine in Germany, a son of William
and Margaret (Jung) Abel. His parents were also
born in the same Rhine District, where the father
followed farming. He came to America in 1890
and spent the rest of his life in Montana, where
he died in 1906, at the age of sixty-seven. His widow
is still living at Lewistown.
William M. Abel was the oldest of five children,
two sons and three daughters. He grew up in his
native land, and 1884, at the age of sixteen, crossed
the ocean by steamship to New York City and
reached Helena, Montana, March i6th of that year.
He spent some time at Helena, working in markets
and grocery stores, and in 1891 arrived in Lewistown
after a journey by railway and stage. Here he en-
tered the livestock, meat and produce business, asso-
ciated with his brother John under the firm name
of Abel Brothers. They have sold meat and other
products to the community for over a quarter of a
century, and out of their well earned prosperity
have accumulated 880 acres of fine ranch and farm-
ing lands devoted both to the production of stock
and grain.
Mr. Abel is affiliated with the Independent Order
of Foresters and the Woodmen of the World, and in
politics is a republican, though often independent
and supporting the best man regardless of party.
In 1892 he married Margaret Kraus, a native of
Wisconsin. Their five children are named William,
Eleanor, Edna, Elsie and Frank, all of whom were
born in Montana.
James Livingston Martin since locating at
Lewistown has made himself a factor in that com-
munity's business and civic affairs, and is now serv-
ing his second term as clerk of the District Court.
He was born in Polk County, Missouri, April
26, 1877, a son of William A. and Clementine (King)
Martin. His father, who was born in Tennessee
in 1851, was taken while a child by his parents to
Missouri, grew up in Polk County, acquired his
education in the public schools, and spent his active
life as a farmer and stock man. He died in No-
vember, 1916. He was deeply interested in the
cause of education and served as a member of
the school board many years. Jie was a demo-
crat and a member of the Methodist Episcopal
Church. His wife was born in Wisconsin in 1856,
and is still living in Polk County, where she and
her husband were married in 1875. James L. Mar-
tin was the second of seven children, five sons and
two daughters, all living but one.
Mr. Martin spent his boyhood days on his fath-
er's Missouri farm. He attended public schools,
graduating from high school in 1898, and for a
year taught. His first experience in business was
as a merchant at Aspen, Colorado, and from there
in 1904 he came to Lewistown and continued his
successful career as a merchant until 1908. After
that he took up the real estate and insurance busi-
ness, but in the fall of 1912 was elected clerk of
the District Court. He began his first term the
first Monday in January, 1913, and was re-elected
in the fall of 1916. Mr. Martin is a democrat, and
is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 450 Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks, and with Judith
Lodge No. 30, Knights of Pythias.
February 2, 1908, he married Helma Elberg, a
native of Wisconsin. They have one son, James
W., born in 1910 and now attending school.
Harry H. Howard was born in 1877 and the Boze-
man Daily Chronicle, in 1882. When the Chronicle
was ten years old and Mr. Howard fifteen their
destinies were linked together in a bond that has
not been dissolved for more than a quarter of a cen-
tury. He is now manager and half owner of the
Daily Chronicle plant, one of the best equipped
ne*vspaper and printing offices in Southern Montana.
Mr. Howard was born at Canyon City in Grant
County, Oregon, August 24, 1877. His paternal an-
cestors came originally from Scotland and were
early settlers in the State of Missouri, On his
mother's side Mr. Howard has an admixture of
French and German ancestry. His father, Dr. J.
W. Howard, was born in Missouri in 1843 and was
a child when he accompanied the family on its long
migration from Missouri to Grant County, Oregon
In the same party and riding in another prairie
schooner that made up the train was a young girl,
Josephine Cozad, who afterwards became the wife
of J. W. Howard. The latter was reared in Grant
County, Oregon, was married in that state, was a
graduate of Oregon University and for many years
a successful physician and surgeon. He practiced
180
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Canyon City, Oregon, and in 1886 removed to
Dillon, Montana, where he practiced two years, and
then for a number of years was one of the prom-
inent men in his profession at Butte. Finally he
retired and lived with his children at Great Falls
until his death in 1907. He was a very active repub-
lican and prominent in politics in different commun-
ities. For one term of two years he served as
coroner of Silver Bow County, was an alderman
in Butte, and on one occasion lacked one vote of
being nominated for mayor of that city. He was
also affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. His wife,
Josephine Cozad, was born in Illinois in 1852, and
is still living, making her home among her children.
These children were seven in number : John H., in
the piano business at Portland, Oregon; J. W., who
shares almost a family talent for music and is a
professional musician at Boston, Massachusetts;
Harry H. ; L. L. and E. E., proprietors of a men's
furnishing goods store on Main Street in Bozeman ;
L. D., advertising manager of the Daily Chronicle;
and E. C, a musician at Everett, Washington.
Mr. Howard learned typesetting and all the me-
chanical features of printing, at the same time get-
ting a knowledge of newspaper management and
work in the editorial department. Since December,
191 1, the Chronicle lias been published as a daily.
The firm is the Chronicle Publishing Company, Wd-
liam M. Bole being president; James P. Bole, vice
president and editor, and H. H. Howard, secretary,
treasurer and manager. It is the official democratic
paper of Gallatin County. The plant has all the
modern facilities for printing a daily paper and do-
ing general commercial and book printing.
Mr. Howard for many years has been devoted and
has worked unceasingly for the welfare of his home
city. Probably the chief object of his civic energy
has been the 'fire department, which he has served
as president for fourteen years. For several terms
he has served as president of the Bozeman Cham-
ber of Commerce, also as a member of the City
Council four years, for two of those years was pres-
ident of the Council, and on several occasions acted
as mayor. Mr. Howard is a democrat, is affiliated
with Bozeman Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Bozeman Camp, Woodmen of the
World, Bozeman Lodge, Brotherhood of American
Yeomen, and Bozeman Lodge No. 463 Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks.
Mr. Howard and family reside in a modern home
on South Tracy Avenue. He married at Bozeman
in 1900 Miss Aline Anceney. who was born at Den-
ver, Colorado, where her parents were early settlers.
She was of French ancestry. They have two chil-
dren: Lillian Josephine, born in 1903, now a mem-
ber of the junior class of St. Vincent's Academy at
Helena; and Charlie Louise, born in 1905, a student
in the public schools. •
Thomas B. Edwards. The Anaconda National
Bank of Anaconda is one of the most stable and
conservative banking institutions of this part of the
state and its condition reflects credit upon its officers
and community alike. Its capital stock is $100,000,
its surplus. $30,000, and its deposits, $1,517,486.16.
C. Yegen is its president; Thomas B. Edwards is
its vice president and manager and M. A. Fulmor
is its cashier.
Thomas B. Edwards is one of the best known
financiers of the state and since his association with
the bank, it has shown a healthy _ increase in de-
posits and other business, and gained prestige in
the community. Mr. Edwards was born at Rood-
house, Illinois, October 12, 1872. a son of George
W. Edwards and grandson of Isom Edwards. The
Edwards came from Wales and the name is purely
Welsh or Gaelic. The ancestors were a maritime
people. Cader Edwards, the emigrant, was born
in Wales and became an educated man and a great
reader, and when about forty years of age came
to the new world, landing at Baltimore, Maryland.
There he married a young woman by the name of
Margaret or Maggie Noblett and went to what was
then the extreme frontier of Virginia. Later he
drifted southwest along the frontier until the
close of the French afid Indian war, 1762-3,
and was a member of the Evan Shelby Set-
tlement in what later became the extreme ' north-
eastern corner of Tennessee. Here the outbreak
of the American Revolution found him, an old man
with a large family, but he volunteered and served
during that war, participating with Isaac Shelby in
the battle of King's Mountain, in which five of his
sons and sons-in-law were engaged. Dying at the
close of the war, he directed his wife to take the
family to the new settlement in Kentucky, and in
the fall of 1783 they landed in the Blue Grass sec-
tion of Kentucky, and from them have sprung the
large Edwards family of the United States.
Isom Edwards, grandfather of Thomas B. Ed-
wards, was born in Kentucky in 1799 and died at
Roodhouse, Illinois, in 1878, where he was a pioneer
and took up a large amount of land becoming an
extensive farmer. All of his sons but one were
in the war between the States, they being as fol-
lows : Thomas, who did not serve, Isom, Presley,
James and George W. The only brother of Thom-
as B. Edwards' mother, Jordan Frame, was killed
while serving in this same conflict.
George W. Edwards, father of Thomas B. Ed-
wards, was born at Roodhouse, Illinois, in 1841,
and died at the same place in 1907, having lived
in that neighborhood all his life and been engaged
in farrhing. He was a democrat and a Baptist,
and lived up to his ideals in politics and religion.
During the war between the States he served in
an Illinois infantry regiment and was in Florida
under Gen. Max Sigel. He married Julia Jackson,
born in Kentucky in 1843, who died at Roodhouse,
Illinois, in 1878. Their children were as follows:
George McClellan, who is a farmer of Illinois ;
Dora, who married Joseph Mirts, a farmer of Car-
rington, Missouri ; James L., who is a farmer of
Roodhouse, Illinois ; Thomas B., whose name heads
this review ; Mary Jane, who married a Mr. Mc-
Farland, a farmer of Illinois ; and Fred, who is a
farmer of Garnet, Kansas.
Thomas B. Edwards attended the rural schools
of Greene County, Illinois, and a private school of
Sullivan, Missouri, and then became a student of
the Steelville Normal Business Institute at Steel-
ville, Missouri. Subsequently he stiidied law in the
offices of several attorneys of St. Louis, Mis-
souri, and was admitted to the bar, following which
he was engaged in practice in that city from 1900
until 1902. In 1903 Mr. Edwards came to Mon-
tana and for some years was associated with the
mercantile interests of Yegen Brothers at Billings,
during the last four years being manager, but in
191 3 he went to Vallier, Montana, where he organ-
ized the Vallier Mercantile Company and for three
years was its manager. In January, 1917, Mr. Ed-
wards came to Anaconda to become vice president
and manager of the Anaconda National Bank. This
bank was established in 1904 by Yegen Brothers of
Billings as a private institution, and nationalized in
1907. It is located at No. 212 East Park Avenue,
and the building was re-modeled in 1917 so that it
is now equipped with all modern facilities and ap-
HISTORY OF .MONTANA
181
pliances for conducting a high grade banking busi-
ness, and is one of the finest in the city.
Mr. Edwards is an independent republican. He
belongs to the Christian Church of which he is an
elder. Fond of outdoor sports he belongs to the
Anaconda Anglers Club, and spends his recreation
period in hunting for big game in the Rocky Moun-
tains, but this is naturally restricted on account of
his multitudinous duties. For some years he has
been a member of the American Bankers Associa-
tion. He is vice president and half owner of the
Stoup Hardware Company of Billings. Mr. Ed-
wards owns a modern residence at No. 105 East
Seventh Street, Anaconda.
In June, 1901, Mr. Edwards was married at St.
Louis, Missouri, to Miss Lillie Anderson, a daugh-
ter of Mr. and Airs. James Anderson, both of whom
are deceased. Mr. Anderson was a farmer of Cal-
houn County, Illinois, for a long period. Air. and
Airs. Edwards have no children. A man of excel-
lent education. Air. Edwards has found it more con-
genial to use his knowledge in business enterprises
than to confine himself to the restrictions of the
most exacting profession, and his success proves
that his judgment in this respect was sound. Since
coming to Anaconda he has taken a business man's
interest in its growth and both personally and
through the medium of his bank, is responsible
for much of the expansion recently shown here.
John Kastelitz, one of the leading general mer-
chants of Bear Creek, owns and operates one of the
most important establishments of its kind in Car-
bon County. He was born at Zogorje, Austria,
which is now a portion of the new country of the
Jugo Slavs, June 29, 1878, a son of Jacob Kastelitz,
born at the same place as his son in 1847, where
he spent his life, his calling being that of a farmer.
During the war between Austria and Turkey he was
a soldier. The Roman Catholic Church held his
membership. He was married to Jennie Fotur, also
born at Zogorje in 1847, and died there in 1918.
The children born to Jacob Kastelitz and his wife
were as follows : John, whose name heads this re-
view; Alary, who married John Sustersich, a farmer
of Zogorje; and Frank, who resides at Zogorje, is
engaged in mining.
John Kasterlitz attended the public schools of his
native place until he was thirteen years of age,
at which time he left school and learned the trade
of a shoemaker, following it for two years. He
then went to Northern Austria, and made ties for
the railroad for a time, and for six years was en-
gaged in contracting for ties and stakes. In 1901
he came to the United States and for the subsequent
eighteen months was engaged in the same line of
business in Alississippi, Louisiana and Texas. He
then went to Pueblo, Colorado, and for four months
worked in the smelters, and then began working
in the coal mines of Wyoming, being thus engaged
for three years. In 1906 he located permanently
at Bear Creek, Alontana, and for seven years was
engaged in coal mining leaving this line of work
to become general manager for the Slavonic Co-
operative Alercantile Association, holding that posi-
tion for four years, when he bought the business
and has since operated it as a general store. It is
located on Alain Street, and a very large business
is carried on, especially with the miners. In addi-
tion to his business, Mr. Kastelitz owns his resi-
dence, which is on the edge of town, and a ware-
house for storing his stock of goods. Politically
he is a democrat. The Roman Catholic Church
holds his membership. He belongs to Bear Creek
Lodge, Knights of Pythias ; Bear Creek Aerie,
Fraternal Order of Eagles, and the Slavonic Society.
In 1910 Mr. Kastelitz was married at Red Lodge,
Montana, to Miss Frances Semrow, born in Austria,
where she was reared and educated. Mr. and Mrs.
Kastelitz have the following children : John, who
was born in 191 1; Frank, who was born in 1912;
Mary, who was born in 1913; Eddie, who was born
in 1914; and Silvery, who was born in 1917.
Benjamin F. Moulton, chairman of the Board
of County Commissioners of Fergus County, has
until recently been too busied with his extensive
interests as a rancher to give much time to public
aflfairs, though his qualifications for official life
are widely recognized among his friends and ac-
quaintances up and down Montana, where he has
lived for over thirty-five years.
Mr. Aloulton was born in Waldo County, Alaine,
and his people were identified with the Pine Tree
State for several generations. His birth occurred
February 28, 1867. His parents, Elkanah H. and
Alelissa (Tasker) Aloulton, were also natives of
Maine. His father died at the age of eighty-seven
and his mother at seventy-seven. Their four chil-
dren, three sons and one daughter, are all living,
Benjamin being the third in age. His father was
a farmer and quite a prominent stock man, rais-
ing and exhibiting Durham cattle, and standard
bred trotting horses, and his stock frequently ap-
peared and won premiums at county fairs in New
England. He was a republican in politics and a
member of the Masonic Order.
Benjamin F. Aloulton spent his boyhood days on
his father's farm and acquired a common school
education in his native county. He left Alaine and
came West, and in the spring of 1883 reached Bill-
ings, Alontana. From there he went to Flat Wil-
low, then in Aleagher County, now Fergus County,
and was connected with the Alontana Sheep Com-
pany, which a few years later sold their sheep herds
and stocked up with cattle. Air. Aloulton was with
this livestock corporation about four years. He
then located a tract of Government land on Mc-
Donald Creek and engaged in the stock business
for himself, handling sheep, cattle and horses. He
still owns about 2,100 acres of land and has it highly
improved with buildings and other facilities and
equipment. In June, 1918. he disposed of his sheep,
and his farm is now devoted entirely to cattle, the
famous White Face or Herefords, and the Per-
cheron horses. He has about 225 head of Herefords
and forty head of Percherons.
Several years ago Air. Aloulton bought a home
in Lewistown in order to establish his family con-
venient to better school facilities. He lives in
Lewistown during the winters but his summers
are spent on his ranch about forty miles from that
city. He was appointed a member of the Board
of County Commissioners in 1916, and was elected
for a regular term of six years in 191 7, and has
been chosen chairman of the board. He is a re-
publican and is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
Air. Moulton married Julia Smith, a native of
Iowa, and they have three children, two daughters
and one son, Lucy, Clara and Edwin. Lucy is the
wife of Alark Teters, of Alontana.
Whitfield Shipley, now retired at Lewistown,
was the practical coal mining expert who opened up
many of the pioneer deposits of coal and lignite in
Alontana, and from an experience covering nearly
forty years probably has more first hand informa-
tion and history of coal mining in Alontana than
any other living man.
182
HISTORY OF MONTANA
He was born in England October g, 1859, a son of
Robert and Ellen (Taylor) Shipley. His parents
spent all their lives in England, where his father
was a gardener. He died in 1870 and the mother at
the age of fifty-two. Whitfield was the eleventh in
a family of twelve children, only three of whom are
still living. . ,
Whitfield Shipley learned mining in the old country
and in 1877, at the age of eighteen, came to America,
landing at New York City and first going to the
coal district around Brazil, Indiana. He was soon
employed by the Northern Pacific Railway as a coal
mine prospector in the Dakotas. In the spring of
1880 the same company sent him on to Montana, and
he located a bed of coal seven miles west of Miles
City, at the Town of Lignite. Here he opened the
first coal mine for the company. He also went over
the proposed line of a railroad toward Washington,
and made locations for a number of coal mines.
Later returning, he located the coal at Timber-
line to which a branch road was constructed. He
also' opened the mine where Red Lodge now stands,
this being the pioneer coal mine for general use
in Montana. Mr. Shipley's experience also covers
other phases of mining. He was at Maiden in
pioneer times, working in the Spotted Horse quartz
mines, the Maginnis mines, and then went to iieit
and opened the coal mines there. His last practical
work as a miner was done in Fergus County. He
established himself on a tract of Government land
and did coal mining and farming in combination
until 1919. In that year he sold his ranch and has
since lived quietly retired in Lewistown. Mr. Ship-
ley is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and in
politics is a democrat. . , ,,
On December 29, 1889, he married Mary Ann
Couch a native of South Wales. She is a daughter
of Thomas and Maria (Victory) Couch, both natives
of Devonshire, England. She is the second child
tn a family of eleven children, of whom six are
living. Her father is still living in Peterboro, On-
tario, at the age of ninety-six.
Maj. William Osterhout Whipps. By the im-
portance of his duties Maj. William Osterhout
Whipps is one of the most distinguished of Montana
sons who shared in the World war.
Major Whipps, who is a son of William C. and
Annie E. Whipps, of Kalispell, was born at Helena,
January 25, 1888, and was three years old when his
parents removed to Kalispell. The brilliant qualities
of his mind were evidenced when he was a boy in
school. At the age of seventeen he graduated at the
head of his class from the Flathead County High
School, the following year he spent in the Shattuck
Military Academy at Faribault, Minnesota, and was
graduated at the age of eighteen at the head of his
class and with the highest marking received by any
student that has ever passed through that institu-
tion. His scholastic career was completed in Co-
lumbia University in New York, where he spent six
years, and at the age of twenty-four graduated, hav-
ing specialized in engineering. On returning from
the east he was associated with his father in the
mercantile business at Kalispell four years. In
1914 he went to Texas to engage in the Bermuda
Onion industry in the southern part of that state.
On account of unsettled conditions on the Texan
border and the difficulty of getting Mexican laborers
he sold his interests and returned to Montana. For
about a vear he was engaged in the laying out and
building of roads in Flathead County.
He had become interested in military aflfairs and
had joined Company F of the State Militia at Kali-
spell in 1908 or 1909. He became a lieutenant of the
company and when its services were required on the
Mexican border in 1916 he accompanied the Second
Montana Regiment. On his return he was in the
engineering department of the Anaconda Copper
Company at Butte, but still retaining his commis-
sion in the militia he was called to Federal duty
March 26, 1917. He opened a recruiting office in
Butte. He was promoted to captain April 10, 1917,
and assigned to duty as supply officer for the Second
Montana Regiment. This regiment on being mus-
tered into the National army became the One Hun-
dred and Sixty-Third United States Infantry. Later
Captain Whipps was detached from the regiment and
made acting quartermaster at Fort William Henry
Harrison, and was on duty there until December,
1917. He was then relieved and ordered to join
his regiment in France. He reached England en
route to France January 19, 1918, and was detained
there and again detached from his regiment to serve
as assistant quartermaster at Winchester, one of the
principal American camps in England. In April,
1918, he was permanently transferred to the Quarter-
master's Corps and assigned as disbursing officer
for the Winchester District, embracing Southampton,
Portsmouth and some other camps. His duties oc-
casionally required his presence in London and Liver-
pool. In December. 1918, he was ordered to London
and assigned as chief disbursing officer for all Eng-
land. This was one of the most responsible positions
in the American Expeditionary Forces. He was still
at work in that capacity as late as December, 1019,
engaged in settling up the many accounts of the War
Department with the English Government and all
other accounts and contracts in England pertaining
to the American War Department. He was relieved
from duty as chief disbursing officer of England
in December, 1919, and immediately assigned to duty
in the American Graves Registration Service and
placed in temporary command of the zone of Great
Britain with headquarters at London.
In the fall of igi8 Captain Whipps was recom-
mended for promotion, but the war being ended by
the armistice he did not receive his commission as
major until February, 1919- On being solicited to
take the examination for a commission in the Reg-
ular army he passed a perfect examination and was
highly recommended by General Riddle and other
high officers for a commission.
In the fall of 1916 Major Whipps married Rose
Surgley. They have one child, William Surgley
Whipps, born at Helena November 18, 191".
Howard Zenor Bielenberg. While most of his
time is now given to the management of his fine
garage at Deer Lodge, Mr. Bielenberg is one of the
most widely traveled and experienced citizens of
that town. He has mined as far north as the .\rciic
Circle, has been south to the Equator, and the forty
years since he was born at Deer Lodge have afford-
ed him opportunity for a busy and unusual career.
He is a son of N. J. Bielenberg, an honored old
resident of Deer Lodge and a man of similar variety
of fortune and experience. His father was born
in 1846 near the city of Hamburg, but over the line
in Holland. In 1848 his parents came to the United
States and settled at Davenport, Iowa, where he
lived until he was seventeen years of age. He then
learned the butcher's trade in Chicago, and in 1S63
came to the Northwest frontier, traveling up the
Missouri River, and arriving at Fort Benton, Mon-
tana, in 1863. He followed his trade in Blackfoot
City, then a thriving mining town, and was one of
the' first butchers in Helena. He bought a ranch
on Dempsey Creek in Powell County, and still owns
about 7,000 acres in that vicinity. Through many
HISTORY OF MONTANA
years he continued his trade and his business as a
retail and wholesale meat dealer and originated the
Butte Butcher Company, an organization still in
existence, and in which he has financial interests.
His home has been at Deer Lodge since 1873, and
he was in the butcher business there until he sold
out in 1909. Through half a century or more he has
given much time to mining, and has operated at
Butte, Helmville, Missoula, in Powell County, at
Contact, Nevada, and in fact his interests and oper-
ations in the gold, silver, copper, lead and placer
mines might be said to cover every important min-
ing district in the West. He is a man of indefat-
igable energy, great enterprise, and through the ex-
ercise of both physical and moral courage achieved
more than ordinary success. He was the first man
to drive cattle from Montana across to Cheyenne,
the nearest railroad point. He is enjoying a serene
existence, after the many trials and tribulations of
pioneer days. He is a republican and a member of
the Presbyterian Church, is affiliated with Helena
Lodge of Masons and the Temple of the Mystic
Shrine at Helena and has been a public spirited citi-
zen of Deer Lodge many years. He was the origi-
nator of the waterworks system of that town, and
in other ways has promoted its development and
upbuilding. He owns a large amount of real estate,
and some years ago he erected one of the finest
homes in "the city on Milwaukee avenue. N. J.
Bielenberg married Annie Bogk who was born in
1850 and died at Deer Lodge in 1918. Alma, the
oldest of their children, is the wife of W. L Hig-
gins, a mine operator at Deer Lodge; Howard Z.
is the second in age ; Gussie died unmarried in
1891 ; she was a prominent member of the Woman's
Club at Deer Lodge and as a memorial to her
father built and gave to the club its handsome club
building. Anne is the wife of M. C. Newlon, a
monument dealer at Bakerfield, California. Claude
N., the youngest of the family, is on his father's
ranch at Dempsey.
Howard Z. Beilenberg attended public school at
Deer Lodge, a military academy at Davenport. Iowa,
and finished his education in the Helena Business
College. At the age of twenty-one he began his
independent career when he went north to Alaska,
and as a gold prospector and miner was in the
Nome rush and later made a trip within the Arctic
Circle. He had more than the ordinary success in
that northern country. He returned to Deer Lodge
in 1901, but in igo2 went back to Alaska and re-
mained there about five years. From 1907 to 1910
Mr. Bielenberg was interested in a ranch at Deer
Lodge. He then traveled over the state about a
year and on resuming his home at Deer Lodge in-
vested his means in local real estate and established
the garage on Main Street which he still owns and
manages. This is the leading garage in point of
service and equipment in Powell County. In 191 1
Mr, Bielenberg made a trip to the Panama Canal
Zone to look after some landed interests owned by
his father there. Mr. Bielenberg owns a modern
home at 509 Missouri Avenue, he is a republican
and Presbyterian, and is affiliated with Anaconda
Lodge No. 239 of the Order of Elks.
September 2, 1908, at Helena, Montana, he mar-
ried Miss Annie Winkelman. Her father is the
noted John Winkelman of Helena, an interesting
pioneer character of the Northwest, born at Bey-
rciith, Germany, came to the United States in 1869
and for ten years wore Uncle Sam's uniform in the
regular army. He was with the army in Montana
when some of the buildings were erected at Fort
Benton and 'Fort Missoula. When he left the army
after ten years of service he located at Bielenberg,
and has been continuously connected with some of
the mercantile establishements of that city. He is
a republican and Lutheran and Odd Fellow. He
married Ellen Gibson, who was born in Sweden
in 1854. Mrs. Bielenberg is the only child of her
parents, and was liberally educated in the grammar
and high schools of Helena, the Helena Business
College, and is one of the most prominent Woman's
Club members of the state. She is active in the
Deer Lodge Club, which she has served as president,
and is now chairman of the Literary Department,
and in 1906 she originated and has been the first
and only president of the Parent-Teachers Associa-
tion of Deer Lodge. Mr. and Mrs. Bielenberg have
three children : John Howard, born November 14,
1909; Nicholas I., born November 27, 1913; and
Mary Ellen, born December 13, 1914.
Leonard O. Walker owns and conducts the lead-
ing general store in his part of Carbon County, and
is one of the substantial business men of Belfry,
Montana. He belongs to good American stock,
his ancestors having come to the American colo-
nies some time antedating the Revolution, and lo-
cated in New York State, where they continued
to make the name of Walker synonymous with pro-
bity, sagacity and intense patriotism. With the pas-
sage of time members of this family have gone
forth and been equally faithful in upholding its high
standards in other states, gradually moving west-
ward until Leonard O. Walker is now firmly es-
tablished in Montana, although he was born in Sulli-
van County, Missouri, December 9, 1867.
C. E. Walker, father of Leonard O. Walker,
was born in New York State in 1829, and he died
in Sullivan County, Missouri, in 1897. After grow-
ing up in his native state C. E. Walker went to
Sullivan County, Missouri, having been married
in Illinois, and became one of the pioneer farmers
of that region. During the Civil war he served
in the Missouri militia, thus rendering a very effi-
cient service to his country and state during a pe-
riod of great stress. Although he and his wife
were married in Illinois, she was a native of Sulli-
van County, Missouri, where she was born in 1835,
her maiden name having been Mary Weaver. She
died in her native county in 1889. They had the
following children : Frank, who is in the hardware
business at Spokane, Washington ; Ida, who mar-
ried E. D. Beatty, a retired farmer of La Mar,
Colorado; Leonard O., whose name heads this re-
view; Roy, who is a music dealer of Oklahoma City;
and L. j., who is a farmer residing in Sullivan
County, Missouri. C. E. Walker was a republican
of the strongest type. A member and enthusiastic
worker in the Methodist Episcopal Church, he was
recognized as one of its pillars, and was missed in
it, as elsewhere, when he died.
Leonard O. Walker attended the rural schools
of Sullivan County, Missouri, and the Green City,
Missouri, College, which he left at the age of nine-
teen years. His first business experience was gained
as proprietor of a harness establishment at Green
City, Missouri, where he remained for six years,
leaving that place for Montana, in 1897. and spend-
ing a year on a ranch near Fromberg. For the
subsequent two years he conducted a general store
at Fromberg. and then bought a ranch in that vi-
cinity, living on it until 1913. He then sold it and
came to Belfry, where he began selling harness
and shoes in a small way, adding to the lines he
carried as he found the demand growing, and now
has the leading general store in his part of Carbon
County, and carries a stock valued at $15,000,00.
The store is located on Broadway, and Mr. Walker
184
HISTORY OF MONTANA
is the sole proprietor. Since coming to Belfry Mr.
Walker has bought a comfortable modern home,
and his interests are centered in this locality, where
he is fast becoming a very important factor.
In 1892 Mr. Walker was married at Green City.
Missouri, to Miss Lucena Bailey, a daughter ot
John Bailev and wife, both deceased, Mr. Bailey
having been a Missouri farmer. Mr. and Mrs.
Walker had two children, John R., who is on a
ranch near Belfry, and Jean Irvine, who died at the
age of eighteen months. Politically Mr. Walker is
a republican and has been assessor for two years,
and was on the school board for ten years. Frater-
nally he belongs to Bridger Lodge Independent Or-
der of Odd Fellows, and Green City Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America. To Mr. Walker belongs the
mercantile sense so that he is able to meet the de-
mands of his trade with an excellent grade of goods
and offer them at prices as low as is consistent
with their quality. He knows how to buy and
understands conditions so well that he can econo-
mize in selling and in this way give his customers
the benefit of his abilities and' connections. Having
decided to make Belfry his permanent home, Mr.
Walker is naturally desirous to secure for it urban
improvements and' have it line up with the other
communities of Carbon and adjacent counties, so
that he may always be depended upon to back with
his energy and influence all measures tending to
bring about such results.
BuRTOx R. Cole, who has been a lawyer at Lew-
istown since 1912, has gained much prominence in
his profession, and is recognized as an able and
hard working attorney whose future, based on the
solid achievements of the past, is one of unmis-
takable success.
Mr. Cole was born in Oberlin, Ohio, March 11,
1876, son of Erwin R. and Clara (French) Cole.
His parents were both natives of Ohio. His father
was a merchant at the college town of Oberlin
until 1879, when he moved to the Kansas frontier,
locating at Fort Hayes, and spent the rest of his
life there as a merchant. He died in 191 1, at the
age of seventy-six. His wife passed away in 1885,
aged forty years. Burton R. C'ole was the first of
their five children. Erwin R. Cole was a member
of the Kansas Legislature for one term and served
for a number of years as justice of the peace. He
was a republican in politics, a Presbyterian, and
affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows.
Burton R. Cole grew up in Kansas, but finished
his education in Oberlin College, Ohio, graduating
with the class of 1900. He studied law in the
Cleveland Law School during 1906-07. graduating
in the latter year. Mr. Cole soon afterward came
to Montana, and during 1911-12 taught in the Uni-
versity of Montana at Missoula. In the fall of
1912 he located at Lewistown, was admitted to the
Montana bar, and has since been busied with a
general practice. He is a republican, an Odd Fel-
low. Knight of Pythias, and in Masonry is affiliated
with Lewistowir Commandery, Knights Templar,
and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena.
May 8, 1912, Mr. Cole married Elizabeth Schilling.
She was born in Butte. Montana. They have one
son, Burton R.. Jr.
John C. Dunn, M. D. A physician and surgeon
of exceptional attainments, whose work has brought
him a commanding position in his profession at
Lewistown, Doctor Dunn at one time engaged in
practice at Chicago, but for the greater part of his
professional career has been identified with the states
of North Dakota and Montana.
He was born at Owen Sound, Canada, October
10, 1873, a son of Captain Edwin and Jennie (Hanna)
Dunn. His father was born at Birmingham, England,
in 1837 and his mother was born in 1853 at Mon-
treal, Canada, of Scotch parentage. Captain Edwin
Dunn came to Canada with his parents when eight
years of age, grew up and was educated at Owen
Sound, and in 1861 was a Canadian soldier in the
standing army of the Dominion during the Fenian
raid. Later he served as a captain on the Great
Lakes. During the Riel rebellion in Manitoba in
1881 he was captain of the steamer which took Gen-
eral Woolsey to Port Arthur. Subsequently he was
commander of the fishing patrol of the Great Lakes.
He retired from active life in 191 1 and died in
May, 1916. His wife passed away in January, 1901.
They were married at Owen Sound and had two
children. May, wife of James Garvey, and Dr.
John C.
Dr. John C. Dunn acquired his early education at
Owen Sound, attended the Ontario Collegiate Insti-
tute and prepared for his profession at Northwestern
University in Chicago. After graduating in 1902 he
remained at Chicago in private practice for about
five years. He then moved to Stanley, North Da-
kato, and in the fall of 191 1 came to Lewistown,
Montana. He has a general practice but is especially
well known for his work in surgery. He is a mem-
ber of Fergus County and State Medical societies
and the American Medical Association.
Doctor Dunn is a prominent Mason, being affiliated
with Lewistown Lodge No. t,7. Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Hiram Chapter No. 15, Royal
Arch Masons, DeMolay Commandery of the Knights
Templar at Minot, North Dakota, and with the
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Grand Forks, North
Dakota. He and his wife are both active in the
Chapter in the Eastern Star, and he is affiliated with
Lewistown Lodge No. 456 of the Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks. Politically he is a re-
publican.
Doctor Dunn married July 27, 1903, Miss Carrie
Devine. She was born at Allegan, Michigan, the
seventh in a family of five sons and five daughters
born to Michael and Julia (Cummings) Devine.
Her parents were both born in Canada. Her mother
is now deceased and her father, who is eighty-one
years of age, spent his active life as a contractor and
builder. Doctor and Mrs. Dunn have two children :
John Edwin, a student in St. James Military School
at Faribault, Minnesota, and May, aged nine, at-
tending the public schools of Lewistown.
Lewis S.\muel Hollier. It is a compliment
worthily bestowed to say tliat Gallatin County is
honored by the citizenship of Lewis S. Hollier, of
Bozeman, for he has achieved definite success
through his own efforts and is thoroughly deserving
of the proud American title of self-made man. the
term being one that, in its better sense, cannot but
appeal to the loyal admiration of all who are ap-
preciative of our national institutions and the privi-
leges afforded for individual accomplishment. It is
a privilege, ever gratifying in this day and age. to
meet a man who has the courage to face the battles
of life with a strong heart and steady hand, and
to win in the stern conflict by bringing to bear only
those forces with which nature has equipped him.
self-reliance, self-respect and integrity.
Lewis S. Hollier was born in Christian County,
Illinois, on April 5. 1853. and is a son of Christopher
Columbus and Nancy (McKinney) Hollier. Chris-
topher C. Hollier was born in the State of Illinois
HISTORY OF MONTANA
185
in 1902. He was a farmer by vocation, in which
he was successful, and spent his entire life in Illinois.
He was a republican in politics, served as town clerk
and took an active interest in the civic and political
affairs of his community. He was a veteran of the
Mexican war and was a member of the Christian
Church and of the Masonic fraternity. He married
Nancy McKinney, who was born near Springfield,
Sangamon County, Illinois, in 1832, and died in
Christian County, Illinois, in 1894. To this worthy
couple were born the following children : Gunnell
McKinney and Clarissa, who died in early childhood;
Lewis S. is the ne.xt in order of birth ; Mary, who
died in Park County, Montana, at the age of forty-
five years, was the wife of Jacob Bliler, an extensive
rancher at Wilsall, Montana ; Edward, who died
at Livingston, Montana, at the age of fifty years ;
Alice is the wife of Eli Bliler, a farmer in Christian
County, Illinois; Ida is the wife of William Car-
mony, who resides on the old homestead in Christian
County, Illinois; Lucy is the wife of a Mr. Harris,
a farmer in Missouri ; Nancy Margaret died in child-
hood, as did Florence Columbia and Minnie.
Lewis S. Hollier received his educational training
in the rural schools of Christian County, Illinois,
and remained on his father's farm until twenty-eight
years of age. In the spring of 1881 he went to
Fredonia, Kansas, where he remained for six months,
at the end of which time he came to Bozeman,
being numbered among the pioneers of this locality,
and during the following three years he was em-
ployed as a general laborer. He then established a
dray line, which he operated for twenty years, and
then sold it. For thirty years he has acted as dis-
trict representative for the Continental Oil Com-
pany, and for about twenty years he has been a
dealer in wood and coal. Mr. Hollier has exercised
sound business judgment in all his transactions and,
though starting here at the beginning with practically
nothing, he is today numbered among the prosperous
and successful men of this community. Besides a
comfortable and attractive residence in Bozeman, and
other property here, he is the owner of some good
land in Southern Oregan.
Mr. Hollier has always been an ardent supporter
of the republican party, and served one term as a
member of the City Council of Bozeman. Fraternal-
ly he is a member of Gallatin Lodge No. 6, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and of Pythagoras Lodge
No. 2, Knights of Pythias.
Mr. Hollier has been twice married. In 1874, in
Christian County, Illinois, he was married to Marob
A. Toothaker, a native of Christian County, Illinois,
and who died in Bozeman in 1888. She became the
mother of one child, Beatrix, who died at the age
of eight years. In 1890. at Bozeman, Mr. Hollier
was married to Trena Baker, a native of Iowa, and
to them have been born the following children :
Georgie is the wife of Frederick Benedict, of Brem-
erton, Washington, who is a draughtsman in the
service of the Government ; Alice died at the age
of fifteen years; Samuel is a machinist at Boze-
man; Trena is a junior in the Montana State College
and Myrtle is a sophomore in the same institution ;
Stella attends the Gallatin County High School.
Mr. Hollier has ever given his support to all worthy
movements for the advancement of the community.
His residence here of many years has but strength-
ened his hold on the hearts of the people with whom
he has been associated, and today no one here en-
joys a larger circle of warm friends and acquaint-
ances, who esteem him because of his sterling qual-
ities of character and his business ability.
James McCalman has had a long and varied ex-
perience in brick and stone contracting, and has
done a great deal of construction work for the
state government of Montana. He was the con-
struction contractor for the State Penitentiary, and
makes his home at Deer Lodge.
Mr. McCalman was born at Morven, Scotland,
December 23, 1859. His father James McCalman
was born in the same locality in 1809 and spent
all his life there as a farmer. He died in 1894. He
was a liberal in politics and a very faithful Pres-
byterian in his church affiliations. James McCal-
man married Mary McLaughlin, who was born at
Morven, Scotland, in 1820, and died there in 1885.
Catherine, the oldest of their children, lives at
Troon, Scotland, widow of Thomas Little, who
was a merchant; Mary lives at Oban, Scotland,
widow of John Mclntyre, who was an insurance
man ; Dr. John is a minister of the Christian Church
at Lakemont, New York ; James is the fourth of
the family ; Douglas is a minister of the Presby-
terian Church at Strachur, Scotland; Major Duncan
of Baltimore, is a major in the Regular United
States Army and was all through the World war
with the Ninety-sixth Engineers ; Margaret lives
at Morven, Scotland, widow of Allan Curry, who
was postmaster of that town.
James McCalman attended the public schools of
his native town in Scotland, and as a youth learned
the trade of general building construction. He
came to the United States in 1882, following his
trade for two years at Minneapolis. It was thirty-
five years ago that he identified himself with Mon-
tana, with headquarters at Helena. He became a
leading contractor in brick and stone work, erecting
the first bank at Helena and business buildings and
residences. In 1894 he moved to Deer Lodge, where as
contractor he erected all the walls of the main build-
ings and the wings of the penitentiary, a contract
that took his time and all the facilities of his organ-
ization for five years. After completing the work he
spent several years in Alaska as a gold prospector
and had considerable success in mining the precious
metal. Mr. McCalman returned to Deer Lodge
in 191 1 and resumed his business as a construction
contractor for the State Penitentiary. At present
he is working out a large contract at Warm Springs,
building the hospital and all the other buildings
of the insane asylum. He employs convicts entirely
for the work, keeping about eighty busy. He is
also erecting the Tuberculosis Hospital, barns,
power house, dormitories, kitchens and other struc-
tures at Galen, Montana.
Mr. McCalman is a republican in politics. He
owns a modern home at loio Fifth Street in Deer
Lodge. He married at Tacoma, Washington, in
1908, Miss Marion McFarlane, daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. John McFarlane of Tobermory, Scotland.
Her father was at one time a justice of the peace
in Scotland. Mrs. McCalman is a trained nurse
and came to this country from Glasgow. They have
three children : Ronald, born August 3, 1909 : Doug-
las, born April 27, 1912; and Malcolm, born Sep-
tember 12, 1917.
Ch.\rles a. Weil, president of the P. L. Howe
Lumber Mills of Eureka, has been through every
phase of the lumber industry, from lumber camp
to business office, and his experience has covered
most of the Middle West as well as the Northwest.
His career has brought him generous means, and
for years he has been one of the most influential
citizens of this section of Montana.
Mr. Weil was born at West Bend, Wisconsin,
March 20, 1866, a son of Henry and Catherine
186
HISTORY OF MONTANA
(Wightman) Weil. His father was a native of
Alsace-Lorraine and a lawyer by profession. Charles
A. Weil acquired a public school education in Wis-
consin, and at the age of sixteen taught a term of
school. He also had some experience in newspaper
work before he entered the lumber industry, work- ,
ing in camps and mills and lumber yards in Wis-
consin, Illinois and North Dakota, and for the past
fourteen years has been at the head of the exten-
sive mills at Eureka. He has many interests with
the lumbering and business enterprises of the North-
west.
Mr Weil married Miss Maude Norris, daughter
of William L. and Augusta (Vestey) Norris. Her
father was a native of Dublin, Ireland, and for
many years editor and owner of the Watertown
Republican in Wisconsin, and through his paper
and individuality was a staunch upholder of the
republican party. Mrs. Weil was born at Water-
town, Wisconsin, and finished her education in the
Bordulac Seminary at Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. Mr.
and Mrs. Weil have two children, Genevieve and
Kenneth. Genevieve finished her education at Graf-
ton Hall in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, while Ken-
neth attended the Illinois Northern College at Dixon
and a school at Rugby, North Dakota. Genevieve
is the wife of G. A. Horstkotte. mechanical super-
intendent of the Shevlin Hixon Mills at Bend, Ore-
gon. They have one child, Charles A. Horstkotte.
Kenneth, who is manager of the Miller Lumber
Company at Bend, Oregon, married Laura Reynolds,
of Rugby, North Dakota, and has two children,
Charles Kenneth and Muriel.
In 1917 Mr. and Mrs. Weil erected one of the
finest residences in Lincoln County. It was built
almost exclusively of rnaterials manufactured in the
mills at Eureka. It is a house in colonial style,
and many of its plans were suggested by Mrs. Weil.
Mr. Weil is a democrat in politics. He is a Knight
Templar Mason, also affiliated with the Scottish
Rite Consistory and the Shrine, and is a member
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and
Modern Woodmen of America. Both Mr. and
Mrs. Weil give their active membership and sup-
port to the Episcopal Church. During the World
war thev were prominent factors in the splendid
record made by Eureka. Mrs. Weil was purchaser
for the Red Cross Chapter and he served as one
of the executive committee of the Chapter and was
also chairman of the second and third Liberty Loan
drives. Mr. Weil in 1916 was elected a member
of the Montana Legislature and was in the Legis-
lature for two terms, throughout the war period,
serving on a number of important committees and
at all times doing what he could to uphold the
stanch patriotism of the state.
One of Montana's newspapers referring to his
work in the Legislature said truthfully of him:
"Representative Weil is one of those men who do
things. When given a task to perform it becomes
the duty of the moment and is attended to. There-
fore it is not surprising that he served as chairman
through all the Liberty Loan campaigns in Lincoln
County and in the campaigns for the Red Cross
and other associated war activities. While a demo-
crat in politics, he is not an intensely partisan legis-
lator, but looks more to the merit of a measure
and the welfare of the state than to party prefer-
ence. This is one of the reasons for his re-election
in a county where the republican candidate for state
senator was elected by a substantial plurality. Dur-
ing the last session of the State Legislature he was
chairman of the important committee on privileges
and elections. He has been appointed a member of
the committees on ways and means, banking, town-
ships and counties, and fish and game."
Mr. Weil is one of the directors of the Farmers
and Merchants Bank of Eureka and of the Security
State Bank of Whitefish. He was president of the
Montana Lumber Manufacturers' Association and
also president of the State Forestry Association.
The P. L. Howe Lumber Mills, of which he is the
executive head, are successors to the Eureka Lum-
ber Company, and at Eureka they have one of the
immense manufacturing plants of Montana, with
an annual capacity of 60,000,000 feet of lumber
products.
Lkwis Carlile Clark is a native of the great
mining center of Butte, and for a number of years
has been actively identified with ranching, stock
raising and other business affairs at Lewistown.
He was one of the leading men in Fergus County
in supporting and maintaining the various war-
auxiliary movements during the World war
His father was the late Henry S. Clark, one of
the earliest Montana settlers and long prominent
as a business man and public official of the state.
Henry S. Clark was born in New York State,
October 5, 1832, and in one line traced his ancestry
back to the Mayflower. His father. Rev. Charles
Clark, was a Baptist minister and preached at
various towns in New York. Henry S. Clark ac-
quired his education in several towns where his
father was a pastor, and after leaving the Low-
ville Academy became a bookkeeper and later teller
in the Rome Exchange Bank. He was elected
city treasurer of Rome in 1853. In 1855 he went
to Chicago, and for three years was a messenger
with the United States Express Company. In
1858 he went to Des Moines, Iowa, and continued
as an express agent there and at Kansas City,
Missouri, until the first of i860. Early in that year
he went to Pike's Peak, Colorado, and with three
others located the Manitou Springs and the town-
site of Colorado City. The wonderful value of
those scenic places was not then appreciated, and
he soon became a miner, also ranched near Colorado
City, but in 1864 flood and grasshoppers and In-
dian hostilities drove him away. During 1865-66
he kept a grocery and commission store at Denver.
In 1866 he joined a party making the journey
with mule teams from Denver to Montana. He
settled at the mining camp of Greenwood, eighteen
miles from Helena, and opened a store, kept the
stage station and postoffice, and became interested
in mining. In 1878 he removed to Butte City.
While a successful business man, he was almost
continuously identified with some public office dur-
ing his residence in Montana. He was elected
clerk and recorder of Deer Lodge County in 1871,
serving seven years ; during 1880-81 was deputy
assessor of Silver Bow County; in 1882 was elected
clerk and recorder of that county, and filled the
office four years ; and subsequently was deputy
collector of internal revenue for the Third Divi-
sion of Montana.
Henry S. Clark died at Long Beach, California,
January 22, 1914. At Fountain, Colorado, August
31, 1863, he married Laura Roberts. She was born
in Bourbon County, Kentucky, February 10, 1844,
and died at Bartlesville, Oklahoma, March 15, 1912.
She was long prominent as a pioneer Montana
woman and was widely known for her interests
in fraternal organizations. Her father, Samuel E.
Roberts, was a pioneer Colorado rancher and stock-
man. Mrs. Henry S. Oark left Denver in Sep-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tember, 1867, to join her husband in Montana, mak-
ing the journey by stage coach around Salt Lake.
For a time she and her infant son were the only
passengers, and they had to pass through long
stretches of country recently devastated by Indian
raids. She was a splendid type of the pioneer
woman, steadfast, courageous, and willing to meet
every emergency with the same spirit as her hus-
band. She held many of the prominent offices in
the Women's Auxiliary bodies of the Ancient Or-
der of United Workmen, the Order of Rebekahs,
and the Eastern Star. Henry S. Clark was a promi-
nent Mason and Odd Fellow. He and his wife
had ten children, two of whom were born in the
pioneer district of Colorado and eight in the equally
frontier conditions of Montana. The first died in
infancy and the son who accompanied his mother
on her perilous trip to Montana is William Lee
Clark. The others in order of age were Henry
S., Arthur B., Clarence, Clara, Hudson, Lewis
Carlile and Laura, twins, and one othef that died
in infancy.
Lewis Carlile Clark was born at Butte, Febru-
ary I, 1885. He grew up at Butte, attending the
grammar and high schols there, and finished his
education in the University of Michigan. After
his college career he took up stock ranching in Fer-
gus County, being a sheep man, and was president
and manager of the North Montana Livestock
Company until 1912. .'\fter that he devoted his
ranch of 887 acres to the growing of wheat. He
is now extensively interested in real estate, is a
stockholder in the Miners Savings Bank & Trust
Company at Butte, and in recent years has given
much time to public affairs in Lewistown. After
an exciting campaign he was elected mayor of Lew-
istown in May, 1917, and served until May, 1919.
During the war he was the first chairman of the
Civilian Relief Committee, is now chairman of
the Fergus County Chapter of the Red Cross, and
president of the Fergus County War Relief Asso-
ciation. Mr. Clark is atfiliated with Lewistown
Lodge No. Z7, Ancient Free and .Accepted Masons,
Lewistown Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch Masons,
Lewistown Commandery No. 14. Knights Templar,
and belongs to .Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine
at Helena. He is a past exalted ruler of Lewistown
Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks.
March i, iQio, he married Margaret Jane Byrne,
a native of Wisconsin. They have three children,
named Clara Margaret, Lois C. and Lew Carlile.
William C. Whipps. It is the deliberate judgment
of a large part of the citizenship of Kalispell that
no one man has longer exemplified the strongest in-
fluence of his public spirit in behalf of all matters
affecting the welfare of the community as William
C. Whipps, veteran merchant, former mayor and a
citizen who has never neglected an opportunity to
keep his section of the state in the very lead of im-
provements and development.
Mr. Whipps is of English ancestry. His great-
grandfather, Benjamin Whipps, was a Maryland
slave holder, and one of the first white settlers
in Ohio. Lloyd Whipps father of the former mayor,
was a soldier 'with an Ohio regiment in the Civil war.
Lloyd Whipps married Louise Grant, a native of
Virginia, her family being remotely connected with
that of General Grant.
William C. Whipps was born near Lexington,
Ohio, August 30, 1856. He was educated in common
schools, attended college at Oberlin, Ohio, and ac-
quired a general commercial education and took a
course in telegraphy. In 1872, at the age of sixteen.
he went to the Nebraska frontier and as an operator
for the Union Pacific Railway was stationed at
McPherson. McPherson was the home of Buffalo
Bill, the late Col. W. F. Cody; Texas Jack, whose
real name was Jack Omohondro, and Doctor Carver,
the famous rifle shot. Mr. Whipps became an in-
timate friend of these celebrities and was dubbed
"Buffalo Bill, Jr." The town was on the frontier,
in the midst of Pawnee, Sioux and Cheyenne In-
dians, and many of its white characters were gam-
blers, horse thieves and murderers. From McPherson
Mr. Whipps was transferred to Sidney, Nebraska.
He shared in the excitement and romance of the time,
and eventually he gave up his position at Sidney
with the railroad and joined a party of five on an
expedition to the Black Hills. To reach the Black
Hills reservation required a hazardous journey over
200 miles, and the Indians were known to be hostile
to every advance of the white men. In order to
reach the coveted country the party of five left
Sidney at one o'clock in the morning June 26, 1875,
and traveled chiefly by night, hiding through the day.
They arrived at French Creek, near Harney's Peak,
July i6th and was the first party to reach there.
They located claims on Spring Creek, and were
soon at work prospecting and developing their claims.
July 29th General Crook ordered all miners to leave
by the loth of August or suffer the penalty of being
carried as prisoners to Fort Laramie. There was
no other course but to obey, and the men divided
their supplies and returned to Sidney, being reduced
to starvation rations before they reached tliat town.
Mr. Whipps again entered the service of the Union
Pacific Railway as agent and operator, was assigned
to duty at North Platte, and subsequently as express
messenger was at Denver and Salt Lake. In 1881 he
left the railroad and came to Dillon, Montana. He
entered the service of the well known firm of Sebree,
Ferris & White at Dillon, and was soon promoted
to head bookkeeper and cashier of the forwarding
department. In January. 1883, the company sent
him to Livingston to establish a forwarding house,
Livingston being then the terminus of the Northern
Pacific Railway. Not long afterward he joined
the Merchants National Bank of Helena, becoming
its manager, and in 1891 left the capital for Demers-
ville, then the metropolis of the Flathead_ country.
He organized the Northwestern Bank, the first bank
in Flathead County, and subsequently organized the
First National Bank of Kalispell, erecting for its
home the first brick building in the .own. He re-
mained as cashier and manager of the First National
of Kalispell until 1898. The following five years
he was receiver of the United States Land Office,
and at the close of his official term engaged in the
mercantile business under the name of W. C. Whipps
& Son. In 1904 Mr. Whipps erected the Whipps
Block, the largest and best building in Kalispell. He
is also owner of some fruit land on Flathead Lake,
has a summer home there, and is owner of several
ranches near Kalispell.
His summer home in Glacier National Park was
the first to be built for private use. When the For-
restry Department was contemplating the sale of the
timber to private parties at Lake McDonald, Mr.
Whipps proved himself an aggressive friend of con-
servation and took the matter tip directly with
President Roosevelt, describing the wondrous beauty
and other attractions of the region, and suggesting
that it be made a national park. President Roose-
velt with characteristic energy acted_ upon the sug-
gestion, and as a result Americans enjoy today a park
second to none in the world for its peculiar advan-
tages. The action he took in behalf of the Glacier
National Park has been characteristic of Mr. Whipps'
188
HISTORY OF MONTANA
entire record as a Montana citizen. He has done
everything possible to promote the growth of Kali-
spell. He became its first elective mayor in 1893
and served three consecutive terms. As mayor he
carried out a complete system of sewerage, paved
the principal streets and several of the handsome
tree lined thoroughfares date from his administra-
tion. In 1910 he again yielded to public demand and
be(fame mayor. During this administration he
brought about the reclamation of 43 acres of
marsh lands and transformed it into the beautiful
city park named Woodland Park. Mr. Whipps was
also one of the prime movers in building the Masonic
Temple. He is a Knight Templar and thirty-second
degree Scottish Rite Mason, a Mystic Shriner, and
is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows, Knights of Pythias, Elks and the Episcopal
Church.
At Helena October 20, 1886, he married Miss Annie
E. Osterhout. They have two children, William O.
and Caroline Louise.
Angus L. McLaughlin. Specific mention is made
of many of the worthy citizens of Montana within
the pages of this work, citizens who have figured
in the growth and development of this favored sec-
tion of the Union and whose interests are identified
with its every phase of progress, each contributing
in his sphere of action to the well-being of the com-
munity in which he resides and to the advancement
of its normal and legitimate growth. Among this
number is he whose name appears above, a gentle-
man of large and successful business interests and
who for nearly three decades has played a con-
spicuous part in the development of his section of
the country.
Angus L. McLaughlin is descended from sterling
old Scotch ancestry, his grandfather having emi-
grated from the land of hills and heather to the
Dominion of Canada at an early day. There he fol-
lowed farming pursuits, but his death occurred dur-
ing one of the great cholera epidemics, he himself
falling a victim to that dread disease, the event
occurring prior to the birth of the subject of this
sketch. One of his sons, Lachlan McLaughlin, was
born in the Province of Ontario, Canada, in 1820,
and his death occurred in the same locality in i8g8.
His vocation had been that of a dairyman and
farmer. He took an active interest in political mat-
ters, in which he took an independent or liberal
attitude and served as reeve (supervisor) of his
county. He served in the historic rebellion of 1837-
38 and in many ways exhibited traits of character
that stamped him as a man of more than ordinary
personality. He married Flora McDougald. who was
born in Ontario, Canada, in 1834. and who died there
in 1896. Their children were as follows : .\ngus L. ;
Dan, who is general road master for the Great
Northern Railway at Sprague, Washington ; John,
of Livingston, Montana; Ernest, a miner at Butte,
Montana: James, who is an official of the Canadian
Pacific Railroad Company at Winnipeg, Canada.
Angus L. McLaughlin was born in the Province of
Ontario, Canada, on April i, 1861. He was edu-
cated in the public schools of his home locality and
until twenty-seven years of age assisted his father
on the home farm. Then for a while he was em-
ployed in construction work on the Canadian Pacific
Railroad, but in 1890 he came to Montana, locating
at Livingston, where he entered the bridge and
building department of the Northern Pacific Rail-
road, in which he was employed for fifteen yea;s.
He then became president and manager of the Liv-
ingston Building and Manufacturing Company, which
at that time handled many large and important con-
tracts in the State of Montana. In 1912 Mr. Mc-
Laughlin entered into a partnership with D. Joseph
O'Neill, under the firm name of McLaughlin &
O'Neill, which has proven one of the strongest com-
binations in its line in Montana. The firm is en-
gaged in a general contracting business, the con-
struction of business blocks, cement walks, sewers,
water works and bridge work of either frame or
concrete. Among the contracts the firm has satis-
factorily handled are the Big Timber Garage, the
water works extension at Laurel, the sidewalk and
curb district in the Town of Columbus, the Belgrade
sewer district, the completion of the sewer district
in the City of Livingston, the Livingston Water
Works, the Finck Factory, the Lehrkind business
block, the Harvat Block, the residences of D. J.
Fraser and Dr. E. V. Foster, besides many other
business blocks and residences.
Politically j\Ir. McLaughlin is a democrat, while
his religious membership is with the Roman Catholic
Church. He is a member of the Livingston Council,
Knights of Columbus, the Catholic Order of For-
resters and the Highlanders. He is an active member
of the Livingston Chamber of Commerce and takes
an active part in promoting every movement look-
ing to the advancement of the best interests 'of his
city and community.
On October 4, 1890, Mr. McLaughlin was marjied
to Jeanette McRae, of Ontario, Canada, the daughter
of John and Flora (McDonald) McRae. Her
father, who was a railroad contractor, is now de-
ceased, and his widow resides at Strathcona, Alberta,
Canada. To Mr. and Mrs. McLaughlin have been
born the following children : George, who was an
employe of the Northern Pacific Railroad at Liv-
ingston, served one year in the army during the
World war, being stationed at Camp Lewis, with
the rank of sergeant. He is now associated with
his father in business. John was a sergeant major
in the United States army, being assigned to the
medical department of St. Louis, and he saw nine-
teen months of border service in New Mexico. He
is also associated with his father in business. James
A. enlisted in the military service of his country in
1917 and was sent overseas in January, 1918. He
was promoted to the rank of sergeant and took
part in the famous Argonne drive and other en-
gagements where victory crowned the American
arms. His death occurred on April 12. 1918, of
disease contracted in the performance of duty and
he lies with many of his comrades beneath the soil
of France ; Lachlan, who is attending the Mount
Saint Charles College in Helena, was also in military
service, having attended the officers training camp
at Mount Saint Charles, at Helena: Ernest is a
student in Park County High School. The record
of this family for loyalty is a proud one and a
heritage of which their descendants will never have
cause to be ashamed. In every avenue of life's
activities to which he has applied himself, Mr. Mc-
Laughlin has proved faithful to every responsibility
and today he enjoys the unreserved confidence of
his fellow citizens.
Otto J. Simmons, of Red Lodge, has to an ex-
ceptional degree made abundant use of his oppor-
tunities and his time, and at a comparatively early
age has established himself as one of the independ-
ent business leaders of Carbon County.
He was born at Oweeta, Arkansas, October 13,
1887, and received his early education in the pub-
lic schools of Jenny Lind in his native state. His
parents moved to Red Lodge, Montana, in Sep-
tember, 1900, when he was thirteen years old, and
he attended grammar school there and graduated
HISTORY OF MONTANA
from high school in 1906. He was then nineteen
years of age, and the following two summers he
worked in the drug store of H. J. Armstrong, and
for eight months drove a wagon for the Red Lodge
Laundry Company. He was next employed by the
Carbon Mercantile Company until February, 191 1,
when he was made assistant manager of the gro-
cery department with the Montana Co-operative
Mercantile Company, and was with that corporation
until 1915. During 1915-16 for two years he was
deputy county clerk. His experience 'in that office
brought him to what he regards as his permanent
field, the abstract business. He is now secretary and
treasurer of the Red Lodge Abstract & Title Com-
pany, which was established in April, 1915, and is
the leading abstract company for Carbon County.
The offices of the company are in the Savoy Block.
Mr. Simmons is a republican, is chairman of the
board of trustees of the Congregational Church, is
past exalted ruler of Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534 of
the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and
a member of the Red Lodge Chamber of Commerce.
He owns a good home at 217 North Villard Avenue.
Mr. Simmons answered the call for military duty
during the great war, going to Camp Lewis in the
State of Washington in August, 1918. He was
mustered out and given his honorable discharge
January 24, 1919.
He married at Red Lodge, October 4, 1912, Miss
Jessica Dunn, a daughter of Frank W. Dunn. Her
father was born in Pennsylvania in 1855, settled in
Northern Iowa, near Mason City, in 1884 and was
a farmer and is still living at Mason City. He is
a republican, and has served as township assessor,
and is an active member of the Baptist Church.
Frank W. Dunn married Miss Brown, who was
born in Pennsylvania in 1S57. Mrs. Simmons is a
graduate of the Iowa State Normal School at Cedar
Falls, was a teacher in Mason City and on coming
to Red Lodge, Montana, in 1910. taught in the pub-
lic schools for two years before her marriage. She
is an active worker in the Congregational Church
and a member of the Woman's Club.
Edw.^rd B. Bloom is one of the younger busi-
ness men of Red Lodge, enjoys great popularity with
all that community, and his ability and pleasing
personality have had much to do with the success
of the Kaleva Co-operative Association, of which
he is the general manager.
Mr. Bloom has the added distinction of being a
native son of Red Lodge. He was born there May
3, 1893. His father, Abram Bloom, was born in
Finland in 1861, a son of Jacob Bloom, who spent
all his life in that country as a farmer. Abram
Bloom came to the United States when a young
man and soon went west to Rawlins, Wyoming,
and in 1888 came to Montana. In 1890, at Great
Falls, he married Josephine Jokela, who was born
and reared in Finland, her birth occurring in 1865.
.\fter their marriage they moved to Red Lodge,
where Abram Bloom followed the business of coal
mining. He died in iqio. He was a democrat and
a member of the Finnish Lutheran Church. His
widow is still living at Red Lodge and is the mother
of six children: Emma, wife of Martin Rapp, a
miner at Red Lodge; Edward B. ; Anna, wife of
.'\ndrew Wilmonen, a farmer at Boyd, Montana ;
Elmer, a farmer at Roberts, Montana ; Bertha, wife
of Ray Houton. of Red Lodge : and Jennie, a tele-
phone' operator living with her mother.
Edward B. Bloom has depended largely upon his
native talents and experience for his success in
life. He attended country schools to the age of
eleven, then went to work on a-farm for four years
and at the age of fifteen became a clerk in the
189
Kaleva Co-operative Mercantile Association. His
abilities and industry have been such that the di-
rectors of the association afterward promoted him
to general manager. The business is general mer-
chandise at 3 South Broadway, and is one of the
leading establishments of its kind in Carbon County.
Mr. Bloom is a republican, is a member of Gar-
field Lodge No. 36, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534, of the Elks,
and Red Lodge Camp of Modern Woodmen of
America. He is also a member of the Chamber of
Commerce.
Mr. Bloom owns a modern residence at 10 North
Haggin Avenue. He married Miss Esther Erick-
son at Red Lodge in 1915. Her mother is deceased
and her father is Herman Erickson, a retired busi-
ness man of Red Lodge. Mr. and Mrs. Bloom have
one son, Walter, born January 20, 1916.
Harold S. Croonquist. This is a family that has
been well known in several communities of Mon-
tana for over thirty-five years. For nearly twenty
years it has been especially prominent at Red Lodge,
where the leading business is known as the Croon-
quist Mercantile Company. The manager of this
is Harold S. Croonquist, one of the young and ener-
getic business men of the city.
Harold S. Croonquist was born at Livingston,
Montana, October 16, 1891. His father, A. Croon-
quist, founder of the business at Red Lodge, was
born in Sweden in 1862, and was about twelve years
of age when he came to the United States. He
finished his education at St. Paul, Minnesota, and
for several years was a railway mail clerk on the
St. Paul Railroad. He came to Montana in 1882,
when the Northern Pacific Railway was being con-
structed. For about ten years he was engaged in
the confectionery and cigar business and in 1893
moved to the Yakima Valley in Washington, where
he busied himself with his farming interests. Dur-
ing 1897-99 he was a merchant at Livingston, Mon-
tana, then established a business at Carbonado and
in 1900 came to Red Lodge and established the
dry goods and shoe store at 13 North Broadway,
which is the leading mercantile enterprise of its
kind in Carbon County and is now operated under
the business title of Croonquist Mercantile Com-
pany. Several years ago he retired from busi-
ness and is now living at Spokane, Washington.
While in Red Lodge he served two terms as a mem-
ber of the city council and was in every respect a
public spirited citizen. He is a republican and a
member of the Congregational Church, Mr. A.
Croonquist married Miss Mabel E. Harrisfin, who
was born at Waterbury, Connecticut, in 1869. They
have a familv of seven children : Alfred H., a mem-
ber of the Croonquist firm at Red Lodge; Harold
S. ; Hugh A., who spent 1918-19 as a soldier with
the ,\merican Expeditionary Forces in France, is a
stockholder in the Croonquist Mercantile Company
and resides on his farm at Opportunity, Washing-
ton; Mabel, wife of O. L. Cornwall, a veterinary
surgeon at Coeur D'Alene, Idaho; Stanley M.. who
was an ensign in the United States navy; Ella and
Alice, both at home.
Harold S. Croonquist has spent most of his career
in Red Lodge. He graduated from the "high school
of that town in 1009 and the following two years
was emploved in his father's store. Durmg 1911-1.3
he was a student in Grinnell College m Iowa, com-
pleting the work of the junior year. On leavmg
college he went to St. Mary's. Idaho, where he was
in a store until 1916 and then returned to Red
Lodge and became manager of the Croonquist Mer-
cantile Companv. His father is president of this
corporation, his' brother, A. H. Croonquist, is vic«
1^0
HISTORY OF MONTANA
president, while Harold Croonquist in addition to
his duties as active manager is secretary and treas-
urer.
He is a member of the local Chamber of Com-
tnerce, has served as treasurer of the Congrega-
tional Church, is independent in politics and a mem-
ber of Star in the West Lodge No. 40,
Free and Accepted Masons, and Bear Tooth Lodge
No. 534 of the Elks. Mr. Croonquist married Laura
Curry at Red Lodge, April 9, 1919. Her parents
are Joseph and Martha (Bullock) Curry, residents
of Renton, Washington, her father being a black-
smith.
J. J. Gerondale, who has been a resident of Red
Lodge for the past ten years, is a practical dairy
and butter expert, and as a professional and business
man has done much to advance the interests of the
dairy industry in Carbon County. He is president
of the Carbon County Creamery Company.
Mr. Gerondale was born in Brown County, Wis-
consin, April 27, 1885, and gained his primary
knowledge of dairying in the heart of the dairy-
ing district of America. His family is of Belgian
ancestry. His grandfather Gerondale came from
Belgium and was an early settler in Wisconsin,
where he followed farming. He died in Brown
County, that state. John Gerondale, father of the
Red Lodge business man, was born in Brown Coun-
ty in 1862, and spent his early life there as a farmer.
In 1904 he moved to Wallace, Michigan, and has
since been a farmer, lumberman and lumber job-
ber. He is still active in business. He is inde-
pendent in his political affiliations and is a member
of the Catholic Church. His first wife was Pauline
Bassine, who was born in Brown County, Wiscon-
sin, in 1864, and died there in 1887, the mother of
two sons, Charles and J. J. The former is in the
drug business at Detroit, Michigan. For his sec-
ond wife John Gerondale married Anna Lemense,
of Wisconsin. She died at Wallace, Michigan, in
1907, and her children, four in number, are : Almand,
who is employed in an automobile factory at De-
troit; Leona, who is married and resides at Pestigo,
Wisconsin ; Norbert. who was a soldier and was
a victim of the influenza at Missoula, Montana, in
October. 1918; John, living with his father.
J. J. Gerondale attended the public schools of In-
galls, Michigan, and as a youth had much practical
experience in dairying. Later he took technical
courses and graduated in 1907, after completing the
butter and cream making courses at the University of
Wisconsin, The following year he spent at work
in his technical line at Milwaukee, another year at
Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, six months at Manistique,
Michigan, and then for a year was traveling sales-
man for a line of cream separators in Wisconsin
and Michigan.
Mr. Gerondale came to Red Lodge in 1909, and
was the expert technical man of the Carbon County
Creamery Company for several years. In 1916 he
and Waiter Helm bought out this industry, which
was established in 1906 and has been justly consid-
ered the corner stone of the dairy . industry of Car-
bon County. In 1917 another creamery was estab-
lished at Bridger, and these are the only two cream-
eries in Carbon County. Mr. Gerondale is president
and Walter Helm secretary and treasurer of the
company. The plant is at 423 North Haggin Avenue.
The patrons of the creamery are dairy farmers all
over Carbon County and some in Stillwater County.
Mr. Gerondale is an independent democrat in
politics, a member of the Catholic Church, and in
1018 was exalted ruler of Bear Tooth Lodge No.
^34 of the Elks. For the past seven years he has
been city milk and dairy inspector of Red Lodge.
He is a member of the Chamber of Commerce.
In the fall of 1909, at Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin,
he married Miss Lillian Helm, a daughter of Chris
and Sophia (Colemorgan) Helm. Her parents are
both deceased. Her father was a hotel man for
many years. Mr. and Mrs. Gerondale have two
children: Jack, born May 12, 1912, and James Robert
Gerondale, born April 14, 1919.
Henry H. Forman. Montana has drawn to it
energetic young men from all over the country, the
possibilities of this magnificent state attracting those
who are willing to exert themselves and render
effective service to their municipalities and com-
munities. Red Lodge is particularly fortunate in
the character of the men who have made this city
their permanent home, and Carbon County has
brought into its courthouse to administer the af-
fairs of this section some of the very best of these
residents. One of them, Henry H. Forman, county
auditor and responsible man of affairs, had a wide
experience prior to coming to Red Lodge in 1917.
He was born near Winchester, Clark County, Ken-
tucky, August 15, 1880, a son of Henry Hamilton
Forman, and grandson of Henry Forman, born in
Kentucky in 1803, and died at Mount Sterling, Ken-
tucky, in 1883, where he had been engaged in farm-
ing all of his mature years. During the Mexican
war Henry Forman enlisted in defense of his coun-
try, and served it during that conflict.
Henry Hamilton Forman was born in Kentucky
in 1835', and he died at Indian Field, that state,
in 1897. having been in his native state all of his
life with the exception of his period of service
during the Civil war. In 1861 he enlisted in a Ken-
tucky infantry regiment, and served until the close
of the war, during that period being wounded very
severely. Returning home after peace was declared,
he engaged in an undertaking business, and was also
active as a farmer and stockman. In politics he
was a republican and he was very active in. civic
affairs, holding various local offices. A Mason and
a Presbyterian, he lived up to the highest ideals of
his fraternity and church and was one of the most
unright and conscientious men of the community.
His wife bore the maiden name of Sarah Rice,
and she was born in Kentucky in 1850, and was
killed by an automobile in the City of Oklahoma
in IQ06.' Their children were as follows: W. C.,
who is the owner of a garage of King City, Mis-
souri; Charlotte, who married Douglas Shephard,
died at Edmond, Oklahoma, but he survives and
carries on an insurance business at Edmond; B. C.,
who was a carriage manufacturer, died near Paris,
Kentucky; R. G., who was a rancher and stockman,
died at Fort Concho. Texas, in IQ08; W. C, who
was a telegrapher, died at Indian Field. Kentucky,
in 1S98; Henry H., whose name heads this review;
O. G.. who is in an automobile business at Detroit,
Michigan; D. R.. who is a druggist of El Paso,
Texas; O. L.. who is in a real estate business at
Los Angeles. California; and Ethel Leora, who mar-
ried and lives at Los Angeles, where her husband is
eneaged in the clothing business.
Henrv H. Forman attended the common schools
of Clark County, Kentucky, and assisted his parents
until he was twenty years old, at which time he
began ranching and was so occupied in Kentucky,
Texas and Wyoming, and then in 1808 made his
first trin to Montana, going through the state buy-
ing and sellinsr blooded horses. Later he located
3t Chevenne. Wyoming. In 1916 he returned to
Montana, and was engaged in ranching at Belfry
for a brief period, leaving it for Red Lodge in 1917.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
191
Here he owned a barber shop, and conducted it
until lie was elected on the republican ticket audi-
tor of Carbon County ni 1918, assuming the dutiei?
of the office iu January, 1919, for a term of two
5ears. His office is in the courthouse. While liv-
ing in Illinois he had some experience as a public
official, as he was there a justice of the peace. Fra-
ternally he belongs to Wataga Lodge, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, of Wataga, Illinois.
In 1903 Mr. Forman was married to Miss
Mabel Cornelius at Galesburg, Illinois, and she died
at Moline, Illinois, in 19IJ, leaving two children,
Henry C, who was born May 24, 1905, and Myrtle,
wlio was born January 24, 1907. During April, 191 3,
Mr. Forman was married to Miss Myra Huntington
at Killings, Montana. She is a daughter of E. and
Lizzie Huntington, who reside in Rosebud County,
Montana, where Mr. Huntington is a rancher and
stockman. Mr. and Mrs. Forman have a daughter.
Vivian, who was born November 2, 1914. Mr. For-
man is giving Carbon County a valuable service in
the office he holds, and is recognized as one of the
representative men of this section, and one who is
deserving of the confidence displayed in him by his
constituents.
Gkorge RoLLiN Creel, of Lewistown, has made
his. home in Fergus County for twenty years, coming
to Montana from Illinois.
He was born on a farm close to the Mississippi
River, near the Town of Durham in Hancock
County, Illinois, in 1873, son of Charles A. and
Susan (Yates) Creel. His parents were both na-
tives of Illinois. When he was a year old the
family moved to McDonoiigh County, where he spent
the early years of his life on a farm just at the edge
of Macomb. The corner stone of the limits of that
beautiful little Illinois city was located in the front
yard of the Creel home.
His first schooling was in the district schools, but
becoming acquainted in the city he attended schools
at Macomb and completed his education in the Ma-
comb Business and Normal College. He never
achieved a college degree, but all his life has been
an optimistic student of the pages of the world's
liistory. He has much admiration for the rural life,
at the same time desires the advantages of the city.
His father was born in 1844 and is still living, hav-
ing spent a long and active career as a farmer and
stockman. Mr. Creel was only si.x years old when
his mother died in 1880, at the age of forty-two, as a
result of typhoid fever. At that time the small boy
was much impressed by the service rendered by the
undertaker. After leaving school George Creel fol-
lowed various lines of work. While in a shoe store
at Joliet, Illinois, he met a stockman from Geyser,
Montana, whose story of Central Montana so in-
terested him that thirty days later he was on his
way to Great Falls. One year was spent on a ranch,
then he was employed in the quartz mines at New
Year, and while working in the Judith Hardware
Store at Lewistown, which carried a side line of
caskets, he began planning an exclusive business as a
funeral director. At that time the impressions made
upon him at his mother's funeral were renewed
and after much consideration he went to Chicago and
completed a course and secured a diploma from the
United States School of Embalming.
On his return to Lewiston he had no capital,
hut his training and experience, combined with his
determined ambition, enabled him to bridge over the
period in which failure was daily imminent. A
friend supplied him with the funds with which he
opened his funeral directing parlors in December,
1902. and later the Montana Hardware Company and
Tol. 11—13
the Judith Hardware Company sold their stock of
caskets and funeral supplies to him. He has since
been in business at 605 Main Street, has a splendid
equipment and is a man of the proper talent and
experience to handle this business most success-
fully.
Mr. Creel is proud of his citizenship in his adopted
State of Montana and is endeavoring to keep abreast
with his thriving little city.
He is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 37,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Lewistown
Lodge No. 456 of the Order of Elks, Judith Lodge
No. 30, Knights of Pythias, Judith Lodge No. 30,
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and he and
his wife are both members of Marie Chapter No.
36 of the Eastern Star.
April 14, 1903, Mr. Creel married Miss Kittie A.
Schaaf, who was born at Alhambra Springs, Mon-
tana, daughter of Aaron and Alice (Pool) Schaaf,
early settlers of this state. Mr. and Mrs. Creel are
the parents of three daughters, Lygra L., Judith
Montana and Nita A.
Henry Rosetta has been a resident of Montana
for thirty years, was formerly well known in coal
mining circles in Carbon County, has also been
prominent in official affairs and is an extensive
rancher near Red Lodge.
He was born near Turin, Italy, February 15, 1870,'
but has spent his life since early childhood in the
United States. His father, Frank Rosetta, was born
near Turin in 1837, and while living in Italy culti-
vated a small farm. During one of the wars in
which Italy was engaged in 1856 he hauled sup-
plies to the Italian camp. He came to America in
1876 and was a pioneer settler in Southeastern
Kansas, locating at Osage City. He worked in the
coal mines there, but later became a farmer, and
his death in 1903 was the result of an accident in
his cow stable. He was a republican voter and
was reared in, the Catholic Church. Frank Rosetta
married Theressa Flora, who was born near Turin
in 1851 and is now living at Benton Harbor, Michi-
gan. Henry was the oldest of her eight children.
A brief record of the others is as follows : Amelia,
wife of Emil Balocca, a painter and decorator at
Osagq City, Kansas; Florinda, wife of A. D.
Wardell, a coal miner at Minden Mines, Missouri :
Clementine, residing at Osage City, is the widow of
Charles Herman, who was a coal mine foreman
and farmer; Adolph, of Benton Harbor, Michi-
gan; Emil, a machinist living in Virginia: Quinto,
a musician at Benton Harbor; Frank, a printer liv-
ing at Benton Harbor.
Henry Rosetta was educated in the schools of
Osage Citv, Kansas. He began working and sup-
porting himself at the age of io54 years, when he
was employed as a boy in the coal mines of Kansas.
His coal mining experience gave him his first op-
portunitv when he came to Montana in 1800. He
was employed in the mines of the Rocky Fork Coal
Company until the fall of 1898. In the meantime
he had become a well known and popular figure
in Carbon County, and in that year was elected
assessor of the county. He filled the office for two
years and the following four years he engaged in the
real estate and insurance business. In the mean-
time he became interested in coal lands and de-
veloped the International coal properties at Bear
Creek and was their active manager until 19I3- He
is still a director in the International Coal Com-
pany. Since loi.i he has concentrated his energies
on ranching. His home ranch, individually owned,
comprises 640 acres five miles northeast of Red
Lodge. He also leases over 1,000 acres, and does
192
HISTORY OF MONTANA
his business as a stock raiser on a large scale. He
served as president of the Rocky Fork and Clear
Creek Ditch Company, but refused re-election to
that office in March, 1919. and has been connected
witn the organizations for twenty years. Mr. Ro-
setta is a democrat and is affiliated with Star in
the West Lodge No. 40, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. His residence is at 301 North Platte
Avenue in Red Lodge. He married in Osage City,
Kansas, Miss Clementine Romersa, a daughter of
Joseph and Maria Romersa. Her father is now liv-
ing in Italy while her mother is in Red Lodge.
Mr. and Mrs. Rosetta had the following children:
Alpha, of Red Lodge, a graduate of the high school
of that city, is the widow of Chris Sparling, who
was a farmer in Montana; Sophie, who married
Harry Woodson, of Bear Creek, Montana; Daisy
A., a graduate of the high school, married Edwin
H. Melville of Los Gatos. California: Kate, also a
high school graduate, is at home with her parents
and is bookkeeper for the Red Lodge Brewing Com-
pany; Adolph, who was a graduate of high school
and was a victim of the influenza epidemic at the
age of twenty-one, his death occurring November 6,
191 8; and Leo, who is a public school student.
Marshall E. Miller. The members of the vast
army of business men connected with the various
branches of the autombile industry have been re-
cruited from various other occupations and voca-
tional fields, for the autmobile business is compara-
tively a new one. It is likewise one that appeals
to young men just entering upon their careers, and
many of those who have already tasted of suc-
cess are men still in their early thirties. Marshall
E. Miller, of Billings, is one who, formerly a
farmer, is now proprietor of one of the leading
garages of his city. Mr. Miller is a native of Mont-
gomery County, Missouri, born December 11, 1885,
a son of J. H. and Alice (Cummings) Miller.
Chris Miller, the grandfather of Marshall E., was
a pioneer into Missouri, where he rounded out a
successful and honorable career in agricultural pur-
suits, and died at Bellflower, Missouri, in i8go. His
son, J. H. Miller, was born in 1854, in Ohio, where
he was reared, and was still a young man when he
removed to Vernon County, Missouri, where his
marriage took place. For some years he continued
to make his home in Vernon County, where he
was engaged in farming, a vocation which he sub-
sequently followed in Montgomery County in the
same state, but in December, 1916, retired from ac-
tive pursuits and located near Fromberg, Montana,
where he still makes his home. He is a stanch
republican in his political affiliatio^, but is not in-
terested in public affairs save as a voter and a pub-
lic-spirited citizen. Mrs. Miller, who also survives,
was born in 1862, in Vernon County, Missouri, and
she and her husband are the parents of three chil-
dren: Marshall E., of this notice; Claude, who is
engaged in farming in Vernon County, Missouri ;
and Charles, who makes his home with his parents.
Marshall E. Miller was educated in the public
schools of Missouri, and continued to reside on his
father's farm until he reached the age of twenty-
two years. At that time he embarked in farming
upon his own initiative and continued to be so en-
gaged until 191 1, when he took up his home and
centered his activities at Nevada, Missouri, being
there employed in general work. Upon locating at
Billings in October, 1914, he found employment in
a garage and learned the business, and October 23,
1917, founded his present business at No. 112 North
Twenty-sixth Street, where he has floor space of
25 by SS feet. He has a well-equipped establish-
ment, which has developed into one of the leading
garages of the city, and is fully prepared to do
all kinds of repairing, in addition to which he
handles second-hand cars and handles all kinds of
accessories. Mr. Miller has built up an excellent
trade in his line, and maintains a high standing
in business circles. He is an advocate of democratic
principles and candidates as, regards politics, and
is fraternally connected with Lodge No. 558, Loyal
Order of Moose.
On December 9, 1908, Mr. Miller was united in
marriage at Harwood, Missouri, with Miss Nora
Alice Moore, daughter of Steven J. and Alice
Moore, now both deceased, Mr. Moore having for-
merly been a carpenter at Walker, Missouri. Two
children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Miller :
Raymond, born March 21, igio, and Juanita. born
June 5, 1914.
Charlie T. Trott. A young man of good busi-
ness capacity, familiar from his youth with the "art
preservative of all arts," Charlie T. Trott, of Bil-
lings, established the Trott Printing Company, lo-
cated at 2810-12 Second Avenue, North, in 1909, and
has since managed its affairs systematically and effi-
ciently. A son of Charles Trott, he was born
August 6, 1884, at Deal, County Kent, England.
Charles Trott, a native of England, was born at
Dover, County Kent, in 1854, and there acquired
his early education. He was' engaged in seafaring
pursuits during his early life. In 1890 he immi-
grated to this country, at once making his way with
his family to Montana and locating at first in that
part of Custer County that is now included in Rose-
bud County, at Forsyth, coming from there to
Billings in 1899. Since 1914 he has been actively
associated with the Trott Printing Company. He
married in Deal, England, Charlotte Hall, whose
birth occurred in that town in 1856. Five children
have been born into their household, as follows :
Charlie T., with whom this sketch is chiefly con-
cerned ; Richard, of Billings, superintendent of the
Trott Printing Company; Georgina, living with her
parents; Phyllis, wife of Robert Tallent, who is
engaged in mining at Butte, Montana ; and Wini-
fred, wife of Charles B. Allen, a contractor and
builder at Billings.
But six years of age when he was brought by
his parents to Montana, Charlie T. Trott acquired
his preliminary education at Forsyth. He subse-
quently learned the printer's trade. Coming to
Billings in 1899, Mr. Trott was for a short time
with the Times Publishing Company, and later with
the Gazette Printing Company. Ambitious to start
in business on his own account and realizing the
need of more extensive knowledge of the craft, he
spent several years in different plants of large east-
ern printing centers. Politically Mr. Trott is in-
dependent of party affiliations. Fraternally he be-
longs to Billings "Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, and socially he is a mem-
ber of the Billings Midland Club.
Mr. Trott married at Billings in 1914 Miss Emma
Christoffersen, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Mads
Christoffersen, who reside in Menasha, Wisconsin.
Mr. and Mrs. Trott have two children, William,
born November 25, 1915 ; and George, born July 27,
1918.
Charley W. Hill. The name of Charley W.
Hill is known to everyone interested in real estate
transfers in Page County. For several years he
has filled a large place in the business affairs of
the City of Livingston, and as an energetic, far-
seeing, enterprising man, careful and painstaking in
^^,/^ <^r^i/Uf.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
his work, he has won and now enjoys the confidence
of all who are acquainted with him and his spe-
cial line of work.
Charley W. Hill is descended from good old Yan-
kee stock, his ancestors having located in Massa-
chusetts in colonial days. His paternal grand-
father, Daniel Hill, was born in Maine in 1816
and died at Lynn, Massachusetts, in 1889. For
many years he lived at Swamscott, Massachusetts,
where he established a wholesale fish market, in
which he was succeeded by his son, Charley W.
Hill's father. His wife was a Hathaway of Massa-
chusetts. Mr. Hill's father, also named Daniel,
was born in 1825 in Swamscott, Massachusetts,
where he was reared, though the greater part of
his life was spent in Boston, to which city he moved
after his marriage. Eventually he retired and came
to White Sulphur Springs, Montana, where he died
a few years later, in 1892. He was a republican,
a member of the Baptist Church and of the Masonic
fraternity. In his younger years he had taken
an active interest in military affairs and wa's cap-
tain of the Prescott Light Guards of Boston. He
married Caroline Hill, who, though bearing the same
family name, was not related to him. She was born
in 1827 in Waterloo, Maine, and died at Portland,
Maine, in 1896. To them was born but one child,
the subject of this review.
Charley W. Hill, who conducts a successful ab-
stracting business at Livingston, was born at Bos-
ton, Massachusetts, on November 9, 1857, and re-
ceived his education in the public and night schools
of that city. At the age of seventeen years he be-
gan work in the office of the city surveyor of Bos-
ton, where he remained three years. In 1879 he
came west, locating first at Helena, Montana, of
which he was one of the pioneer residents. Dur-
ing the following two seasons he was on Govern-
ment survey work, and during his first season he
was a member of the expedition out of Helena
which worked in the fiat Willow country. This
region is now a part of Fergus County, but at that
time the county had not been formed and Lewis-
town was as vet undreamed of. During his sec-
ond season he" was a member of the party which
operated in the Powder River country south of
Miles City. Even in that year the railways had not
yet invaded the country. He pre-empted 160 acres
of land west of White Sulphur Springs, dividmg
his residence between his ranch and the town. In
1889 he was appointed deputy county clerk and
recorder of Meagher County, this being immediately
following the admission of Montana to statehood,
and three years later he was elected county clerk
and recorder, to which ofiice he was three times
elected to succeed himself, thus serving six years.
He then, in 1898, returned to his ranch, where he
spent the next two years, but was recalled to public
life bv his election as sheriff of Meagher County,
in which he served one term. He then started a
steam laundry in White Sulphur Springs, but one
year later he transferred the plant to Livingston,
which offered a better opening. However, in 1902
Mr. Hill sold the laundry and entered the employ
of the Livingston Land and Abstract Company,
where he gained valuable experience in the most
important field of abstracting, thoroughly learning
every phase of the business. In 1915 he opened an
abstracting ofiice on his own account, in which he
has met with most pronounced success, he being now
considered the leading abstractor of his county. In
1902 Mr. Hill sold his ranch and now owns a splen-
did, modern home on South Seventh Street, Liv-
ingston.
Politically Mr. Hill is a republican, while his
fraternal relations are with the Independent Order
of Odd Fellows, his membership being with Castle
Mountain Lodge at White Sulphur Springs. He is
also a member of the Livingston Chamber of Com-
merce and takes a live interest in every project
which in any way promises to benefit the city or
county.
On August 14, 1889, at Helena, Montana, Mr.
Hill married Carrie A. Lewis, a native of Oxford,
New York. She received a good education in the
public schools and in Oxford Seminary and is a
lady of refinement and culture. To Mr. and Mrs.
Hill have been born three children, as follows :
Lewis L., who had been connected with the Govern-
ment engineering department in the Yellowstone Na-
tion Park, enlisted in the United States army in
June, 1917, prior to the draft, and in March, 1918,
was sent overseas as a member of the Third Di-
vision, Sixth Engineers Corps, Army of Occupa-
tion. He saw much active service up to the time
of the armistice, having been engaged on the Marne,
in Picardy, at Verdun, where he was wounded,
and in the Argonne Forest drive. His services were
recognized and he became a first lieutenant of en-
gineers. He is a man of splendid educational at-
tainments, being a graduate of the Park County
High School and of Bozeman College. Mary La-
Vaughn, who lives at home, is a graduate of the
Park County High School and for the past four
years has served as cashier of the Montana Power
Company. Florence J., also a graduate of the
county high school, is bookkeeper for the George
L. Tracy Commission House.
It will thus be recognized that the Hill family
has ably done its part in every relation of life which
has presented itself, and they enjoy the sincere re-
spect of all who know them and of their work.
Arthur J. Movius, M. D. Billings is especially
fortunate in having among its more able and skilful
physicians and surgeons Dr. Arthur J. Movius, who
has attained a position of prominence in the medical
profession, his career having been one of continued
progress. Making a specialty of surgery rather than
straying over the entire field of endeavor, he has
become widely known as one of the foremost sur-_
geons of Southeastern Montana, being recognized
as an authority on that branch of medical science. A
son of William R. Movius, he was born at Odessa.
Minnesota, August 11, 1878, of German ancestry.
Born in Germany in 1850, William R. Movius came
to this country as a youth of sixteen years, settling
in Minnesota. Becoming familiar with the various
branches of agriculture during the next few years,
he bought land in the vicinity of Yellow Banks, that
state, soon after attaining his majority, and by
dint of hard labor cleared and improved a good
farm, and for several years operated a general store.
Moving with his family to South Dakota in 1875,
he was there actively engaged in the mercantile busi-
ness until 1890, when he settled at Lidgerwood,
North Dakota, and engaged in the manufacture of
flour, operating a mill for upwards of a quarter
of a century. In 1917 he became a resident of Bill-
ings, Montana, where he is now living retired, en-
joying the fruits of his previous years of toil. Po-
litically he is a democrat ; religiously a member of
the Methodist Episcopal Church ; and fraternally is a
Mason.
Of the union of William R. Movius with Marcella
J. Murray, a native of Minnesota, eight children have
been born, as follows: Arthur T., the special sub-
ject of this personal sketch; Winfred D., operating
a flour mill at Lidgerwood, North Dakota ; Marcella,
wife of Dr. N. J. Shields, a physician and surgeon
at San Luis Obispo, California; Pearl D., wife of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Arthur Rosenkranz, an electrician at Lidgerwood;
Rex iM., treasurer of Sheridan County, Montana,
resides at Plentywood ; Walter R., engaged in the
real estate and insurance business in Billings ; Harold
E., who is associated with the Billings Laundry Com-
pany; and Margaret, wife of Herman Warren, a
railroad employe, living in Mobile, Alabama.
The early educational privileges of Arthur J.
Movius were confined to the public schools of Big
Stone, South Dakota, but in 1895 he was graduated
from the Fargo, North Dakota High School, rank-
ing high in his class. The ensuing five years he was
employed in the milling business with his father at
Lidgerwood, North Dakota. Being of a studiotjs
nature, with a real desire to further advance his
knowledge, he entered the University of Minnesota
at Minneapolis, and in 1904 was graduated from that
institution with {he degree of Doctor of Medicine.
While there he joined the Xu Sigma Nu, a medical
fraternity. Continuing his residence in Minneapolis,
Doctor Movius did post graduate work at .Asbury
Hospital as an interne, specializing in surgery, for
which he had a natural taste and aptitude.
Locating in Montana in 1905, the doctor erected a
hospital at Bridger, and managed it creditably for
four years, in the meantime gaining a broad e.x-
perience in his special line of work and a wide
reputation for ability and professional skill. Dis-
posing of his hospital in June, 191 1, Doctor Movius
came to Billings, and having established his offices
in Suite 239, Hart-Albin Building, has since built
up an extensive and highly remunerative general
practice, specializing as heretofore in surgery. He
is a man of excellent financial standing, owning a
ranch of 640 acres in Treasure County, Montana,
a fine residence at 245 Wyoming Avenue, and is a
large shareholder in the Security Building and Loan
-Association, Billings, Montana.
In his political relations the doctor is independent,
voting according to the dictates of his conscience
regardless of party prejudices. Religiously he is an
active and prominent member of the Methodist Epis-
copal Church, and a member of its board of trustees.
Fraternally he is a member of the .Ancient Free and
' .Accepted Order of Masons ; of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows; and of the Ancient Order
of United Workmen. Socially he belongs to the
Billings Midland Empire Club. He has also the
distinction of being one of the four physicians of
Yellowstone County to hold a fellowship in the
.American College of Surgeons.
In 1906, in Nova Scotia, Doctor Movius was united
in marriage with Miss Marion Murray, a daughter
of the late Andrew and Jane (McKenzie) Murray.
Her father, formerly a farmer and carpenter, has
passed to the life beyond, but her mother, Mrs.
Murray, is a resident of Billings. Mrs. Movius is a
well-educated, accomplished woman, and a graduate
of the Pictou Academy, at Pictou. Nova Scotia.
Doctor and Mrs. Movius are the parents of four
children, namely: Marcella Jane, born May 15,
1907; Marion, born January 20. 1909; Arthur J..
Jr., born October 15, 1910; and William Robert, born
November 10, 1914.
Walter C. Straszer. Notwithstanding the fact
that the republic of Switzerland is 'one of the small-
est countries of the world, it has sent large num-
ber of emigrants to the United States during the
vears that have elapsed since independence was se-
cured. The people of that country, appreciating
tlie blessings of liberty, of which they had had
a strong example in their own land, were not slow
to recognize the possibilities that opened out in
splendid perspective before all who located early in
this country. Accordingly, large numbers of the
hardy Swiss have crossed the Atlantic and sought
homes in • the great West of the United States.
And here their descendants have been numbered
among the most intelligent, patriotic, industrious
and upright of our great and wonderful cosmo-
politan population. The subject of this sketch can
look back with satisfaction to his ancestry, who
were of this hardy stock and he has in himself
emulated the splendid qualities which characterized
them.
The paternal grandfather of the subject of this
•sketch, John Jacob Straszer, was born at Zurich,
Switzerland, in 1804, and in 1851 immigrated to thi-
United States, settling in St. Louis, Missouri, where
he carried on the business of carpenter and con-
. tractor. In 1879 he returned to Switzerland on a
visit, and while there was taken sick and died. His
<son George was born at Zurich in 1845 and accom-
panied his parents on their immigration to the
United States in 1851. He was reared in St. Louis,
and there followed the vocation of a tinsmith. His
death occurred at Webster Grove, Missouri, in
1912. He was a stanch republican in his political
faith and took an active part 'in the civic and po-
litical affairs of his community. He served as
deputy United States marshal for three terrris and
also held county and city offices. .At the time of
his death he was city marshal of Webster Grove.
He was a veteran of the Civil war, and a mem-
ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church and of the
Masonic fraternity. He married in St. Louis Mary
L. Zimmerman, who was born in that city in 1843
and who now resides at Webster Grove. To them
were born five children, as follows : .'Mbert George
is a driver for the National Park Laundry of Liv-
ingston; Lillie E. is the wife of W. C. Urban, chief
rate clerk for the Missouri Pacific Railway at Web-
ster Grove, Missouri ; Walter C. is the immediate
subject of this sketch; Ada Lee is unmarried and
is a teacher by vocation ; Charlotte Marie is the
wife of Louis B. Burns, county surveyor of Miami
County, Indiana.
Walter C. Straszer was born at Manchester, Mis-
souri, on .A.ugust 6. 1873, and received his educa-
tion in the rural schools of St. Louis County. At
the age of thirteen years he began working for a
commission firm of St. Louis, with which he re-
mained a year, and then spent three years in a
grocery store. During the following four years he
worked for the St. Louis Street Railway Company.
In 1808. at the outbreak of the Spanish-American
war, Mr. Straszer enlisted in the First Missouri
Regiment of Volunteer Infantry and was sent to
the camp at Chickamauga Park. He was discharged
with the rank of corporal at St. Louis in 1899. He
then went to San Francisco, California, and during
the following year devoted himself to learning the
mechanical details of the laundry business. In 1900
he came to Butte, Montana, and until 1912 was
connected with the laundry business in that city.
In the latter year Mr. Straszer came to Livingston
and established the National Park Laundry, an en-
terpriee which has proven successful even beyond
his expectations. The plant was first located on
Park Street, but grew to such proportions that
larger space was needed and the laundry was moved
to 202-4-6 South Main Street. Every facility in
the way of up-to-date machinery is provided for
the proper handling of the work and today this
laundry has the reputation of being the leading
house of its kind in this section of Montana. The
National Park Laundry is incorporated, with the
following officers: W. C. Straszer, president: K. A.
Straszer. vice president ; F. E. Green, secretary and
treasurer
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Politically Walter C. Straszer is a standi republi-
can and takes an intelligent interest in the trend
of public affairs, though he is not a seeker after
public office. He holds membership in Livingston
Lodge No. 32. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons;
Livingston Lodge, Knights of Pythias ; the Living-
ston Chamber of Commerce; and the Commercial
Club and the Railway Club.
In igoi, at Butte, Montana, Mr. Straszer mar-
ried Kate A. Griffin, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Michael Griffin, the former of whom was a railroad
contractor. Both of these parents are now deceased.
Mr. and Mrs. Straszer have two children, George,
born in 1903, and Allouez Marie, born in 1907.
Success has crowned the efforts of Mr. Straszer
as the legitimate result of unflagging industry and
perseverance, coupled with integrity and a genial
disposition, and he has justly won and retained the
esteem of his fellow citizens.
Edward C. Jones, who came to Livingston in July,
1906, has steadily practiced law since that date and
has formed some influential connection in his pro-
fession. He is the present county attorney of Park
County.
Mr. Jones is still a young man in years, and
the better part of his career is still ahead of him.
He was born in Vernon County, Missouri, Decem-
ber 2, 1879. His paternal ancestry was from Wales.
His father, J. W. Jones, was born in Huntingdon
County, Pennsylvania, in 1850. When he was ten
years old, in i860, his parents, George W. and
Abigail (Duff) Jones, both natives of Huntingdon
County, moved to Cleveland, Ohio. While at Cleve-
land George W. Jones enlisted in an Ohio regiment,
the Tenth Cavalry, and served four years in the
Civil war. He had previously served in the war with
Mexico. Soon after the close of the Civil war,
in 1866, he took his family to Vernon County,
Missouri, and spent the rest of his life as a farmer
there. He died in Cedar County, Missouri. His
wife, Abigail, had died in Huntingdon County.
Pennsylvania. J. W. Jones received most of his
education while at Cleveland. After moving to
Vernon County, Missouri, in the spring of 1866,
he became a farmer, and in ipii he came to Mon-
tana, locating at Wilsall and was mail carrier be-
tween Wilsall and Lat. He died in Park County,
April I, 1918. Politically he was a democrat and
was a member of the Christian Church and affili-
ated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
J. W. Jones married Agnes B. Dade, who was born
in St. Clair County, Missouri, in 1853 and is now
living in Lat, Montana. Catherine, the oldest of
their children, is the wife of W. W. Pepper, a
farmer and stock raiser at Lat ; Edward C. is the
second in age; Mariamme is the wife of R. L.
Monroe, of Paul, Idaho ; Jacob M. and Robert D.
are both farmers at Lat ; while Florence E. is the
wife of Everett Durham, a farmer and stockman
at Menard, Montana.
Edward C. Jones spent his early career in the
atmosphere of his father's farm in Vernon County,
Missouri, attended country schools, and also the
high school at Schell City, Missouri. For four
years he gave all his time and energy to farming
and began the study of law in the office of Scott &
Bowker of Nevada, Missouri. He was admitted
to the bar in 1904 and remained in the Scott &
Bowker office until January, 1906. In July of that
year he came to Livingston and embarked in a
general civil and criminial practice. His offices are
in the Miles-Krohne Block. Mr. Jones was elected
county attorney in 1918 and began his duties Janu-
ary 6, 1919. He is a member of the Park County
Bar Association, is a democrat, is affiliated with
Zephyr Camp of the Woodmen of the World at
Livingston, is a member of the Chamber of Com-
merce, and is a director in the Montana Mining
Company.
His home, which he owns, is at 305 South Seventh
Street. Mr. Jones married at 5fevada, Missouri,
in July, 1906, Miss Eulalie Scott, daughter of
Charles R. and Mary (Dixon) Scott, both now
deceased. Her father was a lawyer. Mr. and Mrs.
Jones have three children : Alma E., born Marcli
23, 1907; Mildred Virginia, born June 23, 1912;
and Eulalie, born December 4, 1917.
Byron Lee Pampel, M. D. When Governor
Stewart in April, 1918, called Doctor Pampel to
membership on the state board of health, a worthy
recognition was made of the se. vices of one of the
most vigilant and skillful members of the medical
profession in Montana. Doctor Pampel has prac-
ticed at Livingston for twenty years and is a man
of the highest standing in civic as well as profes-
sional circles.
He was born at Salem, Nebraska. July 4, 1873,
and came to Montana soon after completing his
medical education. His grandfather. Christian
Leonidas Pampel, was born in France in 1810. As
a young man he settled in the Miami Valley of
Ohio, and spent his active life there as a farmer.
He died at Sydney, Ohio, in 1880. His wife was
a Miss Harris, a native of New England, who died
in Southern Ohio when about sixty-five years of
age. George W. Pampel, father of Doctor Pampel,
was born in Sydney, Ohio, in 1843, and left that
community when a young man. going to Nebraska,
where he was a flour miller. He married at Salem,
Nebraska, and in 1S78 moved to Centralia, Nemaha
County, Kansas, where he was a merchant until
1901. Since then he has lived practically retired
from business in Kansas City, Missouri. He is a
democrat, a Mason and a member of the Congre-
gational Church. George W. Pampel married Nel-
lie E. Davis, who was born in Vermont in 1846 and
died at Kansas City in 1916. Doctor Pampel is the
oldest of four children. All the others live in Kan-
sas City, both daughters, Carrie and Althea, resid-
ing with their father. The son, Heber D., third
in age. is an architect in Kansas City.
Doctor Pampel is a graduate of the Centralia,
Kansas. High School, and is also an alumnus of
the University of Kansas at Lawrence. He received
his A. B. degree in 1895, and then entered the medi-
cal department of Nebraska State University at
Omaha, graduating M. D. in 1898. For one year
he was interne in the Douglas County Hospital at
Omaha, and in the spring of 1899 arrived at Liv-
ingston and began his busy career as a physician
and surgeon. In 1902 he attended the Post-Grad-
uate Medical School at Chicago and the spring and
summer of 1908 were spent in the New York Post-
Graduate School. He is a member of the county
and state medical societies and the American Medi-
cal Association. His offices are in the Miles-Krohne
Block.
Doctor Pampel is a democrat, is affiliated with
Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Livingston Chapter No. 7, Royal
Arch Masons, St. Bernard Commandery No. 6.
Knights Templar, Algeria Temple of the Mystic _
Shrine at Helena, Zephyr Camp No. 151, Woodmen
of the World, and belongs to the Royal Highland-
ers. He is a member of the Livingston Chamber
of Commerce and a stockholder and director of
the First State Bank of Livingston.
His residence is a modern home at 216 South
106
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Yellowstone Street. Doctor Pampel married Miss
Lois Fagaly at Billings in 1903. They have two
children : George, born June 17, 1904, and Dorothy,
born June 13, 1911.
Harry Brice Blair thirty years ago was a ranch
hand in the Shields River Valley of Montana. Un-
til very recently he was directly interested as an
owner in the lands of that famous region. As a
rancher he did his part in developing an important
section of the state, and is also remembered for
his leading part in developing the first telephone
system covering a vast stretch of country between
Livingston and Myersburg. For the past ten years
Mr. Blair has been in the automobile business at
Livingston, at first as a sales agent and garage
proprietor, and now entirely as an automobile sales-
man. He has developed an organization that is
hardly second to any in the state in the volume of
sales.
Mr. Blair, long regarded as one of Livingston's
most successful business men, attributes his suc-
cess to a faculty and habit which in a colloquial
term is best described as "plugging" along." In
terms of real service to the world arid humanity
such an ability seems more than possession of the
most brilliant qualities and talents.
Mr. Blair was born on a farm at Eola, Illinois,
September 15, 1868. His paternal ancestors came
from Scotland and were early settlers in Pennsyl-
vania, where his father, James A. Blair, was born in
1843. James A. Blair married the mother of Harry
B. Blair in Iowa, where he lived several years. He
afterward established his home on a farm at Eola,
Illinois, and in 1896 retired from the farm and lived
at Aurora until his death in 191 1. During the Civil
war he was employed by the Government as a vet-
erinarian. He was always a republican in poli-
tics. For his second wife he married Nettie Fow-
ler, who is living at Batavia, Illinois. His chil-
dren, however, were all by his first wife, Harry B.
being the youngest of eight. A brief record of the
others is as follows; Belle, wife of H. E. Mc-
Dowell, a banker at Clay Center, Nebraska ; Hattie,
who married James Barclay and both are now de-
ceased; Louise, wife of Edwin Woodworth, a re-
tired rancher in California; Elmer, who was a stock-
man and died at Myersburg, Montana, at the age
of thirty-two ; Erve, a resident of Long Beach, Cali-
fornia, and a stock raiser having a large ranch on
the Clementes Island in Southern California; Ella,
wife of J. K. McMurdo, a rancher at Clyde Park,
Montana ; Frank, who has a large ranch at Clyde
Park and lives at Bozeman.
Harry B. Blair attended school at Aurora, Illi-
nois, graduating from high school in 1885. In 1887
he arrived at Livingston, Montana, and the next
two years he worked for wages on ranches at
White Sulphur Springs. In 1889 he began a modest
business for himself raising cattle on the South
Fork of the Smith River in Meagher County, and
in 1893 he entered the sheep industry. Mr. Blair
homesteaded in 1891 in order to secure a base for
his livestock operations, and he rapidly developed
large herds of cattle and sheep, acquiring an ex-
tensive domain of deeded and leased lands, and was
a notable figure among the stockmen of the Shields
Valley until 1910. In the fall of 1918 he sold all his
ranches, about 5,000 acres. During all these years
he has been a leader in promoting the best welfare
of his section of Alontana as an agricultural dis-
trict. He placed no obstacles in the way of sub-
dividing the old cattle domain, and for years has
advocated intensive farming and the introduction of
high grade stock raising.
Before he left the ranch he was instrumental in
developing a complete telephone system for the
Shields River Valley and by 1907 the independent
system had 250 miles of telephone line covering the
district between Livingston and Myersburg.
In 1909 Mr. Blair entered the automobile business
at Livingston, and the following year moved his
home to that cit3'. He established a garage and
began handling the Reo and Dodge cars. The first
year his sales totalled $15,000, and in less than ten
years he was doing a business approximating
$200,000 annually. In 1917 he sold his garage, and
his business offices at 219 South Main now repre-
sents a complete auto sales and service station, han-
dling the Reo, Dodge and Franklin cars.
Since coming to Livingston Mr. Blair has also
been active in public affairs. He was elected in
1912 a trustee of the schools and has been a direc-
tor of the Park County Chamber of Commerce and
for two years was president of the Commercial
Club. He has also served as president of the Ad
Club, and is a member of the Park County Auto-
mobile Association. He belongs to the Railway
Club, is a republican, is affiliated with Livingston
Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Livingston Consistory of the Scottish Rite, Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena, and Liv-
ingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks. He is a stock-
holder in the First State Bank of Clyde Park. Air.
Blair owns a modern home at 307 South Fifth
Street and another dwelling on South P Street.
On February 17, 1894, at Macon, Illinois, Mr.
Blair married Miss Thirza Van Dorn, daughter of
J. W. and Hattie (Wagner) Van Dorn. Her par-
ents reside at Livingston, her father being a retired
rancher and president of the First State Bank of
Livingston. Mr. and Mrs. Blair have two children,
Mildred and Halsey. Mildred is a graduate of the
Livingston public schools and is the wife of J. W.
Crosby of Livingston. Mr. Crosby enlisted in Sep-
tember, 1917, was sent overseas with the Ninety-first
Division on July i, 1918 and participated in the great
fighting of the Argonne Forest, where he lost his
right leg. He was a sergeant. The son, Halsey, is
a young business man of Livingston, now in part-
nership with his father.
William J. Strever. one of the accomplished and
successful lawyers at Billings, knows life and affairs
from the standpoint of a thoroughly educated man,
a teacher, farmer and rancher, and did not take
up the law until he was nearly forty years of age.
Mr. Strever was born at Boulder, Colorado, July
27, 1873, son of Lloyd G. and Abby Amelia (Geer)
Strever. His paternal grandmother was Esther
Crandall, a native of England, who died in Michigan.
Lloyd G. Strever was born in New York State in
1840, and about 1843 his parents moved to the vicinity
of Lansing, Michigan, where he grew up on a farm.
In 1861 he enlisted in the Sixteenth Michigan In-
fantry and served all through the war, participating
in thirty-nine great battles. He was with the army
of the Potomac at Antietam, Gettysburg, Wilder-
ness, Cold Harbor, Siege of Richmond and Appo-
mattox, and was mustered out with the rank of
lieutenant. After the war he went directly to Central
City, Colorado, and engaged in gold mining until
1870, when he took up livestock raising and farm-
ing near Boulder. He died on the old homestead at
Berthoud, Colorado, July 8, 1907. He was a repub-
lican, a member of the Grand Army of the Republic
and the United Brethren Church. His wife was
born in Stark County, Illinois, in 1852. They were
married at Jamestown, Colorado, and she died at
Billings, Montana, May 18, 1915. She was the
mother of five children; Charles Dell, a machinist
with the Union Pacific Railway at Laramie. Wyo-
7S-€4^-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
197
ming: William J.; Lura E., who died at Berthoud,
Colorado, the wife of H. P. Dennis, who is now a
farmer on the Billings Bench, seven miles northeast
of Billings ; Elmer L., a livestock man and auctioneer
at Billings; and Arthur Edwin, who died at Boulder
City, Colorado, at the age of twenty-one.
William J. Strever acquired his early instruction
in the rural schools of Boulder and Laramie County,
Colorado, took a preparatory course in Fort Collins
College, and in 1901 graduated from the State Agri-
cultural and Mechanics Arts College at Fort Collins,
spending two years in mechanical engineering and
two years in a business course. For two years he
taught school at Boulder, another two years at Lusk,
Wyoming, and for six years was profitably en-
gaged in farming and stock raising in those two
states. Mr. Strever studied law for two years in
the State University of Colorado at Boulder, and in
1912 entered the State University of Montana, law
department, graduating in 1914. In the spring of that
year he located at Billings, and during five years
has discovered an increasing demand for his services
as. a lawyer. His offices are in the Hart-Albin
Building.
Mr. Strever is a republican, a deacon in the Con-
gregational Church, member of the Yellowstone
County and State Bar associations, and is a charter
member of Billings Lodge Xo. 113. Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, aad a member of Billings
Camp of the Woodmen of the World.
August 3, 1904. at Gillette, Wyoming, he married
Miss Pearl Reed, a daughter of Henry L. and Hen-
rietta (Hargraves) Reed, the latter now deceased.
Her father is a retired stockman at Omaha, Ne-
braska. Mr. and Mrs. Strever have three children:
Lura Belle, born May 12, 1906 ; Henrietta Reed, born
February 15, 1909 ; and Edith Corinne, born April
4, 1910.
George W. Cook is a veteran Montanan, has been
a rancher, public official, and in many ways identi-
fied with the life and affairs of Fergus County and
Lewislown for thirty years. He is now president
of the Cook-Reynolds Real Estate & Loan Company.
Mr. Cook was born at Malone, New York, August
30, 1853, a son of Chauncey and Lucretia J. (Hobbs)
Cook. His father, born in Vermont in 1810, lived
from early infancy in New York State, where he
was a farmer. He .died in 1855. He was a whig
in politics and a very active member of the Presby-
terian Church. He had a local reputation as a
singer and gave this talent largely to his church.
His wife was born in New York State in 1814 and
died in 1892. They had eight children, two of whom
.died in infancy and three are still living. George
W. Cook is the youngest child. His mother married
for her second husband Amasa A. Rhoades and had
two children by that marriage.
George W. Cook attended the public schools at
Malone, his native town, and also attended the
Academy at Barre, Vermont. At the age of eight-
een he taught his first term of winter school, and
followed that occupation for several years, alter-
nating between the school room and the farm. He
also farmed for himself, and teaching and farm-
ing constituted his work until 1880.
In the spring of that year he came West, traveling
by railroad as far as Sioux City, Iowa, thence by
boat up the Mississippi to Fort Benton, thence by
stage to Helena and then to Fort Logan. He
worked on a sheep ranch near Fort Logan, was
clerk and bookkeeper for J. W. Gaddis Mercantile
Company at Fort Logan about two years and then
engaged in the sheep business with Dr. W. Parberry.
Their ranch was located on Dog Creek in Meagher
County, now Fergus County. Mr. Cook was a
sheep rancher from 1883 to 1893. In 1890 he was
appointed receiver of the United States Land Office
at Lewistown, and held that post until July, 1894.
He was then elected county treasurer, and by re-
election in 1896 served two terms. After retiring
from office in 1898 he went into the real estate busi-
ness with David Hilger under the firm name of
Cook & Hilger. In 1903 he retired from this firm
and was a grocery merchant a year. After that
he resumed the real estate business by himself and
in the spring of 1908 organized the Cook-Reynolds
Company, which was incorporated the following
year. This is one of the largest firms in this section
of Montana handling real estate and loans.
Mr. Cook was elected the last mayor of the town
of Lewistown on April 9, 1900, and on April 8, 1901,
was chosen the first mayor of the City of Lewis-
town. After about ten years of service he resigned
as a director of the Empire Bank & Trust Company.
He is a republican, is affiliated with Lewistown
Lodge No. 37. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Lewistown Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, Lewis-
town Commandery, Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He also
belongs to the Woodmen of the World.
On October 27, 1874, Mr. Cook married Emma
H. Orvis. She was born in Ferrisburg, Vermont.
To their union were born nine children, a brief
record of whom follows : Elizabeth M., is the
wife of Dr. A. J. Noble, of San Diego, California.
Lillian E., is the wife of J. H. Stephens, present
sheriff of Fergus County. Chauncey L. married
Matilda Roethter. The next in age is Fanny S.
William H. enlisted in July, 1918, was assigned
to the Statistics Department of the army with the
rank of second lieutenant and reached his overseas
department at Brest, France. November 9, 1918, and
has since been in charge of the filing department.
Mary L. is the wife of Frank E. Doran, an auto-
mobile dealer at Lewistown. Ruth P. was married
to Peter S. Williams, a well known Lewistown
lawyer. Verne M. is the wife of Thomas Baker,
a ranch manager. The youngest of the family is
Carro C.
Edwin K. Cheadle, a Montana lawyer with a
quarter of a century's experience, has built up a
reputation that has extended far beyond the limits
of his home City of Lewistown. He is especially
well known for his capable services of twelve
years as judge of the Tenth Judicial District.
Judge Cheadle was born in Indiana, October 22,
1858, a son of Henry C. and Emma K. (Keyes)
Cheadle, his parents both being natives of Ohio.
His father was a Presbyterian minister, was edu-
cated in Ohio, and had pastorates in that state,
Indiana and Minnesota. Judge Cheadle was the
oldest of five children, three sons and two daughters,
four of whom are still living.
He acquired his early education chiefly in the
public schools of Minnesota and in 1883 graduated
from Carlton College at Northfield, Minnesota.
He read law privately and has been a resident of
Lewistown since the fall of 1893. He was admitted
to the Montana bar at Helena in 1894. Much of
his time since beginning practice has been taken up
by public responsibilities. He served one term as
county attorney of Fergus County. He was elected
judge of the Tenth District in 1900, entering upon
its duties in January, 1901. He was re-elected in
1904 and 1908, and gave twelve years to the judicial
office. He is an honored member of the Fergus
County Bar Association and the State Bar Asso-
ciation and in politics a republican.
198
HISTORY OF MONTANA
June 26, 1890, Judge Cheadle married Ida Con-
stance Wohlfahrt. She was born in Minnesota.
Five children were born to their marriage, four of
whom are still living: Henry B., Marie, Edwin K..
Jr., and Constance. Henry B. Cheadle entered West
Point Military Academy in March, igog, and grad-
uated in June, 1913. He was commissioned second
lieutenant, ordered to Galveston, later took part
in General Funston's expedition to Mexico, and saw
active service at various points along the Mexican
border under General Funston. For a time he was
stationed in the Panama Canal Zone, at Camp
Dodge, Iowa, and early in the great war went to
France as a captain. Since his services overseas he
has been stationed at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and
later at Columbus, Georgia, and now holds the
rank of major. Major Cheadle married Beatrice
Mix. Marie, the oldest daughter of Judge Cheadle.
is the wife of Ernest Lorenz, of Oakland, California.
The younger son, Edwin K., Jr., entered the Of-
ficers Training Camp at Fort Slocum, New York, in
1915, was transferred to the Presidio in California,
and is now a first lieutenant of Field Artillery.
Jack Briscoe, judge of the Tenth Judicial Dis-
trict, has been a resident of Montana five years.
He left behind him an honorable record as a lawyer,
public afficial and educator in his native State of
Missouri, and has rapidly achieved position and
influence as a member of the Montana bar.
Judge Briscoe was born in Ralls County, Mis-
souri, February 11, 1870, a son of William J. and
Sarah E. (Clayton) Briscoe. His parents were both
natives of Monroe County, Missouri, where his
father was born December' S, 1838. His widowed
mother, born October 23, 1840, is still living at the
age of seventy-nine. His father, who died Januarv
16, igi7, spent his active life as a grain and stock-
farmer, though for two or three years he was also
engaged in the drug business. He was an active
member of the Masonic fraternity, a Knight of
Pythias, a Baptist and a democrat. " To the parents
were born six children, Judge Briscoe being the
third, and four daughters are still living.
Judge Briscoe attended the public schools of Ralls
County, the high school at New London, and the
Normal School at Chillicothe, Missouri. He studied
law while at New London and he also took a course
in the State University of Missouri. From 1894 to
1901 he was in school work in his native county,
serving as county superintendent of schools one
term. He was admitted to the Missouri bar in
March. IQ02, and practiced law at New London until
the fall of 1014. He served as prosecuting attorney
for Ralls County four years, 1Q07-10, and was
regarded as one of the leading men in every depart-
ment of affairs in that county. Judge Briscoe came
to Lewistown in December, 1914, and from Januarv
I, 1915, to November isth of that year was asso-
ciated with E. W. Mettler in practice. He was
appointed judge of the Tenth Judicial District
by Governor Stewart, serving until January i, igig,
when he entered upon his duties as judge by election,
having been chosen to that office by popular vote
on November 5, igi8. Judge Briscoe served as
public administrator in Missouri in igo2 to 1904,
three years. He is president of the City School
Board of Lewistown, having been elected in April,
igi7, and having been appointed to that office in
the previous year. His experience as an educator
enabled him to render a splendid service to the
citv school system of Lewistown.
Judge Briscoe is affiliated with New Lo.ndon
Lodge No. 307, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
with Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights of Pythias.
He is a democrat and a member of the Fergus
County Bar Association.
May 9, igoi, he married Sarah Elizabeth Stout.
She was born in Ralls County, Missouri, a daughter
of Jacob B. and Eliza J. (Jones) Stout. Her
parents are still living, and of their six children
four are living, Mrs. Briscoe being the third in
age. Judge and Mrs. Briscoe have three children:
Marjorie V., born March 11, igo2, and died August
13, igo2 ; Anderston S., born June 23, 1903 : and
.Mien F., born October 9, 1905.
Jamks Smith, who arrived at Butte on June i.
1883, had experiences that identify him with a num-
ber of pioneer localities in Montana and for the
past dozen years has been a resident of Lewistown
and one of the well known merchants of that city.
Mr. Smith was born at St. Joseph, Missouri.
.•\ugust 12, 1862, a son of James and Mary Smith.
He was the second of three children, two of whom
are still living, and was a small child when his
parents died. His father was a native of Ireland
and his mother of England. James Smith, Sr.,
came to this country when a young man, and was
a pioneer in Western Missouri at St. Joseph, having
one of the first hotels for the entertainment of
the traveling public, located at what was known as
Black Snake Creek.
Because of the early death of his parents Mr.
Smith spent his childhood and youth largely in an
environment of work to the full bent of his strength.
He lived until twenty-one years of age with the
family of John Noonan, a Nebraska farmer. It
was customary for Mr. Noonan to take in return
for keeping the boy all the wages he earned, though
at one time after a period of work in the harvest
fields Mr. Smith collected his own pay and kept
it, that being the first money he ever earned and
enjoyed the use thereof. He attended school only a
portion of each winter.
Mr. Smith left Nebraska in the spring of 1S83.
first going to Denver, and then with a cavalcade of
mule teams reaching Butte at the date above noted.
Here he hauled wood from the lowlands into
Butte for the Walker Brothers, also worked in the
hardware store of W. A. Largy for eight or nine
months and was at Twin Bridges and at Virginia
City, where he engaged in the livery and saloon
business until 1907. In the latter year he moved
to Lewistown, and after one year in the restaurant
business opened a stock of furniture and conducted
a well appointed store in that line. Mr. Smith has
served one term as alderman from the Third Ward
and in politics is a democrat.
In July 1889, he married Miss Alice C. Wyrouck.
Mrs. Smith is a representative of one of the earliest
families of Montana and her own birth occurred
in Madison County, this state. Her parents, Jacob
and Mary Jane (Howe) Wyrouck, were both born
in Pennsylvania, and her father died at the age of
eighty-four and her mother at eighty. Mrs. Smith
is the only daughter in a family of three children,
all of whom are still living. Her parents came to
Montana in 1864. overland with ox teams, and were
among the first settlers at Alder Gulch. Her
father had a pioneer store at that locality, and after-
ward moved to Twin Bridge and engaged in the
cattle and horse business. He finally sold his
ranch and spent his last days with Mr. and Mrs.
.Smith. He was a placer miner at Alder Gulch.
Mr. and Mrs. Smith are the parents of three
children, Harry B., Howard L. and Mae, wife of
Frank D. Tallman.
Harry B. Smith was inducted into the special
limited service section of the United States .\rmy
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in July, 1918; was sent to Vancouver, Washington,
where he was with the Thirty-Second Casual Com-
pany, was later transferred to Toledo, Oregon,
into the One Hundred and First Spruce Squadron:
In January, 1919, was transferred to the Eleventh
Casual Company at Vancouver and mustered out
on January 27, 1919.
Jacob C. Bodden. Business is the very life blood
of the nation's prosperity, and in order that it course
naturally through the veins of commerce and in-
dustry it is necessary that the best men of the country
devote themselves to its operation. The younger
states of the nation have attracted to them some
of the most aggressive men of high character, whose
energies are exerted to the utmost capacity to de-
velop the natural resources of the regions to which
they have come from more eastern points, with the
result that new enterprises are brought into being
and fostered to a productive and satisfactory matu-
rity. The City of Billings affords many such instances
of business prosperity and sagacity, "and one of its
representative men is Jacob C. Bodden. manager of
the Glacier Water Company.
Jacob C. Bodden was born at Theresa, Dodge
County, Wisconsin, April 15, 1866, a son of Jacob
Bodden and grandson of Adam Bodden. The birth
of Adam Bodden occurred near Colo.gne, Germany,
in 1782. A soldier in the German army, he was cap-
tured during the Napoleonic wars, and was sta-
tioned by the French as a guard at Madrid, Spain.
In 1845 he came to the United States, and after a
brief period spent at Wayne, Wisconsin, he located
at Theresa, Dodge County, the same state, where
he homesteaded and died on his farm in 1869. His
wife, whose first name was Margaret, was also born
near Cologne, Germany, in 1802, and she survived
him, until 1888, when she passed away on the home-
stead.
Jacob Bodden was born near Cologne, Germany, in
1831, and was brought to the United States by his
parents. He was reared in Dodge County, Wis-
consin, where he spent the remainder of his life,
being interested in farming, stockraising and operat-
ing a grist-mill at Janesville, Wisconsin. A man of
more than local importance, he was a leader in the
democratic party of his section, and represented his
district in the Wisconsin State Assembly for three
terms. For two terms he served Dodge County as
treasurer, and for one term as sheriff, and was equal-
ly active in civic matters. The Roman Catholic Church
had in him a devout member. Jacob Bodden was
united in marriage with Gertrude Shiefer. born in
Germany in 1841, and brought by her parents to
Dodge County, Wisconsin, in 1848, where she was
reared. They had the following cliildren : Anna,
who is unmarried, resides with her widowed mother
at Oshkosh, Wisconsin ; John, who lives at Horicon,
Wisconsin, is president of the Van Brunt Manufac-
turing Company; Gertrude, who is unmarried, also
lives with her mother; Michael, who resides at
Neenah, Wisconsin, is manager of the Durham Lum-
ber Company; Jacob C, whose name heads this re-
view ; William, who died at Theresa at the age of
thirty-seven years, was a farmer; Ernest, who is a
farmer of Theresa; Frank, who lives at Horicon.
Wisconsin, is president of the Bodden Brothers Lum-
ber Company; Matilda, who died in 191 1, aged thirty-
six years; Hubert, who is a farmer of Theresa;
Henry, who is connected with the Van Brunt Manu-
facturing Company of Horicon, Wisconsin; Amanda
who is a teacher, resides at Oshkosh, Wisconsin ;
and Edmund, who is a farmer of Theresa.
Jacob C. Bodden remained on his father's farm
until he was twenty years of age, at which time
he assumed charge of his father's mill at Janesville.
Wisconsin, and conducted it for four years, when
he entered the employ of the Riedeburg & Bodden
Company, manufacturers of vinegar at Milwaukee.
Wisconsin, and served it as shipping clerk for four
years. Then he and his brother Michael went iiitu
the vinegar business as jobbers at Philadelphia.
Pennsylvania, so continuing for seven years. In
1907 Mr. Bodden came to Billings, and in 1909 or-
ganized the Glacier Water Company, a stock com-
pany, of which he was a charter member, and of
which he is today manager. The plant and offices are
at No. 2308 Minnesota Avenue. The company
bottles spring waters, and distributes the product
through Nortliern Wyorr\ing and Southern Montana.
and has a large and increasing trade.
Mr. Bodden is unmarried, but resides at No. 416
South Thirty-fith Street, owning his home, which
is a modern one. All of his life he has been a
democrat. For sometime after coming to Billings
he was a member of the Chamber of Commerce.
A Roman Catholic by inheritance and conviction, Mr.
Bodden is active in the work of his parish, and
belongs to Billings Council No. 1259, Knights of
Columbus. A man of unusual capabilities, he has
known how to make his eflforts count for some-
thing, and not only is successful, but is a valuable
asset to any community.
Ned A. Telvea. Beginning his financial career
in very early manhood. Ned A. Telyea. of Billings,
started in an humble position in a local bank in
Nebraska, and through sheer worth and ability has
worked his way upward steadily and surely, being
now widely and favorably known as cashier of the
Montana National Bank, and is enjoying to an
eminent degree the respect and confidence of his
fellow citizens. He was born at Tekamah, Neb-
raska. July 6, 1885, a son of C. B. Telyea. who is
of French descent, the immigrant ancestor of the
Telyea family having immigrated from France to
Canada several generations ago.
Born near Buffalo. New York, in 1848, C. B. Tel-
yea was brought up in Wisconsin, where his parents
settled when he' was a small boy. In early man-
hood he made an overland trip to Nebraska, locat-
ing in Tekamah, where he embarked in mercantile
pursuits, for many years being one of the foremost
merchants of the place, and where he still lives,
although he is practically retired from active busi-
ness. Many years ago he served in the State Militia.
and took part in several skirmishes with the Indians.
He is a republican in politics, and while a resident
of Wisconsin served as sheriff for a term. He
is a member of the Presbyterian Church, toward
the support of which he is a liberal contributor,
and belongs to the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows. His wife, whose name before marriage
was Ida Landgren, was born in Sweden, near Stock-
holm, in 1858 and as a child was brought by her
parents to the United States, where she was reared,
her home having been in Missouri. Four children
were born of their union, as follows: Jane, wife
of E. I. Ellis, banker of Tekamah, Nebraska; Ned
A. ; Margaret, with her parents, is a teacher in
the Tekamah schools ; and Bradford, a pupil in the
Tekamah High School.
Educated in Tekamah, Ned A. Telyea was graduated
from the high school with the class of 1902. Soon
after receiving his diploma he accepted one of the
lowest positions possible in the First National Bank
of Tekamah, and proved himself so capable and
faithful that he was promoted to the position of
teller, and remained in that capacity for three years.
Going then to Kansas City, Missouri, he spent a
HISTORY OF MONTANA
short time in the National Bank of Commerce, and
was later a teller in the Omaha National Bank of
Omaha, Nebraska, for six years. Resigning that
position, Mr. Telyea was for two and a half years
assistant cashier of the Butte County Bank at Belle
Fourche, South Dakota. In 1914 he located in
Billings, Montana, and at once entered the Bank
of Montana as assistant cashier. The value of his
services being recognized and appreciated, he was
promoted in January, 1916, to the cashiership of the
institution. On January 2, 1917, the Montana Na-
tional Bank succeeded the Bank of Montana, with
the following named officers : A. H. Marble, presi-
dent; B. S. Langworthy, vice president; and N. A.
Telyea, cashier. This bank is one of the sound
financial institutions of Yellowstone County, having
a capital stock paid in of $100,000 and a surplus
fund of $50,000. The handsome building of re-
inforced concrete, brick and terra cotta, into which
the bank was moved in June, 1918, is advantageously
situated at the corner of Second Avenue and Broad-
way, and is recognized as one of the finest bank
buildings in Montana.
In his political affiliations Mr. Telyea is a re-
publican, and in religion he is a Presbyterian. Fra-
ternally he is a member of Billings Lodge No. 113,
Ancient Free and Accepted Order of Masons, of
which he is treasurer ; of Bellevue Chapter, Royal
Arch Masons, of Omaha, Nebraska; and socially he
belongs to the Billings Club, and to the Billings
Midland Club. He is president of the Billings
Clearing House Association, a position for which he
is well qualified.
Mr. Telyea married, in 1913, at Marshall, Michigan,
Miss Leora Sawyer, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Charles Sawyer, of Marshall, her father being a
well known civil engineer of that place. Mrs. Tel-
yea was graduated from the Marshall High School,
and subsequently completed her studies at the Uni-
versity of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
O. King Gri.mst.ati. Talented and cultured, devoted
to the practice of his chosen profession, O. King
Grimstad, of Billings, has won distinct prestige as
a lawyer, as head of the prosperous- firm of Grim-
stad & Brown having built up an extensive patro-
nage and at the same time, through judicious in-
vestments, he has become widely known as one of
the most extensive landholders of Southeastern
Montana. He was born September 24, 1886, at
Brewster, Minnesota, a son of T. K. Grimstad. His
grandparents, Knute and Susanna Grimstad, were
born, reared and married in Norway. Immigrating
to the United States in 1843, they bought a tract
of wild land in Wisconsin, and by dint of hard
pioneer labor the}' succeeded in improving a good
farm, on which they spent the remainder of their
days, the grandfather dying at Daleyville in 1898,
at the advanced age of eighty-six years.
T. K. Grimstad was born on the home farm in
Daleyville, Wisconsin, in 1853, and there spent his
early life. Succeeding to the ancestral occupation,
he began life on his own account in Brewster. Min-
nesota, where he reclaimed a farm from its primitive
wildness, and was successfully engaged in agricul-
tural pursuits until his death March 7, 1916. A
republican in politics, prominent in public affairs,
he filled various offices, serving ably and acceptably.
He married Tena Rinde, who was born in Norway
in 1862, and is still a resident of Brewster. Her
parents immigrated to the United States in l86g,
settling in Wisconsin, where she was brought up
and educated. To her and her husband eleven
children were born, as follows : John, engaged in
farming at Brewster, Minnesota ; Josephine, wife
of Charles E. Johnson, a real estate agent and in-
vestment broker at Minneapolis, Minnesota; Clark,
a banker at Williston, North Dakota ; Cora, who has
never married, is a resident of Elkhart, Indiana,
where she is engaged as a buyer of merchandise,
having a well-paying business ; O. King, with whom
this sketch is chiefly concerned; Ethel, wife of
Charles J. Spreiter, a banker, residing at West
Concord, Minnesota ; Clayton, a banker, living at
Brewster;, Minnesota, is in the United States Army,
serving in the Engineers Corps and being now, in
1919, with the Army of Occupation; Tillie, un-
married, teaches school at Brewster ; Knute, whose
hom.e is also in Brewster, enlisted in the marine
service, and is now with the United States Army of
Occupation ; Hazelle, a student at the University
of Minnesota; and Paul, attending the Brewster
High School.
After his graduation from the Brewster High
School O. King Grimstad taught school in Jackson
County. Minnesota, for two years, from 1902 until
1904, and the following year was principal of the
schools at Hazel Run, Minnesota. He was sub-
sequently principal of the high school at Jeffers,
Minnesota, two years. Having as a youth deter-
mined to enter the legal profession, he attended
the University of Minnesota, at Minneapolis, every
summer during his career as a teacher, and in
1908 he entered the law department of the Uni-
versity of Michigan at Ann Arbor, from which he
was graduated in 1911, with the degree of Bachelor
of Laws. Coming to Montana in December, 191 1,
Mr. Grimstad together with Rockwood Brown,
began the practice of his profession at Billings,
and met with encouraging success from the start, the
firm being organized as Grimstad & Brown with
offices in suite 3-4-5, Montana National Bank Build-
ing. This enterprising firm, which has a general
civil and criminal practice, has won many suits
of importance and note, and has established an en-
viable reputation for thorough and honest legal
work.
On July 6, 1918, Mr. Grimstad enlisted in the
Naval Air Service, and after being trained at
Pensacola, Florida, was there commissioned as en-
sign in the aviation service On February 7, 1919,
he was placed in the Reserve Corps. Possessing
business talent corresponding with his legal ability,
Mr. Grimstad has invested largely in Montana lands,
owning at least 15,000 acres in three of the counties,
Yellowstone, Carbon and Big Horn. He likewise
owns a modern residence in Billings, and is a stock-
holder and director in several large corporations.
Although not active in political ranks, Mr. Grim-
stad supports the principles of the republican party
by vote. Religiously he is a member of the Con-
gregational Church, of which he was for two years
a trustee. Socially he belongs to the Billings Mid-
land Club, and to the Billings Golf and Country
Club. Fraternally he is a member of Billings Lodge
No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
and was elected exalted ruler in 1918 and resigned
to enter the service of the United States, as above
noted.
Mr. Grimstad married, February 8, 1913. at Min-
neapolis, Minnesota, Miss Carmen McMullen. a
graduate of the Ypsilanti, Michigan, High School.'
Her parents, Charles H. and Jane McMullen, are
living at Ann Arbor, Michigan, her father being
a retired agriculturist. Mr. and Mrs. Grimstad
have one child, Tarje Mc. Grimstad, born July
16, 1015.
Wilbur F. Bigelow. A man of sterling worth
and integrity, amply qualified by his natural abilities
(3//<fc:26^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
201
and broad experience in the commercial world for
the responsible position he holds as cashier and
chief accountant for the Northwestern Auto Sup-
ply Company, W. F. Bigelow, of Billings, is per-
forming the duties devolving upon him in that
capacity with credit to himself, and not only to
the satisfaction but to the pleasure and profit of
the members of the firm which employs him, his
practical and methodical methods relieving them
from all financial worries. The lineal descendant
on the paternal side of one of three brothers that
immigrated from Scotland to New York in early
colonial times, later becoming a pioneer settler of
Ohio. Wilbur F. Bigelow was born in Newton,
Iowa, March 26, 1878, being a son of L. M. Bigelow.
His paternal grandfather, Benjamin F. Bigelow,
was born in 1804, in Ohio, and was there reared
and married. He became a farmer from choice,
but thinking to improve his opportunities for better-
ing his finances he migrated to Illinois in 1857.
Not satisfied with life on the unbroken prairie, he '
moved with his family to Davenport, Iowa, in 1864,
and a short time later bought a tract of land lying
just north of Newton, Iowa, and was there em-
ployed as a tiller of the soil until his death in 1885.
His wife, whose name before marriage was Harriet
Farley, was born in Pennsylvania in 1805, and died
in Newton, Iowa, in iSgg.
L. M. Bigelow was born on the home farm in
Ohio in 1843. In 1857, a lad of fourteen years, he
accompanied his parents to Illinois, and there re-
mained until after his marriage. In 1864 he and his
wife and his parents assumed possession of a farm
situated three miles north of Newton, Iowa, and
in the years that followed he placed the greater
part of the land under a good state of cultivation,
rendering it one of the most productive of any in
the locality. In 1895, having accumulated a fair
share of "this world's goods, he moved into the
Village of Newton, where he lived retired from
business cares until his death in August, 1918. He
married Eliza A. Warren, who was born in Illinois
in 1848, and died at Newton, Iowa, in 1912. Their
children were as follows : Flora, residing at Long
Beach, California, is the widow of the late F. E.
Wiltbank. who was engaged in farming during his
life; Nellie E., wife of Lee M. Sturtevant, a travel-
ing salesman, living in York, Nebraska; Jessie W.,
who married F. M. Keasey, a retired farmer of
Ontario, California; Wilbur F., the subject of this
sketch ; and Earl, proprietor of a cigar store at
Newton, Iowa.
Having acquired his elementary education in the
rural schools of Jasper County. Iowa, Wilbur F.
Bigelow entered the Normal College at Newton,
Iowa, and was there graduated with the class of
1896. Endeavoring to acquire a practical knowledge
of business affairs, he subsequently worked for
others in Newton for five years, and during the
next four years was there engaged in mercantile
pursuits, operating a grocery. Going to Coeur
d'Alene. Idaho, in 1903, Mr. Bigelow served as
cashier for a mercantile firm until 19H, and the
following year filled a similar position at Spokane,
Washington. Coming from there to Billings, Mon-
tana, in the fall of 1912, Mr. Bigelow accepted a
position as cashier and auditor for the Hart-Albin
Company, and retained it until March, 1918. Since
that time he has been actively associated with the
Northwestern Auto Supply Company, which does
business with all of the states of the great Northwest,
its trade extending to the Pacific coast. He serv-
ing as cashier and chief accountant for the firm,
a position which he is ably filling.
Politically Mr. Bigelow is a stanch supporter of the
principles of the democratic party. Religiously he
is affiliated with the Christian Science Church.
Fraternally he is a member of Ashlar Lodge No.
29, Ancient Free and Accepted Order ot Free
Masons; of Ashlar Chapter No. 0, Royal Arch
Masons ; of Billings Consistory, being a thirty-
second degree Mason; and of the Knights of Py-
thias. He has a pleasant rural home of five acres
near the Polytechnic Institute.
Mr. Bigelow married in 1902, at Newton, Iowa,
Miss Elizabeth L. Harsh, a daughter of William
and Eva (Boyd) Harsh, neither of whom are now
living. Mr. and Mrs. Bigelow have one child,
Charles L., whose birth occurred July 25, 1903.
Charles H. Guthard. Conspicuous among the
substantial business men of Yellowstone County
is Charles H. Guthard, of Eillings, who as president
of the Northwestern Auto Supply Company is at
the head of one of the most notable mercantile
enterprises of this section of the country. He is
carrying on an entirely wholesale business, the terri-
tory in which he operates covering not only the
whole of Montana, but extending throughout all of
the adjacent states. A son of the late Henry
Guthard, he was born May 6, 1S68, in Saline, Michi-
gan, of German ancestry.
Born in Germany in 1827, Henry Guthard came
to the United States with his mother in 1833, and
was reared and educated in Washtenaw County,
Michigan. Indians were then plentiful in that re-
gion, the vast forests through which bears, wolves
and other wild animals roamed at will, being their
happy hunting ground. After reaching man's estate
he bought a tract of heavily timbered land near
Saline, and immediately began the almost seemingly
impossible task of hewing a farm from its primitive
wildness, laboring with persevering diligence and
courage. Succeeding well in his efforts, he con-
tinued a resident of Washtenaw County until his
death in 1901, at Saline. He was a democrat in
politics, and an ardent supporter of the Congrega-
tional Church, with which he was identified by
membership. His wife, whose maiden name was
Kate Bieber, was born in Germany in 1834, and in
1846 came with her brother Henry to the United
States, settling in Michigan, where she spent her
remaining days, dying at Saline in 1902. Seven
children were born to them, as follows : John,
engaged in farming at Saline, Michigan; Libbie,
unmarried, lives at Saline; Emma, who died at the
age of forty years, was wife of the late Carl Bick-
well. a publisher; Mary, wife of Prof. Herman
Weihe, an instructor in one of the schools at Mil-
waukee, Wisconsin; Katie, wife of John Heininger,
a farmer in Saline, Michigan; Charles H., of this
sketch ; and Clara, wife of Rev. James Rilling,
pastor of a Congregational Church at Van Wert.
Ohio.
Receiving his common and high school education
in Saline, Michigan, Charles H. Guthard subse-
quently entered the employ of a lumber company,
and for three years after celebrating the fifteenth
anniversary of his birth worked in the pine woods.
The following six years he was employed as a farm
hand, and having thus gained a practical knowl-
edge of the different branches of agriculture was
for five years engaged in general farming on his
own account. Deciding to make a change of oc-
cupation, Mr. Guthard opened a hardware and
implement store at Saline, and managed it success-
fully from 1807 until 1908. Going from there^ to
Denver, Colorado, he embarked in what at that time
was a new business, and for a vear sold auto-
mobiles in that city. Locating in Cody, Wyoming,
202
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in igog, Mr. Guthard remained tliere two years,
selling automobiles the first hall of the time, and
managing the Cody Trading Company the last year.
Making his advent in Billings, Montana, in 191 1,
he was here engaged in the automobile business
for four years, selling cars until igiS-
In the latter year Mr. Guthard organized the
Northwestern Auto Supply Company, which is now
incorporated, its officers being C. H. Guthard, presi-
dent; Rockwood Brown, vice president: and E. C.
Guthard, manager, secretary and treasurer. The
company's plant and offices are situated at 4^5-7
North Broadway, occupying one of the principal
business buildings of the city, it being a large brick
structure, three stories in height, with a basement.
As previously mentioned, the firm does a whole-
sale business only, handling automobile accessories
on an extensive scale, its trade covering Montana,
North Dakota, South Dakota. Colorado, Utah,
Nevada, Idaho, Oregon and Washington. The com-
pany has branch shipping houses at Great Falls,
Montana, and at Pocatello, Idaho, where a very
large business is carried on. although the main
office is at Billings, and in the supervision of these
three houses Mr. Guthard has fifty-two trustworthy
men in his employ. He is also interested in the
agricultural advancement of Montana, having a
two-fifths interest in a ranch of 12,000 acres located
near Toluca. He owns a modernly constructed
residence at No. 205 Wyoming Avenue, where he
and his family enjoy life to the utmost.
Mr. Guthard is a republican in politics, and a
Presbyterian in religion, being a faithful member of
that church. Fraternally he is a member of Billings
Lodge No. 113, Ancient Free and Accepted Order
of Masons; of Billings Chapter No. 6, Royal Arch
Masons ; of Aldemar Commandery No. 5, Knights
T-emplar; of Algeria Temple, .'Ancient Arabic Order
of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine; and of Billings
Consistory, being a thirty-second degree Mason. He
also belongs to the Billings Midland Empire Club.
At Saline, Michigan, in 1892. Mr. Guthard mar-
ried Miss Louisa Schroen, a daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. George Schroen. Her father, a retired farmer,
still resides in Saline, Michigan, but her mother
has passed to the higher life. Mr. and Mrs. Guthard
have two children, namely ; Edgar C, a graduate
of the Billings High School, now manager and
secretary and treasurer of the Northwestern Auto
Supply Company, married Ada Sleeper, of Billings,
and has one child. Jean, born May 15, igi8; and
Raymond, now, in igig, a senior in the Billings
High School.
John R. Swearingen. An influential and highly
respected citizen of Yellowstone County, John R.
Swearingen, of Billings, president of the Mon-
tana Sash & Door Company, has achieved distinc-
tion in the Ijusiness life of the city, and by reason
of his ability, tact and integrity has gained a leading
position in industrial manufacturing and mercantile
circles of this section of the state. A son of
Abraham T. Swearingen, he was born February
I, 1861, in Blue Earth County. Minnesota.
His paternal grandfather. John Swearingen. was a
native of Illinois, and in the Prairie State grew
to a vigorous manhood. Casting his lot early in
life with the pioneers of Minnesota, he settled in
Martin County, and there established the first flour
mill erected west of Dubuque. He continued a
resident of that county until his death at Fairmont
at the venerable age of ninety-two years. On the
paternal side he came of Dutch ancestry, the Swear-
ingens from whom he was descended having emi-
grated from Holland to America in colonial days.
He married a Miss Brown, who was also a native
of Illinois.
Abraham T. Swearingen, a native of Illinois, was
born in Champaign County in 1829. He attended
the pioneer schools of his day, and while yet a
boy was initiated into the mysteries of farming
as then carried on, very little machinery being then
in use. Going to Blue Earth County, Minnesota,
when a young man, he began life for himself as
a farmer, and in the pioneer task of putting his
land under cultivation met with good success. In
1880 he removed to West Union, Iowa, where he
started in an entirely diiTerent line of business,
opening first a furniture store and later becoming
a lumber dealer at Perry, Iowa. In the latter in-
dustry he met with good results, and continued
a resident of Perry until his death in 191 5. During
the Civil war, almost immediately after its out-
break, he offered his services to his country, en-
listing in the Ninth Minnesota Volunteer Infantry,
'and with the exception of the time he returned
to his home to defend his family from the last
Indian outbreak in that locality served until the
surrender of Lee on April g, 1865. A republican
in politics, he was ever loyal to the interests of his
party. He married Amy Allen, who was born in
New York State in 1834, and died at Perry, Iowa,
in igi4, at the good old age of eighty years. They
had but one child, John R., of whom we write.
After leaving the public schools of Blue Earth
County, where he was born, John R. Swearingen
continued his studies at West Union, Iowa, taking
a preparatory course under the tuition of Prof.
S. S. Ainsworth, head of a private school. When
but sixteen years old he entered the service of
the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and Northern Rail-
road Company, with which he remained six years
as telegraph operator. In iSyg, at Perry, Iowa, he
embarked in the lumber business, beginning in a
very humble position in the yard and gradually
worked his way upward until he had managed the
details of the business. In 1882 Mr. Swearingen
bought the yard in which he had formerly been
employed, and for twenty years carried on a sub-
stantial business as a dealer in lumber. Selling
out in igo2, he was associated with the Huttig
Manufacturing Company at Muscatine, Iowa, for
four years, serving as its vice president. In 1906,
still retaining bis connection with the company, he
came to Billings, Montana, as manager of its branch
house, a responsible position that he filled most
ably and satisfactorily. He subsequently organized
the Montana Sash & Door Company, which was
incorporated January 20, 191 1, with the following
named officers; J. R. Swearingen, president, and
R. C. Cardell, secretary and treasurer. This com-
pany is carrying on an extensive and rerriunerative
business in sash, doors and interior finishing mate-
rial, and does all kinds of mill work, either plain or
decorative, its plant and offices being advantageously
located at the corner of Fourth Avenue and Broad-
way. From this plant its products are shipped to
all parts of Eastern Montana and Northern Wy-
oming, its trade being large and constantly grow-
ing. Mr. Swearingen has other property interests
of value, owning a commodious residence at
.301 Clark Avenue, and at Judith Basin has an
immense ranch, containing 1,350 acres of good land.
He has been actively identified with various other
enterprises, but his present business has reached
such proportions that it requires his entire time
and attention, and he has been forced to dispose
of his other interests, although he is one of the
directorate of the Billings Gas Company.
Politically Mr. Swearingen is a strong republican.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Fraternally he is a member of Perry, Iowa, Lodge,
Ancient Free and Accepted Order of Masons; of
Almyra Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; of Perry
Commandery, Knights Templar ; of Zagazig Temple,
Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine; and of Des Moines, Iowa, Consistory, being
a thirty-second degree Mason. Socially he belongs
to the Billings Golf and Country Club.
Mr. Swearingen married first, in 1881, at West
Union, Iowa, Miss May Redfield. who was born
in that town in 1861, and died at Oelwein, Iowa,
in 1882. Their only child, Mabel, a graduate of
Saint Catherine's Hall at Davenport, Iowa, married
A. Peddecord, a traveling salesman, residing in
Perry, Iowa. Mr. Swearingen married for his
second wife, at Perry, Iowa, in 1886, Miss Florence
Cardell, a daughter of Leander and Emma Cardell,
and of this union one child has been born, Irene,
wife of George Arnott, Jr., of Billings, a well
known attorney. Mrs, Arnott is a woman of cul-
ture and refinement, who has had excellent educa-
tional advantages, having been graduated from the
National Cathedral at Washington,, District Of
Columbia.
J. W. Snellbacher, a prominent member of the
Billmgs bar, has spent all his life in the West, -^as
formerly a teacher, and came to Montana in the
service of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.
He was born at Plattsmouth in Cass County, Ne-
braska, October 4, 1883. His father, Michael J.
Snellbacher, was born in Germany in 1841, came
to this country when a young man, and, a black-
smith by trade, established the first blacksmith shop
at Plattsmouth, Nebraska. He was in business there
the rest of his life and died December 30, 1891.
He was a republican, served as a member of the
City Council, was active in the Lutheran Church
and was affiliated with the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. At Plattsmouth in 1882 he married
.'\melia Margaret Lau. She was born in Germatiy
March 23, 1863, and is now living at Colby in
Thomas County, Kansa^. J. W. Snellbacher is the
oldest of the five children of his parents. Claude
Philip, born May 13, 1885, is a farmer at Colby,
Kansas; Henry Fred, born October 19, 1886. is also
a farmer in that vicinity; Margaret, born May 14,
1889. is the wife of L. C. Howard, a rancher and
stock raiser at Miles City, Montana ; Lulu, born
May 20, 1890, is the wife, of William Ehler, a farmer
at Hollyrood, Kansas. The mother of these chil-
dren married for her second husband George Ullrich,
who died at Plattsmouth, Nebraska, in 1901. By this
union there were six children : George, born July
21, 1895, served as a corporal with the American Ex-
peditionary Forces; John, born July 21, 1895, is a
member of the United States navy and in the spring
of 1919 was stationed at Gibraltar; Philip, born
October 4, 1896, was in the spring of 1919 with the
army at Camp Funston, Kansas ; Augusta, born July
4. 1898, is employed in the postoftice at Miles City,
Montana ; Lena, born September 0, 1899, is a teacher
at Colby, Kansas; and Lavina, born June 20, 1901,
is still at home with her mother.
J. W. Snellbacher acquired his education in the
public schools of Plattsmouth, attended the high
school at Colby, Kansas, graduated from the Colby
.Academy in 1008. and as a means of paying his
way through school he taught in Thomas Coutity for
four years. For two years be was also principal of
the high school and graded school at Brewster, Kan-
sas. In 19TO Mr. Snellbacher entered the law de-
partment of the University of Michigan, graduating
LL. B. in 1913. He then came to Anaconda, Mon-
tana, and was in the service of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company lyi years. For a short time he had
a law office in San Francisco, but on August i, 1913,
located at Billings and has rapidly achieved prestige
as a successful lawyer. His offices are in the Staple-
ton Building.
Mr. Snellbacher is a republican in political affilia-
tions, is a member of the Congregational Church,
and in Masonry belongs to Ashlar Lodge No. 29,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Chapter
No. 6, Royal Arch Masons, Billings Commandery
No. 9, Knights Templar, and Billings Consistory
of the Scottish Rite.
In 1919 he built a modern home just outside the
city limits of Billings. Mr. Snellbacher married at
Billings June 22, 1918, Miss Inez Richtman, a daugh-
ter of Jacob and Sophie Richtman. Her mother
lives at Billings, and her father, who was a Union
soldier in the Civil war, is deceased.
Walter S. Smith. One of the pioneer business
men of Lewistown who is still actively engaged in
mercantile pursuits, Walter S. Smith has lived
long and continuously in Montana, and is one of the
men who can speak from direct experiences of
the days of the pack train freighting outfit, was
himself a pioneer and was personally acquainted
with many of the notable figures of the Northwest
in the stirring and romantic days preceding rail-
roads and when all this country was devoted to
mining and stock raising.
He and his family have come a long way from
their ancestral haunts. Mr. Smith was born in
St. Albans Township. Somerset County, Maine,
June 24, 1859, and Maine was also the native state
of his parents, Benjamin R. and Eunice Elizabeth
(Knight) Smith. His father was both a physician
and farmer. During the Civil war he and his
oldest son, Edmund, were Union soldiers. At the
close of the war in 1865 he moved from Maine to
Monticello, Wright County, Minnesota, and took
an active part in the frontier life of that locality.
He bought a farm and also practiced medicine, after
taking a post-graduate course. At one time he
owned 300 acres of land in Minnesota. Later he
lived in Leavenworth, Kansas. He died at the
advanced age of ninety years. He was a whig
and later a republican in politics. His wife died at
the age of sixty years. Their ten children, five sons
and five daughters, made up a large family of whom
five are still living, Walter S. being the eighth in
age.
Walter S. Smith was about six years old when
his parents moved to Minnesota, and he grew up
in that frontier state. While attending the public
schools during limited terms he work on his
father's farm and in the spring of 1879. when
twenty years of age, started out in the world to
find what of adventure and reward it could bestow
upon his ability. His first experiences were in the
Black Hills of South Dakota. He made that
journey by railroad as far as Bismarck and then by
stage to Deadwood. With his brother S. R. Smith
he engaged in the furniture business, also operated
a hack line from Lead to Deadwood, and was in
that locality about three years. He then came
through to Coulson and saw that town moved on
west to the present site of Billings. He and Dave
Price with their teams of horses brought fifteen
passengers from Lead to Billings. Among these
passengers were P. P. Tooley, Mr. Fost, Mr. Gust-
hurst and other noted men of the time in the North-
west. During 1880-81 Mr. Smith was freightmg
between Miles City and Billings, and during the
summer of 1882 he helped Paul McCormick put up
hay for the Government at Fort Custer. In the
204
HISTORY OF MONTANA
fall of 1882 he assisted in moving the Town of
Clark City on the Yellowstone River to the present
site of Livingston. Thus he has helped at the birth
of at least two important cities of Montana. He
drove a stage line from Livingston to Bozeman
during the winter and in the spring of 1883, con-
ducted a freighting outfit between Bozeman and
Helena and from Helena to Fort Benton, handlmg
freight for Ford Brothers and for L J. Baker &
Company between Fort Benton and Fort McCloud
and, returning from Fort McCloud, in the summer
of the same vear he also took freight to the Maiden
Mining Camp, and in the fall of that year located a
homestead near Maiden. He improved his land
and became a cattle and horse raiser. In 1896 Mr.
Smith returned to Lead, South Dakota, and once
more engaged in the furniture business. Upon his
return to Montana in the fall of 1898 he located
at Lewistown, which city has been his home now
for over twenty years. He is the pioneer furniture
merchant of Lewistowrv In igi6 he purchased
440 acres and started a ranch. This ranch is
stocked with about seventy-five head of cattle and
from ten to twelve horses.
Politics and office holding have never been an
object of ambition with Mr. Smith. He served
one term as alderman for the First Ward of Lewis-
town. He is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hiram
Chapter No. 15. Royal Arch Masons, and is a past
master' of his lodge and past high priest of the
chapter. He and his wife are members of Marie
Chapter No. 36, Eastern Star, he being a past
worthy patron and she a past matron. Mr. Smith
is also a past chancellor of Judith Lodge No. 30,
Knights of Pythias.
On January 26. 1887, at Maiden, then a mining
camp in the Judith Basin of Fergus County, Mr.
Smith married Miss Marie Mier. They have one
daughter, Eunice, who is married and the mother
of two sons and one daughter.
E. C. SwEiTZER. Proprietor of the leading dry
goods establishment at Lewistown, with another
successful branch at Harve, E. C. Sweitzer served
a long apprenticeship as a mercantile clerk, and with
accumulated experience and modest capital has won
success where so many failed.
He was born at Galena, Illinois, February 24,
1870, son of Leo and Louise (Franz) Sweitzer.
His parents were both born in Germany and came
to this country with their respective parents when
children. They are still living in St. Louis, Mis-
souri. Leo Sweitzer learned the carpenter's trade
and was a contractor and builder at Galena, Illinois.
During the Civil war he enlisted for a three year
period and after receiving his honorable discharge
re-enlisted and continued fighting for the Union
until the close of hostilities. After the war he
carried on an extensive business at Galena until
igoq, when he retired. He is an honored member
of the Grand Army of the Republic and in politics
a republican.
E. C. Sweitzer was the fifth in a family of six
children, four of whom are still living. After
getting his education in the public schools of Galena
he found a position as clerk in a dry goods store,
and in 1900 came to Montana. For two years he
was manager of George Simon's store at Livings-
ton, and then removed to Lewistown, where he en-
gaged in the dry goods business as a member of the
firm of Hart & Company. In 1910 he bought out
Mr. Hart's interests and is now proprietor of the
business conducted under his individual name. He
is a master of all the details of buying and selling
dry goods, and has made his store at Lewistown
a center for the trade of a large section of country.
He established his branch at Havre in 1915.
Mr. Sweitzer is affiliated with Lewistown, Lodge
No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
is a member of the Rotary Club and the Judith Club
and in politics is a republican. He is also a director
of the Bank of Fergus County.
May 24, 1908, he married Stella Mackey. Their
two children are Cecilia Louise and John Thomas.
Henry Neill, whose interests have identified him
with Lewistown since 1910, is a Montana pioneer,
and his own life has been a record in keeping with
that of distinguished members of the family, in-
cluding his brother, the late John S. M. Neill, who
became a lawyer at Helena in 1881, was a former
surveyor general of the state, and for many years
proprietor of the Helena Independent.
The father of Henry Neill was Rev. Edward
Duffield Neiy, who was born in Philadelphia Au-
gust 9, 1823, a son of Henry Neill, a Philadelphia
physician. Edward Duffield Neill was educated
in the University of Pennsylvania and graduated
from Amherst College in 1842. He studied theology
at Andover and Philadelphia and in early life was
ordained a Presbyterian minister. His first work
was at Galena, Illinois, and from 1849 to i860
he was a minister at St. Paul, Minesota, then a
frontier outpost of ihe Northwest. He built the
first House of Hope in St. Paul. His fame as an
educator and author is even greater than that at-
tending his work as a minister. He served as
superintendent of public instruction and as chancel-
lor of the University of Minnesota in 1858-61. At
the beginning of the Civil war he became chaplain
of the First Minnesota Regiment and served as
hospital chaplain until 1864. From 1864 to i86g,
under appointment of President Lincoln, he was
secretary to the president for signing land patents.
In 1869 President Grant appointed him United
States consul at Dublin, Ireland, where he remained
until 1870. He was the founder and from 1873 to
1874 was president of McAllister College at Min-
neapolis, and on leaving the chair of president he
continued as a member of the faculty of that institu-
tion as professor of history, literature and political
economy. His long and useful life came to a close
in 1893, at the age of seventy. He was a historian,
and all modern histories of Minnesota are based
upon the pioneer work he did, published in 1858
under the title "A History of Minnesota." He also
Ijrought out a work on the Colonial History of
Maryland, on the Old Virginia Company of London,
on the English Colonization of America, on the
Founders of Maryland, on the Virginia Colony
under James I, and in 1887 published a "Concise
History of Minnesota."
Rev. Edward D. Neill married Nancy Hall, who
was born at Snow Hill, Maryland, and died in 180S,
at the age of seventy-two. They were the parents
of five children, four sons and one daughter, Henry
being the second in age.
Edward Duffield Neill had two distinguished
brothers. One, John Neill, who was born at Phila-
delphia in 1819 and died there in 18S0, was a
pioneer American surgeon, and his published works
are part of American medical literature. He served
as a surgeon and also as medical director for
Pennsylvania in the Union army during the Civil
war.
The other brother, who gained distinction as
an American soldier, was Gen. Thomas H. Neill,
who was born at Philadelphia in 1826 and died
there in 1885. He graduated from West Point
Military Academy in 1847, and up to the period
of the Civil war was assigned to frontier duty.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
From 1853 to 1857 he was an assistant professor
at West Point. He was promoted to captain in
1857, and helped muster and organize regiments
early in the Civil war. In February, 1862, he was
made colonel of the Twenty-Third Pennsylvania
Volunteers. For gallantry at the battle of Malvern
Hill he was brevetted a major. He commanded
a brigade in the Maryland campaign and guarded
the crossings of the Potomac in September and
October, 1862. In November of that year he was
commissioned brigadier general of volunteers. For
his services in the battle of Chancellorsville he
received the brevet rank of lieutenant colonel. He
was in the battle of Gettysburg, and for gallantry
at Spottsylvania was brevetted a colonel. He was
acting inspector general in Sheridan's Shenandoah
campaign, and at the close of the war received the
brevets of brigadier general United States army
and major general of volunteers. In 1869 he was
made lieutenant-colonel of the First Infantry, and
in 1871 was transferred to the Sixth Cavalry, and
commanded that regiment on the frontier against
Cheyenne Indians during the campaign of 1874-75.
From 1875 to 1879 he was commandant of cadets at
the United States Military Academy, and in the
latter year was promoted to colonel of the Eighth
Cavalry.
Henry Neill was born at St. Paul, Minnesota,
April 15, 1855, and received most of his education
at Minneapolis, and during his father's official duties
in Dublin, Ireland, also attended school in that
city. Instead of a profession he chose his oppor-
tunities in keeping with the environment in which
he was reared in the Northwest. His first regular
employment was as a track hand in building the
Ashland Central Railway in Wisconsin, now a part
of the Chicago and Northwestern Railway. This
took him to Duluth and later he went West to the
present site of Fargo, North Dakota, which was
then a tent town (1873). He spent the fall and
winter at Fargo and in June, 1874, joined a survey-
ing party which was commissioned to mark the
international boundary line with monuments along
the Forty-Ninth parallel of latitude. He was thus
employed until September, 1874. He then proceeded
to Fort Benton, where he left the expedition and
came to Helena, Montana, and was employed as a
measurer with a threshing crew operating one of
the old style outfits in the grain fields of the
Northwest. January I, 1875, Mr. Neill was em-
ployed as a teacher for the children of Michael
Gunnett. In April of the same year he went to
work for Len McFarland, surveying the Centennial
Valley. This work was finished in the summer of
1876, the tract was given the name of Centennial
Valley. He then returned to Helena and was
employed as a guard at the United States prison,
soon afterward being appointed turnkey and serv-
ing in that capacity two and a half years. He then
engaged with Joseph Hartwell in a saw mill, being
afterward promoted to yard man and finally ac-
quired a half interest in the mill with Mr. Hart-
well. He continued in the saw mill and lumber
business some six or seven years, and from that
entered the contracting and building line. He con-
structed the jail and courthouse at Glasgow, Mon-
tana. Under Governor Robert Smith Mr. Neill
served as land agent for the State of Montana,
and held that office under three difTerent governors.
At the end of his third term he resigned and in ,
1910 moved to Lewistown, where he acquired a
tract of about 500 acres of land. He still owns
294 acres, most of it representing improved and
high class farms. During 1917-19 Mr. Neill had
this ranch under lease. Some of his land he has
made into a subdivision near Lewistown known as
Lewistown Heights, and has erected many hand-
some homes in that location, including his own
residence. Mr. Neill is a democrat and is aftiliated
with Helena Lodge No. 3, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, and with the Royal Arch Masons.
September l, 1880, he married Florence A. Eddy.
She was born in Vermont. Mr. and Mrs. Neill
had four children : Alice Nancy ; Samuel, who
died at the age of twenty-three; Minnesota F. and
Kathryne.
Edward Brassey. A resident of Montana over
fifty years, Edward Brassey has touched the life
and affairs of the state at many points, and has
helped to make as well live history. He is best
known in the region around Lewistown, and among
other things that make his name and life signifi-
cant is the fact that he taugiit the first school in
Fergus County.
Mr. Brassey is a native Englishman, born Octo-
ber 22, 1844, a son of Edward and Elizabeth
(Poyntz) Brassey. His father was born m Wales
and spent his active career as a lumber merchant
at Liverpool, England. He died in 1876. The
mother was born at Bermuda and died in 1879.
Edward Brassey, the oldest of four children, re-
ceived his early education at Liverpool and in early
manhood came to America. He landed at Helena,
Montana, in 1867. He was employed as a miner
in the Last Chance Mine during that summer and
in the fall of 1867 became secretary for a local
company putting up mining buildings on the El-
dorado Bar. For two winters he was employed
teaching school in Cave Gulch, and then worked
in the mines along that creek and at Diamond
City. In 1881 he was elected county superintend-
ent of schools for Meagher County, and he also
served two terms as county commissioner of
Meagher County, including what is now Fergus
County. In the meantime he has acquired some
interests as a rancher, and located his ranch on
Beaver Creek and lived on it for about ten years.
Since i8go his home has been at Lewistown. Dur-
ing this time he has filled many public offices, in-
cluding two terms of eight years as register of
the United States Land Office. For two terms
he was public administrator, and is now a justice
of the peace, having dispensed justice in that ca-
pacity for many years. Mr. Brassey is an hon-
ored member of the Montana Pioneer Society, and
has filled all the offices in Lewistown Lodge No.
30, Knights of Pythias, and Lewistown Lodge No.
456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Po-
litically his affiliations are republican.
December 23, 1876, Mr. Brassey married Miss
Recina Smith. She was born at Fort Scott, Iowa,
and was brought to Montana by her parents when
only three years of age, in 1863. She was there-
fore a Montana pioneer and spent her girlhood
days at Old Virginia City. Mrs. Brassey died in
September, T918. She was the mother of two chil-
dren : William E., who married Bell Burgh and
has three children : and Lillian, who is the wife
of James Charters and the mother of two children.
Harry J. Russell. The lumber interests of Bill-
ings and a wide territory surrounding it have an
important exponent in Harry J. Russell, whose con-
structive labors in this field are carried on as vice
president of the Russell Lumber Company, which has
long held an enviable position in the state. Harry
J. Russell was born in Labette County, Kansas, Sep-
tember 17, 1876, a son of J. K. Russell, and grand-
son of John Russell. The latter was born in Ken-
tucky in 1817, but became one of the pioneer farmers
of Jackson County, Indiana, where, after he had
im
HISTORY OF MONTANA
developed considerable wild land and become one of
the representative men of his section, he died in
1894. He was married to a Miss Prince, also a
native of Kentucky. The Russell family is one of
the old ones of this country, the American progenitor
of it having come to the American colonies from
Scotland prior to the American Revolution.
I. K. Russell was born in Jackson County, Indiana,
in' 1840, and there he was reared and educated, and
became a school teacher. Leaving his native state in
1871, he went west to Labette County, Kansas, where
he pre-empted 160 acres of land, and lived on his
farm until 1887, becoming during that period one of
the representative men of the county, which he
served as registrar of deeds, and deputy sheriff for
si.x years. In 1887 he became interested in the lumber
interests of that part of the state, but left Kansas
in 1905 and homesteaded in Carbon County, Montana,
a 160-acre farm, residing on it for three years. In
the meanwhile his sons had gone into the lumber
business at Billings, and in 1908 he went to that city
to render them such assistance as his own experience
in this line enabled him to give them. Desiring to
revisit his old home, he returned to Indiana in 191 1,
and died at Crothersville that same year. His re-
mains were brought back to Billings and are here
interred. While still residing in Jackson County,
Indiana, he was married to Philena A. Thompson,
who survives him and lives at Billings. She was
born in Jackson County, Indiana, in 1848. Their
children were as follows: E. S., who is a rancher
of Prague, Oklahoma; J. I., who is 111 the lumber
business at Lindsay, California; O. O., who is a
lumber merchant of Denver, Colorado; L. Frank,
who resides at Edgemont, South Dakota, was for-
merly connected with the Russell Lumber Company
of B'illings from 1902 to 1908; Harry J., whose name
heads this review ; and C. A., who is bookkeeper of
the Hecla Mining Company of Burke, Idaho. J.
K. Russell served his country as a soldier during
the Civil war, enlisting in Company K, Eighth
Indiana Cavalry, and remaining in the service for
three years, from 1862 on. His political sentiments
made him a democrat. From boyhood he was a
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and he
was a very active worker in it and a generous sup-
porter of its good work. Fraternally he belonged
to the Modern Woodmen of America and the Odd
Fellows, and took an intelligent interest in these
lodges. Both as a farmer and lumberman he left
his mark on his times and section, and is remem-
bered as a potential figure in the life of Billings.
Harry J. Russell was reared in Kansas, attending
the public schools of Mound Valley and Oswego
until he was sixteen years old, when he left to begin
learning the fundamentals of commercial life in a
grocery business at Chicago, Illinois, remaining in
that city for four years. He then went to Southern
Missouri and spent two years in its lumber regions,
and a year in the sawmills of Mississippi and
Louisiana, thus gaining a first-hand knowledge of
the lumber business which has since been of ines-
timable value to him. Desiring to study the industry
from another angle, he was bookkeeper for the
Forest Lumber Company at Alliance, Nebraska, for
three years, and then until 1903 served as manager
of the lumber company at La Harpe, Kansas. From
1903 to 1904 he was manager of the Russell Lumber
Company at Tulsa, Oklahoma, which was established
in igo2 at Kansas City, Missouri, by O. O. Russell,
and had two yards in Kansas, one at La Harpe and
the other at Mulberry, and two yards in Indian Ter-
ritory, one being at Tulsa and tlie other at Medford,
;\11 of which were sold in 1904, in w^hich year Harry
T. Russell came to Billings. The object of his com-
ing to this city was to assist in establishing the
Russell Lumber Company here, his associates in
the work being O. O., L. L, H. J. and J. I. Russell
The yards of this company are located at First
Avenue and Twenty-second Street, North. It^
present officials are as follows: O. O. Russell, presi-
dent and treasurer; H. J. Russell, vice president
and T. B. Lee, secretary. It is incorporated.
In 1908 Mr. Russell was married at Alliance, Nt-
braska, to Miss Bergetta E. Mangan, who was born
in Pennsylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Russell have one
daughter, Regina, who was born June 20, 191 1. The
family residence at 3418 First Avenue, North, is a
modern house, owned by Mr. Russell. Politically
he is an independent, but has not as yet found time
nor has he had the inclination to enter public life,
his attention being fully occupied with the affairs
of his company. However he is interested in every-
thing connected with the expansion of Billings, and
may be relied upon to co-operate in work calculated
to advance its welfare.
MicH.'VF.L J. GoscH, present county treasurer of
Fergus County, has been a resident of Montana a
quarter of a century, and it was his capacity in
business affairs as well as his wide-spread popu-
larity that caused the people of Fergus County to
give him such an enviable majority when they
elected him county treasurer.
Mr. Gosch was born in Green Lake County, Wis-
consin, on his father's farm, September 19, 1874,
a son of John and Frances (Comiskey) Gosch.
His father, who was born at the City of Danzig,
now the internationalized port of Poland, was
brought to this country when a mere child by his
parents, who landed at New York after a sailing
voyage of six weeks. The family came west to
the wilds of Wisconsin, locating in Greenlake
County, where they were pioneers. John Gosch
cleared a farm from the woods there and spent a
very active life for many years. He spent his last
days in retirement at Berlin, Wisconsin. He had
no concern with politics as a matter of office seek-
ing and was a democratic voter. He died at the
age of eighty-seven. His wife was born in New
York State and died when eighty-four years of
age. Their five children, two sons and three daugh-
ters, are still living.
Michael J. Gosch, youngest child, received his
education in the common and high schools of Ber-
lin, Wisconsin. He has always been willing to
depend upon himself for his share of success and
prosperity. As a youth he clerked in grocery stores
at Berlin, and in April, 1894, arrived at Butte, Mon-
tana, where for about two years he was clerk and
bookkeeper with a wholesale produce establishment
From Butte he removed to Helena and attended
the Engelhorn Business College. Mr. Gosch has
been a resident of Fergus County since 1898. For
the first vear he worked on the ranch of Samuel
Tyler on 'Flat Willow Creek. He was then in the
sawmill business for three years, and engaged in
that business and in ranching for himself at Maiden
in Fergus County. His mills furnished the lum-
ber and timbers for the Gold Leaf mines at Gilt
Edge, the Kendall and Barns King mines of Ken-
dall and the Spotted Horse and McGinnis and
■Columbine mines at Maiden.
Mr. Gosch has been a resident of Lewistown
since lOii. He served four years as deputy coun-
ty treasurer, and in November, igi6, was elected
as chief of that office and re-elected in Novem-
ber, igi8. He received the largest vote in the pri-
mary and the general election of any man on the
democratic ticket in Fergus County.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
207
Mr. Gosch is affiliated with Leuistguu Lodge
Xo. iy. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hiram
Chapter No. 15, Royal Arch Masons, and with
Lewistown Lodge No. 456 of the Elks and with
the Knights of Pythias. On November 25, 1907,
he married Miss Mary Weisbrod. a native of War-
saw, Wisconsin. They have one son, Karl.
Frank Day is a name known and respected by
everyone in Lewistown and many other sections of
Montana. Mr. Day, eighty-three years of age,
came to Montana fifty-five years ago and has borne
a working and useful part in the development of
Montana from frontier conditions.
He was born July 25, 1836, at Bishopton in County
Durham, England, a son of Thomas and Charlotte
Day. He came by sailing vessel to .J^merica at
the age of nine years and joined a brother at Min-
eral Point, Wisconsin. Wisconsin was still a ter-
ritory, and he has therefore lived nearly all his life
in the changing frontier conditions of the United
States. He learned the blacksmith's trade at Min-
eral Point, and at the age of nineteen married Eliza-
beth- Little, of the same town. Five children were
born to their marriage.
In 1864 Frank Day joined a party making the
trip overland by mule team to Virginia City, Mon-
tana. He had the usual run of experience in the
.uold and silver mines there, but eventuallv resumed
his trade and was for a time a traveling black-
smith, shoeing the stage horses^ Later he set up
a shop in Cave Gulch, near Canyon Ferry, and
remained there a number of years. Eventually he
was blacksmith for the Government at Fort Logan,
and in 1881, leaving his family at riiat military post,
removed to Fort Maginnis to assume similar du-
ties. His family joined him at Fort Maginnis in
1882.
Mr. Day was one of the founders of Lewistown.
He and Jacob Holzemer bought 160 acres known
as the Reed place at Reed's Fort. This land is
now included in the modern City of Lewistown.
He succeeded Mr. Reed as the second postmas-
ter of Lewistown, and the old log building which
served the uses of the postoffice is still standing
and has an interesting title as the first postoffice
of Lewistown. Mr. Day has recently donated this
landmark to the city with the intention of hav-
ing it preserved and made a public institution be-
cause of its many historic associations. Mr. Day
also built the Day Hotel, one of the pioneer hos-
telries at which the traveling public was enter-
tained for many years'. The manager of the hotel
was Mr. Holzemer, while Mr. Day managed the
ranch. Later, when the partners dissolved and
divided their Ijusiness, Mr. Day retained the ranch
liroperty. In 1894 he built a blacksmith shop, and
operated it for several years. Since 1898 he has
been practically retired from his business and now
makes his home with his son George H. Day. The
winter of 1919 he spent in California.
Frank Day was one of the men who organized
Lewistown Lodge No. Z7, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, and served it as master. It was
a member of King Solomon Lodge No. 9, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons of Helena. Montana,
before coming to Lewistown. In politics he is a
republican.
George H. Day, a prominent ranchman and busi-
ness man of Lewistown, is a native son of Mon-
tana, and his e.xperience and interests he directs
makes his career worthy of representation in this
history of the state.
Mr. Day was born at Canyon Ferry, near Helena,
Montana, May 30, 1875. He is an adopted son of
Vol. n— 14
Frank and Bertha (Tyson) Day. His foster father
is the grand old pioneer of Lewistown, a brief
account of whose life is found elsewhere.
George H. Day attended school at Lewistown,
and the" first money he earned was riding a race
horse. He was then only nine years of age. He
practically grew up in the saddle and was an ex-
pert cowboy in early youth and has done every
work demanded of a practical ranchman. For
many years he has been a sucapssful breeder of
full blooded Percheron horses and White Faced
cattle. Since 1910 he has had full charge of the
extensive ranch of Frank Day, operating nearly
3,000 acres of land. He raises between 300 and
500 acres of wheat every year. The day ranch
is one of the best around Lewistown and the build-
ing equipment is of the highest standard. The old
homestead is located at Reed's Fort, as the old
townsite of Lewistown was once known.
Mr. Day is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
^y. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and served
two years as secretary of the lodge. He and his
wife are members of Marie Chapter No. 36, of
the Eastern Star, and in politics he is a republi-
can.
July 15, 1899. be married Lillian E. Demuth.
She was born in Wisconsin, a daughter of Peter
and Marj' A. (Dorn) Demuth. Mr. and Mrs. Day
have six children : Bertha H. and Frank R., both
high school students of Lewistown ; Donald M.,
"^arl William, Marion L. and Elizabeth.
Peter J. Osweiler, whose record has been one
of steady promotion to increased responsibilities in
the banking affairs of Lewistown, is cashier of the
Bank of Fergus County, and without help from
anyone since arriving here practically a stranger
has achieved a definite success and standing in the
tommunity.
Mr. Osweiler was born in Brighton in Kenosha
County, Wisconsin, March 21, 1880, son of Paul
and Susannah (Sellen) Osweiler. His father was
a native of Europe and came to this country with
his parents, Peter and Kate Osweiler. They made
the ocean voyage by sailing ship, and from New
York City journeyed up the Hudson to Albany,
thence by canal boat to Buffalo, and by sailing
ship around the lakes to Milwaukee. They located
in Kenosha County when all that country was
covered with heavy timber and the grandparents
hewed a farm out of the wilderness. Paul Osweiler
grew up there in pioneer days and was a Wiscon-
sin farmer the rest of his life. He was a member
of the Catholic Church and died in 1888, at the
age of thirty-five. His wife was born at Milwau-
kee and is now living at Ashton, Iowa. There
were two sons and two daughters, three of whom
are still living.
Peter J. Osweiler, the oldest child, when eleven
years of age removed with his widowed mother
to Ashton, Iowa. There he continued the educa-
tion which had been begun in the schools of
Brighton in Kenosha County. He also worked out
as a farm hand and has never asked for any re-
ward which he could not earn and deserve. At the
age of eighteen he became clerk in a general store,
and four years of that experience gave him a
considerable knowledge of business. With that
equipment he came to Montana, making the jour-
ney by rail and stage to Lewistown, where he
arrived in January, 1902. For about two years
he was bookkeeper for Charles Lehman, and then
spent a year and a half as deputy county assessor.
Since -August i, 1905. he has been connected with
the Bank of Fergus County, first as bookkeeper,
then as teller, then assistant cashier, and since
208
HISTORY OF MONTANA
March i, 1917, as cashier. He is also president
of the State Bank of Leigh, Montana.
Mr Osweiler is a democrat, a member ot the
Catholic Church, and is affiliated with the Knights
of Columbus. On June 12, 1906, he married Helena
M Boor, a native of Ashton, Iowa. They have
three children, Paul Leonard, Helen and Mark
Anthony.
' John C. Huntoon. A resident of Montana for
a quarter of a century, John C. Huntoon has de-
voted himself to many and important interests,
but for the greater part of the time to his profes-
sion as a lawyer. The iirm of Blackford & Hun-
toon, of which he is a member, have a prestige
hardly excelled by that of any other law firm in the
state.
Mr. Huntoon, whose home for the past fifteen
years has been at Lewistown, was born at Peter-
boro, Ontario, Canada, May 13, 1865, a son of
Josiah S. and Betsey Josephine (Kathan) Hun-
toon. His parents were both natives of New York
State. His father, who was born in 1830 and died
in 1916, at the age of eighty-six, spent all his ac-
tive life as a lumberman in Canada, and in his
later years acquired extensive ranching interests
in Montana. He learned the lumber business in
New York State and at the age of twenty-one re-
moved to Canada. He was a pioneer, a woodsman
fortified with every experience from the lumber
camp to the wholesale end of the industry. For
many years he was at the head of the Muskoka
Lumber Company on Georgian Bay, an industry
that manufactures between 18,000,000 and 20,000,000
feet of lumber every year. For nearly forty years
he enjoyed a distinctive rank among Canadian
lumbermen. In 1887 he made his first investments
in Montana, locating at Utica in Fergus County,
where, associated with W. A. Waite, he embarked
a large amount of capital in sheep ranching. This
firm for many years had from 16,000 to 20,000 head
of sheep on their lands. Josiah Huntoon retired
from active business in 1900 and spent the last ten
years of his life at Ontario, California. When he
was eighty years of age he learned to drive his
automobile. He was a thirty-second degree Ma-
son, and in the United States was a republican
in politics. His wife was born in 1833 and died
in 1899, at the age of sixty-six. John C. Huntoon
•was the fourth in a family of two sons and three
daughters.
He was educated at Collingwood, Ontario, and
Toronto, and eventually entered the University of
Michigan Law School, from which he was gradu-
ated in 1891 with the degree LL. B. He was ad-
mitted to the Michigan bar the same year, and
for two years practiced at Detroit, where he was
associated with a prominent Michigan lawyer,
Col. John Atkinson. In October, 1893, he came to
Montana and located at Great Falls, where he prac-
ticed with J. A. Largent, under the firm name of
Largent & Huntoon, for about four years and then
with William Cockrill, under the firm name of
Huntoon & Cockrill, until 1900. Then for three
years Mr. Huntoon gave up his profession to as-
sume the management of the extensive sheep ranch
of his father. He disposed of the greater part
of the ranches in 1017. Locating at Lewistown,
he began practice as senior partner of the firm
Huntoon, Worde & Smith. After three years Mr.
Huntoon engaged in practice alone, and since 1914
has been a member of the firm Blackford & Hun-
toon. handling a general law practice. Mr. Hun-
toon has been prominent as a republican, serving
as chairman of the County Central Committee of
Fergus County and in 1908 was elected county
attorney, an office he filled two years. He is affili-
ated with Cascade Lodge No. 34, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, at Great Falls, with Lewistown
Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks, and Judith Lodge No. 30, Knights of
Pythias. He is a member of the county and state
bar associations and is the present secretary of
the Fergus County Bar Association.
April 20, 1887, Mr. Huntoon married Miss Julia
Maud Towler. She was born at Collingwood, On-
tario. They have one son, Clarence S., who for
a number of years has been in the automobile
business. He was manager of the Standard Great
Falls Garage, later agent for the Willard Storage
Battery Company at Seattle, Washington, and in
1917, at the entering of the United States into the
great war, enlisted. He was in camp at Berkeley,
California, and later at Fort Worth, Texas, and
received his commission as a lieutenant in the
aviation corps a short time before the armistice
was signed. Clarence Huntoon married Margaret
Stapleton at Seattle, Washington in 1918.
Joseph S. Stmineo. The solid business interests
of Billings and the public affairs of the city as well
have furnished the medium in which Mr. Simineo's
abilities and enterprise have worked effectively for
over twenty years. Mr. Simineo is the present
county treasurer of Yellowstone County and bears a
name known and respected all over that section of
the state.
He was born at Chicago, August 26, 1869, and is of
French Canadian ancestry. His great-grandfather
came from France and settled in Canada. His
grandfather, Simon Simineo, was born in the
Province of Ontario in 1793, and moved from Canada
to Grand Haven, Michigan, and later to the State of
Colorado. He died at Gunnison, Colorado, in 1881,
being accidentally killed while unhitching his team.
Joseph Simineo, father of the Billings public official,
was horn at Grand Haven, Michigan, in 1847, was
reared there and for two years conducted a meat
market business at Watseka, Illinois. Then for a
brief time he lived in Chicago, where his son was
born, and in 1872 took his family to Colorado and
became a farmer and stock raiser. In 1889 he ac-
complished another stage of westward migration,
moving to Washington and engaging in the meat
business at Almira and Bellingham. Later he went
to Vancouver, British Columbia, retiring from busi-
ness in 1901, and died in 1902. He was a democrat
and a member of the Ancient .Order of United Work-
men. At Watseka, Illinois, he married Zoa Soucie,
who was born at Watseka in 1852 and is now living
at Walla Walla, Washington.
Joseph S. Simineo, only child of his parents, ac-
quired his early education in the public schools of
Douglas County, Colorado, also at Waterville, Wash-
ington, and attended a busfness college at Portland,
Oregon. At the age of twenty-one he began his
business career as an associate with his father in
the meat business. After five years he. came to
Montana, reaching Billings on October o, 1896. For
7H years he was in the employ of Yegen Brothers,
then for iH years was in the meat business for
himself and for fourteen months was associated in
the same line with Julius Zyert. For three years
Mr. Simineo had charge of the business office of
the Gazette Printing Company at Billings, and then
took up the school supply business and for three
years handled a large volume of business over all
of Eastern Montana.
For a number of years he has been a public
official in Billings, serving as a member of the City
Council from 191 1 to 1917- In 1913 he was appointed
r
HISTORY OF MONTANA
209
deputy county treasurer, an office he held six years.
In the fall of 1918 he was elected county treasurer
of Yellowstone County and began his duties March
3, 1919, for a term of two years. From 191; to 1917
Mr. Simineo was president of the City Council. He
is an active member and treasurer of the Baptist
Church and is affiliated with Billings Star Lodge No.
41, Independeitt Order of Odd Fellows, Billings
Lodge, Woodmen of the World, the Royal High-
landers of Billings, and is a member of the Midland
Club.
In 1895, at Bellingham, Washington, he married
Miss Izetta Trask. She was born in the State of
Maine and died at Billings, Montana, in November,
1909. Her only son, Millard T., was a student in the
Polytechnic Institute at Billings two years and en-
listed from that school on May 6, 191 7, joining the
National Army and seeing much active service over-
seas, and in the spring of 1919 was still in the
army of occupation in Germany. In 191 1, in Yellow-
stone County, Mr. Simineo married Miss Bessie
Rupert, a daughter of James and Lydia (Morse)
Rupert, of Minnesota, in which state she was born.
They have one daughter, Lois, born July 9, 1916.
Weymouth D. Symmes. Though comparatively
a young man, Weymouth D. Symmes has been ac-
tively identified with the affairs of Montana over
thirty years, the greater part of which time has
been devoted to merchandising, a business in which
he has achieved signal success. He is the active
head of the Power Mercantile Company, one of the
largest concerns of its kind, with headquarters at
Lewistown.
Mr. Symmes was born in Canada, January 30,
1870, a son of Thomas J. and Mary (Weymouth)
Symmes. His father was also a native Canadian,
and spent his life as a farmer in that country.
He died in 1905, at the age of sixty-nine. The
mother was born in Bethel, Vermont, and died in
1914. also aged sixty-nine. Weymouth D. was the
third in a family of seven children, six sons and
one daughter, four of whom are still living.
He acquired a public school education in Canada
and also had some experience on his father's farm.
He taught a term or two of school, and on Sep-
tember 8, 1889, arrived in Montana, locating at
Livingston, where he clerked in a mercantile house.
Later he was at Missoula, and was in the engineer-
ing department of the Northern Pacific Railway
until March, 1892. Mr. Symmes has been a fac-
tor in Lewistown since March, 1892, and all that
time has been associated with the Power interests.
He was with the T. C. Power Company until 1894,
when as one of the stockholders he organized the
Power Mercantile Company and has since been
its general manager. He is also general manager
and secretary of the Judith Basin Mercantile Com-
pany at Hobson and Utica, and is president of the
Lewistown Wholesale Company.
While the extent of these establishments is such
as to require a great deal of time and energy, Mr.
Svmmes' public spirit led him to accept the post
of mayor of Lewistown and he gave the city a
very fine administration of its affairs from May,
1913, to May, 1017. Fraternally a prominent Ma-
son, he is a member of Lewistown Lodge No. 37,
.'\ncient Free and Accepted Masons, Hiram Chap-
ter No. 15. Royal Arch Masons, Lewistown Com-
mandery No. 14. Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is
also a charter member of Lewistown Lodge No.
456, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and
in politics is a republican.
August 31, 1898, he married Miss Ionia Long.
She was born at Santa Cruz, California. They
have four daughters and one son, Dorothy I., Eliza-
beth, Mary Ruth, Grace B. and Weymouth D., Jr.
Walter B. Chrysler. The entrance of Walter B.
Chrysler upon his independent career was not a
particularly auspicious one. He was possessed only
of a common school education, commendable am-
bitions and great capacity for careful application
to his work, but his lack of finances or helpful
influences bothered him little, because his self-re-
liance was of such a sturdy character that it enabled
him to develop to the utmost the capital with which
nature had endowed him. It was not within his
make-up to fail; his inherent judgment pointed out
the way for him to proceed, his keen insight dis-
cerned opportunities, his native powers developed
new fields, and the ability which he possessed allowed
him to make each new venture a successful one.
Eventually, in 1914, he identified himself with the
Billings Ice and Coal Company, of which large and
important concern he has since been manager.
Mr. Chrysler was born at Troy, New York, No-
vember 16, 1857, a son of Sylvester and Elizabeth
(Stevens) Chrysler. The family originated in Hol-
land, and was founded in America during the days
of Hendryk Hudson, the family home being in
New York. In that state, in the old Hildeburg
Mountains, Schenectady, in 1819, was born Sylvester
Chrysler, who was reared in that community and
resided there until 1861. In his youth he served
seven years as an apprentice to the trade of car-
riage making and a like period in the car shops,
and eventually became assistant manager of the old
Troy & Albany Railway, under I. V. Baker. In
1861 he removed to Sauk Rapids, Minnesota, where
he did general work at his trade, and in 1865 went
to Fort Ripley, in the same state, where during
that year he had charge of the wagon repair shop
for the United States Government. Returning to
Sauk Rapids in 1866, he was engaged in farming
for two years and was then appointed one of the
first railway mail clerks, a position which he held
for three years, being then placed in charge of a
car shop at St. Paul, Minnesota, where he remained
until 1881. He then spent one year at Denver, Colo-
rado, as manager of car shops, but again returned
to Sauk Rapids and conducted a wagon and repair
shop until 1909, when he came to Billings and made
his home with his son until his death during the
same year. He was a republican and a faithful
member and active supporter of the Congregational
Church, and was well known in fraternal circles,
being a member of the Masons and a seventh-degree
Odd Fellow in New York. Mr. Chrysler married
Elizabeth Stevens, who was born in New York
State, and died at Sauk Rapids, Minnesota, at the
age of fifty-six years, and they became the parents
of five children, as follows : James S., a retired
ranchman of Dykeman. Minnesota ; a daughter who
died young: Charles B., who is connected with a
transfer company at Sacramento. California; Walter
B.; and William, who died young. By a prior
marriage Mr. Chrysler had one son, George S.,
who is deceased.
Walter B. Chrysler was educated in the public
schools of Sauk Rapids, following which he at-
tended the normal school at St. Cloud, Minnesota,
for a short period. He was but fifteen years of
age when he laid aside his school books and started
into work for the old St. Paul & Pacific Railway
at St. Paul, with which line he was connected until
1881. In the spring of that year he accompanied
his parents to Denver. Colorado, and formed con-
nections with the Denver & Rio Grande Railway,
in the same department as his father. In the fall
of that year, however, he transferred his services
HISTORY OF :\IOXTANA
to the Northern Pacific, and was stationed at^ Brain-
erd, Minnesota, where he remained until 1885. It
was in that year that he was sent by his company
to Billings, to take charge of the car works at this
point, and remained as the directing head thereof
until 1894, when he entered the employ of Yegen
Brothers, having charge of the hardware and im-
plement departments. In 191 4 he took charge of
the coal department of the Billings Ice and Coal
Company, and at the present time is manager of
the entire business, the offices and yards of which
are situated at Thirty-first Street, South, and First'
Avenue, while the main offices are in the Yegen
Block on Minnesota Avenue. Mr. Chrysler is well
known in business circles as a man of the strictest
integrity and highest principles, a good executive,
and one of strong force of character. He is the
owner of his own home at No. 109 North 'Thirty-first
Street, a modern residence, and has various other
interests and holdings. In politics a republican, he
has served capably as justice of the peace, and has
always carefully and conscientiously performed the
duties of citizenship. He is an e.x-member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and belongs to
Billings Camp, Woodmen of the World, and to the
Highlanders.
In 1886, at Sauk Rapids, Minnesota, Mr. Chrysler
was united in marriage with Miss Esther M. Thomas,
of that city, where the Thomas family is well known
and highly esteemed. To this union there have
been born four children : Walter S., an electrician,
who resides at Murray, Utah ; Eugene Franklin,
who died at the age of eighteen months ; a son who
died in infancy; and Kenneth Lynn, an engineer in
the valuation department of the New York Central
Lines, with headquarters at Cleveland,. Ohio.
Glenn Ch.'\rles Mc.'\listf.r. It is seldom that an
individual attains to more than ordinary success
in any one line. Life is too short to admit of
proper preparation for the duties of widely divergent
professions or vocations, yet here and there there
appears an individual so gifted that lie apparently
could have succeeded in any field which he had
chosen for his own. In this class is named Glenn
Charles McAlister, who is not only one of the lead-
ing architects of Billings, but who has also achieved
a notable success as the proprietor and operator of
an extensive ranch.
Mr. McAlister was born at Monticello, Missouri,
Movember 2, 1873, a son of James T. and Ruth
E. (Lovitt) McAlister. The McAlister family is
of Scotch-Irish origin, and its progenitors immi-
grated to America during Colonial days. James T.
McAlister, the grandfather of Glenn C, was a pioneer
of Missouri, where he passed his life as a farmer,
and prior to the Civil war worked his land with slave
labor, being a planter of the old regime. His death
occurred .at Monticello, Missouri.' in 1874. The
younger James T. McAlister, father of Glenn C, was
born in 1842, in Kentucky, and was there reared and
educated, but in young nianliood went to Illinois,
where he was married to Ruth E. Lovitt, who was
horn in 1847 in Ohio, and still makes her home at Ab-
ingdon, Illinois. From Illinois Mr. McAlister moved
to Monticello, Missouri, where for twelve years he
followed contracting and building, then went fo
LaHarpe, Illinois, where he was engaged in the
same line of endeavor for fourteen years, and
finally located at Abingdon, where he conducted a
like business until his retirement from active life.
His death' occurred at that city January 10. 1014,
when his community lost one of its reliable, sub-
stantial and highly respected business citizens. Mr.
McAlister was a member of the Masonic fraternitv,
and a democrat in his political affiliation, while his
religious faith was that of the Christian Church
and he was a consistent church member. He and
his wife were the parents of six children, as follows;
Allie, who married J. M. Staley, a business man
of Clear Lake, South Dakota; Buelah, the wife of
William A. Harvey, a farmer of the vicinity of
Abingdon, Illinois; Glenn Charles; June, the wife
of Charles Melvin, a business man ol< Peoria, Illinois;
Roy, engaged in agricultural pursuits at Parkman,
Wyoiping ; and Guy, in the United States Army
Hospital Corps at San Francisco, California.
Glenn Charles McAlister was educated in the pub-
lic schools of LaHarpe and Abingdon, Illinois, and
attended the high school at the latter place, where
he also took a two-year course in the normal school.
He left school at the age of twenty-one years, and
two years later came to Montana and settled at
Butte, where he became engaged in architectural
work, mastered the profession, and followed that
line of endeavor for two years. For two years
thereafter he was identified as engineer with the
Boston Montana Mining Company, and then, during
the year 1900, applied himself to a study of heating
and ventilating. In 1901 he first came to Billings
and engaged in architectural work, remaining until
1903, when he went to Sheridan, Wyoming, and
remained there until 1905. Returning to Billings
in the latter year, he again resumed his professional
activities, with offices in the Hart-Albin Building,
and since that time has risen to high rank in his
calling. Among the principal buildings which he
has designed may be mentioned the Elks Club, Bill-
ings ; Senator Kendrick's home, Sheridan, Wyoming ;
the court house there; two of the large new school-
houses at Billings; the South Side Fire Station;
and a number of the most modern residences at
Billings, including the beautiful home of T. A.
Snidow. In addition to his activities in his pro-
fession Mr. McAlister has been successful in hi',
ventures as a ranchman, and at this time is the
owner of a splendid homestead of 640 acres located
in Custer County, Montana. He is also the owner
of his own home, an attractive residence at No.
1053 North Thirty-second Street, and has various
other holdings and interests. He is independent in
his political views, and casts his vote for man rather
than party. His religious faith is that of the Con-
gregational Church, and he holds membership in
the Billings Club.
In 1905, at Slack, Wyoming, Mr. McAlister was
married to Miss Beatrix May Powers, daughter of
T. A. and Millie (Brittain) Powers, natives of that
community, where Mr. Powers is a rancher. Mrs.
McAlister is a graduate of the Sheridan High School.
Two children have come to Mr. and Mrs. McAlister :
Beatrix Virginia, born May 23, 1909 ; and Raymond
Powers, born February 5, 191 1.
C.^RL R. Meyer, examiner for the .Associated Mort-
gage Investors at Billings, has been identified with
enterprises pertaining to lands and land invest-
ments practically from the start of his career. In
his present capacity he represents a concern of more
than fifty years' standing which is extensively en-
gaged in the farm mortgage business, a field in
which Mr. Meyer's undoubted abilities, backed by
his years of specialized training, find an excellent
medium for demonstration and expression.
Mr. Meyer was born in Sarpy County, Nebraska.
December 21, 1886, a son of U. C. and Carrie Belle
CFoote) Meyer. His father, now a resident of
Peru, Nebraska, was horn in i8,s6, at St. Marv's,
Iowa, where the family home was located until that
little community was practicallv washed away by
an overflow of the Missouri River, at which time
the paternal grandmother of Carl R. Meyer took
HISTORY OF MONTANA
211
her children to Sarpy County, Nebraska, and located
on a homestead, U.' C. Meyer being at that time
about seven years of age. Three years later she
died, and the lad grew up with his elder brothers
and sisters, took up farming on his own account,
and eventually purchased the homestead, upon which
four of his own children were born. He continued
to successfully cultivate this homestead until 1894,
in which year he moved to a stock ranch in Buffalo
County, Nebraska, and after two years took up his
residence at Peru, in order that his children might
secure better facilities for their educational training.
He sold the homestead at the time of his retirement,
but is still the owner of two farms near Peru and
is accounted one of his community's substantial citi-
zens. He was road overseer and a member of the
school board in Sarpy County for many years, and
at present holds a position on the Peru school board.
He is a republican voter and a member of the
Baptist Church, in the work of which he takes an
active and helpful part. Mr. Meyer married Carrie
Belle Foote, who was born near Saginaw, Michigan,
in 1862, and they became the parents of nine chil-
dren, as follows : Ethel, who is the wife of W. S.
Bostder, a real estate broker of Chadron, Nebraska;
Pearl, unmarried, who holds an important position
with a shipping company at Newport News, Virginia ;
Carl R. ; Earl, a practicing attorney of Alliance,
Nebraska ; Hazel, unmarried, who is taking a nurse's
training course at Kirksville, Missouri ; Belle, un-
married, who is engaged in teaching school at
Chester, Nebraska; Opal, who died at the age of
n'^ne years ; Crystal, who is attending normal school
at Peru ; and Arthadel, who is attending higli school
there.
Carl R. Meyer was educated primarily in the
rural schools of Sarpy County, Nebraska, follow-
ing which he attended the normal school at Peru
for four years. Graduating therefrom in 1904, he
began his career as a school teacher in the rural
districts of Douglas County, Nebraska, but after
two years of experience of this nature decided that
the educator's profession was not his forte, and
accordingly secured his introduction to his present
line of work by engaging in the real estate, abstract
and title business at Auburn, Nebraska. After two
years of such operations he went to Omaha, Ne-
braska, as secretary of the Midland Guaranty and
Trust Company, a position which he held until Jan-
uary, 1912, and then removed to Winterset, Iowa,
where he organize^ the Security Loan and Title
Company, of which he was secretary, treasurer and
general manager until October i, 1917. He then
came to Billings with the North Real Estate and
Investment Company, and after nine months severed
his connection with that concern to enter upon his
present duties as examiner for the Associated Mort-
gage Investors. This institution, which has its
headquarters at Rochester, New York, is an old
established company which has been in existence
for about a half a century. The Billings offices
are located at No. 306 Hart-Albin Building. Mr.
Meyer is accounted one of the best informed men
in his line in this part of the state, and bears a
high reputation in business circles, where he is known
for his integrity and his fidelity to engagements.
He is a republican as to political sentiment, belongs
to the Presbyterian Church, and fraternizes with
Winterset (Iowa) Lodge, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, and Winterset Chapter, Royal Arch
Masons.
In 1908, at Omaha, Nebraska. Mr. Meyer was
united in marriage with Miss Florence S. Johnson,
daughter of Charles J. and Augusta (Molander)
Johnson, residents of Omaha, Nebraska, where Mr.
Johnson has been in the auditor's office of the Union
Pacific Railway for the past thirty-five years. Two
children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Meyer:
K. Wilton, born April 15, 1909. and Florence Mar-
guerite, born Aprif 21, 1917.
O. Fletcher Goddard. If it takes a generation
for a family to become established in a community,
that period has been more than fulfilled in the case
of both Mr. Goddard and the City of Billings.
From territorial times to the present Mr. Goddard
has been really and vitally conspicuous in the affairs
in his liome city and state. One of the oldest mem-
bers of the Billings bar, he has been successful in his
profession, business affairs and in politics.
He was born in Davis County, Iowa, in 1853, of
old Virginia Colonial ancestors, a son of Richard
Tilton and Elizabeth (Tannehill) Goddard. His
parents were natives of Ohio and moved to Iowa in
1842, when Iowa was still a territory. His father
was a farmer in that state and died in 1892, after
a residence of a half a century.
O. Fletcher Goddard was one of a family of four
sons and three daughters. He grew up on a farm,
had a common school and academic education and
taught school in various towns in Iowa while study-
ing law. He studied law under his uncle, Judge
Tannehill, at Ceuterville, Iowa, and was admitted
to the bar in 1880. Following this for three years
he practiced at Corydon.
Mr. Goddard identified himself with the yomig
Town of Billings in March, 1883. One of the
hardest working members of his profession, he has
long since attained an enviable place in the bar of
Montana and his name might be fitly mentioned with
any group, however small and exclusively represent-
ing the best abilities and character of the legal pro-
fession. Much of his work has been in corporation
law, and the firm of Goddard and Clark of which
he is senior partner, are district attorneys for the
Chicago Burlington & Quincy Railroad.
In later years many extensive and valuable busi-
ness interests have demanded a large part of his time
and attention. He is a director of the Montana
Coal and Iron Company owning and operating a
large coal mine at Bear Creek, Montana, is secretary
of the Yellowstone Packing Company, and is owner
of several irrigated ranches in Yellowstone County,
and much improved real estate in Billings, including
his own modern home at 304 North Thirty-first
Street.
Through all the varied history of the republican
party in Montana from territorial days to the present
Mr. Goddard has been a consistent and unwavering
advocate of the principles of true republicanism. He
served as pros'ecuting attorney and district attorney
in territorial times, was a member of the constitu-
tional convention of 1889, served in the State Senate
of 1891 and 1893, and in 1893 his individual influence
prevented the election of a democratic senator from
Montana. He was the gold standard candidate of
the republican party for Congress in 1896, and at
liis own expense made a campaign over the state as'
a forlorn hope of his party when all the West and
Northwest was completely committed to the fret-
silver issues. Mr. Goddard stood solidly for the old
line republican party in the campaign of 1912, when
again the bulk of his former party associates gave
their support either to Roosevelt or Wilson.
Mr. Goddard is a charter member of the (old »
Billings Club and also a charter member of the
Billings-Midland Club. He is affiliated with lodge
No. 394 of the Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, and is a Knight Templar Mason and Shriner.
January 20, 1881, at Centerville, Iowa, lie married
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Miss Alwilda Stephenson, a native of Ohio. Of their
three children the oldest is Lora, a graduate of
Drake University at Des Moines, lovvfa, who finished
her education in the University of Michigan and
later took special work in voice culture in North-
western University in Chicago. She is the wife of
William P. Rixon, a prominent business man of
Billings. Mr. and Mrs. Rixon have a daughter,
Helen Rebecca, born in 1912. Helen, the second
daughter, graduated with the class of 1908 at Mon-
tana University, and is now the wife of E. W. Adam,
a farmer and stock raiser at Mosely, Montana. Mr.
and Mrs. Adam have two children, Emil, born in
1916, and Richard Fletcher, born in 1918. The only
son of Mr. and Airs. Goddard was Wilbur F. God-
dard, who died in 1913 at the age of eighteen.
Harold H. Winter. The Ryniker-Winter Hard-
ware Company of Billings is one of the largest and
most complete establishments of its kind, both whole-
sale and retail, in Southeastern Montana. Its story
is a remarkable piece of business history illustrating
the possibilities of growth and expansion under the
direction of men of such phenomenal energy and
progressiveness as Harold H. \yinter, the president,
and ;\lr. Ryniker, the vice president.
Both these men, associated in a business and also
through family ties, were formerly residents of
Quincy, Illinois. Harold H. Winter was born in
that city July 18, 1885, and is still young, as that
date indicates. His father, John E. Winter, was
born in Germany in 1854, and when an infant came
to the United States with an uncle. His father
had been compelled to leave Germany because of
participation in a rebellion in that country. John
E. Winter grew up in St. Louis, Missouri, where
he married, and had a long and interesting experi-
ence as a Mississippi River boatman. He was a
captain and pilot on the Mississippi before the war,
in 1861 enlisted in a Light Artillery Regiment, was
wounded at the battle of Wilson's Creek in Southern
Missouri, and afterward was appointed and served
as captain of a gunboat on the Mississippi. After
the war he lived in St. Louis until 1870, when he
moved to Quincy, and in 1874 retired from the
river and was a traveling salesman. He died at
Quincy in 1900. Politically he was a stanch repub-
lican. John E. Winter married Elizabeth Thomas,
who was born in Quincy in 1859 and died there in
1895. They were the parents of five children: W.
T., formerly a sheep herder in Wyoming, now living
retired at Quincy; Al G., a resident of Billings and
referred to more particularly in later paragraphs ;
Jeannette and Edith, both unmarried and living at
Quincy; and Harold H., the youngest of the family.
The latter attended public school in his native
citj', also the National Business College there, and
as a youth learned the pattern making trade in
one of Quincy's factories. He followed this busi-
ness in Chicago for several years, and while there
took a mechanical engineering course. In 1907 he
returned to Quincy and in 1008 came out to Billings.
In association with W. C. Ryniker, under the firm
name of Ryniker & Winters, he began business by
the purchase of the Cedargreen Brothers tin shop.
Out of that modest establishment has grown the
Ryniker & Winter Sheet Metal Works and other
affiliated enterprises. Ryniker & Winter took charge
of the tin shop May 15, 1908. November 15,
1910, the business was incorporated under the name
Ryniker-Winters Company. Mr. Winters is presi-
dent and W. E. Ryniker vice president, while C. M.
Winter is secretary and treasurer. December 31,
1915, a change of name and organization was made,
when the Ryniker-Winter Hardware Company was
incorporated, and at the same time the sheet metal
works was made a separate corporation, known as
the Ryniker-W'inter Sheet Metal NVorks, with Mr.
Winter as president, Mr. Ryniker vice president and
manager. The Sheet Metal Works are between First
and Second avenues on Twenty-fifth Street, North.
The wholesale hardware plant and offices are at
Seventeenth Street and Montana Avenue, while the
retail stores, handling a general stock of hardware
goods and equipment, are at Twenty-fifth Street,
North, and Second Avenue. There are few firms in
the state that have more extended business con-
nections th'an this. Twelve persons are employed
in the hardware business and twenty-five in the
sheet metal works, while the wholesale business
covers a territory 200 miles in a radius around
Billings.
Mr. Winter is a republican, affiliated with Ashlar
Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Billings Chapter No. 6, Royal Arch Masons, Quincy
Consistory of the Scottish Rite, Algeria Temple of
the Mystic Shrine at Helena, and is a member of
Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Elks, the United
Commercial Travelers and the Billings Midland Club.
Mr. Winter owns and occupies with his family
a modern home at 242 Wyoming Avenue. He mar-
ried Miss Cora Ryniker, of Livingston, Montana,
in 1910. She was born at Quincy. They have one
daughter, Jeannette, born March 14, 1912.
AI G. Winter, a brother of Harold H., was born
at Quincy May 17, 1875, was educated in the grammar
and high schools there and the Gem City Business
College, and as a boy took up newspaper work".
In 1898 he enlisted in Company D of the Nebraska
Infantry for the Spanish-American war. He spent
the greater part of that year in camp at Lincoln,
Nebraska, and at Camp Chickamauga, and was mus-
tered out at Old Fort Omaha in the fall. In May,
1899, he enlisted for the Philippine war, in Company
C of the Thirty-fifth United States Volunteer In-
fantry. He saw much active service in the Far
East, being with General Lawson and was provost
sergeant at Bilibib, the United States military prison.
He returned and was mustered out at the Presidio
at San Francisco in November, 1901. The follow-
ing year he resumed newspaper work as a reporter
with the Quincy Whig, and in 1909 made his first
trip to Billings and for a time was employed by
the Ryniker-Winters Company. He then resumed
his newspaper work at Quincy, but since 1917 has
considered Billings his permanent home and is now
bookkeeper and office manager for the retail hard-
ware department of the Ryniker-Winters Company
and the Sheet Metal Works. He is independent in
politics, a member of the Episcopal Church, and
the Fraternal Order of Eagles. April_ 11, 1914, at
Terre Haute, Indiana, he married Miss Christine
M. McLay. She was born in Scotland and came
to the United States in 1913.
Arthur Leslie Hewett is president of the Se-
curity Bridge Company at Billings, one of the
largest bridge and general construction organizations
in the Northwest. Mr. Hewett learned the bridge
building business in Minneapolis, has spent the
greater part of his active life along that line, and
his work called him out to Montana long before
he acquired a permanent residence in this state.
Mr. Hewett represents old New England stock.
He was born in the Town of Hope. Maine, March
18, 1867. The Hewetts were a colonial family from
England. His grandfather, William Hewett, was
born in 1800, and spent his active life as a carpenter
in a mill at Hope, Maine, where he died in 1882.
He married Eliza Fogler, who also died at Hope.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
213
M. D. Hewett, father of Arthur L., was born at
Hope, Maine, October 12, 1841, grew up and mar-
ried there, and served through practically all the
Civil war as a rnember of the Sixteenth Maine In-
fantry. Like his father he became a carpenter,
also operated a furniture factory in Maine, moved
' to Findlay, Ohio, in 1885 and continued his busi-
ness as a furniture maker there and in 1914, after
his wife's death, he removed to Billings and is
now living on a ranch near that city. He is a re-
publican, an active supporter of the Congregational
Church, a member of the Masonic fraternity, and
has been affiliated with the Grand Army of the
Republic. He married Sarah M. Hastings, who was
born in Knox Ceunty, Maine, and died at Findlay,
Ohio, in 1913. They had three children: George
E., employed in a sash and door factory at Findlay,
Ohio; Arthur L. ; and Florence, wife of P. T.
Baker, a rancher at Billings.
Arthur L. Hewett acquired his education in the
rural schools of the town of Hope and in Knox
County, Maine, and at the age of seventeen went
to work in a grocery store at .Augusta, in his native
state, for six years, and in 1888 moved to Minne-
apolis and took up bridge building work with S. M.
Hewett & Company. The head of this firm was a
great-uncle. He learned his trade there and re-
mained in Minneapolis until IQIO. In the mean-
time, beginning in 1892, he had been making trips
to Montana supervising bridge construction and had
an oifice in Billings from 1904. He has supervised
the construction of sixteen bridges along the Yel-
lowstone River. Moving his residence to Billings
in the spring of 1910. he established the Security
Bridge Company, which has been practically a con-
tinuous organization since 1900, and it was incorpo-
rated in 191 1 with the following officers: A. L.
Hewett, president; W. P. Roscoe, vice president;
and P. W. Hastings, secretary and treasurer. The
offices are at 502 North Thirty-second Street. The
business of the firm is not only the construction of
bridges but the building of waterworks, sewers,
other concrete work on irrigating ditches, and heavy
construction. A branch office is maintained at Lewis-
ton, Idaho. The operations of this firm cover the
states of Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Washington
and Oregon.
Mr. Hewett is treasurer of the Carbon County
Agricultural Company, is an independent republican
in politics, is affiliated with Minneapolis Lodge No.
19, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. St. John's
Chapter No. 9, Royal Arch Masons, at Minneapolis,
Billings Lodge No. .594, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, and is a member of the Billings
Midland Club and the Rotary Club.
In 1910, on coming to Billings, Mr. Hewett built
a modern home at 934 North Thirtieth Street. He
married Miss Myrtie M. Glasser, of Minneapolis, in
August, 1894. She is a daughter of Henry J. and
Susan F. (Thompson) Glasser, her luother living with
Mr. and Mrs. Hewett. Her father, a traveling sales-
man, died at Minneapolis in 1904. Mr. and Mrs.
Hewett are the parents of five children : Florence,
a graduate of the village high school, completed
her education in the State Normal at Bozeman and
is now the wife of W. J. Sherley and resides near
Emigrant, Montana. Viva M. is a junior in the
University of Minnesota. Henry attends the village
high school, Sarah is in the grammar school, and
the youngest, Arthur Leslie, Jr., is called Pat be-
cause he was born on St. Patrick's Day, March
17, 1916.
Frank A. Cousins has spent all his life in the
Northwest, has been a grain dealer for many years,
and is now member gf the firm Ladd & Cousins,
grain dealers, and operates two elevators in Montana.
Mr. Cousins, whose operations prior to locating at
Billings were largely directed from Minneapolis,
was born at Spirit Lake, Iowa, November 2^, 1871.
James Cousins, his father, was born at London,
England, November 23, 1823, a son of John Cousins,
who brought his family to Quebec, Canada, in 1828.
John Cousins spent the rest of his life as a farmer
in Canada. James Cousins in 1857 came to the
United States and located as a pioneer at Fort
Atkinson in Winneshiek County, Iowa. In 1870
he moved to Spirit Lake and again did some pioneer
work, breaking the heavy sod of the virgin prairie.
He spent the rest of his life at Spirit Lake and
died September 15, 1899. He was a consistent
members of the Episcopal Church all his life and
voted as a republican. James Cousins married
Sarah Fitzsimmons, who was born in England in
1832 and died at Spirit Lake in 1888. They had
a large family of children, five of whom died young.
Frank Arthur is the youngest of six who reached
mature years. The oldest, J. A., is a carpenter
at Spirit Lake; T. H. was a retired grain dealer
at Carrington, North Dakota, and died May 31,
1919, leaving a wife, daughter and two sons; C. S.
is coal inspector for the Union Pacific Railway
Company, liviiig at Seattle, Washington; Sarah, of
Spirit Lake, is the widow of Tames Swailes, a
traveling salesman; and W. A.," who operated a
dray Ime, died at Lake Park, Iowa, in the spring
of 1893.
Frank A. Cousins was educated in the public
schools of his native town, including high school,
spent one year at the Spirit Lake Academy and
completed the sophomore year in Iowa College at
Grinnell. After a course in the Capital City Com-
mercial^ College at Des Moines he left school in
the spring of 1892, spent one year as a farmer at
Spirit Lake and two years at Grinnell, and in the
spring of 1897 moved to Carrington, North Dakota,
and took up what has been his main business, grain
buying. He was there until 1905, and then for two
years devoted all his time to managing his farm.
In 1907 Mr. Cousins became traveling superintendent
for the Lyon Elevator Company, covering Central
and Western North Dakota and Eastern Montana.
He made his first business trip to Montana in 1910.
The Lyon Elevator Company consolidated with the
Russell Miller Milling Company in 1909, and at
that time Mr. Cousins joined the Occident Elevator
Company, a subsidiary of the Russell Miller Mill-
ing Company, and was superintendent until 191-;.
with headquarters at Bismarck, North Dakota. In
the fall of 1913 he was transferred to the home
officers of the Occident Elevator Company at Min-
neapolis as assistant general manager. In 1916 Mr.
Cousins located at Billings and from August i of
that year until April i, 1917, was on the road for
the Carney Coal Company.
In December, 1916, he bought an elevator at
Huntley, Montana, and soon gave up his other
connections in order to spend all his time looking
after this elevator, also another which he owns at
Worden, Montana, and his interests as a member
of the firm Ladd & Cousins, which was formed in
August, 1917. His partner is W. P. Ladd, whose
name is noted elsewhere in this publication. The
offices of the firm are in the Electric Building at
Billings.
Mr. Cousins is a republican, a member of the
Baptist Church, is affiliated with Lodge No. 29,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and was deputy
grand master of the Masons of North Dakota when
he left that state. He is a member of Carrington
214
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Chapter No. 15. Royal Arch Masons, and Carrington
Camp of the Modern Woodmen of America. He
belongs to the Midland Club.
Mr. Cousins and family reside in a modern home
at 316 Lewis Avenue. He married Miss Viola May
Dickerson at Grinnell, Iowa, October 2T, 1892. She
was born at Bunker Hill, Illinois, June 10, 1869,
a daughter of S. W. and A. Melvina (Hoyt) Dick-
erson both now deceased. Her father for many
years followed his trade as a wood worker at
Grinnell. Mr. and Mrs. Cousins have one daughter,
Alberta Winifred. She is a graduate of the Bis-
marck High School and of the Handicraft Guild
at Minneapolis, and is now keeping books for the
firm of Ladd & Cousins.
Harry C. Stringham's chief experience has been
in financial affairs, and he plays an important and
vital part in Billings' commercial life as secretary
of the Billings Credit Men's .Association.
Mr. Stringham was born at Denver, Colorado,
November 24, 1885. His paternal ancestors came
from England and were early settlers in New York.
One member of the Stringham family served as
a general in the Mexican war. Mr. Stringham's
grandfather was a Civil war veteran and died in
the Old Soldiers Home at Little Rock, Arkansas.
Fred Stringham, father of Harry C, presents a
remarkable instance of physical integrity and service
that may be expected from a man of absolute
temperance and industry. He was born at North
Branch, Michigan, in i860, lost his mother when
he was twelve years old, and then went to Gales-
burg, Illinois, with his father. At the age of eighteen
he went west to Denver, and for the past forty-one
years has been a locomotive engineer with the
Denver and Rio Grande Railway. He will be re-
tired on a pension in 1920. He has been a rail-
roader, has worked steadily and has a splendid
record, and is a notable exception to the old time
railroad man in the fact that he has never used
intoxicants or tobacco. The rewards of his tein-
perate and industrial life appear in a material way,
since he has amassed a fortune estimated at $75,000.
Many years ago, while living at Manitou, Colorado,
he served in the office of alderman. He is inde-
pendent in politics, is a Mason and a member of
the Presbyterian Church. Fred Stringham married
Minnie Pultz, who was born at Charleston, South
Carolina, in 1865. They had five children : Jesse
and Grace, twins, the former in the mining business
at Bates, Arkansas, while Grace died of the influ-
enza at Bates in 1918; Harry C. ; Will, general
manager of the Sootless and Smokeless Coal Com-
pany at Bates, Arkansas ; and Fred, Jr., a farmer
at Rocky Ford, Colorado.
Harry C. Stringham was educated in the public
schools of Manitou, Colorado, graduating from high
school in 1906, and finished his education with
eighteen months in a business college at Colorado
Springs. He left school with a financial career in
view, and went to work at the very bottom in the
Oberlin National Bank at Oberlin, Kansas. After
six months he went to Pittsburg, Kansas, as an
employe of the First National Bank, and when he
left there he was draft teller. He was next with
the Bradstreet Company in their offices at Portland,
Oregon, and in 1913 came to Billings, continuing
here for three years as a Bradstreet reporter.
In 1916 Mr. Stringham organized the Billings
Credit Men's Association, of which he is secretary,
and performs the important task of managing finan-
cial adjustments for the various members of that
association. His offices are in the Hart-Albin Build-
ing. His home is at 2807 Seventh Avenue, North.
He is a republican, a member of the Episcopal
Church, the Billings Golf and Country Club and
the Elks.
In 1910, at Pittsburg, Kansas, he married Miss
Lois Fuller. She is a daughter of Judge Arthur
and Hannah (Richardson) Fuller, of Pittsburg. Her
father is a prominent attorney and served three
terms as judge of the District Court of Kansas.
Mr. and Mrs. Stringham have one son, Arthur Ben-
jamin, born June 21, 1918.
Rev. Cyril Pauvvelyn. St. Patrick's Churcli of
Billings is under the charge of Rev. Father Cyril
Pauwelyn, one of the scholarly and efficient men of
his church, and since he has been located here the
affairs of the parish have been admirably admin-
istered. He was born at Poelcapelle, West Flanders.
Belgium, and there educated for the priesthood, but
was not ordained there, as he lacked twenty-two
months of the canonical age for the sacerdotal
honors when on June 28, 1885, Bishop Juenger or-
dained the members of his class in the chapel of the
American College at Louvain. He left Antwerp
August 22, 1885, as a deacon, at the same time as
the Rt. Rev. Bishop Aegidius Juenger and the Rev.
Fathers Verbeke and Hillebrand. Arriving at
Helena, Montana, he became an assistant of the late
Rt. Rev. J. B. Brondel until he was ordained to
the priesthood on November 29, and placed in charse
of a circuit including the following churches: Mis-
souri Valley, Boulder Valley, Three Forks, Jefferson
Valley, Miles City and Bozeman, and later added
to this number a church at Marysville and one at
Glendive. At Marysville he had a building con-
structed under his personal supervision, while at
Glendive one was acquired by the purchase of tin-
meeting house of the Congregationalists. This cir-
cuit extended from Helena to the Dakota line, alony
the Northern Pacific Railroad, a distance of 500
miles, and sometimes, owing to the poor transporta-
tion facilities, he was forced to travel with the crew
of a gang working on railroad construction, on a
hand car, in order to visit his parishes. He was tlie
first priest ordained in Montana for the diocese of
Helena.
In the fall of 1887 Father Pauwelyn was reliever!
of some of his arduous duties by Fathers FoUct and
V. Van den Broeck, and he moved his headquarters
from Helena to Miles City, whose first resident priest
he became, although he also had under his charge
Dawson, Custer and Yellowstone counties, which in-
cluded what are now known as Carbon and Sweet
Grass counties, ,16,365 square miles in all. There was
a church at Miles City, dedicated to the Sacred
Heart, and one at Glendive, Dawson County, dedi-
cated to St. Juliana. In the rear of the Miles City
Chapel were two rooms, which Father Pauwelyn
called his home when not "on the road." At that
time Miles City had a boarding school kept by three
Ursuline Nuns, who had under their charge ten
boarders and twenty-five day pupils.
Between 1887 and 1891 Father Pauwelyn improved
the churches at Miles City and Glendive and Billings,
secured the site and raised funds for the first church
at Red Lodge, for which place he was the first visit-
ing priest, saying the first Mass there in a log cabin
July 30, 1889, and from that day on holding services
every fifth Sunday. Before the church at Red Lodge
was built Father Pauwelyn took a six month trip
to Europe, and upon his return was transferred to
the Butte and Dillon missions, first making his head-
quarters with Father Van de Ven at St. Patrick's
Butte. While Father Pauwelyn was attached to St.
Patrick's Church in Butte, in the course of his minis-
trations he became acquainted with James Tuohy. a
HISTORY OF MONTANA
successful prospector and miner, discoverer of some
of the famous copper mines on Anaconda Hill.
Father Pauwelyn attended Mr. Tuohy in his last
illness in 1893, and at his request drew up his will,
in which there were three bequests to the Catholic
Church in mining properties. One, the Black Hawk,
he bequeathed to St. Joseph's Orphanage of Helena,
a second, the Pilot, to the benefit of sick and dis-
abled priests of the Ecclesiastical Province of Ore-
gon, and the third, the Burke and Balaklava, went
to Bishop Brondel, of Helena, and was sold in
1907 by Bishop Carroll for $400,000. The greatest
part of this amount was used in 1909 in the build-
ing of Mount St. Charles College in Helena.
In 1893 Father Pauwelyn transferred his residence
to Dillon, w4iere a church had been erected by his
predecessor, Father Dols, but was not completed and
the parish was heavily in debt. Father Pauwelyn
not only completed the church, but cleared off the '
debt and improved the original building. He se-
cured ground for cluirch purposes at Sheridan, a
station attended from Dillon, but before he could
commence building he was re-appointed to the Miles
City Missions, October 19, 1898, remaining there
for three years, when he again became the successor
of Father Dols, this time at Great Falls, where there
were 2,500 in the parish, and he proved himself
equally efficient as an able and successful city pastor,
just as he had when visiting widely separated
missions.
On May 18, 1904, the diocese of Helena was
divided and Great Falls was made the seat of the
new episcopal jurisdiction, and it fell to his lot to
prepare and direct the installation ceremonies of
the appointed bishop, and he acquitted himself in so
masterly a manner as to reflect dignity upon the
church and credit to his ability. He was then trans-
ferred to Glendive once inore, and attended to the
spiritual welfare of the parishes in Dawson County.
In 1908 Father Pauwelyn returned to West Flanders
because of the illness of his mother, and in 1909
he was stationed at Billings. At that time the beau-
tiful church edifice was burdened with a heavy debt
of $25,000, the priest's house was unfinished, and a
parochial school was only something that lived in
the hearts of the more hopeful.
Father Pauwelyn felt he had a work worthy of
the best efforts of any priest, and began it with
characteristic promptitude, his first work at Billings
being the renovation at his own expense of the rec-
tory. At a cost of over $4,000 he made it habitable
for himself and his assistant priest. As was usual
with him, he indulged his native love of flowers and
shrubbery, and not only laid out a beautiful lawn at
the rectory, but the church as well, and encouraged
the people of his parish to improve their own lawns
in like manner.
In the fall of 1910 Mother M. Olive, General
Superior of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth,
visited St. Vincent's Hospital at Billings, and after
making due investigations she promised to send two
sisters in the fall of the next year to take charge
of the school. In order to have suitable building
ready Father Pauwelyn had the old church re-
modeled and divided into three class rooms. On
August 28, 191 1, St. Patrick's Parochial School was
formally opened with Sisters M. Louise and Barbara
as teachers, with forty-eight pupils as the first day's
enrollment. Within a year this school had increased
until there were eighty pupils. In 1912 another
teacher was added and the sixth and seventh grades
taught in the third classroom. In 1916 a fourth
room was provided by making use of the north side
sacristy, so that the school now has the full eight
grades and 175 pupils are in attendance, but much
more appropriate liousing has been provided by Mrs.
Kate Fratt. When Father Pauwelyn was first made
resident priest of the church at Miles City he united
in marriage Miss Katherine Sheehan of Lamberts-
ville, Illinois, and David Fratt, a wealthy stockman
of Yellowstone County, Montana. When Mr. Fratt
died March 19, 1912, he left his widow his sole heir,
and she, looking for some appropriate memorial to
his memory, consulted with her old friend and
spiritual advisor, Father Pauwelyn, and by his advice
purchased the lots and presented them to St. Patrick's
Church on Christmas Day, 1916. After her death,
which occurred the following New Year's day, it
was found that Mrs. Fratt had set aside $100,000 to
be used in the erection and maintenance of a paro-
chial school, of which $50,000 was to be used for the
erection of the building and $50,000 for the support
of the school. This building was erected, and is
one of the most modern and beautifully equipped of
its kind in the state. Over the entrance is a tablet
bearing the inscription, "Kate Fratt Memorial
Parochial School."
Father Pauwelyn has lent his support to the erec-
tion of a hospital for St. Vincent's at a cost of
$450,000. assisting in selecting the new site. This
hospital profits from the generosity of Mrs. Fratt,
who left to it a bequest of $25,000.
The Knights of Columbus, established at Billings
in 1907, is growing in strength and numbers, the
membership being now considerably over 200. It
was proposed by this order at the state convention
held in Anaconda May 20, 1918, to erect a monument
on Jefferson Island, near Whitehall, in commemora-
tion of the first Mass offered there in 1841 by Fatlier
De Smet, S. J. This was the first Mass said in the
State of Montana.
Each year has seen a healthy and remarkable
growth in the parish, both spiritually and materially.
The indebtedness of $25,000 assisted by the bequest
of $5,000 from Mrs. Fratt, has been cut down to
$8,000. The confirmation class sometimes numbers
as many as 100 members and St. Patrick's has from
twenty to thirty converts annually.
The present church edifice was completed in the
spring of 1906 at a cost of $64,300, and the decora-
tions are particularly artistic. The Catholic ceme-
tery, known as "Calvary," is two miles west of
Billings on high ground, with proper drainage. The
first to be buried in it was Patrick Kelly, born in
Ireland, who died at Billings when sixty-five years
of age, November 15, 1906.
St. Patrick's Church has several out missions, in
1907 the Laurel parish being created, with Rev.
Father Charles Truemper as first resident priest,
and all of the territory west of Billings west of
Canyon Creek was at'tached to the new center. The
Crow Reservation south of the Yellowstone was
opened to settlement, and the Huntley U. S. Reclama-
tion project was created by the Federal Government,
so that new territory covering about 37,000 acres of
irrigated land brought in settlers and many small
towns came into existence, such as Huntley, Ballan-
tine, Worden and Custer. These missions are now-
attended monthly from Billings, and will be until
they in turn so develop as to warrant the estab-
lishment of a new center of activity.
Chandler C. Cohagen is a prominent young
architect of Billings, a son of a well known con-
tractor of the same city and has had abundant op-
portunity from early youth to acquire a thorough
knowledge and experience in all the technique of
building construction, working for his father be-
fore he entered the school of architecture in the
University of Michigan.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr. Cohagen was born at Pierson, Iowa, April
24, 1889. He comes of a family of mechanics. His
great-grandfather was a native of Ireland and an
early settler in Ohio. The grandfather spent his
life in Ohio, dying at Columbus many years ago, and
was a carpenter and builder by trade.
John R. Cohagen, father of Chandler, was born
at Columbus, Ohio, in 1857, grew up there, was
married in Missouri, and during his residence at
Pierson, Iowa, was a farmer. In 1907 he moved
to Billings, and has since been a successful con-
tractor and builder. He is a member of the Billings
City Council, is a republican, an active worker in
the Christian Church and affiliated with Billings
Star Lodge of Odd Fellows and the Encampment
of the same order. John R. Cohagen married Mary
Turner, who was born at St. Louis, Missouri, in
1859. They have two children. Chandler C. and
Ora, the latter an unmarried daughter at home.
Chandler C. Cohagen attended public school at
Pierson, Iowa, graduated from the high school at
LeMars in that state in 1906, and from that year
until 1912 was employed in all the practical de-
tails of construction and architectural work, com-
ing in the meantime to Billings with his parents
in 1907. In 1912 he went east and entered the col-
lege of architecture in the University of Michi-
gan, graduating in 1915 with the degree Bachelor
of Architecture. While in university Mr. Cohagen
became affiliated with the Kappa Psi social fra-
ternity, the Alpha Rho Chi professional fraternity,
and the Tau Sigma Delta honorary fraternity.
On returning to Montana in 191 5 he organized
the firm of Mclver, Cohagen & Marshall, archi-
tects. Their offices were established at Great Falls,
but in 1916 they also established an office at Billings,
and the offices at Great Falls were sold in Sep-
tember, 1917, when Mclver & Marshall went to the
war. Mr. Cohagen now practices with headquar-
ters in the Electric Building. His firm has de-
signed the Natural Science Building of the State
University at Missoula, the Deaconess Hospital at
Billings, and many schools and private residences.
Mr. Cohagen is a member of the Christian Church
and superintendent of its Sunday School, is treas-
urer of the church and is affiliated with Billings
Lodge No. 113, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
the Scottish Rite Consistory, the Masonic Club,
Star Lodge of Odd Fellows, and is a member of
the Rotary Club and the Billings Midland Club.
His own modern home is at 131 Lewis Avenue.
September 18, 1917, at Billings, he married Miss
Flora Brown, a daughter of John and Addie (Riggs)
Brown. Her father was a farmer in Missouri and
is now deceased. Her mother is living at Billings.
Everett E. Lofgren. By his commendable work
both before and since his admission to the bar
Everett E. Lofgren has gained a reputation and
won the confidence of both the members of his
profession and the public and is enjoying a good
practice at Billings.
He was born in Brown County, South Dakota,
April 6, 1891. His father, Frank G. Lofgren, is
still living in Brown County. He was born in
Sweden in 1847, was reared and educated in his
native country to the age of twenty-one, and in
1868 went to Germany. While in that country he
was employed in the construction of the Kiel Canal.
In 1882 he came to the United States and settled
out on the Dakota frontier, in what is now Brown
County, and steadily for over thirty-five years has
prosecuted his industry as a farmer. He is a re-
publican and a member of the Lutheran Church.
Frank G. Lofgren married Anna Carlson. She was
born in 1857, in Chisago County, Minnesota, and
died in Brown County, South Dakota, in 1906. They
were the parents of a large family of nine children :
Ella Victoria, wife of George Ale.x, a farmer of
Claremont, South Dakota; Matilda, wife of George
Swenson, a gas engine expert living in Fargo,
North Dakota ; Charles Walter, who is in the
United States Navy; John F., a farmer at Broad-
view, Montana ; Oriel, unmarried and living at
Claremont, South Dakota ; Everett E. ; Clinton G.,
who was with the United States Army of Occupa-
tion in Germany ; Francis, a farmer at Watauga,
South Dakota; and Arthur D., a musician living at
Fargo.
Everett E. Lofgren attended the rural schools in
his native county, graduated from high school at
Langford in 1908, and then spent two years in the
state college at Brookings, South Dakota. He had
an experience as a school teacher in Brown County
' for three years and in 1912 came to Billings. While
studying law he paid his way as a stenographer,
spent one year in the offices of Judge F. B. Reyn-
olds, another with C. F. Gillette at Hardin, and
two years in the county attorney's office. Mr. Lof-
gren was admitted to the bar in 1916 and has al-
ready acquired a good civil and criminal practice.
His offices are in the Yellowstone National Bank
Building.
Mr. Lofgren is a democrat and served as deputy
county attorney during 1917-18. He is a member
of the Presbyterian Church, is secretary of Billings
Aerie No. 176, Fraternal Order of Eagles, and a
member of Billings Camp, Woodmen of -the World.
On April 12, 1916, Mr. Lofgren married at Helena,
Montana, Miss Agnes Butler. Her mother is Mrs.
Jane Butler, who resides at Toston, Montana. Mrs.
Lofgren is a graduate of the Billings Business Col-
lege.
Robert J. Hanley, M. D. A well trained, earnest
and sincere physician and surgeon whose work has
already attracted attention. Doctor Hanley has been
a resident of Billings since 1916.
He was born at O'Neill, Nebraska, September
15, 1800, and in the paternal line is a direct descend-
ant of the O'Sullivan Bere, a prominent character
in Irish history. His father, Timothy Hanle.v, was
born in Ireland in 1842, and was about eleven years
of age when his parents came to the United States
and settled at Hancock in the Northern Peninsula
of Michigan. He was reared there and became a
miner, but in 1S75 moved to Nebraska and took
up a ranch at O'Neill. He spent the rest of his
days in Nebraska and died in 1907. He was a
democrat and a Catholic. At Hancock, Michigan,
he married Mary (DriscoII) McCarthy. She was
born in Ireland in 1842 and is still living at O'Neill,
Nebraska. Her first husband was James McCarthy,
a native of Ireland. He was a miner and died at
Hancock, Michigan. By this marriage there were
two sons, both physicians, P. H. and James L. Mc-
Carthy. Both are graduates of the Creighton Medi-
cal College at Omaha. Nebraska, and P. H. Mc-
Carthy is a physician and surgeon at Butte, Mon-
tana, while his brother is practicing his profession
at Goldfield, Nevada. Timothy Hanley and wife
had four children : Jerry P., living on the home
ranch at O'Neill, Nebraska; William, a rancher at
O'Neill ; Genevieve, who is a primary teacher at
Butte, Montana ; and Robert J.
Dr. Robert J. Hanley acquired his education^ in
the public schools at O'Neill, graduating from high
school in 1909, did one year of college work at
Creighton University in Omaha, and then took the
full four years' course in the medical school of that
university, graduating M. D. in 1914. He is a mem-
ber of the Phi Beta Pi college fraternity.
^,C(!^^^^^^-t.-^rS^^>
HISTORY OF MONTANA
217
Doctor Hanley for one year was an interne
in St. Joseph Hospital at Tacoma, Washington,
and with that training and preparation began his
professional work at Billings in 1916. He special-
izes in surgery. His offices are in the Security
Building and his home in the Hedgemere Apart-
ments.
Doctor Hanley is a democrat, a member of the
Catholic Church, Billings Aerie of the Fraternal
Order of Eagles, and Billings Lodge Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks, and the Billings
Midland Club. In 1916 at Billings, he married Miss
Kathryn Smith, a daughter of James and Margaret
Smith, who live at Tipton, Indiana. Her father is
a farm owner. Doctor and Mrs. Hanley have two
cnildfen: Robert, Jr., born June 2, 1917, and Mar-
garet Mary, born May 2, 1918.
Thomas Ash Snidow came to Billings in 1891
and soon afterward invested his modest capital in
a flock of sheep. With the sheep industry through
all its ups and downs he has been continuously
identified for over a quarter of a century. However,
that is only one of many things which give him a
distinctive place in the history of Billings and Mon-
tana. One of the largest land owners and leading
financiers of the city, he has consistently for many
years promoted its wholesome and well rounded de-
velopment and is regarded as one of the men chiefly
responsible for the premier position Billings now
enjoys in Eastern Montana.
While thoroughly identified with Montana, he
has exhibited much loyalty to his native State of
Missouri, his home ranch being known as Missouri
Ranch, and he also built a large business structure
in Billings known as the Missouri Building. He
was born near Madison in ]\Ionroe County, Mis-
souri, January 31, 1863. His paternal grandparents
were William and Chloe (Frely) Snidow, both of
German parentage. William G. Snidow was born
in Virginia in 1795 and in 1837 he took his family
across country with o.x teams to the State of Mis-
souri, settling in Monroe County. He developed a
farm out of the prairie and woods of that locality,
and besides his success as a farmer he became known
as a man of leadership in local affairs, was a demo-
crat and active in the Baptist Church. He died in
Monroe County, Missouri, in 1866.
The oldest of his children was James Martin
Snidow, who was born in Virginia September 21,
1825, and was twelve years of age when he went
to Missouri. He bought a farm of his own in
Monroe County in 1854. and during subsequent
years became noted for his great enterprise, pro-
gressiveness and skill as a farmer, horticulturist,
and stock raiser. He always patronized new inven-
tions in farm machinery, and was a breeder of the
best horses. He was sound in religious doctrine as
a Baptist and was a thorough going democrat, but
never active in public office. He died June 28, 1908.
He married Miss Martha Ash on October 16, 1853.
She was born in Indiana April II, 1832, a daughter
of George and Naomi Ash, natives of Kentucky,
where her father was born in 1800 and her mother in
1803. The Ash family came out of England and
settled in America in colonial times. From Ken-
tucky they moved to Indiana in 1831 and subse-
quently were early settlers of Monroe County, Mis-
souri, where George Ash died in 1863 and his
widow in 1891. Mrs. James Martin Snidow died
August 2, 1895. the mother of ten children. Besides
Thomas Ash another son has become well known
in Montana, James P., vice president and manager
of the State Bank of Huntley.
Thomas A. Snidow grew up on his father's Mis-
souri farm, and the work of the farm was made
to fit in with his duties and privileges at school. He
was about twenty-two years old when in the spring
of 1885 he went out to California and then followed
his initial contact with the life of the Far West.
For fourteen months he worked on a California
ranch, then bought and raised a crop of wheat on
a section of land, and on selling his property began
cutting cordwood for a lumber company. He was
also fireman of a hoisting works, and saw a great
deal of the experience of lumbering, ranching and
other industrial development in different parts of
California. He returned to the old home in Missouri
at the close of 1888 and the following year bought
a farm in Randolph County, that state, and put in
a crop. He also did some buying and selling of
livestock.
In April, 1891, Mr. Snidow again started for the
West, was for a few months engaged in the ice
business in Castle, Montana, and in July, 1891, came
overland to Billings, where in October he invested
his savings in 855 head of sheep. Their sale a
little later so encouraged him that he bought 1,500
head and removed them to Big Horn County in
Wyoming and in the spring of 1893 increased his
flock by 700 more. Old timers in the ranching
industry need not be reminded of the conditions
of the following months. During the extreme cold
of the following winter he lost about 900 sheep and
the financial panic did the rest, taking away prac-
tically all the earnings and savings of a number of
years of hard work and thrift. That was a critical
time in his career, but he stood the test well. In
the spring of 1894 he removed with what remained
of his sheep to Yellowstone County south of Bil-
lings and formed a partnership with P. B. Moss,
who furnished 700 head of sheep and a ranch for
range. They became equal partners in the enter-
prise, all the active operation devolving upon Mr.
Snidow. Then followed years of hard work, the
closest attention to business, and by 1900 he had
re-established his credit and his financial position.
In October of that year a partnership was formed
with the First National Bank of Billings, of which
Mr. Moss was president, resulting in the organiza-
tion of the Snidow Sheep Company, with Mr. Moss
president and Mr. Snidow treasurer. Mr. Snidow
became sole proprietor of this business in 1907. At
that time he was running approximately 77,000 head
of sheep and had 400,000 acres of land under lease
on the Crow Indian Reservation. He sold out his
interest in the business in May, 1911. In October,
1909, he and three other men had bought the stock
of the H. P. Rothwell Livestock Company of Roth-
well, Wyoming, afterward known as the Owl Creek
Land and Livestock Company. In 1908 he had also
bought a two-thirds interest in the Basin Cattle
Company in Big Horn County, a company owning
several thousand head of Hereford cattle and a
number of the highest bred Belgian Percheron and
Shire horses.
Mr. Snidow still owns 6,000 acres of ranch lands
in Montana. His home ranch is about thirty miles
west of Billings on the Northern Pacific Railroad
and also on a fine highway over which Mr. Snidow
makes frequent trips in his automobile. This is
the Missouri Ranch, and while conducted for profit
it is in a larger sense a model institution that ren-
ders service to the entire agricultural and stock
husbandry interests of the state. It is the home of
the finest specimens of sheep, Duroc hogs, horses
and poultry. A large amount of the land is under
irrigation, and with the aid of irrigation Mr. Snidow
has for years produced bumper crops of oats, wheat,
alfalfa and sugar beets.
218
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr, Siiidow also has a great variety of financial
and business interests. Reference has already been
made to the large fireproof theater, hotel, office and
store building at Billings erected by him and named
the Missouri Building. He helped organize the
Huntley State Bank in 1905, and is its president.
He is also president of the Boyd State Bank, which
he organized and opened for business March 5,
1919, with a capital of $20,000. He is president
of the American Land and Live Stock Company of
Billings and president of the Billings Gas Company
and has been identified with a number of other
financial and industrial corporations. In recent years
his capital and enterprise have gone far afield. Asso-
ciated with William Woods of Billings, he is an
operator in the oil fields of the parish of Caddo
near Shreveport, Louisiana, where he and Mr.
Woods own 120 acres now being developed. He
has developed another lease in the same vicinity,
where one well has been brought in of 500 barrels
capacity. He has another lease of 480 acres. He
is also interested in a prominent petroleum field in
Lee County, Kentucky.
In 1918 Mr. Snidow completed a home of almost
unsurpassed beauty and comfort among the resi-
dences of Billings. It is located at 820 Division
Street, and stands in the midst of a large tract of
well kept grounds 150 feet square. While inde-
pendent in politics and not seeking office for the
sake of office, Mr. Snidow has long been recognized
as one of Billings' most useful citizens. He served
four years as an alderman, but his chief municipal
enthusiasm has been in behalf of a public park sys-
tem. He has been a member of the Park Board of
Billings since organization. In fact the first tract
of ground formally laid out as a public parkway
is situated on Division Street in front of his resi-
dence, and was improved and beautified by his own
manual labors in spare time evenings and mornings.
Five other well laid out small parks in the city
district are due to his foresight and planning. At
the present time, however, he is planning his big
work in that form of municipal advancement, re-
volving about a tract of fifty-four acres situated
north and west of town adjoining the Polytechnic
Institute grounds. Mr. Snidow is president of the
Hiland Homes Company, which has under develop-
ment a large tract of 214 acres adjoining the city
on the north and west, "all platted and ready for
incorporation within the city limits.
As these brief facts indicate Mr. Snidow has
always worked for a Greater Billings, and coming
generations will have much to owe him for his
foresight and public spirit. He is a member of
the Billings Midland Empire Club and the Billings
Club. November 26, 1899, he married Miss Sallie
L. Rodes. She was born in Monroe Count}', Mis-
souri, a daughter of John C. and Virginia Rodes.
Her father was a well known farmer and leader
in public aflfairs in Shelby County, Missouri. Mr.
and Mrs. Snidow had two children : Martha, who
died in infancy, and Virginia, born October 17,
1903, now a junior in the Billings High School.
Preston B. Moss, a Montana resident of over
a quarter of a century, was for many years execu-
tive head and owner of the First National Bank
of Billings. His later fame is destined to rest
upon a specially conspicuous and substantial achieve-
ment as a city builder. His capital, resources and
individual enterprise have been deeply engaged in
the projected and now building city of Mossmain,
one of the most ambitious projects of city planning
in the entire Northwest.
Mr. Moss was born at Paris, Missouri, September
28, 1863. His father, David H. Moss, who died
at Paris in 190(5. was for many j'ears a lawyer and
banker. He was born at Columbia, Missouri, in
1828, and was descended from a family that came
from England to Virginia and thence moved west
to Kentucky and later to Missouri. As the date of
the birth of David H. Moss indicates, the family
were identified with Central Missouri from earliest
pioneer settlement. David H. Moss was a California
forty-niner, going West during the gold rush and
spending two years on the Pacific Coast. He was
a democrat, a very active member of the Christian
Church and belonged to the Masonic fraternity. His
wife was Melville Hollingsworth, who was born at'
Paris, Missouri, in 1838 and died there in 1915.
Preston B. Moss acquired a public school educa-
tion in his native town, attended the Kemper Mili-
tary Academy at Boonville, Missouri, and on leaving
school at the age of twenty had an active experience
of six years in the lumber business at Paris. M^r.
Moss came to Billings in 1892. For eighteen years
he was owner and president of the First National
Bank and gave that institution its enviable reputa-
tion and standing among the banks of the state.
Since leaving the bank he has given the bulk of
his time and energies and private resources to the
building of the City of Mossmain, located in Yellow-
stone County. The site of Mossmain is at the
junction of the Great Northern, Burlington and
Northern Pacific Railways, and is contiguous to the
greatest freight distributing yard in the Northwest.
The plans for that city represent a happy combina-
tion of modern idealism with sound commercial
judgment. Building cities by plan, and it might be
said by wholesale, is something comparatively new
in America, but several individual instances might
be cited of such construction on a scale of splendid
success and results. The plans for Mossmam were
drawn by one of the most brilliant architects and
city planners in the world, Walter Burley Griffin,
formerly of Chicago, famous as the architect who
won by international competition the first prize for
the plans for the Federal Capital of Australia. The
plans drawn by Mr. Griffin for Mossmain embrace
every item of experience gained in recent years,
and embody modern ideas but provide for every
degree of comfort in individual homes as well as
economic facilities and convenience in a town that
will serve a great railroad center.
Mr. Moss has his offices in the Masonic Temple
at Billings. He is interested in the Northern Hotel
at that city and is owner of the Billings Utility
Company. Politically he is strictly independent. Mr,
Moss is one of the prominent Masons of Montana,
having affiliations with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, .An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Chapter
No. 6, Royal .Arch Masons : Aldemar Commandery
of the Knights Templar, of which he is past emi-
nent commander, and is a past grand commander of
the State Knights Templar. He is also affiliated
with Billings Consistory and Algeria Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Helena, of which he is a past
potentate.
In 1889, at Paris. Missouri, Mr. Moss married
Miss Mattie Woodson, daughter of G. W. and
lantha (Jackson) Woodson. Her mother is living
at Billings. Her father, deceased, was for a num-
ber of years a merchant in Oregon. Mr. and Mrs.
Moss are the parents of five children: Woodson,
who is a graduate of the Phillips-Exeter Academy
of New Hampshire, is in the cattle business with
home at Billings. Miss Kula, at home, is a graduate
of the Dwight College at Englewood, New Jersey,
a school in which her younger sister. Miss Mel-
ville, also finished her education. Preston B., Jr..
~:^DuuA^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
m)
a graduate of the Billings High School, is now
serving in the National Army, and David H. is a
high school boy.
Judge F. B. Reynolds, who came to Billings- in
April, 1909, was a lawyer and public official of dis-
tinction in his home state of Michigan, and in Mon-
tana has achieved a particularly high reputation as
a lawyer. He has specialized in "corporation and
livestock cases, and such has been the quality of
his work that he represents important interests in
Idaho, Wyoming and Colorado, and also represents
livestock interests in Chicago.
Ten years of absence have not caused the citi-
zens of his old home community in Branch County,
Michigan, to forget the quality of his citizenship
and services. Judge Reynolds was born at Quincy
in Branch County, Michigan, January 20, 1874. He
is a son of Judge Norman A. and Emorette A.
(Harding) Reynolds. His mother is descended
in direct line from a brother of General Israel
Putnam of Revolutionary fame. Judge Reynolds'
career and that of his honored father have been
almost parallel in politics, religion, war and profes-
sional interests.
Judge Reynolds represents one of the oldest
American families. His first ancestor in America
was John Reynolds, who was born in England in
1612 and with his wife, Sarah, settled at Water-
town, Massachusetts, in 1633. He finally located at
Greenwich, Connecticut, where he died in 1660. The
sixth child of John Reynolds was Joshua Reynolds,
and he served as a member of the Connecticut Leg-
islature. Judge Reynolds' Revolutionary ancestor
was Joseph Reynolds, who at the time of the war
for independence was living in Dutchess County,
New York. During that war ho was on a scout-
ing expedition and was taken prisoner and con-
fined in the hold of a British prison ship in New
York Harbor. This Revolutionary soldier was a
son of Caleb Reynolds and a grandson of Joshua
Reynolds.
Judge Norman A. Reynolds, who lives surrounded
by a wealth of affection and esteem at Coldwater,
the county seat of Branch County, Michigan, was
born in Cayuga County, New York. May 28, 1843,
and was reared a farmer's son, educated in dis-
trict schools and academies. September 7, 1861, he
enlisted in Company A of the Tenth New York
Cavalry, and at the end of three years' re-enlisted
and veteranized, and continued vv^ith the Army of
the Potomac until honorable discharged .August 8,
1865. He was promoted from the ranks through
various grades to that of first lieutenant, and was
acting captain of his company in the Battle of
Gettysburg. He was wounded three times, receiv-
ing his last wound at the fighting at Appomattox
just before Lee's surrender. He was once cap-
tured, but escaped before reaching prison. After
the war he returned home, visited several states in
the West, and on March i, 1866, became a resident
of Branch County, Michigan. He was a farmer
near Quincy until 1876, and then sold the farm
and after a diligent period of study was admitted
to the bar in 1878. In the same year he was made
Circuit Court commissioner and in 1880 was elected
probate judge, serving three terms or twelve years.
He retired from practice in 1903 and in that year
was appointed by the governor a member of the
board of control of the state public school and was
re-appointed in 1905. He was also for one term
mayor of Coldwater. He is a republican, active in
the Methodist Church, a member of the Masonic
fraternity and has long been one of the most in-
fluential citizens of Coldwater. He married for his
first wife Emma Dofferty. She died at Quincy,
Michigan, and both her children are deceased. In
1872 he married Emorette A. Harding, who was
born in Allen Township of Hillsdale County, Michi-
gan, in 1843.
Frank B. Reynolds was about three years old
when his parents moved to Coldwater, and he at-
tended the public schools of that city, graduating
from high school in 1891. He spent two years as
a special student in the literary department of the
University of Michigan, studied law in his father's
office and took his senior law course in the Uni-
versity of Michigan, graduating LL. B. in 1895.
The same year he began practice at Coldwater in
partnership with his father, and that relationship
continued until December 31, 1900. Judge Reyn-
olds, as noted above while living in Michigan had
a career closely paralleling that of his father. He
was for three years city attorney of Coldwater and
two terms Circuit Court commissioner. In May,
1898, he enlisted in the Thirty-second Michigan
Infantry, for service in the Spanish-American war,
and was color sergeant of his regiment. He was
in camp at Tampa, Fernandina, Florida, and Hunts-
ville, Alabama, and was mustered out in September,
1898. In 1900 he was elected probate judge of
Branch County and was re-elected in 1904, serving
two terms in that office, whereas his father was
three terms probate judge. Judge Reynolds on re-
tiring from office in April, 1909, came direct to
Montana.
He is a stockholder in the American Bank &
Trust Company and served several terms as direc-
tor, is a director of the Billings Building and Loan
Association and the Security Building and Loan
Association. With a large and important law prac-
tice he has yet found time for many civic and in-
stitutional duties. He is a trustee of the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church, a member of the board of
trustees of the Billings Midland Club, a director of
the Billings Young Men's Christian Association and
chairman of the state committee of the Young
Men's Christian Association since its organization
in 1912. is one of the directors and secretary of
the Billings Deaconess Hospital Association and is
affiliated with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, and Billings Consistory of
the Scottish Rite.
Going back again to the years of his boyhood, it
should be noted that when thirteen years of age
Judge Reynolds was captain of a company of cadets,
well equipped and uniformed, at Coldwater, Michi-
gan, and had the honor of being presented with a
sword by the famous Civil war leader. General Rose-
crans. This presentation was made at Hillsdale,
Michigan, at a state encampment of the Grand Army
of the Republic.
In 1896, at Coldwater, Michigan, Judge Rejmolds
married Miss Florence M. Hilliar, daughter of
Purches and Adelaide (."Vdams) Hilliar. Her par-
ents are now deceased. Her father at one time
was a farmer at Coldwater, Michigan. Judge and
Mrs. Reynolds have two children : Adeltha A., a
graduate of the Billings High School, now the wife
of Vern D. Clark, who was assistant teller of the
Montana National Bank at Billings and is now sec-
retary of the Security Building & Loan Association
of Billings, and Frances, who is specializing in musi-
tal studies.
Olaf Garden, whose work from early manhood
has been connected with the promotion of sales of
farming implements, particularly threshing machin-
ery, came to Billings as representative of the Min-
neapolis Threshing Machine Company, and is man-
ager of the Billings branch, handling all the ma-
220
HISTORY OF MONTANA
chinery output of that company over a large area
in the Northwest.
Mr. Garden was born in St. Peter, Minnesota,
August 7, 1877. His father is Ole L. Garden, who
was born at Totem, Norway, in 1841, son of Lars
Garden, who was born in the same locality in 1811.
Lars was a school teacher in Norway, and late in
life, after retiring from this profession, came to the
United States and died at St. Peter, Minnesota, in
1871. Ole L. Garden grew up in his native coun-
try, served his regular term in the Norwegian army,
and coming to the United States in 1869 settled
in St. Peter, Minnesota. He married there, and in
1878 moved to Norman County in the same state,
homesteading a claim, and gradually developing his
possessions and interests in that locality until he
now owns 1,280 acres, comprising two complete
sections of land. Aside from his local affairs he
has served as township treasurer, and is a member
of the Lutheran Church. He married Mary Dahl,
who was born in 1847, also at Totem, Norway. She
died at Gary, Minnesota, in 18S6. She was the
mother of seven children : Lewis, editor of the
Gary Graphic ; Christine, unmarried and living with
her father; Regina, living at Crookston, Minne-
sota, widow of H. B. Lanager, a traveling business
man who was killed in a railroad wreck in 1908;
Olaf , who is the fourth among the seven ; John O.,
a real estate broker at Wolf Point, Montana ; Os-
wald, living on the home farm at Gary, Minnesota;
and Martin, a merchant at Gary.
Olaf Garden grew up on his father's farm in
Minnesota until he was twenty years of age. He
attended the rural schools of Bear Park Township
m Norman County, and on leaving home entered
the threshing machine business. He spent one year
as salesman at Crookston, Minnesota, for the J. L
Case Threshing Machine Company. For seven
years he was salesman for the Avery Company at
Fargo, North Dakota, following which for two years
he was a local machine dealer at Hettinger, North
Dakota. Thus after ten years of successful expe-
rience he joined the Minneapolis Threshing Com-
pany as a salesman and was located at Winnipeg,
Canada, Grand Forks, North Dakota, and on De-
cember 1, 1916, came to Montana in charge of the
Billings branch of the company. The plant and
offices are located at 413-19 North Twenty-fifth
Street. This branch, of a business which covers the
entire Northwest, was established at Billings in
1909, the building being erected in 1910. It is the
combined plant and warehouse and covers 140 by
200 feet. The business, comprising the handling
of threshing machinery, gas and steam engines in
the territory worked from Billings, includes Mon-
tana and Wyoming. The head offices of the com-
pany are at Minneapolis.
Mr. Garden during his business experience has
found opportunity to make some permanent invest-
ments and owns a ranch of 320 acres in Kidder
County in North Dakota, and another of 160 acres
in Polk County, Minnesota. He also has a mod-
ern home at looi North Thirty-first Street in Bill-
ings.
Mr. Garden is a republican and is affiliated with
Billings Lodge No. 113, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, Mitchell, South Dakota, Royal Arch Ma-
sons, Constantine Commandery of the Knights Tem-
plar at Crookston, and Kem Temple of the Mystic
Shrine at Grand Forks.
December 29, 1912, at Decorah, Iowa, he married
Miss Theoline Sophia Severson, a daughter of Kit-
tle and Anna (Luraas) Severson. Her mother died
in 1918 and her father is a farmer near Decorah.
Mr. and Mrs. Garden have two daughters. Mar-
guerite Ada, born December i, 1914, and Adeline
Lillian, born January 2, 1917.
Ray Anderson is a veteran telegrapher, worked
all over the Northwest for railroads and for the
Western Union, but his time is now crowded with
the official duties of justice of the peace, police
judge and United States commissioner at Billings.
Mr. Anderson, one of the younger officials among
the citizens of Billings, was born at Broken Bow
in Custer County, Nebraska, February 6, 1886. His
father, Rasmus Anderson, "was born in Denmark
in 1864, came to the United States at the age of
eighteen, landing in Boston, spent two years work-
ing at different things in Chicago, and then moved
to Custer County, Nebraska. He owned and op-
erated a farm for many years, but in 1894 engaged
in the real estate and insurance business at Broken
Bow. He is still living there and is now practi-
cally retired. He has been active in public affairs,
and served one term as commissioner in Custer
County. He is a republican, a Knight Templar and
a Shriner. Rasmus Anderson married Louisa
Barnes, who was born in Illinois in 1865, her peo-
ple being among the pioneers of that country. Ras-
mus Anderson and wife had six children: Ray;
N. M., a traveling salesman living at San Francisco :
O. K., a traveling representative for Swift & Com-
pany, living at Broken Bow; Lee I., who is a mem-
ber of Evacuation Company No. 30, of the Amer-
ican Expeditionary Forces with the Army of
Occupation in Germany; Eunice, unmarried, and a
teacher at Anslemo, Nebraska, and Florence, who is
married and lives at Lincoln, Nebraska, her hus-
band being with the American Expeditionary Forces
in France.
Ray Anderson attended the public schools at
Broken Bow, also had a business college course
there, and at the age of fourteen began learning
telegraphy with a local office of the Chicago, Bur-
lington & Quincy Railway. As a railroad teleg-
rapher he was employed at many points in Nebraska,
Wyoming and South Dakota until 1904, when he
went to Livingston, Montana, in the despatcher's
office of the Northern Pacific Railway. In the same
year he was transferred to Butte, remaining in the
yard office for a short time and was then moved to
Billings, handling a key in the telegraph office of
the Northern Pacific until 1909. In that year he
became chief operator for the Western Union Tele-
graph Company at Billings, but left telegraphy in
1912 to become deputy county treasurer and deputy
county assessor. He held both those offices for two
years. In the fall of 1914 he was elected justice of
the peace, beginning his official term January i,
1915. He was re-elected in igi6 and 1918. His
present term expires in January, 1921. In April,
1917, he was made police judge for the City of
Billings, and since May, 1916, has been United
States commissioner for the District of Montana.
This last office was for a term of four years, and he
is therefore a representative of the city, county and
federal governments. He has his own offices at
loi^ North Twenty-seventh Street and has an office
in the city hall. He is an extensive property own-
er, having six dwelling houses and other real estate
in Billings.
Mr. Anderon is affiliated with Billings Star Lodge
No. 41, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, is presi-
dent of Billings Aerie No. 176 of the Fraternal
Order of Eagles, and is a member of the Billings
Midland Empire Club. He is unmarried and re-
sides at 210 South Twenty-ninth Street.
William P. Rixon. The Rixon family came to
Billings more than twenty-five years ago, and Wil-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Ham P. Rixon then was old enough to appreciate
the pioneer character of the town, and since early
manhood has been active in its growth and busi-
ness activities. His is one of the leading names
in real estate circles of Billings.
Mr. Rixon was born in Milton in Western On-
tario, Canada, July 4, 1876. His ancestors came
from England and were early settlers in Canada.
His father, John Rixon, was born in Ontario,
March 23. 1831, grew up and married in his native
country, and was a man of rather adaptable genius,
being a carpenter, a printer and a farmer. He had
a good farm and a printing office in Canada. In
1882 he came to Miles City, Montana, and thence
traveled overland by wagon to Billings. He worked
in some of the early printing offices in Billings,
followed his trade as a carpenter, and erected some
of the main buildings in the early days of the city.
He died at Billings, an honored and respected citi-
zen, in September, 1905. He was one of the earliest
members and, most active supporters of the Epis-
copal Church in Billings, while in politics he was a
republican. John Rixon married Susanna Panton,
who was born in Ontario in 1845 and is still liv-
ing at Billings. She is the mother of a large family
of eight children: Anna, wife of P. L. Reece, a
railroad contractor living at Nicholson, Pennsyl-
vania ; Mar.v, who died at the age of sixteen ; Helen,
wife of Leslie Bates, president of the Standard
Forms Board Insurance of Alameda, California;
Eleanor, wife of J. B. Fritschi, who is also in the
insurance business in Alameda ; Fred P., a druggist
at Billings; William P.; Winifred, wife of Charles
J. Chappie, a Billings druggist ; and Harold A., as-
sistant cashier of the Security Trust & Savings Bank
of Billings.
William P. Rixon was six years old when his
parents came to Montana. He attended the public
schools at Billings, but at the age of fifteen left his
books and studies to begin his independent career.
For six years he was employed in Mr. Chappie's
drug store, and then for four years traveled for
Swift & Company. On leaving the road in 1905
Mr. Dixon took up the real estate and in;;urance
business and has since built up a large clientele in
both lines. His offices are at 10 North Twenty-
seventh Street and his modern home is at 311 North
Thirty-fourth Street.
Mr. Rixon is a member of the Episcopal Church,
is a republican and is affiliated with Ashlar Lodge
No. 29, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. In
June. 1907, at Billings, he married Miss Lora God-
dard. daughter of O. F., and Alwilda (Stevenson)
Goddard. Her parents live at Billings, where her
father is a prominent attorney. Air. and Mrs. Rixon
have one daughter, Rebecca Helen, born Septem-
ber 28, 191 1.
J. N. Whittinchill, district manager of the Mon-
tana State Telephone and Telegraph Company at
Billings, entered the telephone industry early in life,
and his father, a resident of Pocatello, Idaho, was a
veteran telephone man. having been connected with
some of the early systems in the West.
The Whittinghills are an English family, came
to America in colonial times and were pioneers of
Kentucky. They were also identified with the early
settlement of Indiana, where Mr. Whittinghill's
paternal grandfather. P. N. Whittinghill. was born
in 1831. He spent most of his life at Dale, Indiana,
and died at Booneville in that state in 1916. He
was a veteran of two wars — the war with Mexico
and the Civil war.
L. P. Whittinghill, father of the Billings telephone
man, was born at Dale, Indiana, in 1854, grew up
there, and shortly after his marriage at Rockport
moved to Selvin, where he was a merchant and
postmaster. In 1890-93 he was in the railroad busi-
ness at Huntingburgh, Indiana, and from 1893 to
1905 was a merchant at Las Animas, Colorado. He
entered the telephone business at La Junta, Col-
orado, and since 1912 has been plant chief of the
telephone system at Pocatello, Idaho. He is a repub-
lican voter. He married Frances Armstrong, who
was born at Rockport, Indiana, in 1864.
J. N. Whittinghill, only child of his parents, was
born at Selvin, Indiana, November 4, 1884. He
acquired his early education in the public schools of
Huntingburgh, in his native state, and at Las Ani-
mas, Colorado, and was graduated from the La
Junta High School in 1903. During the next five
years he was employed in the general offic.^s of the
Santa Fe Railway at La Junta. In 1908 he entered
the telephone business at L^ Junta, beginning as a
helper and acquiring a thorough knowledge of the
business both in the technical and business depart-
ments. He was made district cashier at La Junta,
was manager at Lamar, Colorado, for eighteen
months and in October, igii, came to Helena, Mon-
tana, as division cashier. January i, 1918, occurred
his promotion to the post of district manager of the
Billings district, comprising Northern Wyoming and
all of Montana east of Logan. The Billings offices,
at 15 North Twenty-seventh Street, have the super-
vision of three hundred persons.
Mr. Whittinghill is a member of the Billings Club,
the Billings Midland Empire Club, the Rotary Club,
and Billings Country Club and is affiliated with the
La Junta Lodge No. 701 of the Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks. He is a republican. He
married Miss Edna McDonald at La Junta, Colo-
rado, in October, 191 1. Her parents are Charles and
Elizabeth (Kelley) McDonald, residents of La
Junta. Mr. and Mrs. Whittinghill have four chil-
dren, Noral, born March 5, 1913; Charles, born
May II, 1914; Robert, born February 12, 1916, and
Frances, born December 30, 191 7.
William P. Roscoe. One of the distinctive fea-
tures of Billings is the youth of the city's leading
business men, and it is a very desirable one, for
these progressive citizens enter into their work
with the enthusiasm and high ideals not often re-
tained after experience and age have mastered a
person, and their community consequently prospers
because of these characteristics. One of these men
is William P. Roscoe. vice-president of the Security
Bridge Company and one of the most aggressive
and effective young business men of Billings.
Mr. Roscoe was born at Wadena, Minnesota, Feb-
ruary 12, 1886, a son of Peter Roscoe. The family
is of French extraction, the grandfather, Charles
Rascicot, having founded it in the United States.
This name has been Americanized into Roscoe.
Peter Roscoe was born in i860, and has been for
a number of years the traveling representative of
a wholesale crockery house of Minneapolis, his
trade territory being the State of Minnesota, al-
though he resides at Minneapolis. He is a democrat
and for some years was postmaster at Wadena,
Minnesota. The Roman Catholic Church holds his
membership. Fraternally he belongs to the Macca-
bees. Peter Roscoe was united in marriage with
Catherine O'Grady, born at Kilkenny, Minnesota,
in 1857, and their children are as follows : William
P., whose name heads this review ; Nora, who is the
wife of Charles Carroll, an insurance operator of
Billings; Maurice J., who is in an insurance busi-
ness at Minneapolis ; and Louise, who resides with
her parents.
William P. Roscoe attended the public schools of
Minneapolis until he was sixteen years of age, but
HISTORY OF MONTANA
then went to the western part of what is now South
Dakota and was a cowboy for three years. Return-
ing then to Minneapolis, he took a position with the
Security Bridge Company, and, beginning at the
very bottom in 1905 as a laborer, has worked his
w'ay up, being made foreman of constructioii work
at Minneapolis. In October, 1910, he was sent to
Billings, Montana, as a contractor for the company,
and in 1915 was promoted to the vice presidency,
in which position he has since continued. He is a
practical man. understanding every detail of the
business, and his services are valued accordingly by
his company. A stanch republican, he has been very
prominent in his party. A Catholic by inheritance
and conviction, he is active in his .parish. The
Roscoe family residence is at Xo. 209 Avenue D, and
is one of the conveniently modern ones of Billings.
In 1907 Mr. Roscoe was united in marriage at
\ew Ulm, Minnesota, to Miss Florence Nenno, a
daughter of N. J. and Mar.garet Nenno, now of
Clinton, Iowa. Mr. Nenno is a retired merchant.
Mrs. Roscoe was graduated from the high school
at New Ulm, and is a lady of recognized charm and
delightful personality. Air. and Mrs. Roscoe have
three children, namely: Margaret, who was born
May 14, 1908; Mary Bernice, who was born in 1915 ;
and William P., Jr., born July 21, 1917-
J. L. McDonnell. The career of J. L. McDonnell
during the past ten years has been a steady rise to
increasing responsibilities in the service of some of
the great meat packing firms of the country. One
of the most coveted positions in the packing industry
is the management of branch houses. Mr. McDon-
nell is the present manager of the Billings branch
of Swift & Company.
Mr. McDonnell was born at DeGraff. Minnesota,
May 29, 1887, but has spent most of his life since
early childhood in Montana. His grandfather,
Patrick McDonnell, came from 'Ireland and first
settled among the Thousand Islands of the St.
Lawrence River and Canada and afterward moved
to a farm in a pioneer district of Minnesota, in
which state he spent the rest of his life. J. J.
McDonnell, father of J. L. McDonnell, was born
on one of the Thousand Islands in Canada in 1849,
lived there to manhood, and then moved to Brainerd,
Minnesota. He spent a number of years as a farmer
near Brainerd and DeGrafT and in 1889 became
one of the pioneers of Great Falls, Montana. He
helped build the first smelter at Great Falls, later
was a merchant and is now in the mercantile busi-
ness at Mossmain, Montana. For three terms he
was a member of the Great Falls City Council, and
in many other ways identified with the growth and
prosperity of that city. He is a Catholic in religion.
T. J. McDonnell married Maria Murphv, who was
born at Belle Plaine, Minnesota, in 1859. Their
family of children consists of the following: F. H.
McDonnell, owner of a macaroni factory at Great
Falls; George, a rancher at Great Falls; the third
m age is J. L. McDonnell; J. P. McDonnell is a
salesman at Great Falls; Mary is the wife of H. J.
McGowan, a Great Falls merchant ; Agnes married
L. C. Baker, a salesman living at Billings; and Flor-
ence. Marie and Lawrence, the three younger chil-
dren are still at home with their parents.
J. L. McDonnell was two years old when he came
to Montana. He attended the public schools of
Great Falls, finishing his sophomore year in the
high school, and this was followed by a business
course in the Great Falls Business College. On
leaving school in 1905 he spent one year in the
employ of Strain Brothers, general merchants, for
five years was associated with his father in the
store and then acted as solicitor for the Grand Union
Tea Company one year.
He started at the very bottom of the ladder in
the packing industry, his first appointment being in
1909 as a wagon driver for Armour & Company.
Later he was inade shipping clerk from Great Falls
to Denver, was sent as a salesman to New Mexico,
later returned to Denver as city salesman, and in
1914 joined the packing house of Sulzberger &
Sons as city salesman at Great Falls. Mr. McDon-
nell has been with Swift & Company since 1915, at
first as salesman at Great Falls and after two months
was moved to Billings and given the management
of the branch house in that city. This branch house
is located along the Northern Pacific tracks. Mr.
McDonnell has the supervision of quite a staff of
people in the branch house, fifteen clerks and sales-
men.
He is a member of the Billings Midland Club, is
affiliated with Denver Camp No. i of the Woodmen
of the World, is a third degree Knight of Columbus,
and a member of Billings Council 1259, and his
church affiliation is Catholic.
Mr. McDonnell and wife reside in the Wesch
Apartments at Sixth Avenue, North. He married
at Las Vegas, New Mexico, in 1912, Miss Bess
Wroe, daughter of J. W. and Ella (Farrow) Wroe.
Her parents now live at Denver, her father being
retired from active business pursuits.
N. L. Martin. A well known and highly esteemed
citizen of Yellowstone County, N. L. Martin, pro-
prietor of the Martin Pickling Factory at Billings,
and the owner of a fine ranch at Huntley, is carrying
on his industrial work most systematically, and by
strict attention to the details of his business opera-
tion, and his thoroughly upright dealings, both as
a manufacturer and an agriculturist, is meeting with
gratifying success. Coming from thrifty Swiss an-
cestry, he was born April 10, 1883, at Casselton,
North Dakota, a son of B. F. Martin. His paternal
grandfather, Nathaniel Martin, was born in Switzer-
land and as a young man immigrated to the United
States, becoming a pioneer settler of Ohio. Taking
u[ a tract of Government land, he began the im-
provement of a homestead, and with his neighbors,
who were few and far between, suffered all the hard-
ships and privations of life in a new country, among
other disadvantages having been forced to haul his
corn fifty miles in order to have it ground. Nothing
daunted, however, he subsequently became a pioneer
settler and farmer of Winona County, Minnesota,
where he resided until his death in 1885.
Born on the parental homestead in Ohio in 1850,
B. F. Martin was but a small boy when taken to
Winona County, Minnesota, where he was reared
and educated, attending the pioneer schools and
assisting in the pioneer task of reclaiming a farm
from the wilderness. Succeeding to the occupation
to which he was reared, he became a tiller of the
soil, and soon after his marriage bought land in
Casselton, North Dakota, where he was extensively
engaged in general farming for many seasons.
Going from there to St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1891.
he operated two meat markets there for three years.
Removing then to Clear Lake, Minnesota, he carried
on farming in that locality until 191 1, when he set-
tled at Hurdsfield, North Dakota, where he nnw
owns and manages a large stock and grain farm.
He is a republican in politics, and a member of the
Lutheran Church.
B. F. Martin married Anna Luhmann, who was
born in 1855 '" Germany but as a child was brought
to America by her parents, who located in Minne-
sota, where she was brought up. Into the household
//' J^f 7T{ ^aJa^tx
HISTORY OF MONTANA
223
thus established eight children were born, as fol-
lows : N. L., with whom this sketch is chieHy
concerned; Ben, residing at Billings, Montana, is a
representative of the Watkins Remedy Company of
Winona, Minnesota; Marie, wife of Chester Drury,
a farmer in Hurdstield, North Dakota ; William,
engaged in farming in Hurdsfield ; John, whose home
is in Hurdsfield, is now, in the summer of 1919, in
Germany with the United States Army of Occupa-
tion; Nicholas, also following agricultural pursuits
in Hurdsfield ; and Esther and Helen, living with
their parents.
After completing the course of study in the public
schools of Minnesota N. L. Martin entered the Agri-
cultural College at Saint Anthony Park, Minnesota,
and was there graduated with the class of 1905.
The ensuing two years he was employed at Cody,
Wyoming, as time keeper on the irrigating tunnel
then being constructed by the Government. Coming
from there to Montana, Mr. Martin tiled on a tract
of land in Huntley, and having proved up his claim
lived upon it six years, in the meantirne adding im-
provements of value, and now having its sixty acres
under cultivation. While there Mr. Martin em-
barked in the pickling business in Huntley, Montana,
beginning on a modest scale, the first year putting
up fourteen barrels of good pickles. The second
season he put up 3^0 barrels, and the third year,
encouraged by his success, he erected a small plant
in Huntley, which he operated for three years. In
1914, in order to enlarge his operations, Mr. Martin
established his large pickling factory in Billmgs,
at the corner of Twentieth Street and Montana
Avenue, and is now -carrying on an immense busi-
ness, shipping each year twenty-seven carloads of
pickles of all kinds and sizes, puttnig them up ni
glass stoneware or barrels, as the trade demands,
and sending them to all parts of Wyommg, Montana,
North Dakota and Idaho, employing as many as
twenty-five people in the work. Mr. Martin has an
attractive home at 215 Lewis Avenue, Billings, and
also owns his plant. He is independent in politics,
and is a member of the Billings Midland Empire
Club. . ,, -, ,.
At Red Lodge, Montana, in 1910, Mr. Martin mar-
ried Harriet Hall, a daughter of Mr and Mrs J.
L. Hall. Mr. Hall, who was a retired farmer died
in Manning, Iowa, in 1918, and Mrs Hall still
resides in Manning. Mr. and Mrs. Martm have
two children, Robert, born April 7. 1912. and Har-
riet, born August 30. IQM-
George A. Wright has played an effective part
in the development of Northeastern Montana as a
homesteader, farmer, merchant and public spirited
citizen. He was one of the early business men ot
Dooley, where he still has his home.
Before recounting his Montana experiences it will
be appropriate to note his ear y life and fa-nily con-
nections. He was born in Shiawasse County, Michi-
gan January 19. 1882. His grandfather, Arthur
Wright, was a Canadian of Irish stock, and moved
to Michigan prior to the Civil war. He enlisted
in a Michigan regiment in the Union Army He
died at Fenton when about eighty-two years of age.
He was three times married. His son George W
was the child of his first wife, and by his second
marriage he had a daughter, Mrs. Oliver Launstein,
a resident of Owosso, Michigan. ^ , , .
George W Wright, father of the Dooley business
man was born in Michigan, spent his _ life as a
laborer and farmer and died at Owosso in 1894, at
the age of thirty-five. He married Mary Jane Mc-
Kenzie who was born in the Province of Ontario.
Her father, George McKenzie, w;as a Canadian of
Scotch parentage. Mrs. George W. Wright died in
Vol. n— 15
1899, at the age of forty-two. Besides her son
George A. she had two children, both living at
Detroit, Grace and Blakeman.
George A. Wright had some experience in farm-
ing in North Dakota prior to his removal to Mon-
tana. In 1907 he filed on a half section of land in
sections 3 and 4, township 34, range 54. southwest
of Plentywood. He proved up on this claim in the
fall of 1912. In a building 12 by 12 feet he and his
wife and child lived during the first year, until their
permanent house of frame was erected in 1908. Mr.
Wright began farming at once, and while the first
few years were not satisfactory as crop years, the
range furnished grass for hay, and that supplemented
the poor crops sufficiently to give a living. Good
grain crops of wheat, oats and flax were harvested
in 191 1 and 1912. Mr. Wright is still a land owner
but has not given his personal attention to farming
since 1912.
For one year, with home at Plentywood, he did a
local business buying and selling horses, and in July,
1913, identified himself witli the new village of
Dooley, buying a lot, erecting a building and open-
ing a stock of hardware merchandise about the 1st
of September. He continued to sell goods until the
close of the year 1918, when he closed out his local
business. Most of his interests since then have been
at Opheim in Valley County, in addition to his farm
near Plentywood. He sold both hardware and farm
implements at Dooley, and in 1916 he and Lee Mun-
son erected the first garage in the town. They con-
ducted this business two years and then Mr. Wright
sold. He also owns some developed farm lands near
Dooley.
Mr. Wright was one of the first members of the
Dooley School Board, and as a private citizen has
always been interested in local affairs. He is a
democrat, and since reaching his majority supported
Parker for president in 1904, Bryan in 1908, and
Wilson in the last two elections. Mr. Wright has
contributed to Dooley's growth by the erection of
one of its best residences, a nine-room bungalow
built in 1917. This is a modern home with full base-
ment, and from it the family have dispensed a gen-
erous hospitality.
Mr. Wright married Miss Ida Garrison. They
were married in Rolette County, North Dakota,
October 27, 1903, the ceremony being performed by
a Methodist minister, Rev. Mr. Kishpaugh. Mrs.
Wright was born near Belville, Ontario, March 26,
1880, and in 1889 her parents settled at Owosso,
Michigan, where she finished her education in the
high school. She is a daughter of Robert W. and
Lucinda (Trumper) Garrison, natives of Ontario.
The Garrisons were farmers and her father is now
living at Belville, Ontario, while her mother died at
Rolette, North Dakota. Mrs. Wright has a sister,
Mrs. J. A. Charbonneau, of Ryder, North Dakota.
After completing her education Mrs. Wright was a
teacher in North Dakota, doing her last school work
at Fisher in that state. She cast her first presiden-
tial vote for Mr. Wilson in 1916 and during the war
was an active Red Cross worker at Dooley. Mr. and
Mrs. Wright have an interesting family of children,
named Grace Evelyn, Frank Garrison, Robert Bruce,
Lucile May and Mildred Melvina.
Charles E. Stroup. Practically every line of
endeavor is ably represented at Billings, the local
demand being for the best in each, and some of
the most reliable men of the country have conse-
quently been attracted here. One of those who has
found in this city congenial surroundings and op-
portunity for creditable advancement is Charles E.
Stroup, a hardware merchant. He was born at
224
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Blain, Pennsylvania, May i8, 1882, a son of George
M. Stroup. The great-great-grandfather came to the
American colonies about the time of their revolu-
tion and located in Pennsylvania, where his son,
Peter Stroup, grandfather of Charles E. Stroup,
was born, he coming into the world at ToysviUe,
that state, in 181 1, and he left it at Blain, the same
state, in 1892, after having spent his life in Perry
County, where he was engaged in farming.
George M. Stroup, son of Peter and father of
Charles E. Stroup, was born at Blain, Pennsylvania,
in 1845, and he died there in 1917, having spent
his life within its confines, devoting himself to
farming. A strong republican, he was associate
judge of Perry County for two terms, was county
assessor for the same length of time, and took a
very active part in the politics of his county. The
Lutheran Church had in him an earnest and gen-
erous member, and he was always active in church
work. During the Civil war he was a teamster
for the government, and as such was at the battle
of Gettysburg and other important engagements.
George M. Stroup was married to Mary Martin,
born at Blain, Pennsylvania, in 1847. Their chil-
dren were as follows: Annie, who married Dr.
H. W. Woods, a physician and surgeon, lives at
Blain, Pennsylvania; Margaret, who married Wil-
liam Morrow, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, died in
1913, but her husband survives her and is traffic
agent for the Pennsylvania Railroad at Pittsburgh;
Robert M., who is a banker of Zap, North Dakota;
Charles E., whose name heads this review ; Frank
Nefif, who is superintendent of schools at Palmyra,
New York ; and Laura, who married Roy Allen, now
principal of schools of Meriden, Connecticut.
Charles E. Stroup attended the common and high
schools of Blain, Pennsylvania, and was graduated
from the latter at the age of sixteen years. Going
to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, he served his appren-
ticeship to the mercantile trade, studying all of its
details, for five years, and then, in 1904, came West
to Bozeman, Montana, where he spent si.x months.
In October, 1904, he arrived at Billings and entered
the hardware establishment of Yegen Brothers, In-
corporated, there spending four years. For the sub-
sequent year he was with the Flemming Hardware
Company, and in 1909 established his present hard-
ware business at No. 2812 Minnesota Avenue, which
is one of the leading establishments of its kind
in the city and in Southeastern Montana. The
business is now incorporated as the Stroup Hard-
ware Company, with Charles E. Stroup as president
and treasurer; T. B. Edwards as vice president;
and L. L. Worthington as secretary. Mr. Edward?
is one of the prominent business men of Anaconda,
Montana. The policies of the company are such
as to win the confidence and approval of the trade,
and a healthy increase is shown annually. Mr.
Stroup is a republican of the stalwart type, but
has never cared to assume the responsibilities of
public life. The Congregational Church affords him
a religious home, and benefits by his generous
donations. Star Lodge No. 41. Independent Order
of Odd Fellows, and the Billings Midland Empire
Club hold his membership. The Stroup residence,
which is owned by Mr. Stroup, is located at No.
23 s Wvoming Avenue.
in 1910 Mr. Stroup was united in marriage with
Miss Annetta Freeman, a daughter of John and
Elizabeth Freeman, both of whom are deceased,
having been in life farming people in Missouri.
Mr. and Mrs. Stroup have two children, namely:
Charles E., who was born June i, 1914; and Jean,
who was born December 5, 1918. A man of unusual
business capacity, Mr. Stroup has devoted himself
to perfecting his knowledge of one line of endeavor
and, concentrating as he has done upoti it, he has
produced results which must be gratifying to him-
self and his associates, as well as beneficial to the
city with which he has permanently identified him-
self. It is such men as Mr. Stroup who form the
great backbone of American business supremacy and
thus aid so materially in the development of any
community in which they see fit to establish them-
selves.
John C. Abrahamson acquired his early knowl-
edge of merchandising in Minnesota, of which state
he is a native, and for the past ten years has been
actively identified with business in Carbon County,
Montana, where he is vice president of the Roberts
Elevator Company.
Mr. Abrahamson was born in Dassel, Meeker
County, Minnesota, October 3, 1885. His father,
Matt Abrahamson, was born in Finland in 1837,
and at the age of nineteen went to Water Island,
Norway, and followed the fishing trade for six
years. In 1862 he came to the United States, located
in Minnesota, first at St. Peter and then at Fort
Ridgely, where he was in Government work four
years. The next fourteen years he spent in brick-
yards at Minneapolis, and in 1880 settled at Dassel,
Meeker County, where he homesteaded eighty acres.
After selling the homestead he bought a farm of
167 acres three miles east of Dassel, and brought
that into a fine state of cultivation and improvement.
He died there July 9, 1914, and the old farm is now
owned by his three sons. He was a republican and
an active supporter of the Lutheran Church. His
wife, whose maiden name was Johanna Kangas, is
still living on the old homestead. She was born in
Finland in 1856. The children were : Ida, living
with her mother, widow of Mr. Korbi, who was a
farmer; Harry B. on the homestead at Dassel;
Elizabeth, wife of Art Pellervo, credit man for the
Union Cannery at Astoria, Oregon ; Axel, who died
at the age of twenty-seven; Emma, wife of Leo
Dibb, of Glencoe, Minnesota; and William, a farmer
at Plummer, Minnesota.
John C. Abrahamson attended the rural schools of
Dassel and Spring Lake, Minnesota, and at the age
of sixteen began earning his own way. By work
in stores as clerk and in other capacities he acquired
a thorough knowledge of merchandising. For two
years he was at Ely in Northern Minnesota, two
years at Cloquet, and another two years at Chisholm.
He arrived at Red Lodge, Montana, August 9, 1909,
and for one year worked in the mines. For a year
and a half he was with the Carbon Plumbing &
Heating Company. Mr. Abrahamson was associated
with Dan O'Shea, Albert Budas and Frank Clark
in the purchase of the Hawkeye Elevator Company,
which they reorganized as the Red Lodge & Roberts
Elevator Company. The business was incorporated
August 28, 1913, as the Roberts Elevator Company.
Mr. Abrahamson has since been vice president of
this, one of the largest general supply and mercan-
tile organizations in Carbon County.
He makes his permanent home at Roberts, where
he has a modern residence. He is affiliated with the
Brotherhood of American Yeomen and is a demo-
crat in politics. At Duluth, Minnesota, February 3.
1903, Mr. Abrahamson married Miss Ida Koponen,
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Herman Koponen, who
live in Thompson Township of Carleton County,
Minnesota. Her father was a pioneer farmer in
that county. The four children of Mr. and Mrs.
Abrahamson were: Esther, born October 23, 1906;
Ellen, born March 10, 1909: John, born October 10,
1910; and Wilhart, who died in infancy.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
John J. Pietila. One of the business organiza-
tions affecting and benefiting a large part of the
population of Carbon County is the Roberts Elevator
Company, a complete and adequate mercantile supply
business, handling groceries, hardware, implements,
coal, lumber, brick, light and heavy machinery and
many other supplies required by the neighboring
community of farmers, miners and the varied popu-
lation surrounding Roberts.
The secretary and manager of this business is
John J. Pietila, who has had a long and active ex-
perience in business. He was born at Delaware,
Michigan, October 30, 1884. His father, Nels J.
Pietila, was born in Northern Finland in 1S49, and
married in that country Hilda Luukas. She was
born in Northern Finland in 1857. Nel.s Pietila came
to this country in 1870, and at Delaware, Michigan,
was a miner and also a logger in the lumber woods.
In 18S2 he became a pioneer in the Black Hills of
South Dakota, locating at Lead, where he is still
living. For the past thirty years he has performed
an invaluable service in that locality as a minister
of the Finnish Apostolic Lutheran Church, and is
still active in his calling. Politically he is a re-
publican. His wife died at Lead August 26, 1916,
mother of the following children: Elizabeth, wife
of Nels Juso, a farmer at Englewood, South Da-
kota; John J.; Ellen, wife of Gus Kumpula, a
farmer at Newell, South Dakota; Mary, who is un-
married and is a stenographer and clerk in the
Internal Revenue Department at Washington, D. C,
and Esther, living at home with her father.
John J. Pietila attended public school at Lead,
South Dakota, but his education was finished so far
as books and formal instruction were concerned at
the age of sixteen. The following three years he
was employed in mills, mines and stores, and in
1903, at the age of nineteen, he made his first
acquaintance with Montana, being employed in the
mines at Jardine. After that he was a mmer
around Butte until 1907- From '907 to 19" he
resided at Lead, South Dakota, where by employment
in different stores he acquired a thorough knowledge
of the general mercantile business. Mr. Pietila again
went to Butte in ion, and was an independent
merchant there for six months, when he sold out
his establishment. He then became manager of the
Kaleva Co-operative :^Iercantile Association of Red
Lodge, remained there three years, and for one
year was manager of the Washoe Trading Company
at Washoe, this state. He returned to Red Lodge
as general manager of the Montana Co-operative
Mercantile Association for a year and eight months,
and then bought an interest in the Roberts Elevator
Company, of which he is secretary and manager.
The other officers of this corporation are: Albert
Budas, president; John C. Abrahamson, vice presi-
dent; C. E. Hudson, treasurer; Emil Heikkila, gen-
eral manager; and F. L. Clark, director.
Mr. Pietila is a republican, a member of the
Lutheran Church, and is affiliated with Bear Tooth
Lodge No. ^34 of the Elks and Summit Camp No.
328 of the Woodmen of the World at Red Lodge.
Since coming to Roberts he has acquired a modern
home. He married at Deadwood, South Dakota,
July 26, 1910, !Miss Mary Tapani, daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. Eric Tapani. Her mother is still living
at Haparanda, Sweden, and her father, now de-
ceased, was a Swedish farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Pietila
on February I, 1920, adopted a son, George Tayry
Pietila, born at Butte, Montana, August 16, 1916.
J. V. CoNLEY. In the present practical age little
attention is paid to those who bewail their misfor-
tune in having no "luck," for that word has lost its
old meaning. Thorough preparation for the business
of life in any line and faithful and persistent appli-
cation usually explains one man's success over an-
other, which is easily illustrated in considering those
who have gone forward in any profession or in-
dustry. It has been men of enterprise who have
won notice and position in the big affairs of the
world everywhere, and Billings, as a representative
community, has noted examples. One of these who
has achieved much in the space of fourteen years
is J. V. Conley, who is secretary and treasurer of
the Lindsay Billings Company, of which he is also
a director.
J. V. Conley was born at Indianapolis, Indiana,
August 30, 1885, and is a son of J. H. and Mary
(McCarty) Conley, and a grandson of Martin Con-
ley. The latter was born in Ireland in 1809, and
came to the United States and settled at Decatur,
Illinois, where he lived many years, engaged in
railroading. He was a veteran of the Civil war
and he died at Decatur in 1901 and was laid to rest
with military honors. J. H. Conley was born in
Massachusetts in 1851, moved later to Illinois and
then to Indianapolis, Indiana, as best suited to his
business, which was railroading. In 1893 he moved
to Decatur, Illinois, and engaged in farming in that
vicinity until 1905, when he came to Montana and
farmed here until 1917, when he retired to Stockton,
California. He owned one of the first irrigated
farms of the Billings Land & Irrigation Company.
He votes the republican ticket. He married Mary
McCarty, who was born in 1858, and they have had
the following children: Mary, who is the wife of
J. P. Carroll, clerk of the Supreme Court, and
resides at Helena, Montana ; John M., who is a
retail merchant of Stockton, California; Julia, who
is the wife of Ora Kemp, a ranchman near Huntley,
Montana; J. V., who is the fifth in order of birth;
Nellie, who is the wife of G. A. Rhodes, of Walla
Walla, Washington ; William J., who is in the farm
implement business at Stockton ; and Edgar P., who
operates a ranch near Billings.
J. V. Conley attended the public schools of In-
dianapolis and was graduated from the high school
at Decatur in 1901, when he entered James Millikin
University, from which institution he was creditably
graduated in 1904. For one year afterward he
worked as bookkeeper for the Standard Oil Company
at Decatur, and then accompanied the family to
Billings, Montana. From 1905 to 1907 he was with
the Billings Hardware Company, his duties being in
both office and store in the capacity of general
utility man. He then went with the Twohy Brothers
Construction Company, for which he was purchasing
agent and paymaster from 1907 to 1910, in the latter
year coming to Lindsey & Company as bookkeeper.
Through promotion he later became secretary and
treasurer when the company was incorporated as
the Lindsay- Walker Company, and he was also one
of the directing board. In February, 1917, the
Lindsay Billings Company bought the Lindsay-
Walker Company, and Mr. Conley became an official
of this organization, as stated above. The offices
of the company are located at No. 2715 Minnesota
Avenue and an immense business is done in the
handling of wholesale fruits, produce and confec-
tionery, its trade territory extending to Thermopolis,
Wyoming, on the south, to Big Timber, Montana,
on the west, to Judith Gap, Montana, on the north,
and to Forsyfhe Montana, on the east. Mr. Conley
has a force of twenty employes. Strict discipline
is maintained, but Mr. Conley is a just and generous
employer.
At Billings, Montana, in October, 1917, he was
HISTORY OF MONTANA
married to Miss Hazel Morris, who is a daughter
of H. M. and Jennie (Hopper) Morris. Mrs. Conley
is a graduate of the Billings High School. The
family home is at No. 321 North Thirty-second
Street. They attend the Congregational Church.
In politics Mr. Conley is a republican. He is a
member of the Elks and belongs to the Billings,
the Billings Midland, the Empire and the Billings
Golf and Country Clubs, and the Young Men's
Christian Association, and has been very helpful in
the latter organization during the war relief activi-
ties of the association. Personally Mr. Conley is
a man of unimpeachable character.
Dell H. Holliday was for many years engaged
in railroad work, and achieved a place of prominence
in railroad circles. It was that service that brought
him west of the Missouri River, and when he retired
from the transportation business he was in Wyoming,
and from there about fifteen years ago came to
Billings, where he has built up one of the largest
real estate and insurance agencies in the eastern
part of the state.
Mr. Holliday was born in Fairfield County, Ohio,
March 28, 1859. The family were among the earliest
settlers of Fairfield County. His great-grandfather
was a native of Scotland, and on coming to America
settled in Maryland. The grandfather, John Holli-
day, was born in Maryland in 1819, and early in
life moved to Fairfield County, Ohio, where as the
result of many years of labor and good management
he cleared up a farm of 300 acres originally covered
with heavy timber, and left that farm. to his son,
Jacob R., who was born there, and the same farm
was also the birthplace of Dell H. Holliday. John
Holliday died on the old homestead in Ohio in 1877.
His wife was Magdeline Ruffner, a native of Penn-
sylvania.
Jacob R. Holliday was born in Fairfield County,
and spent much of his life there as a farmer. In
1879 he moved to Fairbury, Nebraska, where he was
one of the first settlers and developed his homestead.
After five years he returned to take charge of the
home farm in Ohio, living there three years, and
then retired to Beatrice, Nebraska. A short time
before his death he moved to Hurdland, Missouri,
where he died in 1899. During the Civil war he had
enlisted in the Seventeenth Ohio Infantry, but after
ten months was incapacitated by reason of a sun-
stroke. That sunstroke also was the direct cause
of the shortening of his life. He was a republican,
and from childhood was an ardent oil-school Baptist
in religion. Jacob R. Holliday married on April 30,
1858, Julia M. Cartright. She was born at Parkers-
burg, Virginia (now West Virginia), in 1839, and
is still living at Oklahoma City at the age of eighty.
Dell H. was the oldest of her .four children. John
W., the second, is a veteran railroad engineer, having
been with the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Rail-
road continuously since 1880. He still has a main
line passenger run out of Denver, where he resides,
and also owns 100 acres of farm land adjoining that
city. Orpha K., the third child, is living at Oklahoma
City, where her husband, Peter Jacovitch, a candy
maker, died. Eura B. is the wife of J. C. Hare, of
Kansas City, Missouri, a traveling salesman.
Dell H. Holliday was educated in the public schools
of Lancaster, Ohio, lived on his father's farm to
the age of twenty-one, and then his father, according
to the prevailing custom, gave him as his capital or
start in life a horse, saddle and bridle. In the mean-
time, however, he had been making energetic efforts
to train himself for a career. In 1876, while living
at home, he had learned telegraphy, and he secured
his first practical experience in one of the local
offices of the Columbus and Hocking Valley Railway.
In 1880 he entered the service of the Burlington &
Missouri River Railway as a telegraph operator and
station agent. He was assigned to different points
in Nebraska until 1890, and was appointed the first
traveling freight agent west of the Missouri River
for that corporation. His headquarters were at
Lincoln, Nebraska, two years. He was then trans-
ferred to Cheyenne, Wyoming, as terminal agent and
general agent, and remained on duty with that rail-
road for twelve years. During that time he had
full charge of several departments, handling freight,
passenger and other traffic and had supervision of
the telegraph lines.
On leaving the service of the Burlington Railway
in 1903, Mr. Holliday engaged in the mercantile
business for two years in Cheyenne, and in 1905
moved to Billihgs. Since then he has developed one
of the leading agencies for real estate and fire in-
surance in Southeastern Montana, his business offices
being in the Belknap Block. He is a property owner,
owning a number of buildings and dwellings and a
modern home, an eleven-room modern house at
119 North Thirty-second Street. Mr. Holliday is
an independent republican in politics, without any
official record, and is affiliated with the Christian
Science Church.
At Riverton, Nebraska, April 30, 1886, he married
Miss Maude Elliott. She was born at Knoxville,
Iowa, and died at Billings September 21, 1915. Mr.
Holliday has two children, his son, Clarence, who
graduated from high school at Cheyenne, Wyoming,
is a leading business man of Cheyenne. Wyoming,
owning a large storage, dray, ice and coal business.
The daughter, Frankie M., is the wife of J. W.
Bellrose, of Billings. Mr. Bellrose is associated in
business with Mr. Holliday.
N. B. Smith is well known to the live stock deal-
ers of Montana as deputy state veterinarian. He
was formerly in the Federal service with the Bureau
of Animal Industry, and has been active in the
work of his profession for more than a quarter of
a century.
Dr. Smith was born at Van Wert, Ohio, September
3, 1868, of English ancestry, but of a family that
has been in America since colonial times. His
ancestors first settled in Pennsylvania. His grand-
father, George W. Smith, was born at Basil, Ohio,
in 1816, and spent most of his life at Basil and
Van Wert. He was a millwright by trade, and
was also one of the builders of the Ohio Canal. He
lived retired at Baltimore, Ohio, where he died in
1892. His wife was Elizabeth Reese, a native of
Ohio who died at Baltimore.
Amos Smith, father of Dr. Smith, was born at
Basil, Ohio, in 1841, and has spent all his life there
with the exception of one year in Nebraska. He
has had various business interests, operated flour"
and saw mills and also doing much contract work.
He is now retired. Amos Smith is quite well known
in Billings, where he has spent four summers. He
is an honored veteran of the Civil war, having
enlisted in 1861 in the Seventeenth Ohio Infantry.
He was color bearer of his regiment and was all
through the trouble, participating in such notable
battles as Shiloh, Gettysburg, Lookout Mountain,
Missionary Ridge, siege of Vicksburg, and with
Sherman on the march to the sea. He has been a
republican for over fifty years, and for the past
sixteen years has served on the election board, and
religiously he is a Methodist. Amos Smith married
Flora Mumaugh, who was born in Van Wert, Ohio,
in 1847. They have six children, Edward Sherman,
who was a machinist and was struck by lightning
in South Dakota June 14, 1893 ; N. B. ; Mary Eliza-
beth, who is unmarried and living with her parents ;
HISTORY OF MONTANA
227
William M., a physician and veterinary who was in
the Government service when he died at Cincinnati,
Ohio, January 29, 1919: Walter C, living on a ranch
near Billings; and Grace Henrietta, the wife of
Vernon D. Johnson, a civil engineer living at Elkton,
Virginia.
N. B. Smith was educated in the public schools in
Ohio, and found employment at home until he was
twenty-nine years of age. In the meantime, in 1893,
he graduated from the Ohio State University with
the degree D. V. M., and for seven years had a
busy practice in his home community. In 1894, the
year after his graduation, he was appointed a member
of the State Board of Examiners for veterinarian by
Governor McKinley, serving two years, the short
term, and was then reappointed for the long term
of six years by Governor Bushnell.
Doctor Smith resigned from this position to enter
the Bureau of Animal Industry in 1900. His services
with that branch of the Federal Government re-
quired his presence at Kansas Cit>', Missouri, where
he represented the bureau in the packing houses.
In 1902 he was transferred to Billings, and in 1907
was transferred to the stock yards at Omaha and
did field work for the bureau until June, 1914. At
that date he resigned to become deputy state veteri-
narian at Billings. For a number of years he has
also carried on a large private practice, and has
completely equipped ofifices and stables at 202 North
Twenty-fourth Street. Doctor Smith also owns a
fine irrigated ranch of 160 acres six miles west of
Billings. His modern home is at 241 1 Second
Avenue, North.
Doctor Smith is a republican, a member of the
Methodist Church, and is affiliated with Basil Lodge
No. Ill, Knights of Pythias, in Ohio.
May 28, 1909, at Kansas City, Missouri, he mar-
ried Miss Anna North. She was born at Kansas
City and was educated there. She is the daughter
of James O. North, who was born in Kentucky in
1836, lived in his native state to the age of twenty-
one, and at the beginning of the Civil war joined
the Confederate Army and was all through the
period of hostilities as a bup-ler in a regiment under
the command of General Joe Shelby. He died at
Kansas City October 6, 1910. He was a democrat
and a Baptist in religion. Mr. North married Mollie
Julia Clause, who was born in Missouri in i860,
and is still living near Holt in that state. Doctor
and Mrs. Smith have one daughter, Mary Elizabeth,
born September 2, 1914.
Eliot W. Keene. A true type of the energetic,
public-spirited and enterprising business men who
have contributed largely toward the growth and
advancement of the industrial and mercantile inter-
ests of their home city is Eliot W. Keene, of Bil-
lings, a widely known and successful shoe merchant
and automobile dealer. A son of G. S. Keene, he
was born in Gallatin, Daviess County, Missouri,
July 25, 1876, of English lineage, his immigrant
ancestor having come frorn England to America in
colonial times, settling in Virginia. His grandfather,
George Keene, a prominent physician and surgeon,
and a veteran of the Mexican war. spent his entire
life in Kentucky, dying in Louisville prior to 1876.
He married a Miss Ballard, a beautiful Kentucky
maiden.
G. S. Keene was born in 1843 in Louisville, Ken-
tucky, and was there reared and educated. Migrating
to Missouri in early manhood, he bought a tract of
wild land, and with toilsome perseverance, laboring
in winter's cold and sumrner's heat, he placed it
under a good state of cultivation, enduring at first
the usual hardships, dangers and difficulties of
pioneer life. Coming frOm there to Montana in
1910, he bought a ranch near Billings, his land
adjoining Broadwater Avenue, a valuable piece of
property which he still owns, although he has lived
retired from the activities of business since 1916, his
home being in Billings. Politically he invariably
casts his ballot with the democratic party. He mar-
ried Lavina Hubbard, who was born in Daviess
County, Missouri, in 1849, and into the household
thus established nine children were born, including:
Olivia, wife of Charles D. Wynne, of Bozeman,
Montana, a painter and decorator ; Laura, who mar-
ried O. M. McCarty, of Billings, a teamster; Worth,
a rancher residing five miles west of Billings ; Eliot
W., the subject of this sketch; May, wife of Simon
Shackelford, an agriculturist living on his ranch
five miles west of Billings; Love, living with her
parents, is the widow of Lawrence Cushman, who
was killed in 1918 in an auto accident at Logan,
Montana ; Hattie married H. O. Hyatt, assistant
manager of the Great Western Sugar Company at
Lovell, Wyoming; and Georgia, wife of Oscar White,
a machinist in the employ of the Northern Pacific
Railway Company, with his home in Livingston,
Montana.
Receiving his preliminary training in the rural
schools of his native county, Eliot W. Keene com-
pleted his early education at the Gallatin High
School. Reared to agricultural pursuits, he remained
on the home farm until nineteen years old, when he
made a trip to Yellowstone National Park. Return-
ing by way of the Yellowstone River, he walked
from the river over the trail to Bozeman, Montana,
where, with the Nelson Story Milling Company, he
learned the trade of a carpenter and millwright,
serving an apprenticeship of two years. Coming to
Billings in 1899, Mr. Keene followed the carpenter's
trade two years, and was subsequently associated
with the Billings Brewing Company four years.
Being then under the administration of W. B. George,
appointed street commissioner, he filled the office
for two years. During that time the foundation
for the Billings City Hall was made, one of the
men employed by Mr. Keene in the work having
been Tom Stout, who made his first appearance as
a workman in Montana at that time.
Mr. Keene was afterward employed as a contrac-
tor and builder until 1913, in that industry carrying
on an extensive business. He constructed a part of
the large building belonging to the Billings Brew-
ery; the J. R. Scott Building; the Raedemaker
Building on Broadway; fourteen fine residences in
Billings, in the meantime moving fourteen times,
as he assumed possession of each house as soon as
it was completed, and had to move as he disposed
of each; and various other of the more important
buildings of the city. In 1913, forming a partnership
with L. E. Garrison, he established the Keene-
Garrison Shoe Store, it being the largest and most
up-to-date store of the kind in Montana, and still
owns a half interest in the business. During the
same year Mr. Keene embarked in the automobile
trade, being agent for the Cadillac car for a year,
but since that time has handled the Oldsmobile cars.
The Montana Oldsmobile Service Station and sales-
room is located at 112 North Twenty-ninth Street,
where courteous and prompt attention are given
each and every patron. Mr. Keene is president of
the firm, and as sales agent covers a territory em-
bracing the whole of Montana and Northern Wyo-
ming. Along the Rim Rock, adjoining Billings,
Mr. Keene has a beautiful home, which with its
attractive surroundings makes one of the most
valuable and desirable estates in the vicinity.
Mr. Keene married in 1901. in Billings, Miss
Teresa Blackford, who was graduated from the
high school in Shelby County. Missouri. Her par-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ents, Andrew and Mary (Thomas) Blackford, are
residents of Billings, her father being a retired agri-
culturist. Mr. and Mrs. Keene have six children,
namely: Ellsworth, born March 25, 1902, is now, in
1919, a sophomore at the Saint Thomas and Saint
Paul College, a military school ; Frances, born in
1904, attends the Billings High School ; August, born
in 1907; Merry Nell, born in 1909; Ruth, born in
1910; and Catherine, born in 1915. Politically Mr.
Keene advocates the principles of the democratic
party. Socially he belongs to the Billings Midland
Empire Club, and fraternally he is an ex-member
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and
member of the Modern Woodmen of America, the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and the
Fraternal Order of Eagles.
Chester R. Ingle. A worthy representative of
the Yellowstone County bar, Chester R. Ingle, of
Billings, possesses a large measure of genuine talent,
a distinctive personality, and a legal knowledge and
skill that have brought him success in his profes-
sional career and won him an honored position
among his fellowmen, both as a man and as a
lawyer. A son of John H. Ingle, he was born at
Burt, Iowa, May 4, 1880, on the paternal side being
of pure Dutch ancestry, the founder of the Ingle
family in America having come from Holland to
this country, while on the maternal side he is of
Irish descent.
Born in Virginia in 1854, John H. Ingle was a
small child when his parents removed to Tennessee,
where he was brought up and educated, as a boy
and youth being well drilled in the many branches
of agriculture. Realizing that more favorable op-
portunities for improving and advancing one's
financial condition were offered young men of in-
dustry and ability in the West, he made his way in
early manhood to Iowa, settling in Burt, Kossuth
County, where he subsequently bought land, and in
addition to carrying on general farming most profit-
ably was for many j-ears successfully engaged in
mercantile pursuits. In 1891 he removed with his
family to Guymon, Oklahoma, and is still residing
in that place, being one of the foremost farmers and
stockmen of Texas County. He is an independent
democrat in politics, but takes no active part in
public matters. He married Mary McChesney, who
was born in Troy, New York, in 1859, and of their
union five children have been born, as follows :
Guy, a farmer, resides in Liberal, Kansas; Chester
R. ; Roy of Omaha, Nebraska, is associated with an
automobile company as machinist; Olive, wife of
William Brown, a garage owner in Wichita, Kansas ;
and Ruth, living with her parents.
Accompanying his parents to Kansas in childhood,
Chester R. Ingle acquired his rudimentary education
in the public schools, in 1898 being graduated from
the high school at Liberal, Kansas. Ambitious then
to further advance his knowledge of books, he
attended the normal school at Stockton, Kansas,
and in 1904 was graduated from Campbell Uni-
versity at Holton, Kansas, with the degree of
Bachelor of Laws. Immediately locating at Liberal,
Kansas, he opened a law office, and during the seven
years he remained in that place built up an excellent
practice, at the same time establishing a wide reputa-
tion for legal ability and skill. Going to Bremerton,
Washington, in 191 1, he was there successfully
engaged in his professional work for two j-ears. In
1913, hoping to make a permanent location in some
wide-awake city, Mr. Ingle came to Montana, settling
in Billings, with his office at Room 2, Belknap
Building, and his residence at 1141 Miles Avenue.
A formidable opponent in any cause, be it civil
or criminal, Mr. Ingle labors unweariedly in the
interests of his clients, and his efforts have been
generously rewarded, his practice having became ex-
tensive. A man of good financial foresight, Mr.
Ingle has made judicious investments, among his
other landed holdings being a valuable ranch of 600
acres situated twelve miles northwest of Billings,
which he wisely devotes to the raising of grain, in
his agricultural experiments meeting with gratifying
results. He is a stanch republican in his political
views, and while a resident of Bremerton, Washing-
ton, served as city attorney.
In 1907, at Stockton, Kansas, Mr. Ingle was united
in marriage with Miss Beth Bartholomew, a daugh-
ter of Elan and Rachel (Montgomery) Bartholomew,
of Stockton. Her father, :\Ir. Bartholomew, is a
botanist of national reputation, and his son Albert,
who has an equal knowledge of that science that
treats of plants, is professor of botany at the Uni-
versity of Wisconsin in Madison. Mr. and Mrs.
Ingle have one child, Chester, born January 30, 191 1.
Frank Von Eschen. manager of the Billings
branch of the Ryan Grocery Company, is one of
the most enterprising and reliable young business
men of Yellowstone County, where he is most well
and favorably known. He was born at Shelby, Iowa,
March 25, 1886, a son of F. Von Eschen, born in
Switzerland in 1847. He died at Shelby, Iowa, in
1895, having been brought in his boyhood by his
parents to the United States. Settlement was made
in Wisconsin, and there he was reared, but after
his marriage he moved to Shelby, Iowa, and con-
tinued farming the remainder of his life. The
Lutheran Church had in him an earnest and stead-
fast member. F. Von Eschen was married to a
lady whose first name was Rosa, and they had the
following children : George, who resides at Shelby,
Iowa, where he is engaged in merchandising ; Florian,
who is a professor of Willamette College of Salem,
Oregon; Edward, who is a manufacturer of operat-
ing tables for physicians, resides at Kirksville, Mis-
souri; Ben, who is a farmer of Shelby, Iowa;
Aaron, who is also a farmer of Shelby, Iowa ; and
Frank, who was the youngest.
Frank Von Eschen attended the public schools of
Shelby, Iowa, and was graduated from its high
school in 1904, following which he took a com-
mercial course at Boyles Business College at Omaha,
Nebraska. He then entered the employ of the
Pacific Express Company at Omaha, leaving it at
the expiration of a }-ear to go with Adams & Kelley,
wholesale sash and door, of Omaha, with which
he remained for another year. In 1907 Mr. Von
Eschen came to Billings, and was first employed
by Yegen Brothers, Incorporated, as stenographer
and general office worker. After a year he repre-
sented this company on the road, but a year later
returned to the office. In 1014 G. W. Ryan bought
the wholesale grocery department of Yegen Brothers,
and Mr. Von Eschen went with him as an office
employe. So efficient did he prove himself that in
1916 he was made manager of the Billings branch,
and the development of this department since he
has taken charge of it justifies the confidence dis-
played in him by Mr. R.van. The offices of this
branch are located at No. 2816 Minnesota Avenue,
and the headquarters of the company, operating as
the Ryan Grocery Company, are also at Billings.
Other firms associated with this company are the
Ryan Mercantile Company, of Great Falls, Montana;
and the Ryan Havre Company, at Havre, Montana.
Mr. Von Eschen is an independent republican. Well
known in Masonry, he belongs to Ashlar Lodge
No. 29, .\ncient Free and .Accepted Masons. So-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
229
cially he is a member of the Masonic Club and
the Midland Empire Club of Billings. He owns his
modern residence at No. 230 Yellowstone Avenue.
In 1907 Mr. Von Eschen was married at Corning,
Iowa, to Miss Anna Van Pelt, a daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. H. V. Van Pelt, of Corning. Mr. Van
Pelt is a retired farmer of that city. Mrs. Von
Eschen is a graduate of the Corning High School,
and a lady of delightful personality. Mr. and Mrs.
Von Eschen have the following children : Harry
L., who was born in IQ08; Maurine, who was born
in 1910; Kenneth, who was born in 1913; and
Dorothy, who was born in 1915.
Walter R. Movius. A prominent and prosperous
business man of Billings, full of push and vim,
Walter R. Movius, junior member of the firm of
Ryerson & Movius, Incorporated, real estate and
insurance agents, is ■ an industrious and diligent
worker, allowing nothing to escape his observation
that will in any way tend to advatice the interests
of his firm or his patrons, and although young in
years is making steady progress along the pathway
of success. A native of North Dakota, he was born
at Lidgerwood November 19, 1890, of German
many in 1850. Immigrating to the United States at
the age of sixteen years, he first made his home at
Yellow Banks, Minnesota, where for a time he was
variously employed. When ready to start in life
for himself he bought land in that vicinity, and
with true pioneer grit and labor redeemed a farm
from the wilderness. In addition to his labors as an
agriculturist he was also there engaged for a number
of years in mercantile pursuits. Opening a general
store at Bigstone City, South Dakota, in 1875, he
managed it successfully for fifteen years. Making
a change of residence and business in 1890, he moved
to Lidgerwood, North Dakota, where he operated a
flour mill until 1917. Coming in that year to Mon-
tana, he has since lived retired from business activi-
ties at his home in Billings. He is identified with
the democratic ranks in politics, is a faithful and
valued member of the Methodist Episcopal Church,
and belongs to the Free and Accepted Order of
Masons.
William R. Movius married Marcella J. Murray,
who was born in Minnesota in 1861, and to them
eight children have been born, as follows : Arthur
J., a well known physician and surgeon of Billings;
Winfred D.. a manufacturer of flour at Lidgerwood,
North Dakota; Marcella, wife of N. J. Shields, M.
D., a prominent physician and surgeon of San Luis
Obispo, California; Pearl D. married Arthur Rosen-
kranz, of Lidgerwood, North Dakota, an electrician ;
Rex M., a resident of Plentywood, Montana, is
treasurer of Sheridan County; Walter R., with
whom this brief sketch is chiefly concerned ; Harold
E., of Billings, is associated with the Billings Laun-
dry Company; and Margaret, wife of Herman War-
ren, of Mobile, Alabama, a railway employe.
Receiving his preliminary education in Lidger-
wood, North Dakota, Walter R. Movius was grad-
uated from its high school with the class of 1908,
Subsequently entering the Northwestern University,
at Evanston, Illinois, he was there graduated with
the degree of Bachelor of Science in 1912. While
there he joined the Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity,
with which he is still affiliated. In 1912, in order
to better fit himself for a business life, Mr. Movius
attended the Mankato Commercial College, at Man-
kato, Minnesota, continuing his studies there for
a year. Establishing himself then at Plentywood,
Montana, he was employed in the recorder's office
for a year, and was afterward deputy county treas-
urer of Sheridan County and deputy assessor until
April I, 1915, performing the duties thus devolving
upon him in a highly satisfactory manner.
Coming very soon after that date to Billings, Mr.
Movius was field and office man for the Guaranty
Investment Company for a period of eighteen
months. Forming a partnership then with Mr.
Lloyd H. Ryerson, under the firm name of Ryerson
& Movius, he embarked in the real estate and insur-
ance business, and in his undertakings has met with
well merited success. The firm, which was incor-
porated March i, 1918, handles city properties and
farm lands, having its full share of all the business
of that kind carried on in Yellowstone County, its
offices being located at 2905 Montana Avenue. The
officers are men of great enterprise and energy,
Lloyd H. Ryerson being president, while Mr. Movius
is secretary and treasurer. Mr. Movius is likewise
secretary and treasurer of the Billings Fuel & Feed
Company, and president of the Billings Real Estate
Board, offices for which he is amply qualified, and
which he is filling to the eminent satisfaction of all
concerned. He is a democrat in politics, and a
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church and of
the Billings Midland Club. He has an attractive
home at 246 Wyoming Avenue, and there takes
pleasure in extending its hospitalities to the many
friends of himself and wife.
On June 21, 1915, at Plentywood, Montana, Mr.
Movius married Ruth E., daughter of I. A. and
Emily (Denny) Oakes, residents of Plentywood,
where Mr. Oakes is serving as postmaster. Mrs.
Movius was educated in Idaho, being graduated from
the Boise High School. Mr. and Mrs. Movius have
one child, Ruth Marie, born May 22, 1916.
Lenord L. Worthington. Sincerity and trust-
worthiness are characteristics of Leonard L. Worth-
ington, secretary and assistant manager of Yegen
Brothers, Incorporated, of Billings, and his steady
advance in the business world is because of tliem and
his constructive work in every position he has held.
He was born at Odell, Nebraska, October 23, 1882,
a son of Eli Worthington. The birth of Eli Worth-
ington occurred in Pennsylvania in 1850, and his
death at Long Beach, California, in December, 1918.
After being reared in his native state Eli Worthing-
ton came as far west as Iowa, and after a brief
stay in that state came on to Nebraska, homesteading
at Odell. where he was a pioneer. He later estab-
lished himself as a merchant at Odell, and in l888
went to Beatrice, Nebraska, where he conducted a
meat market until his retirement from business cares
in 1910, at which time he established his residence
at Long Beach, California, and there rounded out
his useful life. Stanch in his support of republican
principles and candidates, he never cared for political
preferment, but did his duty as a citizen and up-
right man. In the creed and teachings of Christian
Science he found his religious ideals. Eli Worth-
ington was married to Hulda Jane Parks, born in
Pennsylvania in 1853. She survives her husband and
makes her home at Billings. Their children were
as follows : Hattie May, who died at Billings in
1905 ; Maude, who married L. H. Bostwick, receiving
and shipping clerk for Yegen Brothers, Incorporated,
lives at Billings, Montana; L. L., whose name heads
their review; Frank R., who was accidentally killed
by a fire engine in 1913, while a member of the
Maverick Hose Company of volunteer firemen of
Billings ; and Joseph, who is bookkeeper and receiv-
ing teller for Yegen Brothers, Incorporated.
L. L. Worthington attended the common schools
of Beatrice, Nebraska, and completed the junior
year of the high school of that city, when, in 1900,
230
HISTORY OF MONTANA
he left school to become self-supporting in the em-
ploy of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad,
with which he remained for six years, during that
time being located at Beatrice. He then came to
Billings, Montana, arriving in this city February lo,
1902, and was chief clerk in the local freight office
at this point until the consolidation of the roads here,
at which time he was made transfer clerk in the
joint freight office, so continuing until March, 1905,
when he was made claim clerk in the .local office for
the same railroads at Omaha, Nebraska. In July,
1906, Mr. Worthington returned to Billings and
began his connection with Yegen Brothers, Incor-
porated, as a clerk. It was not long until his capa-
bilities received due appreciation by his promotion
to the position of head bookkeeper in 1907. Mr.
Worthington is a man who is never content with
doing merely what is regarded as the duties of a
position, but reaches out to learn others, and added
responsibilities were given him in 1910, when he
was made credit man. In this latter position he
displayed such sound judgment and proved himself
so excellent a judge of character that in July, igi.S,
he was made secretary of the company and assistant
manager, and as such he is add'ng to his reputation
as an efficient business man. He is a stalwart re-
publican. L'ke his father, he is a Christian Scientist.
His fraternal affiliations are with the Billings Lodge
No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
He also belongs to the Billings Midland Empire
Club, the Billings Golf and Country Club, and the
Billings Rotary Club. For some time he has been
secretary of the Stroup Hardware Company of Bil-
lings, and stands very high in the estimation of that
house. Mr. Worthington owns his comfortable
modern residence at No. 615 North Thirtieth Street.
On November 15, 1905, Mr. Worthington was
married at Beatrice, Nebraska, to Miss Mary Ellen
La Salle, a daughter of LeRoy F. and Martha
La Salle. Mr. La Salle died at Beatrice, but his
widow survives him and makes her home in that
city. He was a prominent stockman for a number
of years, and interested in the industrial life of
Beatrice. Mrs. Worthington is a graduate of the
Beatrice High School, and a lady of admitted charm
of manner. Mr. and Mrs. Worthington have the
following children : La Salle, who was born Octo-
ber 22. 1906; Bonita, who was born April 4, 1908;
and Max, who was born October 7, 1909.
Bert G. Brockway, a resident of Montana since
1901, has played several successful roles, as farmer,
rancher, banker, as head of one of the largest real
estate organizations in Montana and as present rep-
resentative of Billings in the State Legislature.
Mr. Brockway was born at Vicksburg, Michigan,
April 19, 1874, a son of George and Hattie M.
(Williams) Brockway. His grandfather was a na-
tive of New York state and a pioneer in Southern
Michigan, spending his life on a farm near Vicks-
burg. George Brockway was born in Kalamazoo
County, Michigan, in 1852. was a farmer in that
state, and died near Vicksburg in 1876. when Bert
G. Brockway was two years old. The latter was one
of two children, his older brother. William A.
Brockway, being also associated in the real estate
business at Billings. His mother, who resides in
Billings, was born in Indiana in 1845, and after the
death of her first husband became the wife of
Webster J. Crane, a veteran of the Union armv and
also living at Billings. They have one child, Merle
E.. at home.
Bert G. Brockway received his early education in
the public schools of Vicksburg, Michigan, and
Anita, Iowa, attending high school in the latter
place. He also took a course in the Normal School
at .Atlantic, Iowa. Leaving school at the age of
nineteen, he took up the practical work of farming
in Cass County, Iowa, and was thus engaged until
the fall of i8g6. He then went back to the scenes
of his early childhood at Kalamazoo, Michigan, and
for three years was engaged in the dairy business,
and also was engaged in the coal and wood retail
business. Coming to Billings in the spring of 1901,.
Mr. Brockway spent a season as cowboy on the
stock ranch of Joe Sims, and then returned to the
vicinity of Billings and located on an irrigated farm
in the Yellowstone Valley west of Laurel. With the
energy characteristic of him he prosecuted his busi-
ness of farmer there for six years, and then en-
gaged in the mercantile business at Laurel, organ-
izing the Laurel Trading Company and also the
Citizens National Bank, which he served as vice
president. Disposing of his interests at Laurel in
1911, he permanently identified himself with Billings
and has since looked after some valuable farming
interests in addition to his active business as a real
estate man.
Mr. Brockway is president of the Brockway Real
Estate Company, Incorporated, with offices at 2710'/^
First Avenue. North, in Billings. This is one of the
largest firms in the state and its transactions in 1916
included the sale of 69,943 acres, with a total money
value of $1,018,895.23. The other members of the
firm are William A. Brockway, vice president; Roy
C. Kimmel, secretary and treasurer, and Ora J.
Brockway, trustee.
Mr. Brockway has not achieved success in busi-
ness at a sacrifice of the duties and responsibilities
of good citizenship. He is president of the Billings
Deaconess Hospital Association, a trustee of the
Billings Chamber of Commerce, and trustee of the
Young Men's Christian Association. He was
elected on the republican ticket to the State Legis-
lature in 1918, and during the sixteenth session of
the legislature was chairman of the committee of
townships and counties, and a member of the appro-
priation committee, the committee on live stock and
public ranges and the agricultural committee.
Mr. Brockway affiliates with the Congregational
Church and with Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks, and Laurel Camp
of the Modern Woodmen of America.
September 4, 1895, at Atlantic, Iowa, he married
Viaretta Shoup, a native of Cass County, that state.
They are the parents of five children : Marie, who is a
graduate of the Billings High School, and finished
her education in the State University at Missoula,
is the wife of J. Frank Cox, Jr., associated with the
Brockway Real Estate Company at Billings; Ethet
M.. a graduate of the Billings High School and now
a student in the State University at Missoula; Ina,
a graduate in iqig of the Billings High School;
Hattie, a freshman in the local high school ; and
Faye, a student in the Billings grammar school.
Thomas C. Armitage. postmaster of Billings,
came to Montana on the tide of the construction
forces of the Northern Pacific Railway. There is
hardly a phase of the development of Billings with
which he is not personally acquainted, though his
chief interests in Montana for many years have
been identified with farming and live stock ranch-
ing. Altogether he has played a notable part in the
citizenship of the state.
He was born in Monroe, Michigan, July 20, ^1859,
a son of George W. and Eliza (Cole) Armitage.
The Armitage family is of original Irish stock and
were early settlers in New York state. Mr. Armi-
tage's mother, who is still living at Monroe, Michi-
gan, where she was born, represents in one line
the noted pioneer Kentucky family of Disbrow.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
231
George W. Armitage grew up in New York state,
and when a young man went to Monroe, Michigan,
where he followed merchandising until his death.
In politics he was a republican, and a very active
member of the Presbyterian Church.
Thomas C. Armitage acquired his education in
the public schools of Monroe, graduating from high
school, and at the age of sixteen took up railroad
service, working for a railroad company at New
Orleans about one year. He then became connected
with the Santa Fe Company, working in Kansas,
also in St. Louis, Missouri, and first joined the
forces of the Northern Pacific in the superintend-
ent's office at Brainerd, Minnesota. He was there
four years, and as a member of the construction
department arrived at Miles City, Montana, in 1881.
He spent the winter there and in the spring of
1882 came to Billings and was one of the few set-
tlers of that year who are still alive and residents
of the city. In 1883 he continued with the construc-
tion forces of the Northern Pacific in building the
National Park branch from Livingston, and helped
construct the branch line from Superior to Ash-
land, Wisconsin, then the Phillipsburg branch to
Montana, the Marysville branch and other branch
lines. In 1890 he was appointed the first agent of
the Northern Pacific at Marysville, and held that
office three years.
Almost as soon as he came to Montana in 1882
Mr. Armitage took up a tract of government land
near Billings, joining the town on the west. In
1893, on leaving the railroad service, he settled on
the ranch and still owns and operates it and made
it his home until 1914. He was appointed post-
master of Billings in 1913, and on taking over the
office moved his home into the city. He was ap-
pointed by President Wilson and in 1918 was re-
appointed for another term of four years. He is a
man of thorough business ability and has con-
ducted the office in a way satisfactory to all con-
cerned.
Mr. Armitage was also elected a member of the
Legislature in 1907, serving during the fifth session.
He is a member of the Congregational Church.
His modern home, built in 191 5. is at 227 Wyoming
Street.
Mr. Armitage married at Drummond, Montana, in
1887, Miss Tulia Whiteside, daughter of Andrew J.
and Marv Whiteside, the latter still living at Port
Angeles. 'Washington. Her father was a pioneer
farmer in Deer Lodge County, Montana. Mr. and
Mrs. Armitage are the parents of five children:
Sydney C, a graduate of the Billings High School
and now in the oil business in Kansas ; George T.,
who graduated from high school and from the State
University at Missoula, is a first lieutenant in the
National Army and was with the American con-
tingent in Siberia; John Kenneth, a gradute of
high school, is an emplove of the Yellowstone Bank
of Billings: Harriet and Florence, the two younger
children, are high school students. Sydney C. was
a lieutenant in the artillery, and at the time of the
armistice was stationed at Fort Sill. Oklahoma,
from which place he soon after received his dis-
charge. John Kenneth was in the National Army
at Camn Lewis for nearly one year and received
his discharge in February, igip-
E. M. Adams. M. D. During the first twenty-five
years of his life Dr. Adams did little else than
attend school and acquire the thorough academic
and professional training which has served him so
well in his real work as a physician and surgeon.
Dr. Adams came to Red Lodge, Montana, ten years
ago and is regarded as one of the most competent
surgeons in his part of the state.
Dr. Adams' family history belongs to New Eng-
land, and his ancestors were of the sturdy and
thrifty people typical of New England character.
He was born at East Swanzey, New Hampshire,
.A.ugust 7, 1882. His paternal ancestry goes back
to an early date in the Massachusetts colony, and
a number of generations back his ancestry corre-
sponded to that from which descended in another
branch the statesman who twice filled the chair of
President of the United States. His grandfather,
.Albert Adams, was born in 1808 and spent most of
his life as a farmer at Rindge, New Hampshire,
where he died of pneumonia in 1875. His wife,
Mary P. Adams, was borr in 181 1 and died of
apop'lexy at Rindge in 1884. John B. Adams, father
of Dr. Adams, was born at Rindge August 12, 1842,
and spent most of his life in that state. He was
a farmer, lumberman and lumber dealer and suc-
cessively made his home at Rindge, East Jeffrey, East
Swanzey and Hancock. He died at Hancock De-
cember II, 1909. He was a democrat, very active
and influential in local affairs, and filled the office
of commissioner of Hillsboro County, was a member
of the school board several times,' and supervisor
of highways. He was also identified with the
Grange. John B. Adams married Mary J. Wood-
bury, who was born at Winchendon, Massachusetts,
November 11, 1850, and is now living at Hancock,
New Hampshire. Her parents were Samuel D. and
Jerusha D. Woodbury. Her father was born De-
cember 9, 1816, was a farmer and merchant at
Winchendon, Massachusetts, and died there of
dysentery August 2^, 1899. His wife was born July
22, 1820. and spent her last years with her daughter,
Mrs. John B. Adams, and died at Hancock January
9, 1916. The children of John B. .Adams and wife
were: George A., an attorney at Salamanca, New
York; Fred Albert, a fruit grower at Dublin, New
Hampshire; J. H. Adams, who is head bookkeeper
for the Moxie Nerve Food Companv at Boston,
Massachusetts: Dr. E. M. Adams: Ernest L., a
merchant at Hancock, New Hampshire : Charles E.,
who is in the engineering department of the Arner-
ican Expeditionary Forces ; and R. W., who lives
on the farm with his mother at Hancock.
Dr. E. M. Adams attended public school at East
Swansey, spent one year in high school at Hancock
and four years in Gushing Academy at Ashburnham,
Massachusetts. He was graduated there in IQ03,
and during the following year did post-graduate
work in the Dean .Academy at Franklin, Massa-
chusetts. In the fall of 1904 he entered the Uni-
versity of Cincinnati, where he spent one year in
the general academic and medical preparatory courses
and in the fall of 1905 began the regular work of
the medical department, comnleting his course and
graduating M. D. in 1900. During 1908-oq he was
interne in the German Deaconess Hospital at Cin-
cinnati. Dr. Adams has membership in several col-
lege and medical fraternities, including the Phi
Delta Theta, Theta Nu Epsilon and the Nu
Sigma Nu.
He arrived at Red Lodge. Montana, June 9. I9"0.
and from that date to the present has been engaged
in a general medical and surgical practice, though
more and more his services are required in the
snecial field of surgery. Some years ago he estab-
lished a nrivate hosnital for the greater convenience
of his clients, and its patients come from Montana
and Wyoming. Since 1016 he has been health officer
and secretary of the Board of Health of Carbon
County and holds similar positions in the City of Red
Lodge. He is also company physician for the
Northwestern Improvement Company and is a mem-
ber of the County and State Medical societies and
232
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the American Medical Association. His offices are
in the Church Building on Broadway.
Dr. Adams is a democrat in politics and is affiliated
with Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, Red Lodge Aerie No. 742,
Fraternal Order of Eagles, Red Lodge Chapter,
Brotherhood of American Yeomen, and Red Lodge
Camp of Woodmen of the World. Besides his
modern home at 301 North Hauser Avenue, he has
a ranch of 320 acres on Shane Ridge. In 1919 he
completed his private hospital on South Hauser
Avenue. This hospital has twenty-five rooms and
is equipped with every device known to the modern
hospital.
August 31, 1910, at Red Lodge, Dr. Adams mar-
ried Miss Mary E. Edwards, daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. Samuel T. Edwards. Her mother is deceased.
Her father is a retired farmer at Clinton, Missouri.
Mrs. Adams is a graduate of the State Normal
School of Missouri.
S. W. Matlock, serving his third term as sheriflt
of Yellowstone County, is a Montana pioneer, hav-
ing been a resident of Billings and vicinity for oyer
twenty-one years. He has all the virile qualities
associated with the true westerner, is a man of reso-
lute purpose, and has a reputation for utmost relia-
bility in the performance of everything he under-
takes.
Mr. Matlock was born near Pattonsburg, Mis-
souri, March 7, 1872. His ancestors came from
Scotland to the United States in colonial times. His
grandfather, James Matlock, was a pioneer in
Northwestern Missouri and died in Ray County
many years ago. Ray County, Missouri, was a part
of the old Platte purchase, and the Matlocks were
among the first to settle there. James Matlock,
father of Sheriff Matlock, was born in Ray County
in 1833. He spent most of his life as a farmer in
Daviess County, in the same section of Missouri,
and died there in 1894. He was a democrat in politi-
cal affiliation. James Matlock married Fredonia
Gordon, who was born in Kentucky in 1846 and is
now living near Pattonsburg, in Daviess County.
She was the mother of a large family of children,
named briefly as follows : George, a farmer at Twin
Falls, Idaho; Benjamin, a farmer in Daviess County,
Missouri; Marv, living with her mother; S. W.
Matlock; Wood, a farmer at Ainsley, Nebraska;
Tillie, wife of Ed White, a farmer in Kansas;
Belle, who died in IQII at Terrv, Montana, wife of
Henry Kincaid ; Leah, wife of D. Ingalls, of Perry;
Lizzie, who is the present wife of Henry Kincaid,
a dairyman and farmer at Perry, Montana; and
Addie, wife of John Way, a farmer at Perry.
S. W. Matlock grew up on his father's farm in
Daviess County, Missouri, attended the rural schools,
and acquired a practical knowledge of farming and
cattle feeding. In 1888 he came to Montana, spend-
ing one season on a ranch near Billings and then
worked in the coal and wood business in the City of
Billings for a year and had many experiences and
occupations, serving four years as superintendent of
the Big Ditch in Yellowstone County. For three
years he was a member of the Billings police force,
for two years was deputy state humane officer, and
has all the experience and other qualifications of the
capable and trustworthy public official. He served
as deputy sheriff under James Webb in 1907-08.
Mr. Matlock was elected sheriff of Yellow-stone
County in 1914. and was re-elected in 1916 and 1918.
He has acquired a considerable stake in the agri-
cultural life of Montana, owning a farm of three
hundred and twenty acres at Broadview and another
of similar acreage' at Pompey's Pillar. Mr. Mat-
lock, who is unmarried, is affiliated with Billings
Star Lodge of Odd Fellows and Billings Camp
of the Woodmen of the World. Politically he is a
democrat.
Cornelius S. Nelson is editor and proprietor of
the Plentywood Herald, the pioneer newspaper of
Sheridan County and the first paper published in
the Big Muddy Valley. For twelve years the Herald
has been the chief medium for publicity and home
news in this' section of the state, and it is properly
regarded as one of the most valuable of pioneer
institutions.
Mr. Nelson, whose early experiences were farm-
ing and banking before he came to Montana, was
born at Hendrum, Minnesota, March 12, 1876. He
is a son of Sybert and Barbo (Moen) Nelson, the
former a native of Bergen and the latter of Valders,
Norway. They were members of Norwegian fami-
lies of farmers, and both were urged by American
friends to cast in their lot with the new world.
Mrs. Nelson's transportation was paid by some
friends on this side, while Mr. Nelson paid his own
steerage passage. They met and were married in
Fillmore County, Minnesota. Sybert Nelson served
his apprenticeship as a blacksmith in the old country
and followed that trade throughout his active life.
He also accepted the opportunity in Minnesota to
acquire cheap land, and became interested in farm-
ing, owning some developed farms. He retired after
gaining his financial independence. He early took
out citizenship papers, and cast his first presidental
ballot for General Grant and was ever afterward
identified with the republican party. At one time
he served as an alderman of his home town in
Minnesota. He and his wife were members of the
Lutheran Church. Their children were : Maria,
who married A. M. Eckmann and died at Hendrum,
Minnesota; Cornelius S. ; Theodore S., a banker;,
and Anton, a farmer at Hendrum, Minnesota ; Julia,
wife of F. G. Johnson, of Scobey, Montana; Martin,
of Plentywood; and Amanda, wife of A. G. Ueland,
of Outlook, Montana.
Cornelius Nelson lived on a farm to the age of
seventeen, and during that time knew what it was
to work hard and strenuously at manual labor. He
attended country schools, also Concordia College at
Moorehead, Minnesota, and graduated in 1900 from
the Illinois Normal School at Dixon. He also spent
two years at the University of Minnesota. Before
coming to Montana he saw a great deal of the
Middle Western country. At Guthrie, Oklahoma,
he was appointed and served two years as deputy
sheriff under Sheriff Carpenter. On leaving Okla-
homa he returned North, and for three years was at
Crosby and Ambrose, North Dakota, serving as
assistant cashier of banks in those towns.
He came to Plentywood in July, 1908, and his pur-
pose in coming was to establish a paper. For several
months he was busy making arrangements to that
end, and opened his office and issued his first edition
of the Herald on Octobr 23, igo8. His first editorial
announced it as a republican weekly and devoted
particularly to rural development and homesteaders'
news and similar interests. Naturally the paper did
not receive the heartiest welcome from the ranchers,
who had long enjoyed the freedom of the plains
and had exploited the local resources to their own
advantage. However, by the publication of a fair
and clean paper he made friends of ranchers and
homesteaders alike, and his policy and management
have altogether resulted in a great deal of practical
good to the entire locality.
One of Mr. Nelson's first acts on coming to Mon-
tana was to file on a homestead. Luckily this home-
stead adjoins the townsite, and its situation is such
HISTORY OF MONTANA
as to make it available for townsite purposes when
the need for "a greater Plentywood" becomes ap-
parent. Mr. Nelson resides on the homestead, his
home being within the limits of Plentywood.
His early political training was as a republican,
and in 1900 he cast his first presidential ballot for
Major McKinley. He has always regularly sup-
ported the republican nominees. His paper has been
the official city paper of Plentywood ever since the
incorporation of the town. Mr. Nelson was made a
Mason while at Guthrie, Oklahoma, and is now
affiliated with Plentywood Lodge of that order.
At Crosby, North Dakota, July 29, 1908, he mar-
ried Miss Anna Thoreson. She was born at Bran-
don, Minnesota, in August, 1877. Her father, Chris
Thoreson, was born in Norway, came to the United
States in young manhood, and married at Brandon,
Minnesota, a lady of German birth. Chris Thoreson
is a hardware and implement merchant at Mohall,
North Dakota. His children included Mrs. Nelson;
Lena, wife of A. A. Burke, of Greenbush, Minne-
sota ; Mrs. Homer McKenzie, of St. Cloud, Minne-
sota ; Mrs. George Keup, of Columbus, North
Dakota; John and William, of Sherwood, North
Dakota ; Bennie, of Carpio, North Dakota ; Emma, a
teacher at Havre, Montana; and Gladys, of Mohall,
North Dakota.
Mrs. Nelson completed her education in the St.
Cloud Normal School, and taught for several years
in Minnesota. She first met Mr. Nelson while prov-
ing up a homestead at Crosby, North Dakota. She
has done much to insure the success of the Herald
at Plentywood and at times has carried some of the
local work of the office. Both Mr. and Mrs. Nelson
were earnest in their support of war movements,
Mrs. Nelson serving as local chairman of the Red
Cross Chapter. They were reared as Lutherans but
now affiliate with the Congregational Church at
Plentywood.
W. M. Brapford. The Bradfords of Livingston,
Montana, are a branch of one of the oldest fami-
lies in American history. Their ancestry goes back
to the original Mayflower pilgrims, one. of the lead-
ers in which noted band was Governor Bradford.
This particular branch of the family were among
the earliest settlers in the old Northwestern Ter-
ritory, later the State of Ohio, and their particular
talent has apparently been chiefly mechanical, since
nearly all the members of the family in Montana
have followed constructive lines. W. M. Bradford,
of that family, is a veteran railroad man, a car-
penter by trade, and for a number of years has
been supervisor of the bridge and building depart-
ment of the Northern Pacific Railway at Livingston.
His grandfather. Charles Otis Bradford, was
born in 1799 in what three years later became the
State of Ohio. He spent his life in Ohio as a
farmer and died in Hancock County in 1839. He
married Jane Sparr, who was born in Ohio in 1797
and died at Schuyler, Nebraska, in 1891. C. O.
Bradford, father of \V. M. Bradford, was born in
Hancock County. Ohio, April 3, 1839, and during
his early life there followed farming. In 1866 he
moved to Tipton County, Indiana, and there became
a blacksmith and wagon maker. In 1873 he moved
to Schuyler. Colfa.x County, Nebraska, and was a
carpenter and builder. Since 1905 his home has
been at Livingston, Montana, and though now eighty
years of age he is still working as a carpenter for
the Northern Pacific Railway. A republican in
politics, he has been honored with local offices and
is a very active member of the Methodist Church.
In 1863 he enlisted in Company A of the 47th Ohio
Infantry and served throughout the remainder of
the war, taking part in Sherman's campaign around
Atlanta and the march to the sea. The wife of this
veteran soldier was Sarah J. Cornwall, who was
born in Hancock County, Ohio, in 1842. She died
in September, 1919, in Lima, Ohio. The first of
their children, Winslow, died when twelve years
of age. Willis C, the second, is bridge and building
foreman for the Northern Pacific at Livingston.
W. M. Bradford is the next in age. C. Edward is
a Burlington Railway engineer, living at Sheridan,
Wyoming. Robert is a contractor and builder at
Livingston. S. D. is a bridge and building fore-
man for the Northern Pacific at Livingston.
William Oliver is a contractor and builder at Val-
paraiso, Nebraska. Ollie is the wife of Edgar Fus-
selman, a clerk in the bridge and building depart-
ment under W. M. Bradford.
W. M. Bradford was born July S, 1867, while his
parents were living in TiptC'U County, Indiana. He
had just reached school age when they moved to
Nebraska, and he graduated from the high school
at Schuyler in 1888. His active career covers a
period of thirty years. Until i8g6 he was in the
employ of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Rail-
way, beginning as a carpenter, and finally was made
foreman of the bridge • and building department.
In 1896 he joined the Northern Pacific at Living-
ston, again was carpenter for two years, was then
made bridge and building clerk, from that was pro-
moted to bridge and building foreman, and from
1912 has been supervisor of the bridge and building
department with offices in the Northern Pacific
Building on Park Street. In his present position
he has widely extended responsibilities, handling an
average of 150 men and looking after all the work
assigped to his department over a stretch of ap-
proximately 700 miles 'of the Northern Pacific line.
Mr. Bradford is also well known as a Livingston
citizen, having served two years as a member of
the City Council, while in 1915 he was appointed
and served two years as mayor. His administra-
tion was a very progressive one and is remembered
for several important improvements, including the
installation of a garbage system, the paving of
streets and the installation of an ornamental light-
ing system. Mr. Bradford is a republican, is a
trustee of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and
was formerly identified with the Odd Fellows and
Knights of Pythias. He is owner of a modern home
at 102 South F Street.
In Schuyler, Nebraska, Mr. Bradford married
Miss Alice Shaw, born in Nebraska, from which
union two children were born. The oldest was
Louis, who, while employed as a brakeman with
the Great Northern Railway, was killed at Cutbank
at the age of nineteen. The second of the family,
Helen, lives at Seattle, Washington, where her hus-
band is a hoisting engineer. Mrs. Bradford died
in 1894. In 1899 Mr. Bradford married Miss Flor-
ence Roup, who was born in Iowa. The two children
by this union are Harry and Ruth, the former a
junior in the Park County High School and the
latter in grammar school.
Robert B. BR,\DF0Rn, a brother of W. M. Brad-
ford, supervisor of the bridge and building depart-
ment of the Northern Pacific Railway, is, like other
members of the family, a carpenter by trade, and
has built up an extensive business as a general con-
tractor at Livingston.
He was born in Tipton County, Indiana. April
12, 1872, son of C. O. Bradford, now a resident of
Livingston. Robert B. Bradford left the public
schools of Schuyler, Nebraska, at the age of six-
teen and then worked steadily at the carpenter's
trade. He did some contracting while at Schuyler
and in August, 1900, came to Livingston, Montana,
234
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and has been active as a building contractor ever
since. Some of the chief business blocks and pri-
vate residences of Livingston have been constructed
by his skillful and expert organization. For five
years he had charge of a carpenter shop under the
bridges and building department of the Northern
Pacific. A few examples of his work in Livingston
are the Ebert Apartment, the Park Hospital, the
Golden Rule Department Store, the garage of the
United Motors Company, the residences of John
Seaman, S. O. Brady, C. S. Hefferlin and many
others.
Mr. Bradford is a republican, a Methodist, is affil-
iated with the Elks, Woodmen of the World, Mod-
ern Woodmen of America, and also belongs to the
Carpenters' Union. He is regarded as one of the
most loyal and public spirited citizens of Livingston.
In 1805, at Schuyler, Nebraska, Mr. Bradford,
married Miss Cora Spidle, daughter of George and
Jane (Morgan) Spidle, now retired farmers of
Schuyler. Mr. and Mrs. Bradford have three chil-
dren: Lorren, a student in the State Agricultural
College at Bozeman, and George Theron and Virgil,
both students in the public schools at Livingston.
Lewis Terwilliger. Until about five years ago
Lewis Terwilliger was known in several cities and
communities of Montana as a successful educator.
He had taken up teaching probably with the inten-
tion of making it his life work in his native state of
Michigan, and after coming to Montana he was
teacher, principal and school superintendent for a
number of years. After ten years of service as
principal of the Park County High School he re-
signed to take up business,, and now has a pros-
perous abstract and real estate business at Living-
ston, is mayor of that city, is interested in several
industrial corporations, and is one of the best known
Masons and Knights of Pythias in Montana.
Mr. Terwilliger was born in Clinton County,
Michigan, August I, 1869. His paternal ancestors
came originally from Holland and were identified
with the colonial settlement of New York. His
grandfather, Tiras Terwilliger, was born in New
York State in 1809, and afterward moved with his
family to Michigan and was a pioneer settler in
the central part of that state. He died on his farm
in Montcalm County, Michigan, in 1889. His wife
was Abigail Sprague, also a native of New Y'ork.
Homer Terwilliger, father of the Livingston busi-
ness man, was born in New York State in 1841
and died in Clinton County, Michigan, in 1905. He
was quite young when he went to Michigan with
his parents, and after his marriage spent his life
as a farmer in Clinton County. In 1861 he became
a Union soldier, a member of the 8th Michigan In-
fantry, and was all through the war, being four
times wounded in battle and spending six months
in a rebel prison. He was in the battles of Antietam
and the Wilderness, and operated with Burnside's
Division around Knoxville, Tennessee. Politically
he was a republican and was a very devout Meth-
odist. Homer Terwilliger married Lucinda Lewis,
who was born in Michigan in 1846 and died in Clin-
ton County, that state, in i8q6. Lewis is the oldest
of their three children. The other two both live
in Michigan, Lee being a blacksmith at Crystal,
while Asahel is a farmer in Montcalm County.
Lewis Terwilliger received his primary education
in the rural schools of his native county, graduated
from the high school at Maple Rapids in 1887,
and in 1890 graduated in the normal and scientific
departments of Ferris Institute at Big Rapids. In
the meantime and afterward he put in about seven
years as a teacher in Michigan, being assistant prin-
cipal at Maple Rapids two years, principal at Eagle
Harbor three years and principal of the Stambaugh
schools two years.
Mr. Terwilliger came to Montana in 1895, was
principal of schools at Townsend one year, assist-
ant superintendent at Butte one year and three years
principal of the city schools at Boulder. He then
helped organize the Jefferson County High School,
and remained as its principal three years. In 1903
he accepted the responsibilities of principal of the
Park County High School at Livingston, and when
he resigned ten years later it was to identify him-
self permanently with that city as a business man.
For one year he was connected with the First State
Bank, and has since built up an organization of his
own, handling abstracts and real estate, his trans-
actions covering a large part of Southern Montana.
His offices are at 123 South Main Street. Evidently
Mr. Terwilliger is a thorough business man, and
has been more successful financially than most men
•who devote a large part of their time to teaching.
He owns a grain and stock ranch of six hundred
and forty acres two and a half miles southwest of
Wilsall. also has a modern residence at 209 South
Sixth Street in Livingston, and is secretary of the
Yellowstone Valley Land and Irrigation Company
and a director in the Livingston Marble and Granite
Works.
Mr. Terwilliger was elected mayor of Livingston
in April, 1919, for a term of two years. He is a
republican in politics. His Masonic affiliations are
with Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and
Accepted Order of Masons, of which he is past
master ; Livingston Chapter No. 7, Royal Arch Ma-
son, of which he is past high priest ; St. Bernard
Commandery No. 6, Knights Templar, of which he
is past eminent commander; Orient Chapter No. 6
of the Eastern Star, and is past grand patron of
the State of Montana, Algeria Temple of the Mystic
Shrine at Helena, and Livingston Consistory No. I.
In 1919 he received the 33rd degree, the highest
degree in Masonry. He is past chancellor com-
mander of Yellowstone Lodge No. 10, Knights of
Pythias, at Livingston, and as master of arras of
the Grand Lodge of Knights of P>'thias is in line
for the office of grand chancellor of the Grand
Lodge of the state. He is past exalted ruler of
Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks and is a
member of the Livingston Chamber of Commerce
and the Livingston Commercial Club.
In 1896, at Reed City, Michigan, Mr. Terwilliger
married Miss Mary Bennett. Her father, Charles
Bennett, is deceased and her mother now lives at
Salt Lake City, Utah. Mrs. Terwilliger before her
marriage was a teacher in Michigan. She took kin-
derg:arten training at the Ferris Institute in Big
Rapids. Mr. and Mrs. Terwilliger have two chil-
dren : Vena, a graduate of the Park County High
School and a teacher in Park County, and Homer,
a graduate of the county high school and now asso-
ciated with his father in business.
Samuel Mott Souders, M. D. Dr. Souders be-
came a resident of Red Lodge January 19, 1901. He
had recently graduated in medicine and came to
the Northwest highly recommended for his abilities
and talents. He came to Red Lodge as assistant
surgeon for the Northwestern Improvement Com-
pany and later was appointed chief surgeon, though
in the meantime he has built up a large general
medical and surgical practice. Dr. Souders gave Red
Lodge a splendid hospital, a four-story modern hos-
pital building which he erected on Broadway, oppo-
site the postoffice. He owns and directs this institu-
tion, and it has facilities for the accommodation of
<
HISTORY OF MONTANA
from thirty to fifty patients. These patients have
been received from all the Northwestern states,
including Montana, Wyoming, Dakotas and Idaho.
Dr. Souders, who has therefore filled an important
place in the citizenship of Carbon County for the
past eighteen years, was born at Beavertown, Ohio,
May 5, 1873. His original ancestors in the paternal
line came out of Germany to America about the
period of the Revolutionary war, locating in Vir-
ginia. His grandfather, John Souders, was born at
Alexandria, Virginia, in 1800 and moved from his
native state to Ohio, where he followed farming.
He served as a soldier in the war with Mexico in
1846-47. He died at Circleville, Ohio, in 1881. His
wife bore the maiden name of Ann Slater. She was
born in Virginia and died in Circleville, Ohio.
Dr. Souders' father was an honored physician and
spent his entire life in Ohio. For more than half
a century he practiced medicine and surgery at Dean
in that state. He was born at Circleville in 1833
and died at Dean in 1917. He took much interest
in local affairs, filling various offices, and in politics
was a prohibitionist. During the Civil war he was
a surgeon in the Union army. His church member-
ship was English Lutheran. Dr. Samuel Souders
married Jennie O'Neill, who was born in Lancaster
County, Pennsylvania, in 1844 and died at Dayton,
Ohio, in August, 1917. Her mother was a cousin
of General Sherman. Dr. Samuel Souders and wife
had a family of four children. Minnie, the oldest,
has been with the American Red Cross in overseas
work, and in the spring of 1919 was still in Italy
on duty with that organization. She is the widow
of E. W. Darst, who was a prominent minister of
the Christian Church and at one time was pastor
of large churches in Boston, Massachusetts, Chicago,
Illinois, and Berkeley, California. The second child
is Maud, wife of Professor John Heiss, Professor
of Modern Languages at Purdue University in
Lafayette, Indiana. Dr. Souders is third in age,
while Myrtle, the youngest, is a graduate of the
Conservatory of Music at Cincinnati and is instruc-
tor in music at Dayton, Ohio.
Samuel Mott Souders acquired his early education
in the public schools of Dean, attended the Dayton
High School, a preparatory school at Springfield,
Ohio, and in 1S93 graduated with the A. B. degree
from Wittenberg College at Springfield. The follow-
ing four years he spent as principal of the high
school in Van Buren Township of Montgomery
County, Ohio. He then entered the University of
Cincinnati and completed the work of the Medical
College in 1900. He is a member of the Greek letter
fraternity Beta Theta Pi and the Omega Upsilon
Phi medical fraternity. Dr. Souders is a thoroughly
progressive and advanced man in his profession and
spent every summer from 1901 to 1917 in post-
graduate work. The University of Wittenberg con-
ferred upon him the degree A. M. in 1917. He has
also attended surgical clinics in Philadelphia, New
York City, Cincinnati and Chicago. After graduat-
ing Dr. Souders was interne of the Jewish Hospital
of Cincinnati until he came out to Montana. He
has served as health officer of Carbon County and
the City of Red Lodge and is an active member of
the Carbon County Medical Society, being its presi-
dent, of the Yellowstone Valley Medical Society,
the Montana State Medical Society and the American
Medical Association. He also belongs to the Volun-
teer Medical Corps of the United States. Dr.
Souders has acquired some valuable property since
coming to Montana. One is an irrigated ranch of
148 acres on Rock Creek near Red Lodge. He also
has 640 acres of deeded land on Dry Creek and
owns an eighth interest in 1,600 acres where the
Empire Gas and Fuel Company have been drilling
for gas, and also a third interest in a ranch of 200
acres devoted to fruit culture at Fromberg.
Dr. Souders is a republican, was reared in the
Lutheran Church and now affiliates with the Epis-
copal Church at Red Lodge and is a vestryman. He
is a member of the Star in the West Lodge No. 40,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Carbon Chapter
No. 20, Royal Arch Masons, Bear Tooth Lodge No.
534, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
Dr. Souders married Miss Margaret Jones on
December 25, 1901, at Vernon, Texas. Her mother
is still living at Vernon. Her father, the late Thomas
Jones, was a stockman, merchant and townsite pro-
moter at Vernon, was one of the leading pioneers
of Wilbarger County, Texas, served as sheriff of
that county, and organized and promoted several
townsites in the Red River Valley. Dr. and Mrs.
Souders have three children: Mott, Jr., born De-
cember 10, 1905 ; Margaret Elizabeth, born January
12, 191 1 ; and Helen Jeanette, born May 14, 1912.
B. Thorwald Krohne is active head of the real
estate business developed by his late honored father,
Charles O. Krohne, who came to Livingston thirty
years ago and by his business energy and public
spirited devotion to the city's best interests is one
of the men who deserve longest memory among the
upbuilders of this part of the state. The business is
now conducted by B. T. and C. E. Krohne under the
title of C. O. Krohne Sons.
Charles O. Krohne was born in Sweden in 1863.
He died at Livingston August 8, 1917. He was
reared and married in his native country and there
learned the trade of machinist. On coming to the
United States in 1885 he settled in Minneapolis,
where he continued work at his trade. In 1889 he
moved to Livingston, and shortly afterward gave up
his mechanical vocation and established and event-
ually built up one of the leading real estate and
insurance organizations of Southern Montana. He
made his business a source of direct benefit to the
broader prosperity of Livingston and the surround-
ing terri.tory and was always diligent in working for
the city's welfare. He was a man of charitable
instincts and gave liberally of his means and per-
sonal influence to objects and causes outside the
average man's interest. He served as public admin-
istrator for Park County several times. He was a
republican, a member of the English Lutheran
Church and affiliated with Livingston Lodge No.
246, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
Charles O. Krohne married Tekla Johnson, who was
born in Sweden and is a resident of Livingston.
The successors of the honored father are his two
sons, B. Thorwald and C. E. B. Thorwald Krohne
was born at Minneapolis March 8, 1888, but has spent
practically all his life at Livingston. He attended
the public schools, was a student in the State College
at Bozeman until 1908, and the following year at-
tended Phelps Business College, also at Bozeman.
He then took an active part in the business of his
father, also farmed, and since the death of his
father has handled the interests both in town and
in the country. His offices are at 116 East Callender
Street. Mr. Krohne owns a ranch of 700 acres in
the Yellowstone Canyon, a place of forty-four acres
adjoining Livingston, and 320 acres north of town.
He is unmarried, is a republican, a member of the
Lutheran Church, is affiliated with Livingston Lodge
No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks No. 246.
His home is a modern residence at 327 South H
Street.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Charles S. Hefferlin came to Montana in 1882
with the Northern Pacific Railway. A few years
later he graduated from railroading, and began the
work with which his name is destined to be long
associated in Livingston, town builder and business
developer. He has probably done more to develop
the business section of Livingston than any other
individual, and is also a local banker of more than
thirty years of successful experience.
He was born in Easton, Leavenworth County,
Kansas, February 5, 1857. His father, Martin A.
Hefferlin, was born in the Province of Loraine,
France, and on coming to this country lived at St.
Louis, later at Weston, Missouri, and finally at
Wyandotte, Kansas. For many years he was a
merchant. In politics he was a democrat. He died
at Wyandotte in 1875. Martin A. Hefferlin married
Louise Ann Humphrey, who was born in Ohio in
1835 and died at Livingston, Montana, in March,
1901. Several of their sons have become well known
in Montana. The oldest child, M. A. Hefferlin, was
a railroad clerk and died at Wyandotte, Kansas, at
the age of twenty-seven. O. M. Hefferlin was an
early day merchant at Livingston, where he died in
1918. Charles S. is the third in age. H. D. Hefferlin
is proprietor of the Albemarle Hotel at Livingston.
William N. was for many years a merchant and is
now employed as a machinist in the Northern Pacific
shops at Livingston. Ida M., the only daughter, is
a resident of Livingston, widow of John M. Coyan,
a former merchant of that city. J. W. Hefferlin,
the youngest son, is a real estate broker in Liv-
ingston.
Charles S. Hefferlin graduated from the Wyan-
dotte High School in 1872. For three years follow-
ing he worked in the local postoffice and then
became chief clerk in the Wyandotte office of the
Kansas Pacific Railroad. Subsequently he was with
the Kansas Pacific at Ellis, Kansas, spending three
years there and about three years in Denver, Colo-
rado. In 1882 he became cashier of the Northern
Pacific Railroad at Billings, soon afterward was
sent to Custer, and in 1883 arrived at Livingston.
He remained with the Northern Pacific five years
longer, and having in the meantime taken full meas-
ure of the present and prospective advantages of
Livingston proceeded to put his ideas and plans
into effective execution. In 1884 he built the Hef-
ferlin Block, one of the first of many building
improvements which now constitute him probably
the largest property owner in Park County. In
1882 he built the Merchants Bank Opera House
Building, and the following year organized the bank-
ing institution, which for thirty years has been
owned and conducted by him and is at once one of
the oldest and most conservative and successful
banking institutions in Southern Montana. He
started the bank with a capital of $25,000, while
today it has $100,000 capital and is patronized by
many of the leading business men and business cor-
porations of the state. This bank in 1900 opened
the first distinct department for small savings de-
positors in Livingston.
In 1882 Mr. Hefferlin built the Hefferlin Opera
House, and in later years the Auditorium Block, the
Callender Block, Electric Block, Holly Block, and
he built and equipped the Livingston Flour Mills in
1898. Fully a score of business structures in Liv-
ingston have been built and owned by him. He
was one of the organizers and principal promoters
of the Electric Hot Springs Company to develop
the resources of the Corwin Hot Springs as a
popular health resort.
Mr. Hefferlin has given much of his time and
means to promote the best interests of his home
community. For the past four years he has served
as chairman of the Board of County Commissioners
of Park County. He was a member of the Eighth
Session of the Legislature from Park County and
is a former member of the City Council and Board
of Education. He is active in the Chamber of
Commerce and the Commercial Club, and is a former
member of the Alasonic fraternity.
Mr. Hefferlin has a ranch of 400 acres on the
Mission, and at the present time is owner of twenty-
five store and business buildings in the heart of
Livingston. He also has a modern home at 220
South Yellowstone Street.
October 13, 1887, at Livingston, he married Miss
Florence M. Holliday. She was born at Winterset,
Iowa, daughter of Samuel L. Holliday, who became
well known in ^lontana as a pioneer merchant,
rancher and stockman. He died at Livingston in
1917. Mr. and Mrs. Hefferlin have two children :
Charles H., a graduate of the Park County High
School, is now cashier of the Merchants Bank,
having been associated with his father in that institu-
tion for several years. Marie, the only daughter,
is still at home.
Ward Higley Nye. An educator of exceptional
gifts and experience. Ward Higley Nye was called
from a position as superintendent of one of the
finest school systems in Ohio to the superintendency
of the city schools of Billings, and in that work has
fulfilled all the expectations entertained of his ability
as a school administrator. His influence as an
educator is not confined to Billings, since he is a
member of two of the most important organizations
affecting the state school system, the State Board
of Education and the State Te.xt Book Committee.
Mr. Nye was born at Windsor in Ashtabula
County, Ohio, May 24, 1872. His paternal ancestors
were originally from Denmark, going from there to
England, and thence coming to Massachusetts in
colonial times. His grandfather, Hezekiah Nye,
was a Connecticut Yankee, born in 1823, and when
a young man went to the Western Reserve of Ohio
and established his home in Ashtabula County. He
was a farmer and died at Orwell, Ohio, in 1884.
He married Mary Baldwin, a native of Ohio.
Frank Nye, father of the Montana educator, was
born in Ashtabula County in 1849 and has spent his
active life as a farmer in that county. He is now
living retired at Orwell. He is a republican and
an Odd Fellow. His wife, Frances Higley, was born
at Hartsgrove in Ashtabula County in 185 1. They
had two sons, Ward H. and Aymer. The latter
resigned in 1919 as postmaster of Orwell to resume
his active business career.
Ward H. Nye attended the rural schools of
-Ashtabula County, was graduated in 1893 from the
New Lime Institute at New Lyme, Ohio, sjlent two
years in Western Reserve University at Cleveland,
paying his way by teaching in the city night schools,
and in 1901 graduated A. B. from Oberlin College
in Oberlin. Ohio. In the intervals of his busy
career as a teacher he has taken post-graduate work
at Harvard University.
Mr. Nye began teaching when seventeen years of
age in one of the country districts of Ashtabula
County. He continued that work for two years
while advancing his own education, spent one year
as a teacher in New Lime Institute, for two years
was principal of the village school at North Bloom-
field, Ohio, and after graduating from college was
for two years principal of the Oberlin High School,
for one year principal of the high school at Urbana,
Ohio, and before coming to Montana was for five
years superintendent of schools of the City of
y (/^ <7^^^*^^^t>^Z,:r^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
237
Oberlin. He was elected superintendent of schools
at Billingi in 1908 and for over ten years has been
in charge of the city school system. Superintendent
Nye has under his supervision twelve schools, a
staff of 120 teachers, while the scholarship enroll-
ment is 4,00a.
He has been a member of the State Te.xt Book
Committee of Montana for seven years, and for
eight years a member of the State Board of Educa-
tion, having first been appointed by Governor Norris
and reappointed by Governor Stewart. He is a
member of the Montana State Teachers Association
and the National Education Association, and is active
in the Billings Midland Club, which incorporates the
Chamber of Commerce. Politically he is independent
and is a member of the Congregational Church. He
has active fraternal affiliations with the Masonic
Order in Ohio, including membership in Hartsgrove
Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Urbana
Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, Elyria Commandery,
Knights Templar, and Al Koran Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Cleveland.
July 2, 1895, at New Lyme, Ohio, Mr. Nye married
Annie Belle Rathbone, daughter of Dr. A. G. and
Priscilla (Watson) Rathbone. Her mother is still
living at New Lyme, Ohio. Her father spent his
active life as a physician and surgeon in that Ohio
village. !Mr. and Mrs. Nye are the parents of two
sons, Paul, born June 24, 1896, spent three years in
the State Agricultural College at Bozeman and is
now in the real estate business at Billings, and
Howard, born February 6, 1905, is a pupil in the
public schools.
Andrew Lewis Guthrie. Much of the history of
the community of Reed Point in Stillwater County
revolves around the name and personality of Andrew
Lewis Guthrie, the pioneer merchant there, formerly
postmaster, and for many years active as a rancher
there and elsewhere in Montana.
Mr. Guthrie, a Kentuckian by birth, has been a
resident of i\Jontana for nearly thirty years. He
was born in Wayne County, Kentucky, March 28,
1866. His paternal ancestors were colonial settlers
in Virginia from Scotland. His father, Stephen A.
Guthrie, was born in Clinton County, Kentucky, in
1834 and died in that county in 1906. He spent his
life as a farmer, was a democrat, gave much atten-
tion to his church duties as a Methodist, and was a
member of the Masonic fraternity. He married
Martha J. Southerland, who was born in Wayne
County, Kentucky, in 1835, and died in Clinton
County March 16, 1890. Most of their large family
of children, eleven in number,' have lived in Ken-
tucky. However, Aaron, the oldest, went to Texas
and was a farmer there until his death. Margaret
died in Clinton County, as did also her husband, J.
S. Bell, a merchant. Marshall was a Wayne County,
Kentucky, farmer and died there. J. Thomas is a
farmer in Clinton County. Abijah died in childhood.
The sixth in age is -'\ndrew Lewis. Robert also
became a well known Montana resident, was a
farmer, and was serving as sheriff of Stillwater
County when he died at Columbus in 1914. Allen
S. is the other of the three brothers who are resi- '
dents of Montana, and he is a stockman in Sweet-
grass county. Viola is the wife of Cicero Owens,
of Wajme County, Kentucky. Laura lives in Clinton
County in her native state, widow of Carter Stephen-
son, who was a merchant. Zelma is the wife of
Cecil Harrison, a farmer in the State of Washington.
Andrew L. Guthrie attended rural schools in Clin-
ton County, Kentucky, and lived on his father's farm
until he was twenty-one years of age, On coming
to Montana in 1890 he had some employment at Big
Timber, but late in the same year went to Lewistown
and spent four years as an employe of B. C. White.
He then returned to the Big Timber district and
was for ten years in the sheep business there.
Air. Guthrie then homesteaded ten miles southeast
of Reed Point, and he still owns that quarter section.
Many of his interests, however, have been closely
identified with Reed Point, where he owns a hun-
dred lots on the townsite and in 1906 established the
pioneer general store. This was a small stock of
goods, but Mr. Guthrie was a popular as well as
capable merchant and his business has grown and
prospered until it is one of the leading stores in
Stillwater County. He also owns the building in
which it is conducted and a large garage and a
residence.
Mr. Guthrie served as postmaster of Reed Point
for nine years under the Roosevelt administration.
However, he is a democrat in politics. He is
affiliated with Reed Point Lodge of Masons, and
also with the Odd Fellows.
In 1899, at Bozeman, Montana, he married Miss
Sophia Brumfield, daughter of James and Luthena
(Patten) Brumfield. Her mother is living at Reed
Pomt and her father was a farmer and died near
Bozeman. Mrs.. Guthrie is the present postmaster
of Reed Point. To their marriage were born seven
children : Vinton L., manager of his father's garage;
Robert, Alice and Arthur, all attending public
schools; Lucile, Gail and Rex Pershing, the babies
of the family.
Theodore J. Benson, M. D. No profession has
more emment men connected with it than that de-
voted to the practice of medicine and the safeguard-
ing of the nation's health, and Alontana has its fair
share of these practitioners, who not only are an
honor to their calling, but also to their country,
for without exception they are excellent men and
worthy citizens. One of the best examples of this
class is Dr. Theodore J. Benson, physician and sur-
geon, who is engaged in an active practice at From-
berg.
Doctor Benson was born at Northfield, Minnesota,
July 29, 1873, a son of Olaf Benson and his wife,
Bessie (Johnson) Benson, and grandson of John
Johnson, born in Sweden. John Johnson died near
Redwing, Minnesota, soon after coming to the
United States, at a period antedating the birth of
Doctor Benson. Olaf Benson was also born in
Sweden in 1828, and he died at Northfield, Minne-
sota, in 1914. Reared in Sweden, he there learned
the blacksmithing trade, and after coming to the
United States in the early '50s, at which time he
located at Northfield, Minnesota, he continued to
work at it, being the pioneer blacksmith of that
region. Having served in the Swedish army, he
was a trained soldier, and when the Civil war broke
out he volunteered, but was not called into the
service. Having come to the United States in search
of personal liberty, from the time he secured his
naturalization papers he voted the republican ticket,
finding in the principles of that party the epitome of
his own views. The Lutheran Church held his
membership and had his support until his death.
His widow survives him and makes her home at
Northfield, Minnesota. Mrs. Benson was born in
Sweden in 1841. Their children were as follows:
Nelson, who resides at Michigan, North Dakota, is
a druggist; Amanda, who married Ebenezer Bevins,
resides at Minot, "North Dakota ; Anna, who rnar-
ried Frank S. Stone, an insurance agent, resides
at Minneapolis, Minnesota: Doctor Theodore J., who
was the fourth in order of birth ; Ella, who married
John Schumm, a merchant tailor, resides at North-
238
HISTORY OF MONTANA
field, Minnesota; and Oscar, who is conducting the
homestead near Northfield, Minnesota.
Theodore J. Benson attended the rural schools of
Rice County, Minnesota, and was graduated from
the Northfield High School in 1895, following which
he was engaged in farming in Rice County and at the
same time continued studying, having decided to
become a physician, and subsequently matriculated
in the University of Minnesota at Minneapolis, from
which he was graduated in 1904, with the degree of
Doctor of Medicine, having earned all of the money
necessary for his courses. Doctor Benson is a
close student and annually attends clinics at Min-
neapolis, Minnesota, and Rochester, New York, so
as to keep abreast of his profession, especially in
surgery, in which he specializes. During 1904 he
was interne in the Swedish Hospital at Minneapolis
and during 1905 was engaged in practice in that
city. In 1906 he came to Fromberg, Montana, and
has the distinction of being the pioneer of his pro-
fession in this locality. He owns his office building
and modern residence on Montana Avenue, From-
berg. In addition to his city property Doctor Ben-
son owns a ranch of 140 acres of land near
Fromberg. Independent in his political views, he
has served as Mayor of Fromberg and is now on
the school board. He affiliates with the Methodist
Episcopal Church. Fraternally he is a member of
Fromberg Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, and Fromberg Lodge, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows.
In 1908 Doctor Benson was married at Billings,
Montana, to Miss Iva Cliff, a daughter of Moses
and Harriet (Smith) Cliff, of Ingram, Wisconsin,
where Mr. Cliff is a merchant. Mrs. Benson was
a graduate of the high school of Glenwood, Wis-
consin, and the Ashbury Training School for
Nurses, having been a registered nurse prior to her
marriage. She died February 6, 1918. Doctor and
Mrs. Benson had the following children: William
Cliff, who was born September 24, 1909; Anton
John, who was born May 8, 191 1; and Theodora,
born December s, 1915.
Arie W. DeGroot since coming to Montana from
North Dakota has directed most of his energy to
banking, and for several years has been cashier and
manager of what is now the Stillwater Valley Na-
tional Bank at Absarokee.
Mr. DeGroot was born at Three Oaks, Michigan,
September 29, 1884. His father, Gerrit DeGroot,
was born in Holland in 1840, and married Margaret
Sweinenberg, who was born in the same country
in 1843. They came to America in 1866 and settled
at Three Oaks. Michigan. Many thousands of Dutch
people have colonized in Michigan, but Gerrit
DeGroot was the first Hollander to locate in the
locality of Three Oaks. He spent the rest of his
life as a farmer there and died in 1910, and his
widow is still living at Three Oaks. He was a
republican and an active member of the Dutch Re-
formed Church. Their children were: Anna, un-
married and living with her mother; Jennie, wife of
Joseph A. Baker, who is a foreman in the Clark
Equipment Company at Buchanan, Michigan ; Minnie,
wife of Abram Sikkenga, of Kalamazoo, Michigan;
Alexander, a farmer at York, North Dakota;
Johanna, w^ho died at Three Oaks at the age of
thirty-nine; Gerrit, a salesman of electrical goods
at Detroit, Michigan : Arthur, a farmer at Three
Oaks ; and Arie W.
Arie W. DeGroot attended public school at Three
Oaks, graduating from high school in 1901, and
completed his sophomore year in Kalamazoo College.
After two years of work on the home farm he went
out to York, North Dakota, in 1905, farmed there
one year and for two years was deputy county treas-
urer of Benson County. Mr. DeGroot came to
Montana in 1908, and for a year his principal head-
quarters were at Glasgow. He then entered the
Columbus State Bank at Columbus as bookkeeper,
and after nine months had attained such efficiency
that he was given the post of assistant cashier of
the Bank of Absarokee and for two years was
manager of that institution. On resigning he spent
three years as representative of the Oregon Mort-
gage Company at Three Forks, Montana, looking
after their farm loans. He then returned to
Absarokee and has since been manager and cashier
of the Still\yater Valley National Bank. O. H.
Hovda established this bank as a private institution
in 1909. It became the Stillwater Valley State Bank
in 1915 and in 1917 the Stillwater Valley National
Bank. F. E. Runner, a prominent rancher of the
Stillwater Valley, is president, H. N.. Howland is
vice president, with Mr. DeGroot filling the office
of cashier and responsible manager. The bank has
a capital of $25,000 and has earned surplus and
profits of $10,000.
Mr. DeGroot is also half owner in a ranch of
320 acres fifteen miles northwest of Absarokee, and
has a modern home in town. He is a republican, a
member of the Presbyterian Church, is affiliated
with Stillwater Lodge No. 62, Ancient Free and
.Accepted Masons, at Columbus, and Billings Lodge
No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
He married at Columbus in 1913 Miss Lillian
Jacobs, a daughter of M. A. and Anna (Cornell)
Jacobs, the latter now deceased. Her father is a
property owner and proprietor of the Monumental
Works at Columbus. Mrs. DeGroot is a graduate of
the Montana State College at Bozeman. They have
two children : Duncan, born February 5, 1914, and
Frances, born April 26, 1915.
Ernest A. Logan. Through practically all of his
business life Mr. Logan has been identified with the
Red Lodge State Bank, of which he is cashier and
a director. He finished his education at Red Lodge,
and at the age of twenty-one was appointed clerk of
the City School Board and served continuously for
fourteen years, until he resigned in April, 1919. He
is one of the 3'ounger business men carrying the
chief responsibilities in the van of progress.
He was born at Van Meter, Iowa, May 8, 1884.
The Logan family is of Scotch-Irish ancestry. His
grandfather, Alexander Logan, was born in Ohio
in 1836 and was a carpenter and contractor, a busi-
ness he followed for many years at Van Meter,
Iowa. In the fall of 1898 he located at Gebo, Mon-
tana, where he continued to follow his business until
his death in 1898. Thus three generations of the
Logan family have been identified with Montana.
Alexander Logan was a Union soldier during the
Civil war. He married Hulda Adams, who was born
in Ohio and died at Gebo, Montana.
T. M. Logan, father of Ernest A., was born in
Ohio in August, i860, but was reared and married in
Iowa, where he took up his father's business as a
carpenter and contractor. From Van Meter in that
state he moved to Bridger, Montana, in April, 1898,
and in 1901 located at Red Lodge. Practically every
lartre and important piece of building construction
in Red Lodge was handled by him and his organiza-
tion. He continued to make his home at Red Lodge
until his death. He died at Billings Anril 18. iot6.
while on his way to the Hot Springs at Thermopolis,
Wyoming. He served several terms as alderman in
Red Lodge, and for a number of years was a mem-
ber of the School Board, was a republican and an
HISTORY OF MONTANA
239
active supporter of the Christian Church. J. M.
Logan married Wessie Ritchey who was born in
Iowa in 1866 and is now living at Billings. She is
the mother, of five sons : Hubert D., a carpenter
and builder* at Twin Falls, Idaho ; Ernest A. ; Kline
R., who is employed by the Northwestern Improve-
ment Company at Red Lodge ; Jack M., who went
overseas with the Army of Occunation and after
the armistice became superintendent of the army
school at Coblenz, Germany ; Harold F., who was
also overseas as a sergeant in the Medical Corps.
Ernest A. Logan began his education in the public
schools of Iowa and graduated from the Red Lodge
High School in 1906. For one year he was employed
by the Northern Pacific Railway Company, and then
accepted a clerkship in the Red Lodge State Bank.
Later he was promoted to assistant cashier and since
1914 has been cashier of the bank and a stockholder
and director. He is secretary of the Carbon Build-
ing and Loan Association, is independent in politics,
a member of the Christian Church, Star in the West
Lodge No. 40, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Red Lodge Camp of the Modern Woodmen of
America, the local aerie of the Fraternal Order of
Eagles and the Eastern Star. Mr. Logan resides at
2iy Nutting Avenue. He also has some property
interests near Chicago, Illinois.
At Chicago June 8, 1910, he married Miss Mabelle
I. Shane, daughter of M. S. and Fannie ( Rumary)
Shane. Her parents are residents of Lombard, Illi-
nois, her father being a retired salesman. The three
children of Mr. and Mrs. Logan are Ernest A., Jr.,
born September 30, 1912; Norman R., born April
30, 19JS; and Mabelle I., born June 15, 1917.
Vard Smith. Conspicuous in the roll of names
of men who have conferred honor upon the legal
profession in Montana is that of Vard Smith, of
Livingston. He has a great versatility of talents,
and exactness and thoroughness characterize all his
attainments and work. He is regarded by all who
know him well as an attorney of superior force and
ability. In all the relations of life he has so met
his responsibilities as to win the sincere respect of
all with whom he has come in contact.
Vard Smith is the scion of one of the sterling old
families of this section of the country, his father,
John T. Smith, being one of the strongest lawyers
and most eminent citizens of the state. John T.
Smith, who retired from active participation in busi-
ness on December 31, 1916, sold his ranches here on
April 16, 1919, and Will hereafter make his perma-
nent home in San Diego, California, though he
expects to return to Livingston during the summer
months. The following fitting tribute to this grand
old man appeared in the Big Timber Pioneer in May,
1919:
Announcement is made from Livingston that the
Hon. John T. Smith, dean of the Eastern Montana
Bar Association, has quit — not retired, just quit.
The finale came last week, when all that he possessed
in the agricultural line — horses, cattle, machinery,
etc. — went under the hammer to the highest bidder.
Nearly thirty years ago John T. Smith, with about
six foot six of muscular angularity, landed in Liv-
ingston, swung his shingle to the breeze and began
to expound the doctrines of Blackstone and Kent.
He did well. Fortune did not smile upon him; he
just embraced fortune. For years he handled North-
ern Pacific town lots and agricultural lands, and
here and there gathered in a quarter, a half or a
whole section of land in what is now the famous
Shields River Valley, at not to exceed $2.50 an acre.
He saw the future possibility and grabbed it. In
time he branched out in an agricultural way and.
Vol. n— 18
as the late Judge Henry said in introducing him at
a press banquet, became a lawyer among farmers
and a farmer among lawyers.
Time, however, sang its requiem. Three years ago
he realized that he was gradually being horned
away from the legal feed trough by young blood.
With a foresight that had carried him through days
of adversity he gathered the main horner into the
fold, formed the firm of Smith, Gibson & Smith, and
retired to the ranch. Law to him was a memory,
but interest in public affairs never lagged. . . .
But it is ended. The Livingston daily announces
that the Hon. John T. has sold his 3,700 acres of
land for $20 per acre. . . . He has also disposed
of his personal holdings at fancy prices and will
hereafter spend the summers in Livingston and the
winters in California.
And so begins the closing chapter in the meteoric
career of one of the grand old men of Montana.
Hereafter it will be just the Hon. John T. Smith, not
a lawyer among farmers, or a farmer among law-
yers; just plain John T. Smith — full of years, wit,
satire, eloquence and red-blooded Americanism ; a
lawyer among lawyers ; a farmer among farmers ; an
orator among orators ; a prince among princes ; a
man among men.
Vard Smith was born at Butler, Missouri, on May
10, 1885, and came with his father to Livingston
when but a boy. Here he received his elementary
education, graduating from the Park County High
School in 1904. Having determined to make the
practice of law his life work, he then entered the
law department of the University of Nebraska at
Lincoln, where he studied two years. While there
he became a member of the Greek letter fraternities,
Alpha Tau Omega and Plii Delta Phi. He was
admitted to the bar in 1908 and has since applied
himself assiduously to the practice of his profession
at Livingston. He was first admitted to the firm of
Smith, Gibson & Smith, of which his father was
the senior member, and since the latter's retirement
the firm has been known as Gibson & Smith, the
senior member of the present firm being Fred L.
Gibson, who is referred to specifically elsewhere in
this work. Mr. Smith applies himself to both the
criminal and civil branches of legal practice and
has met with splendid success. He is dignifying and
honoring his profession by his able services and is
today numbered among the leaders of a bar noted
for the high order of its talent.
Politically Mr. Smith is a democrat and has
given faithful allegiance to his party. • In 1912-13 he
served as county attorney. He is a member of the
Park County Bar Association, the Montana State
Bar Association and the American Bar Association.
He is an active member of the Masonic fraternity,
holding membership in Livingston Lodge No. 32;
Livingston Chapter No. 7, Royal Arch Masons ; St.
Bernard Commandery No. 6, Knights Templar, and
the Eastern Montana Consistory of the Scottish
Rite, thirty-second degree.
On December 20. 1916, at Livingston, Vard Smith
was married to Carolyn Davis, daughter of W. E.
and Martha (Valentine) Davis, the former of whom
is a successful contractor and builder at Livingston.
Mrs. Smith is a graduate of the Park County High
School and is a lady of many estimable qualities, a
popular member of the social circles in which she
moves. To Mr. and Mrs. Smith has been born one
child, John Davis, born September 26, 1918.
Arthl'R J. HuFFER first saw Livingston more than
thirty years ago, worked as a ranch hand in that
section of Montana for a time, and later home-
steaded and developed a ranch and farm and is
240
HISTORY OF MONTANA
still extensively interested in ranching in Southern
Montana. His chief business for the past three or
four years has been a garage at Livingston, an
extensive business conducted under the name Hufifer
Garage and Motor Company.
Mt. Huflfer was born in Bedfordshire, England,
December 2, 1871. His father, William Huflfer, was
born in England in 1816 and died at Sussex in 1899,
spending all his life in his native country, and his
business was that of merchant. He was a member
of the Church of England. His wife, Mary, was
born in 1822 and died in Sussex in 1885. Arthur
was the fifth in a family of six children and the
only one in America. The fourth, a daughter, is
deceased, and the others, Frederick, Elizabeth,
Charles and Samuel, are all living in England.
Arthur J. Huffer had the equivalent of a high
school education in Sussex, England. He left
school at the age of seventeen and in 1888 arrived
at Livingston, Montana. For two years he rode the
range as a cowboy. He then went to the mining
district of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, and operated an
air compressor there a year, until the big strike
demoralized the industry of that locality. Returning
to Livingston, he homesteaded 160 acres twelve miles
east of Livingston, and lived on that for ten years.
Subsequently he moved his ranching headquarters
to Mission Creek and continued there until 1916.
He still owns 360 acres of irrigated land on Mission
Creek.
On coming to Livingston in 1916 Mr. Huflfer en-
gaged in the garage business at the corner of Main
and Clark streets with W. D. Stevens as partner.
His partnership continued until 1919. In June of
the present year the handsome and well equipped
garage was completed, covering floor space of loox
140 feet, one of the largest institutions of its kind
in the state. The Huflfer Garage & Motor Company
is now incorporated with Lon T. Swan, president ;
William L. Klipstein, vice president; A. J. Huflfer,
manager and treasurer ; and George W. Root, secre-
tary. It does a general garage business, aflfording
storage for individual cars and also a general livery
service. They handle supplies of accessories and
are local distributors for the Stearns, Knight and
Oakland cars and the International trucks.
Mr. Huflfer is a member of the City Council of
Livingston. Politically he is a republican, and is a
member of fraternal bodies and civic organizations
including Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, Livingston Chapter No. 7,
Royal Arch Masons, Livingston Consistory No. I
of the Scottish Rite, Algeria Temple of the Mystic
Shrine, Zephyr Camp No. 151, Woodmen of the
World, Tourist Homestead Brotherhood of Ameri-
can Yeomen, Chamber of Commerce and Commercial
Qub and the Railway Club of Livingston.
Mr. Huflfer's modern home is at 328 South E
Street. He married at Livingston in December,
1907, Mrs. Catherine L. Hodges. She was born in
Ireland.
Lon T. Swan, who is president of the Huflfer
Garage & Motor Company at Livingston, has for
years been a factor in improving the strain of cattle
in Southern Montana, is an extensive ranch owner
and Hereford breeder, and member of an old estab-
lished family in Montana.
He was born at Navarre, Ohio. July 25. 1868. His
paternal ancestors came originally from the Neth-
erlands and settled in Pennsylvania. His father,
Enos Swan, was born in Ohio in 1836, was reared
in that state, was married in Indiana, and in 1861
joined an Indiana three months' regiment and after-
ward reenlisted with an Ohio Regiment and was
all through the war. He was in the battles of
Shiloh, Vicksburg, Lookout Mountain and Mission-
ary Ridge, and for a short time was a prisoner.
Several years after the war he brought his family
to Montana and was a contractor in the .vicinity of
Manhattan, in Gallatin County. For one year he
was also on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation. In
1876 he moved to Chico and founded a butcher and
packing establishment. In 1879 he went to his
ranch on Trail Creek, and in 1882 moved to Port-
land, Oregon, where for twenty-six years he was
a member of the police force and was then in the
real estate business. He died at Portland in 1917.
He was a Grand Army man and very active as a
republican. Enos Swan married Mary Jones, born
in Indiana in 1839 and now living at Chico, Mon-
tana. Viola, the oldest of her children, is the wife
of Andrew Dahlberg, a farmer at Portland, Oregon.
Lon is the second in age. Edward is owner of a
garage and engineer in the mines at Butte. Grace
is the wife of Richard Devoe, a rancher near Emi-
grant.
Lon T. Swan lived on his father's ranch to the
age of thirteen, and after that was a cowboy riding
the ranges in Park County. At the age of twenty
he began ranching for himself in Park County. For
a number of years he has been raising grain on his
property south of Livingston, and has also been in-
te.ested in the production of high grade cattle. In
1014 he formed a partnership with Geoige J. Allen
for raising high grade stock, and that partnership
continued until Mr. Allen retired on account of age.
.'\t the present time Mr. Swan specializes in pure
bred Hereford cattle. He has a fine herd of these
white faced cattle on his ranch of twelve hundred
acres eleven miles south of Livingston. Allen &
Swan formerly owned thirty-five hundred acres, but
sold it in February, 1919.
Mr. Swan owns a town home at in South Sixth
Street. He is a member of the Chamber of Com-
merce and Commercial Club at Livingston, is a
republican, and is affiliated with Livingston Lodge
No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
Livingston Chapter No. 7. Royal Arch Masons ;
Livingston Consistory of the Scottish Rite,
Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena,
Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks, Silver Tip
Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
In 1888, at Livingston, he married Miss Edna
McLaughlin, a daughter of H. E. and Margaret
(Benjamin) McLaughlin. Her parents are now de-
ceased. Her father was a railroad contractor in
Montana and afterward a rancher. Three children
have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Swan : Leonard,
a student in the Park County High School, and
Donald and Albert, both grammar school students.
C. R. Ryan. The leading business interests of
the thriving Western cities are largely in the hands
of men still in the very prime of life and in posses-
sion of their youthful enthusiasms and capabilities
for hard work and long hours. The opportunities of
these centers in a country still in the process of
development are of such a nature as to attract to
them the very best of the youth of our land, and
as a result there is an alertness and quicknes.s of
perception not to be found in the older communities.
Men in the West acquire wealth before old age
overtakes them, and consequently they are still
venturesome enough to avail themselves of openings
more mature business men, restrained by conserva-
tism, might let pass, and so they and their com-
munities benefit. Laurel, Montana, is one of these
thriving cities which is growing by leaps and bounds
and which reflects in its progress the character of
the men who are doing business in its midst. A
man who has developed with the city and assisted
HISTORY OF MONTANA
241
in its advance very materially is C. R. Ryan, sole
proprietor of the Laurel Creamery, whose products
have a ready sale throughout Yellowstone and Car-
bon counties.
C. R. Ryan comes of good old Irish stock, his
paternal grandfather, Michael Ryan, having been
born in the Emerald Isle, from whence he came in
young manhood to Ontario, Canada, and there be-
came a prosperous merchant, dying before the birth
of his grandson, C. R. Ryan, which occurred in
Saginaw County, Michigan, July 21, 1885, to which
locality his father M. H. Ryan, had come in young
manhood from Ontario, Canada, where he was born
in 1861. M. H. Ryan was a blacksmith by trade,
and is now serving as sheriflf of Midland County,
Michigan, where he has resided for a number of
years, being elected by a large majority on the
republican ticket. He is a Mason and Modern
Woodman, and a very prominent man in his com-
munity. The mother of C. R. Ryan bore the maiden
name of Clara Hankin, and she was born at Sagi-
naw, Michigan. She and her husband had but one
child.
C. R. Ryan was reared at Saginaw, Michigan,
attending the schools of that city and the High
School of Freeland, Michigan, following which he
became a student of the .-Xgricultural College at
Lansing, Michigan, where he took a special course
m butter making. After completing his traming in
that respect Mr. Ryan traveled in the West, visiting
Colorado, Nevada, Utah and Montana, and finding
in the state last named the conditions he desired
he engaged with the Billings Creamery, at Billings,
Montana, in igo8, remaining there until 1913, when
he came to Laurel, buying an interest in the Laurel
Creamery. In 1915 he became the sole proprietor,
and now owns the business and the building on Main
Street in which the plant is located. He manufac-
tures butter and ice cream of superior quality, and
takes a pride in keeping his products up to the high
standard he has raised. Mr. Ryan also owns his
convenient modern residence in Laurel, and all of
his interests are centered in this city, so that he
takes an active and forceful part in the work of
the Commercial Club, of which he is a member.
He has served as a member of the City Council, and
is independent in his political views.
On June 6, ipn, Mr. Ryan was united in marriage
with Miss Rilla Sanford at Midland, Michigan. She
is a daughter of Ward V. and Nellie (O'Donnell)
Sanford, the mother being a sister of I. D. O'Donnell
of Billings, Montana. Ward V. Sanford was a grain
buyer and owned an elevator at Freeland, Michigan,
where he died in 1912, his widow surviving him and
maintaining her residence at Freeland. Mrs. Ryan
is a graduate of the University of Michigan. The
children of Mr. and Mrs. Ryan are as follows :
Ward S., who was born August 31, 1912, and Jean,
who was born August 28, 1914.
Lewis C. Babcock is president of the Yellowstone
National Bank of Billings and is a young banker
and business man in every way worthy of the
responsibilities and honors achieved by his father,
the late Albert L. Babcock, of whom he is the only
son and child.
A Montanan whose services figured largely in the
history of Billings for over thirty-five years, the
late Albert L. Babcock was one of the fortunate men
of the Northwest, but his fortune consisted not
alone in what he could personally enjoy but in
achievements and institutions which are permanent
and which still remain as part of the solid business
fabric of Billings and vicinity.
.Mbert L. Babcock was born at -'\lbany. New York,
December 22, 1851, a son of William C. and Julia
(Lawrence) Babcock, also natives of New Y'ork
State. Albert L. Babcock was reared in New York,
worked on his father's little farm, attended district
school, and served an apprenticeship from the age
of fourteen in a country printing office. He also
clerked in a country store, and the family having
in the meantime moved to Illinois in 1873 he joined
his capital with that of a friend and established the
grocery firm of Babcock & Lobdell at Pontiac. He
was one of the proprietors of a successful business
in Illinois until 1882.
Mr. Babcock in the latter year identified himself
with the young city of Billings, and he and A. W.
Miles established the pioneer hardware house of
Babcock & Miles. This grew into a large and
important establishment, corresponding to the
growth of Billings and the development of the sur-
rounding territory. In '892 the A. L. Babcock
Hardware Company was organized and in 1902 the
business was sold to the Billings Hardware Com-
pany. Later Mr. Babcock organized the Babcock-
Frazer Company, and was its president.
The late Mr. Babcock was one of the men who
organized the Y'ellowstone National Bank in May,
1891. This institution succeeded the Bank of Bill-
ings, which had been in existence five years. Colonel
Babcock was the first vice president of the bank and
in 1893 became president, an office he held until his
death on July 6, 191 8.
His enterprise touched and stimulated the busi-
ness life of Billings at many points. In 1895 he
erected the Y'ellowstone Valley Flouring Mill, which
was later incorporated as the Billings Milling Com-
pany, with Mr. Babcock as president, the plant being
sold in igio to a milling company of Minneapolis.
In 189s he erected the Billings Opera House and
was its manager until 1906. During 1907 he built
the Babcock Office and Theater, one of the finest
business blocks in the state, and including a beauti-
fully appointed theater. He organized the Billings
Telephone Company in 1895, and was president of
the company until the plant was sold to the Bell
Telephone interests.
A. L. Babcock was a tower of strength to the
republican party of Montana, though politics was
only incidental to his exceedingly busy career. He
was chairman of the County Central Committee of
Yellowstone County, was chairman of the Board
of Commissioners of the county from 18S5 to 1889,
and was the first senator from Yellowstone County
elected after the admission of Montana to state-
hood in 1889. He was a member of the Lower
House from 1892 to 1894, and was in the Senate
from 1894 to 1898. He served with the rank of
colonel on the staff of several governors. He was
a member of the Chamber of Commerce and was
prominent in fraternal organizations, including Ash-
lar Lodge. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons;
Billings Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; Aldemar
Commandery, Knights Templar, of which he was
one of the organizers; Algeria Temple of the Mys-
tic Shrine, and was affiliated with the Knights of
Pythias and Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks. He served as grand commander of the
Knights Templar of Montana in 1894. He was the
first exalted ruler of the Billings Lodge of Elks.
September 12, 1877, A. L. Baljcock married Miss
Antoinette Packer, of Pontiac, Illinois. She was
born in New York State in 1852 and is still living
at Billings.
Lewis C. Babcock was born at Pontiac. Illinois,
in 1878, and was four years old when his parents
came to Montana. He attended the public schools
of Billings, in 1892 entered the Montana Military
School at Deer Lodge, and in 1805 became a student
in the Shattuck Military Academy at Faribault, Min-
242
HISTORY OF MONTANA
nesota. He graduated in June, 1899, from this
splendid school as captain of Company A, the senior
company of the academy, having risen from the
ranks through the various grades of corporal, ser-
geant, first lieutenant to captain. Mr. Babcock fin-
ished his education by two years in the University
of Chicago, and in 1901 returned to. Billings and
entered the A. L. Babcock Hardware Company. In
1903 he became identified with the Yellowstone
National Bank, beginning in the collection depart-
ment, later was bookkeeper, then cashier, and in
igo8 was promoted to vice president, and after the
death of his father was made president. The Yel-
lowstone National Bank at the beginning of 1919
entered a beautiful new home, a bank building of
classic architecture and of commodious and modern
arrangement. The bank is the oldest in Yellow-
stone County, with resources and capital equal to
those of any bank in the state.
Mr. Babcock is also associated with many other
interests formerly handled by his father. He is
secretary and treasurer of the Babcock-Selvidge
Company, a prominent real estate firm. He is a
trustee and secretary and treasurer of the Midland
Club, is an independent in politics, is affiliated with
the Episcopal Church and is a member of Ashlar
Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Bill-
ings Consistory of the Scottish Rite, Algeria Temple
of the Mystic Shrine and Billings Lodge of Elks.
In January, 1901. at Chicago, Lewis Babcock
married Miss Josephine Twyman, daughter of Jo-
seph and Caroline S. ('Stevens) Twyman. Her
father, now deceased, was an artist. Her mother
is living at Philadelphia. Mr. and Mrs. Babcock
have two children, Lawrence Twyman, born August
30, 1906, and Caroline Antoinette, born May 26, 1913.
C. M. KuTZNER has developed a successful busi-
ness as a wholesale lumber broker at Billings. His
experience in the lumber business may be said to
have covered his entire life, since he grew up in
the atmosphere of the lumber woods of Wisconsin,
and his father and grandfather before him were
lumbermen all the way from the woods to the fin-
ished products.
Mr. Kutzner was born at Eau Claire. Wisconsin
March 10, 1886. His father, F. G. Kutzner, was
born in Germany in 1837, and about 1847 his parents
came to Canada and in 185 1 settled in Wisconsin.
The grandfather was a worker in the lumber woods
of Wisconsin and died at Eau Claire. F. G. Kutzner
early acquired efficiency in the lumber business, was
a scaler and grader, and followed all branches of
the lumber business. He died at San Diego, Cali-
fornia, in 1914. His first vote as an American citi-
zen was cast for Abraham Lincoln at the begin-
ning of the Civil war. He was an active member
of the Congregational Church and affiliated with
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. On Janu-
ary 17. 1871, at Kilbourn, Wisconsin, F. G. Kutzner
married Addaline C. Hubba'd, who is still living at
San Diego. She v/as born in 1849 on the state line
between Illinois and Wisconsin. Besides C. M.
Kutzner the only other living child is Dorothy C,
wife of H. F. Kates, a mail carrier in San Diego.
C. M. Kutzner acquired a public school education
at Eau Claire, Wisconsin, graduating from high
school in 1004. He then became an office boy with
the John S. Owen Lumber Company at Eau Claire,
and was with the firm for three years. After learn-
ing stenography in night school he was made as-
sistant bookkeeper. For eight months he was a
stenographer with the Northwest Paper Company
at Cloquet, Minnesota, then for five years was
stenographer in the offices of the Cloquet Lumber
Company, and came to the Northwest and spent
three years with the Dover Lumber Company at
Dover, Idaho. Mr. Kutzner has been established at
Billings since 1915, and his offices as a wholesale
lumber broker are in the Security Building.
He is unmarried, is a republican, a member of
the Congregational Church, and is affiliated with
.Ashlar Lodge No. 29, .\ncient Free and Accepted
Masons, and with the United Commercial Travelers.
E. H. KuYKENDALL IS a lawyer of successful ex-
perience, with ■ abilities that have won him a large
practice and good position in the bar of several
states, but since locating at Billings has given his
time to the development and maintenance of the
Billings Business College, one of the finest schools
of its kind in the Northwest.
Mr. Kuykendall was born at Mount Vernon,
Illinois, June 6, 1876, and descends from a family
that originated in Holland and were colonial set-
tlers in New York. His father, James A. Kuyken-
dall, was born at Mount Vernon, Illinois, in 1841
and spent his active life as a farmer in that state.
He is now living retired at Illiopolis, Illinois. He
is a democrat, has been honored with several town-
ship offices, is a teading member in the Baptist
Church and is affiliated with the Independent Order
of Odd Fellows and the Modern Woodmen of
-■Xmerica. James A. Kuykendall married Elizabeth
Ralph, who was born at Madison. Indiana, in 1847
and died at Mount Pulaski, Illinois, in 1915. They
had a family of seven children: .\dolphus, a rail-
way section foreman living in Illinois ; Frank, a
farmer at Illiopolis ; John, a Nebraska farmer ; E.
H. Kuykendall, the fourth in age : Carrie, wife of
Fred Cheek, a railway employe at Mount Pulaski,
Illinois ; Maggie, wife of C. R. Reed, a farmer
near Racine, Wisconsin ; and Stella, a resident of
Oklahoma.
E. H. Kuykendall attended the country schools of
Mangamon County, Illinois, and graduated LL. B.
from the law department of the Illinois Weslevan
L'niversity in 1898. For three years he practiced
law at North Bend, Nebraska, and then went to
Oklahoma Territory and for eight years was con-
nected with the bar of Muskogee. He also practiced
for a time at Pittsburg, Kansas, and in 191; came
to Billings and bought the Billings Business College.
This college, of which Mr. Kuykendall is president,
was established in 1910 by Miss Frances Miller.
Mrs. Kuykendall is secretary and treasurer 'of the
college and the vice president is J. F. Farrell, The
college has handsome quarters on the second floor
of the new Yellowstone National Bank Buildine,
and its facilities are in every way in keeping witn
its splendid environment. The students come from
the states of Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota
and Wyoming, eighteen states altogether being rep-
resented in the student body.
Mr. Kuykendall is a republican in politics, a mem-
ber of the Congregational Church, and is affiliated
with Ashlar Lodge. Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons ; Billings Chapter, Royal Arch Masons ;
Aldemar Commandery, Knights Templar, and Bill-
ings Lodge, Knights of Pythias.
He married at Muskogee, Oklahoma, in 1912 Miss
Hallie Gearhart, a native of Kansas. They have one
daughter, Ruth, born June 13, 1018.
Hf.nrv J. Calhoun had the first automobile
owned by any resident of Columbus. He was a
pioneer liveryman in that city, and when the auto-
mobile became popular he naturally gravitated into
the garage business and today owns and operates
one of the most popular establishments of that kind
in the Yellowstone Valley.
Mr. Calhoun was born near Penn Yan in Yates
J/^l^^^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
243
County, New York. November 15, 1866, and comes
of a family especially well known in the State of
Iowa, where he grew up and where he lived until
he came to Montana. The Calhouns were colonial
settlers in New York. Mr. Calhoun's grandfather,
Charles C. Calhoun, was born in New York State,
was a farmer there in pioneer times, and later fol-
lowed his son to Iowa and died in Calhoun County,
that state, at the advanced age of ninety-nine years,
nine months and eight days.
Calhoun, County, Iowa, was named in honor of
its pioneer settler, Charles Calhoun, who was born
in Yates County, New York, in 1839 and died at
Lake City, Iowa, in 1904. He had been a farmer in
his native county, but after his marriage he moved
out to Iowa and because of his early settlement and
his popularity and prominence in- that locality the
county was given his name. He followed farming
■ in Calhoun County until he retired to Lake City.
Politically he was a republican. His wife was
Obera Moore, who was born in New Y'ork in 1841
and died in Calhoun County, Iowa, in 1879. She
was the mother of the following children : Emma,
who died at the age of twenty-four in Lake City.
Iowa; Mary, who died at the age of ten years;
John, a farmer in Calhoun County, Iowa ; Ida. wife
of S. B. Zane, a real estate broker of Lake City;
.\bbie, who since the death of her husband. John
Wingerson. has rented their farm and lives at Lake
City ; and George, who was a farmer and railroad
man and died at Lake City at the age of forty.
Henry J. Calhoun grew up on his father's farm
in Iowa, and attended the rural schools through
the eighth grade. He possessed some of the pioneer
instincts of his father and at the age of fifteen.
in the spring of 1882. he left the old farm and
came out to the far Northwest, the Yellowstone
Valley of Montana. He was soon working as a
cow [)uncher, and as a cowboy he rode the ranges
for fifteen years. In 1896 he established the pioneer
livery stable at Columbus, and for twenty years
was in partnership with W. P. Adams. In 191 3
he opened his garage and is today proprietor of a
thoroughly equipped establishment, the building for
which was erected in 1017 and stands diagonally
opposite the Stockmen's National Bank. The garage
is a two-story building 50 by 140 feet.
Mr. Calhoun served as a member of the City
Council of Columbus for the last ten years. He is
also an active member of the Columbus Chamber
of Commerce, is a democrat and in religion a Cath-
olic. Besides his garage business he owns two
dwelling houses and his own modern home and has
two ranches of 320 acres on Shane Creek. Conse-
quently he has prospered since coming to Montana
and is a thoroughly enthusiastic Montana citizen.
In 1892, at Columbus, he married Miss Mary La-
velle. daughter of Patrick and Margaret (O'Brien)
Lavelle. Her father was one of the pioneer busi-
ness men of Columbus. Mr. and Mrs. Calhoun have
five children and two of the sons responded patriot-
ically to the demands of the country at war and
were soldiers. The oldest child. Celia. died when
si.x years old. John, who was born March I. 1895,
was educated in the public schools of Columbus, has
been associated with his father in business, and on
April I, igi8, enlisted and was sent to train with
the Aviation Corps, first at San Antonio. Texas,
then in Arkansas, and finally at Wilbur Wright
field at Dayton. Ohio. He was mustered out Feb-
ruary 12, 1919. The second son. Bernard, born
February 15. 1898. is a graduate of the Columbus
High School, spent four years in the University
of Minnesota, and a year before graduating from
the law department he joined the Medical Corps and
saw service at Camp Grant. Illinois. He is a young
man of brilliant mind and has undoubtedly a splen-
did future. The two youngest children are Francis,
born in 1907, and Ruth, born in 1909, both at home
and attending public school at Columbus.
MosE Little. As superintendent of the Main
Range Mine in the East Butte district, Mose Little
is actively and prosperously identified with one of the
more important industries of Montana, economists
telling us that mining is one of the three chief
sources of all the wealth in the world, the others
being agriculture and fisheries. A son of Joseph
Little, he was liorn October i, 1871, on the Isle of
Man, the home of his ancestors for many years.
The birth of Joseph Little occurred on the Isle of
Man in 1849. He was a sailor during his earlier
years, but turned his attention to mining after leav-
ing the sea. Immigrating to the United States in
1886, he located at Central City, Colorado, and was
engaged in mining pursuits in that vicinity for
twenty years. Returning then to the Isle of Man,
he has since resided there, beiqg retired from active
pursuits. While in Colorado he supported the prin-
ciples of the republican party. Religiously he is a
member of the Church of England, and fraternally
he belongs to the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. His wife, whose maiden name was Mary
Quane, spent her entire life on the Isle of Man,
her birth occurring in 1845 and her death in 1880.
Four children were born of their union, as follows :
Mose, of whom we write; David, who served in
France for two years during the World war, being
mustered out in 1919; George, of whom all trace is
lost ; and Joseph, of Seattle, Washington.
Completing his early education in the public schools
of Colorado, Mose Little began life for himself as
an underground miner in Colorado. Coming to Butte,
Montana, in 1893, he worked as a common miner two
years, being in the employ of John A. Leggat, and
the ensuing five years was with the Heinze Mining
Company. For four years thereafter he was suc-
cessfully engaged in business on his own account,
leasing mines and prospecting, and was later with
the North Butte Mining Company as a miner until
1912. In that year he became associated with the
Pilot Butte Mining Company, which was merged into
the Tuolumne Company, under the name of the
Main Range Mine. On March i. 1919, Mr. Little
accepted his present position as its superintendent,
and in its management is very successful, the 125
miners in his employ being well acquainted with
the work required of them.
Mr. Little married in Anaconda. Montana, in 1897,
Miss Annie Gill, a daughter of Thomas and Annie
Gill, neither of whom are now living. Mr. and Mrs.
Little have three children, namely : Edward, a sta-
tionary engineer; Mary, a graduate of the Butte
Business College, is a stenographer for the Mon-
tana Electric Company; and Montana, attending the
public schools. Religiously Mr. and Mrs. Little are
valued members of the Episcopal Church. Polit-
ically Mr. Little is a stanch republican. Fraternally
he is a member of Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, of Butte; of Butte Con-
sistory; and of Butte Camp No. 153, Woodmen of
the World. Mr. and Mrs. Little have an attractive
residence at 735 East Mercury Street, East Butte,
the latchstring being ever out to their friends and
acquaintances.
J. M. Freeman. America is the land of oppor-
tunity, and provided a man possess the requisite
qualities no limit is placed upon the success to
which he may attain. With the development of the
Western States new fields of endeavor have been
opened up. and to them have come not only men
244
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of unusual capabilities from the East, but also
those from other countries. J. M. Freeman, gen-
eral manager and vice president of the Montana
Coal' and Iron Company, with headquarters at Bill-
ings, is a man who has developed with this section,
and was brought here from England by his parents.
J. M. Freeman was born at Wigan, England, De-
cember 12, l88g, a son of William Freeman, who
was also born at Wigan, England, in 1857, where
he was reared and where he worked as a coal op-
erator. In the pursuit of his calling he visited the
United States twice, and then decided to locate per-
manently in this country, coming here for the last
time in 1894 and settling at Red Lodge, Montana,
where he was engaged in coal mining Until his retire-
ment. He still resides at Red Lodge. At one time
William Freeman served in the English army. He
was married to Mary A. Robinson, born in England
in 1856, and their children are as follows : William
R., who is a superintendent of mines owned by the
Montana Coal and Iron Company; Anna, who mar-
ried William Beadle, a farmer in the vicinity of
Roberts, Montana ; Jennie, who married William
Shepard, a ranchman in the vicinity of Roberts,
Montana ; Helen, who married H. A. Simmons,
county attorney of Red Lodge, Montana; T. H.,
a master mechanic at Washoe, Montana; J. M.,
whose name heads this review ; Florence, who
married R. W. Wadsworth, of Bear Creek, Mon-
tana; Miss R. L., who is a stenographer for the
above mentioned company; Ethel, who married J. V.
Williams, of Washoe, Montana; and Edith, who
is at home.
As he was only a small child when his parents
brought him to Montana, J. M. Freeman has been
reared in this state, and attended the comrnon
schools, also for one year attended the Butte High
School and for two years was a student of the Red
Lodge High School, leaving in 1905 to engage with
a sub-contractor on Government work for a year. In
1907 he formed connections with the Montana Coal
and Iron Company, which he still maintains, begin-
ning as a clerk, and as he learned the details of
the business being successively promoted until in
1913 he was made general manager, and a little later
was elected vice president. The headquarters of the
company are at Billings, and Thomas M. Kearney
is its executive head. The mines are located at
Washoe, Montana, with a capacity of 1,500 tons
per day, and the company has another mine at
Foster Gulch, one mile south of Bear Creek,
Mr. Freeman having supervision over all the mines
and the 400 men employed in working them. The
coal produced is a high grade semi-bituminous
quality.
In 1913 Mr. Freeman was married at Red Lodge,
Montana, to Miss Anna C. Flaherty, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. J. T. Flaherty, of Red Lodge, where
Mr. Flaherty is engaged as a coal operator. Mr.
and Mrs. Freeman have three children, namely:
Anna C, who was born in January, 1915; George
F., who was born in April, 1916, and Evelyn M.,
who was born in May, 1919. Mr. Freeman is in-
dependent in his political views. A practical man,
he understands every detail of his work, and is
able to give to it an intelligent and sympathetic
supervision, impossible in one who had not grown
up in the company.
Walter B. Innks. Though only a few years
resident in the state, Walter B. Innes is known all
over Montana on account of the services he ren-
dered during the war as district fuel administra-
tor, with full and complete charge of the produc-
tion and distribution of coal in twelve northern
counties of Wyoming and all of Montana. It was
volunteer work — Mr. Innes was not even a "dol-
lar a year man." It took most of his time from
his private business, and there was endless execu-
tive detail to tax his energies and patience.
The success of the fuel administration as a whole
was due to the policy of selecting practical coal
men for its administration. Mr. Innes knows the
coal business from the standpoint of a number
of years' successful experience. In a short time
he has built up a thriving wholesale coal business
at Billings, and since 1918 has been secretary of the
Western Coal Producers' Association.
Mr. Innes was born at Alameda, California, Sep-
tember 13, 1887, a son of Alexander and Susan
Beecher (Hartwick) Innes. His mother was of
the same family as Henry Ward Beecher and that
distinguished connection. His grandfather, Mitchell
Innes, was a native of Scotland and brought his
family to Ontario, Canada, in pioneer times, spend-
ing the rest of his life in that province. Alexan-
der Innes, who was born at Edinburgh, Scotland,
in 1832, came with his parents to America in young
manhood, and in 1850 crossed the continent to
California. He was a miner and later a farmer and
dairyman, owning a large amount of land. He
lived at Alameda, where he died in 1900. He had
served as city recorder, was i republican, a mem-
ber of the Presbyterian Church and a Mason.
His widow, now living at Alameda, was born in
New York State in 1855. Their children num-
bered six : George A., a lumberman, died in South-
ern California, aged forty-two ; C. E., in the whole-
sale jewelry business, died at Los Angeles at
thirty-four; Sarah, who died at San Rafael, Cali-
fornia, aged thirty; Arthur G., a dairyman at Ala-
meda : and Walter and Warren, twin brothers, the
latter in the lumber and shingle business at Eureka,
California
Walter B. Innes after completing his junior year
in the Alameda High School spent three years in
British Columbia and acquired a knowledge of the
lumber business all the way from the stump to
the counting room. He then traveled over Cali-
fornia as a lumber salesman, and came to Mon-
tana in March, 1914, joining the Nelson Coal Com-
pany at Great Falls. This company made him its
sales manager at Billings in June, 1918, though for
the greater part of that year his time was taken
up with his duties as district representative of the
fuel administration. March i, 1919, he engaged
in the wholesale coal business for himself under
the name W. B. Innes & Company, with offices
in the Electric Building. He is general sales agent
for the Foster Bear Creek coal.
Mr. Innes is a republican voter, is affiliated with
the Methodist Church and is a member of Oak
Grove Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
in California. His home is at 120 North Thirtieth
Street, Billings. June 23. 1917, at Great Falls, he
married Miss Margaret Clark. Her mother, Mrs.
Mary E. Clark, is a resident of Great Falls.
Warren A. Dedrick. Every year is bringing into
increased prominence the work of Warren A.
Dedrick as a Montana architect. Examples of his
professional skill are found in many of the cities
and towns of the state, and several large structures
in Billings, where he has his home and headquarters,
were planned and the building work supervised by
him.
Mr. Dedrick is a son of D. W. Dedrick, a promi-
nent building contractor of Montana. His father
was born in Texas in 1854, grandson of the founder
of the family in America, who came from England.
D. W. Dedrick spent his boyhood days in Texas,
Missouri and Colorado, and in 1898 located at Mis-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
245
soula, Montana, and in the following year came to
Billings. He has developed a large business as a
contractor and builder and erected many of the
business and residence structures at Billings and
elsewhere. He is independent in politics, is affiliated
with Billings Star Lodge of Odd Fellows, Billings
Camp of the Modern Woodmen of America, and is
one of the leading business men of the city. D. W.
Dedrick married Emma Underwood, who was born
in Jeffersonville, Indiana, in 1858. They had four
children. Bertha, who died at Billings in X903, was
the wife of Albert Carrier, now a merchant at Big
Timber, Montana. Mr. and Mrs. Carrier had two
children, Fred being a rancher at Big Timber and
married and the father of one child, Albert, and
Lawrence, still at home. Charles E. Dedrick was
a merchant and died at Billings in 1913, and by his
marriage to Eleanor Hutton, who is still living at
Billings, left one child, Dorothy, who died in 1917.
The third in age is Warren A. Dedrick. The young-
est, Henry, a resident of Tacoma, Washington,
served as a sergeant in the National Army and was
mustered out in February, 1919.
Warren A. Dedrick acquired his education in the
public school of Billings, graduating from high
school in 1908. He was born at Hot Springs, South
Dakota. May 3, 1891, and has lived in Montana since
early childhood. After leaving high school he
learned architecture by work in an architect's office
and also studied the art in the University of Michi-
gan, where he graduated in 1914 with the certificate
of architecture. While at university he became a
member of the Kappa Beta Psi Greek letter fra-
ternity. Mr. Dedrick opened his office at Billings in
1914, and has been engaged in the general practice
of his profession five years. Some of the best
examples of his work are to be found in public
school buildings. He also drew the plans for the
Midland Fair Association buildings and grounds ;
was architect for the Losekemp Memorial Building
for the Polytechnic Institute at Billings; for the
Court House at Stillwater. Montana ; the high schools
at Hardin and Chouteau, Montana, and Worland
and Greybull, Wyoming, and has also done con-
siderable other work in Wvoming. He is a member
of the City of Billings Park Board.
Mr. Dedrick's offices are in the Securities Building
and his modern home is at 941 North Thirty-first
Street. He is independent in politics and is affiliated
with Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, and with Billings Star
Lodge No. 41 of the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows.
March 23, 1915, at Billings, he married Miss Lila
F. Rhoads, daughter of Dr. John and Catherine
(Works) Rhoads, the latter now deceased. Her
father is a farmer near Laurel, Montana. Mr. and
Mrs. Dedrick have two children, Warren A., Jr.,
born August 13, 1916, and Adena, born October 30,
1918.
Sam Fefferman is a citizen whose career is a
credit to America and its institutions and govern-
ment. He came to this country a young lad, bare-
foot, without money, with many other handicaps,
and in achieving success has never lost sight of his
obligations and patriotic duties. He was one of the
men who contributed most generously in proportion
to his resources to the cause of the great war. and
he did that modestly and always with a sense of his
boundless obligation to th? country which made him
what he is and never with a feeling that he had
overpaid his debt.
Mr. Fefferman, who has built up a large and pros-
perous business as a dealer in hides, wool, fur and
metals at Billings, was born at Poduloesky, Russia,
September 23, 1885. His father. Manual Fefferman,
was born in the same locality in 1849, and lived there
until his death in 1897. He was a farmer and later
a cattle dealer, was well educated, and an active
member of the Jewish faith. His wife, Esther
Learn, was born in Russia in 185 1 and is living at
Billings. Pessie, the oldest of her children, resides
in Cleveland, Ohio, widow of Albert Kaufman, who
was a teacher in Russia, came to the United States iif
1884, followed merchandising and died at Minne-
apolis in igo2. Eva, living at Minneapolis, is the
widow of Isador Lawn, a merchant tailor of that
city who died in 1919. Adolph is a merchant at
Chicago and Morris is in the mercantile business at
Great Falls. Montana.
Sam Fefferman, youngest of his father's children,
came to the United States with his widowed mother
in 1897. He was then twelve years of age. While
in Minneapolis he attended night school and made
his living by peddling papers and doing other work.
He acquired a practical English education and since
the age of si.xteen his experience has been in the fur
business. He worked one year for Gordon &
Ferguson, furriers, at Minneapolis. Coming to
Billings in 1902, he began on an exceedingly modest
scale as a dealer in hides, fur, wool and metal, and
has made his the chief enterprise of the kind in
Southeastern Montana, his trading connections cover-
ing a radius of fully 800 miles around Billings.
He has his business headquarters at Twenty-sixth
Street and Minneapolis Avenue, and is sole owner
and proprietor, having eighteen people in his employ.
Mr. Fefferman is prominent in the Hebrew Syna-
gogue at Billings, is a member of the B'Nai B'Rith,
was treasurer for two years, in 1917-18, until the
growth of his business compelled him to give up
this office, and is still an official in the order. He
is a republican in politics. His modern home is
at 707 North Twenty-fifth Street. Mr. Fefferman
married at Billings in 1907 Miss Annie Samuel.
Her parents came from Russia and her mother is
now living in Canada. Her father was in the cotton"
business and died in 1900. Mr. and Mrs. Feflfer-
man have two children, Rosie, born July 10, 1913,
and Addie, born October 22, 1916.
Edward M. Svbert. secretary and general manager
of the A. W. Miles Lumber & Coal Company, has
been actively associated as a right hand man with
Mr. Miles at Livingston for nearly twenty-five years.
His steadfast devotion to business, his good judg-
ment, his vision and his executive control have been
responsible for the success of many broad laid plans
by the Montana capitalist.
Mr. Sybert was born at West Monterey, Pennsyl-
vania, December 12, 1862, and comes of a family of
long lived ancestors. His father, Jacob Sybert, was
born at West Monterey in 1834, spent his active
life there as a merchant, and is now living retired
at the age of eighty-five. He is a democrat in poli-
tics and has served as justice of the peace. He is
a Methodist in religion and is affiliated with the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Jacob Sybert
married Mary Jane Coe, who was born at West
Monterey in 1838 and is now past eighty years of
age. In a family of nine children Edward M. was
the fourth and the only one in the Northwest, most
of the others living not far from the scenes of their
childhood. Albert, the oldest, and Perry, the second
son, are oil well drillers and producers, the former
still at Monterey and the latter at Williamstown,
West Virginia. Daniel, the third in age. is an oil
well contractor at Mars, Pennsylvania. Samuel, the
next younger than Edward, is an oil operator living
246
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Cleveland, Harry is an oil well contractor at
Clarksburg, West Virginia, Merton owns a moving
picture show at Moundsville, West Virginia, Oscar
is also in the motion picture business at Marietta,
Ohio, and the youngest of the family, Delia, is the
wife of John McCarty, who is in the automobile
business at Detroit.
Edward M. Sybert finished his education at the
Grove City College in Western Pennsylvania, and
at the age of sixteen began teaching in his home
district. He was a teacher there for seven years.
Seeking the larger opportunities of the West, he
went to Leadville, Colorado, in 1887, but in June
of the same year arrived in Montana and joined his
uncle, G. M. Coe, in the Shields River Valley. From
1893 to 1896 Mr. Sybert was an employe of the
Albemarle Hotel at Livingston, being manager when
he resigned. He became associated with A. W.
Miles as bookkeeper in the spring of 1897, and since
that date there has been no division or break in his
steady allegiance and devotion to the business of
his employer and associate. When the A. W. Miles
Company was incorporated in 1901 he was made
secretary and treasurer, and for a time had general
oversight over the business management of this
general mercantile organization. In 1903 he became
manager of the lumber department, and when in
January, 1914, the lumber and coal business was
separated and incorporated as the A. W. Miles
Lumber & Coal Company Mr. Sybert withdrew from
the older corporation to become general" manager
and secretary of the lumber and coal company. He
is the man chiefly responsible for the broadening and
extension of the service of this corporation.
While always busy Mr. Sybert has answered many
calls to outside interests. From 1899 until 1916 he
was clerk of the Livingston School Board, has also
been a member of the City Council, and has long
been prominent in fraternal circles. He is affiliated
with Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Livingston Chapter No. 7, Royal
Arch Masons, St. Bernard Commandery No. 6,
Knights Templar, Orient Chapter No. 6 of the
Eastern Star, Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine,
and Scottish Rite Consistory, and has filled offices
in practically all the Masonic bodies at Livingston
He is also a member of the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, the Woodmen of the World, the Elks
and the lumbermen's organization, the Hoo Hoos.
Ir 1892, while living in the Shields River Valley,
Mr. Sybert married Miss Margaret E. Johnson.
They are the parents of two daughters. Myrtle
Edna, the older, is the wife of Hon. Don D. De-
laney, a resident of Chicago. Mr. Delaney was
formerly private secretary to Alschuler and Baker,
judges of the Court of Appeals of the United
States, and is now privately practicing law. He
served as a first lieutenant in the World war. Flor-
ence Madeline, the younger daughter, is in the senior
class of the Park County High School.
Owen J. Thomas. Montana as a great agricul-
tural state furnishes a great volume of business
to the manufacturer of agricultural implements and
machinery, and practically all the standard com-
panies have representation here through local sales
agencies or branch houses. There is probably no
grain district in the state where the J. I. Case
Threshing Machines are unknown. The principal
distributing agency for these machines, which have
been a standard of perfection with threshermen for
two generations, is at Billings. The manager of
the branch house at that point is Owen J. Thomas,
who has had a long and active experience in the
farm implement business both as a salesman and
collection manager.
Mr. Thomas was born at Lime Springs, Iowa,
August 19, 1876. His father, H. W. Thomas, was
born at Menibridge, Wales, June 24, 1847, grew up
at his native town and married there, and in 1872
came to the United States and settled at Utica,
New York. The following year he located on a
farm at Lime Springs, Iowa, and is now living
there retired. For many years he has been a man
of prominence in his locality, holding township
offices and in every way using his influence for
local betterment. He is a republican and a member
of the Presbyterian Church. H. W. Thomas mar-
ried Elizabeth Jones, who was born October 13,
1847, at Llangaffo, Wales. Owen J. Thomas was
fourth in age in a family of eight children, all of
whom have done exceedingly well in life. The
oldest child, W. H. Thomas, is a judge of the
.Appellate Court of the State of California, with
home at Los Angeles ; L. R. Thomas is a contractor
and builder at Mclntyre, Iowa; H. H. Thomas is
in the real estate business at Los Angeles ; Eliza-
beth A. is the wife of W. R. Jones, a large prop-
erty owner and real estate man at Lime Springs,
Iowa ; Margaret is the wife of George H. Thomas,
a railway conductor on the Soo Line Railroad, living
at Hankinson, North Dakota; R. H. Thomas is as-
sistant sales manager with the Standard Oil Com-
pany at Fargo, North Dakota; and Jennie, the
youngest, is the wife of Tom Michaelson, agent
for the Soo Line Railroad at Nacoma^ North
Dakota.
Owen J. Thomas acquired his education in the
public schools of Lime Springs, graduating from
high school in 1893. His experience in the imple-
ment business covers practically a quarter of a
century, beginning with a local implement house at
Lime Springs. A year later he went to the home
office of the Piano Manufacturing Company at
West Pullman, Illinois, starting as a mechanic in
the construction of mowers and binders and eventu-
ally being promoted to assistant inspector of all
the work of the factory. In the spring of 1899
tlie company sent him to eighteen different states,
looking after calamity cases. During 1901-02 he
was with the Deering Harvester Company of Chi-
cago, being located in that city in 1901 and as sales-
man in Iowa and North Dakota during 1902. In
1903 occurred the consolidation of a large group
of implement manufacturers, including the Osborne
Harvester Company, the Wardin-Bushnell-Glesner
Harvester Company, the Milwaukee Harvester Com-
pany, Deering Harvester Company and the Mc-
Cormick Harvester Company into the International
Harvester Company. Mr. Thomas remained with
this organization as collector from 1903 until Feb-
ruary 28, 1904, when he joined the J. I. Case Thresh-
ing Machine Company's organization.
His first work as a salesman was with the Fargo
branch, covering Minnesota, North Dakota, South
Dakota and Montana. June 19, 1906, he was pro-
moted to manager of the collection department at
Fargo, handling collections in Minnesota, North
Dakota, and in Montana to Billings on the Northern
Pacific and to Malta on the Great Northern Rail-
way. The last stage in his promotion occurred in
December, 1912, when he was moved to Billings
and was made manager of the branch, which stand-
ing alone is a business of great magnitude and
one of the important assets of the commercial dis-
trict of Billings. The plant and offices are at
2203-2217 Montana Avenue, and forty employes are
under the supervision of Mr. Thomas, who has
full charge of both the sales and collectian de-
partments.
While essentially a business man, with no aspira-
tions for political preferment, Mr. Thomas has
HISTORY OF MONTAiNA
actually exercised a large and beneficent influence
in the affairs of several communities. At Billings
he is a member of the school board and chairman
of the finance committee. Since coming to Mon-
tana he has been urged to run for several promi-
nent offices, including that of mayor of Billings
and governor of the state. Politically he is a re-
publican. He is one of the prominent members of
the First Presbyterian Church, being an elder. He
is past chancellor commander of Billings Lodge
No. 58, Knights of Pythias, a member of the United
Commercial Travelers, is affiliated with Ashlar Lodge
No. 29, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Bill-
ings Chapter No. 6, Royal Arch Masons, Billings
Consistory of the Scottish Rite, and the Eastern
Star Lodge. He is also a trustee of the Rotary
Club, is president of the Billings City Club and
a former member and trustee of the Chamber of
Commerce. For two years he was a director of
the American Bank and Trust Company of Billings,
and is now vice president of the Midland Empire
Fair Association and is vice president of the Dea-
coness Hospital. As a Presbyterian layman he is
on the executive commission of the Presbyterian
Board of the State of Montana and was a com-
missioner from Yellowstone Presbytery to the Gen-
eral Assembly at Columbus, Ohio, in 1918. He is
treasurer of the anti-saloon league of this state,
was a member of the recruiting board of the
Young Men's Christian Association for the states
of Montana and Wyoming during the World war,
and is now a director of the local Young Men's
Christian Association. Out of eight western states
he was selected one of five in February, 1919,
to manage the Young Men's Christian Association
work in France, but had to decline the honor. His
wife shares with him in his prominence as a church
worker.
Mr. Thomas and family reside at 308 North
Thirty-third Street. He married at Jamestown,
North Dakota, September 16, 1903, Miss Eunice
Pauline Somsen, daughter of John and Antonia
(Grooteboer) Somsen. Her parents live on a farm
at Jamestown, North Dakota. Mrs. Thomas is a
graduate of the Lime Springs High School. They
have three children ; Elizabeth Merle, born July
21, 1904; Mildred Josephine, born June 29, 1910;
and Margaret Antonia, born May 26, 1916.
Harry Allen Stevens has become a factor in
the enterprise of the new town of Rapelje as
manager of the local business of the McCaul Web-
ster Elevator Company of Minneapolis.
Mr. Stevens was born at Anoka, Minnesota, June
30, 1894. His maternal ancestors came from Eng-
land to New York in colonial times and were pioneers
in the State of Maine. His father, Henry B.
Stevens, was born in Maine in 184.S and married
in that state Augusta Barker, who was born in
Maine in 1854. Henry B. Stevens moved out to
Minnesota about 1880 and for a number of years
was in the contracting business at Anoka, where
he died in 1918. He was a democrat in politics
and a member of the Methodist Church. His
widow is still living at Anoka. She was the mother
of five children : Cora, who is the principal of
schools at South Tacoma, Washington; William F.,
connected with the Soo Line Railroad as a con-
tractor; Mrs. Nanna Johnson, who died at Min-
neapolis in 1917, wife of a railroad man of that
city; Harry Allen; and David, a harness maker by
trade, who lives with his mother at .^noka.
Harry A. Stevens graduated from the high school
of Anoka in 1912, and he spent one year as a
teacher in South Dakota. For eight months he
was connected with the General Electric Company
at Coon Rapids, near Minneapolis. His home has
been in Montana since 1914, when he located at
Broadview, spent a short time in a general mer-
chandise store and then established the Broadview
Independent with N. D. Sherman, and was its
editor for about six months. He sold his interest
to Mr. Sherman and then joined the McCaul-
VVebster Elevator Company at Broadview as book-
keeper of the local branch. Later he was promoted
to yard manager and in 1918 was sent to Rapelje
to take the management of the business. The busi-
ness at Rapelje consists of handling lumber and
hardware. The main olfices are at Minneapolis and
there are twenty-six branches in Montana, and
trade relations cover the states of North Dakota,
South Dakota and Nebraska.
Mr. Stevens is a member of the Rapelje Com-
mercial Club, is affiliated with Rapelje Lodge of
Masons, and is a Methodist and democrat. April
18, 1915, he married at Broadview Miss Rachel
Dunton, daughter of Abram and Luzerne (Lovelace)
Dunton. Her parents live on a ranch near Rapelje.
M.\URICE J. Breen. While prepared at the uni-
versity for the legal profession, Maurice J. Breen
has never practiced law except in handling his own
interests, and has been primarily a banker. He
was one of the organizers and is president of the
First National Bank of Bridger.
Mr. Breen was born at .Edina in Northeast Mis-
souri May 13, 1875. His parents, John and Mar-
garet (McMahon) Breen, were born in Ireland and
came to the United States in 1868, first locating
at Boston. The father was a tanner by trade, but
in this country always followed farming. He died
in 1914 and his wife in 1883. Maurice Breen has
four brothers and four sisters living; John, district
manager of the Montana Oil Company at Great Falls;
Henry, in the hardware and implement business at
Ghent, Minnesota; Jerry, a student in the Univer-
sity of Minnesota; James, attending St. Thomas
College at St. Paul; Mary, wife of W. C. .Ahern,
of Taunton, Minnesota; Nellie, unmarried, at home;
Sadie, a school teacher at Amiret, Minnesota; and
Bessie, who is attending school at St. Paul.
When Maurice J. Breen was five years old his
parents left their farm in Missouri and moved to
Chicago and soon afterwards went out to the plains
of Minnesota. Maurice J. Breen acquired his earlv
education at Marshall, Minnesota, graduating from
high school and later entered the law department
of the University of Minnesota, graduating in 1901.
After graduation he engaged in the grain and bank-
ing business at Macoun. Saskatchewan, where he
had charge of a bank as cashier from 1901 to 1910.
He then returned to Minneapolis and until 1914
was engaged in the real estate business in tha^
city. Mr. Breen came to Montana in 1914, had
charge of a real estate and insurance business at
Laurel for a time, and since 1915 has been a resi-
dent of Bridger. Associated with the- late Col. A.
L. Babcock, J. W. Chapman and J. O. Higham,
he established the First National Bank of Bridger
with a capital of $25,000. It now has a surplus
of $5,000, and the bank is a member of the Federal
Reserve system.
Mr. Breen is a democrat in politics but has never
been an aspirant for office. His parents were
Catholics, he was reared in that faith and his family
give the church dutiful allegiance. Mr. Breen mar-
ried in 1909 Katherine Ahern, a daughter of Garret
and Katherine (Brown) Ahern, of Taunton, Min-
nesota. Her father was a farmer in Minnesota and
died in 1896. Her mother is still living on the
home farm. Mr. and Mrs. Breen have four chil-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
dren: Mary, born in 1910; Margaret, born in 1912;
Katherine, born in 1913; and John, born in 1916.
Jacob P. Madsen, mayor of Fromberg, Montana,
and one of the most thoroughly progressive execu-
tives in the state, is a man of sterhng characteris-
tics and fearlessness of action. He was born near
Copenhagen, Denmark, November 24, i«73. a son
of Mas Sorensen, also born near Copenhagen. Den-
mark, in 1826 and died in that same vicinity in
January, 1902. A carpenter and builder, he did
an extensive business and was a pensioner of the
Government on account of having been severely
wounded upon three occasions while serving his
country as a soldier during the war between Ger-
many and Denmark during 1848-50 He was a
lifelong member of the Lutheran Church. The
maiden name of his wife was Karen Jacobsen, and
she was born in Denmark in 1834, and died near
Copenhagen in 18.96. Their children were as fol-
lows: Soren, who became a miner in Australia,
died in that country when forty-three years old;
Mari died unmarried in Denmark at the age of
forty-six years; Rudolph, who is a farmer near
Fromberg; Caroline, who married Peter Madsen,
a member of the Omaha police force, died in 1913;
Jacobin, who is unmarried, lives in California; and
Jacob P., whose name heads this review.
Jacob P. Madsen attended the public schools of
his native land and learned the trade of a cabinet-
maker. In 1891, seeking for better opportunities,
he came to the United States, his objective point
being Billings, Montana. After his arrival, he horne-
steaded 160 acres of land near Fromberg, living
on his land until he proved it, and then in 1912
he sold it and came to Fromberg, where he estab-
lished himself in a livery, dray and automobile
business, being the sole proprietor, with offices on
Main Street, and feed barns on the same thorough-
fare. Mr. Madsen owns the building in which his
business is located and also a warehouse and his
handsome modern residence.
A stanch republican. Mr. Madsen was the suc-
cessful candidate of his party for mayor of From-
berg in 1918 for a term of two years. Very pa-
triotic, he had passed by the city council a law
forbidding during the period of the war the use
of the German and Austrian languages in public
places in Fromberg, and saw that it was rigidly
enforced. He is an able official and takes a great
pride in his city, having in view some important
improvement if reconstruction conditions permit
of their being commenced. Well known as a Ma-
son, he belongs to Roman Eagle Lodge No. 71, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, at Fromberg.
In 1893 Mr. Madsen was married at Billings,
Montana, to Miss Christine Larsen, born in Den-
mark, who died at Fromberg in 1905, having borne
her husband five children, namely: Carrie, who
married Ben Parker, died at Fromberg in 1918, but
he survives and is a carpenter of Fromberg; Myrtle,
who married Cliff Malon, a carpenter of From-
berg; Hazel, who married Mark Lovelady, now
connected with the oil refinery at Greybull, Wyo-
ming; Otto, who enlisted for service during the
great war in January, 1918, is now with the Ameri-
can Expeditionary Forces in France; and Edith,
who is at home. Mr. Madsen was married in 1913
to Mrs. Carrie Derving, who was born in Tennessee.
There are no children by this second marriage.
J. Herman Wolcott. Among the representative
business men of Southern Montana the name of J.
Herman Wolcott should be mentioned. As pro-
prietor of one of the largest and most complete
stores of his section of Park County, he has carried
on the various departments of his enterprise with
that discretion, foresight and energy which are sure
to find their natural sequence in success. Having
always been a hard worker, a good manager and a
man of conservative habits, and being fortunately
situated in a thriving new community, it is no wonder
that he has won the position that he today enjoys
in the business world. He came to this section
of the country amid comparatively pioneer conditions
and has lived to see wonderful changes take place
in this section of the great Treasure State, always
lending such aid as he could in the work of up-
building this section, whose interests he has at heart.
J. Herman Wolcott is descended from good old
English stock, the family having been founded in
America by Henry Wolcott, who came here in
colonial days and located in Connecticut. Among
his descendants was Emery P. Wolcott, a native of
New York State and the grandfather of J. Herman
Wolcott. He lived his life and died in his native
state. Among his children was Samuel P. Wolcott,
father of J. Herman, and who was born in Oneida,
New York, in 1816, and who died at Minneapolis,
Minnesota, in 1906. He was reared and educated
in Oneida and for a time lived in Steuben County,
New York, where he farmed and followed the voca-
tion of a blacksmith. He went to Rome, New York,
and learned the trade of toolmaking, but later moved
to Warsaw, that state, where he again took up the
dual occupation of farming and blacksmithing. In
1870 Mr. Wolcott moved to Nashua, Iowa, and
farmed, but a year later he went to West Union,
Minnesota, making the then long trip over the old
"Jim Hill trail" with wagons. In that section of
Minnesota Mr. Wolcott became a pioneer farmer
and remained there nearly two decades. In 1890
he retired from active labors and came to Livingston,
Montana, to live. Shortly afterward he went to
California and for awhile lived in the Soldiers'
Home, but finally came back to Minnesota, making
his home at Minneapolis until his death.
Samuel P. Wolcott was an ardent republican in
politics and took an active part in local public
affairs in the various places where he lived. In Todd
County, Minnesota, he was supervisor and member
of the Town Council. He was a member and active
supporter of the Congregational Church and was
affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. Mr. Wolcott was a veteran of the Civil war,
having enlisted in 1864 in the Fifty-Fourth Regiment
of New York Engineers, with which he served for
one year.
Mr. Wolcott married Harriet T. Marshall, who
was born in Wyoming County, New York, in 1826,
and died at West Union, Minnesota, in 1889. To
this worthy couple were born the following chil-
dren: Ormus P., who was formerly a railroad man,
is now retired and lives at St. Paul, Minnesota;
Helen P., who now resides in Wyoming, is the widow
of Thomas R. Rosier, late a farmer and inventor,
of Minnesota; Horace, who died at West Union,
Minnesota, at the age of twenty-eight years, was a
farmer and lived at home with his parents ; Henry J.
is a contractor and builder at Livingston, Montana ;
Edward, who died in 1904, was a farmer and mer-
chant at Moline, Illinois; Harriet T. is the wife of
George T. Collins, a coal dealer in Minneapolis,
Minnesota; Marcus Minor is also in the coal busi-
ness at Minneapolis: Marion E. is the wife of
Herbert E. Jones, court stenographer at Hamilton.
Montana; and J. Herman, the immediate subject of
this review.
J. Herman Wolcott was born al Warsaw, Wyom-
ing County, New York, on October 14, 1866. In
early youth he accompanied his parents on their
removals to Iowa and Minnesota, and in Todd
OC.'t^^^
)^o>^^L€.^:>^=cr-^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
249
County of the latter state he received his education,
attending the high school at Sauk Center. In 1888
Mr. \V0lc9tt came to Livingston, Montana, and
entered the employ of A. W. Miles, hardware dealer,
subsequently becoming manager of the Miles Com-
pany, with which he was identified for a number of
years, becoming a stockholder in the company. In
1912 Mr. Wolcott came to Clyde Park as manager
of the new store acquired by A. W. Miles, and under
his administration the business rapidly grew to
immense proportions. In 1914 Mr. Wolcott disposed
of his stock in the Miles Company and then he and
the Bliler Brothers bought the business, which was
then conducted under the title of the Wolcott-Bliler
Company. In 1919 Mr. Wolcott bought the Bliler
interests in the business and is now the sole owner.
He has developed it into a department store, than
which no better can be found in this section of the
state. He carried a large and well selected stock and,
because of the courteous treatment, prompt service
and high quality of goods sold a phenomenal trade
has been built up, drawing from a radius of twenty
miles or more. In addition to his store Mr. Wolcott
is also the owner of a fine ranch of 640 acres of
irrigated land located about three miles southwest of
Clyde Park. He is also a stockholder and a director
in the First State Bank of Clyde Park and in many
ways has given practical demonstration of the faith
he has in the Shields River Valley, one of the most
favored sections of the great Treasure State.
Politically Mr. Wolcott is a republican and has
been honored by his fellow citizens in his election as
alderman from the first ward and as mayor of his
city, to which latter office he was chosen in 1918.
He is a member of the Congregational Church, and
fraternally is identified with Clyde Park Lodge No.
64, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and with
Livingston Lodge No. 246, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks. At Livingston he has member-
ship in the Railway Club and the Chamber of Com-
merce.
Mr. Wolcott has been married three times. In
1895, at Livingston, he was married to May F.
Nesbit, of Allegheny, Pennsylvania. To this union
were born the following children : Winfield, born
April 6, 1898, is a second lieutenant in the United
States marine service, having graduated from the
training school at Quantico, Virginia, on June 15,
1919: Margaret, born April 3, 1903. is a sophomore
in the Clyde Park High School. Mrs. May Wolcott
died in 1904, at Livingston, and in 1906 Mr. Wolcott
married, at Glenwood, Minnesota, Mattie E. Shaw,
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Ross Shaw, the former of
whom is a retired farmer at Sauk Center, Minne-
sota, his wife having died. To Mr. Wolcott's second
union the following children were born : Marion,
May 30, 1907 ; Josephine, May 14, 1908, and Dorothy,
May 20, 1910. Mrs. Mattie Wolcott died at Clyde
Park on July 21, 1915, and on September 30, 1917, Mr.
Wolcott was married to Mrs. Eleda L. (Felsted)
Parks. She is the daughter of Theodore and Mary
(Johnson) Felsted, both of whom are now deceased.
Mr. Felsted was a machinist at Winona, Minnesota.
In all his relations with his fellow men Mr. Wol-
cott has been upright and conscientious, gentle-
manly, considerate and courteous in his personal and
social contact, and he has earned the enviable stand-
ing which he enjoys in the community. The qualities
of keen discrimination, sound judgment and execu-
tive ability have entered very largely into his makeup
and are contributing elements to the splendid suc-
cess which has come to him.
RoFERT C. Cardell. One of the biggest industries
in Billings, Montana, is the manufacture of gas
by the Billings Gas Company, for domestic and in-
dustrial consumption. One of the founders and the
vice president and manager of this corporation is
Robert C. Cardell. Mr. Cardell is a business man
of long experience, excels as an executive and or-
ganizer, and who is responsible with others for the
Billings Gas Company, organized in 1912, and also
the organization known as the Montana Sash and
Door Company, of which he is secretary.
Mr. Cardell was born at Malcolm in Poweshiek
County, Iowa, July 21, 1879, a son of Leander and
Emma L. (Chapman) Cardell. His father, born in
Vermont in 1835, was a California gold seeker in
the early days, going around the Horn. He was
on the Pacific Coast three years, then returned East,
and soon afterward became a pioneer settler in
Poweshiek County, Iowa. In 1880 he moved to
Dallas County in the same state, and was in the
real estate and loan business until 1895, when he
retired. He served as a member of the Iowa Legis-
lature. He was a republican, a member of the
Congregational Church, and his death occurred in
1907. Robert C. Cardell and his sister, Florence,
wife of J. R. Swearingen, president of the Mon-
tana Sash and Door Company, are the only sur-
vivors of five children, the others dying in infancy.
Mr. Cardell attended school at Perry, Iowa, was
a student at Stetson University and the University
of Michigan, and in 1900 at the age of twenty-one,
was a member of the partnership firm of John R.
Swearingen and Company at Perry, Iowa, lumber
dealers.
In 1903 he became traveling salesman for the
Huttig Manufacturing Company of Muscatine, Iowa.
This firm did a large business in the manufacture
of sash, doors and mill work. Mr. Cardell ac-
quired stock in the company, and in 1906 was one
of the members of the firm selected to extend the
business into the Northwest. He was assistant
manager of the branch at Billings. Mr. Cardell
helped organize the Montana Sash and Door Com-
pany on February i, 191 1, and has since been its
secretary. The size and scope of this business may
be understood from the fact that it is capitalized
at $500,000. When Mr. Cardell came to Billings
in 1906 to assist in establishing the western branch
of the Huttig Manufacturing Company he also or-
ganized the Cardell Lumber and Coal Company
and the Cardell Ridge Lumber Company, of which
companies he was president.
In .'\pril, 1915, Mr. Cardell severed his active
connections with both the Montana Sash and Door
Company and the Cardell Ridge Lumber Company
to take the active management of the Billings Gas
Companj', of which he had previously been a di-
rector.
During the critical years of development that
followed there were periods when the prospects
were far from rosy, but with a steadily increas-
ing volume of business and after trebling the
capacity of the gas works the Billings Gas Company
has emerged as one of the city's leading manu-
facturing institutions.
These enterprises obviously make heavy demands
upon his time and energies. However, he is an
interested student and member of various Masonic
bodies, including Ashlar Lodge No. 20, ."\ncient
Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Chapter No. 6,
Roval Arch Masons. .Mdemar Commandery Xo. 5,
Knights Templar ; Scottish Rite Consistory at Butte ;
and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena.
He is affiliated with Billings Lodge of Elks and in
politics is a republican.
April 10, 1906, the same year he came to Mon-
tana, he married Miss Florence Penfield. a native
of Iowa. They have two children : Mary and Rob-
ert Leander.
250
HISTORY OF MONTANA
John R. Davis has been a factor in the Broad-
view community of Yellowstone County for over
ten years, has a ranch ten miles west of Broad-
view and is also serving as county commissioner.
He was born at Fort Edward, Washington Coun-
ty, New Vork, February 6, 1873. His paternal an-
cestors came from Wales and were colonial settlers
in Vermont. His grandfather, Milo Davis, was
born in Vermont in 1815 and was an early day
lumber operator in Warren County, New \ ork,
near Bolton, but spent his last years at Fort Ed-
ward, retired, where he died in 191 1- He married
a Miss Shedd, a native of Vermont, who also died
at Fort Edward, New York. Samuel L. Davis,
father of John R., was born at Bolton in Warren
County, New Y'ork, in 1841, was reared and mar-
ried in that county and was connected with the
same line of business as his father. For a time
he lived at Fort Edward as agent for a lumber
company, in 1882 removed to Indian Lake, New
York, where he engaged in the lumber business,
and is now living retired at Indian Lake. He
served several years as assessor of Hamilton Coun-
ty, New Y'ork, and also as justice of the peace
and in other township offices. He is a republi-
can and in 1861 enlisted in the One Hundred and
Twenty-second New York Infantry and was all
through the Civil war. He is a member of the
Baptist Church and the Odd Fellows fraternity.
Samuel L. Davis married Jane E. Bolton. She
was born in Sheffield. England, in 1841 and died
at Indian Lake, New York, in January, iqi/. Mat-
tie, the oldest of three children, is the wife of Nel-
son St. Marie, a merchant at Indian Lake, New
York. The other two are John R. and Francis S.,
both residents of Broadview, Montana, the latter
also a farmer.
John R. Davis graduated from the high school
of Fort Edward, New York, in 1888. From that
time until he came West in 1906 he was employed
in the lumber business with his father. He spent
two years on a farm in South Dakota and in 1908
came to the Broadview community of Montana,
where he homesteaded 160 acres. Later he owned 480
acres but sold half a section of this in April, 1919.
One hundred and sixty acres he retained as his home
ranch, ten miles west of Broadview, and it is highly
developed as a farm. Since its organization in 191 5
Mr. Davis has been president of the Farmers Ele-
vator Company in Broadview.
Mr. Davis was elected county commissioner of
Stillwater County for the six year term in 1916.
He is affiliated with Stillwater Lodge No. 62, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Lodge No.
394 of the Elks, and is a member of Britton, South
Dakota Lodge of Odd Fellows, having joined that
order at Johnsburg in Warren County, New Y'ork.
September 21, 1910, at Billings, he married Miss
Marietta Thayer, daughter of Dewitt and Florence
Thayer. Her parents are farmers at Britton, South
Dakota, and Mrs. Davis is a graduate of the high
school there. To their marriage were born five
children: Geneva, born July 29, 191 2; Florence,
born September 5, 1913; Montana, born September
19, 1914, and died October October 17, 1915; Lois,
born May 15, 1916; and Irene, born November 26,
1917.
John Normilf. is an old time Montana resident,
has been* in the state thirty years, was a rancher
and cattle man for many years in Carbon County,
and is now proprietor of the only hardware and
lumber business in Boyd, a town in which he has
been much interested for several years.
Mr. Normile was born at Cleveland, Ohio, June
29, 1869. His father, Michael Normile, was born
in County Clare, Ireland, in 1844, and came to the
United States about 1863. For several years he was
employed as an engineer by the Standard Oil Com-
pany at Cleveland. In 1875 he moved to North-
east Missouri, and for about forty years was a
farmer in the vicinity of Edina, but is now living
retired in that town. He is a democrat and a
Catholic. He married Elizabeth Scanlon, who was
born in County Clare, Ireland, in 1852. She died
at Edina, Missouri, in 191 1. John is the oldest
of a large family of children, and a brief record of
the others is as follows : Kate, who died at the
age of eighteen ; Elizabeth, living with her father
at Edina ; James, a confectioner at Seattle, Wash-
ington; Joseph, who died at the age of eight years;
Michael, who is an under sheriff of Carbon County
and lives at Red Lodge; Mamie, a trained nurse
at St. Louis, Missouri ; Charles, a farmer at Edina ;
Levena, a stenographer employed at St. Louis ; Leo,
a farmer at Boyd, Montana, and Frank, who was
an American soldier and participated in the great
Battle of Argonne Forest and returned to the United
States in 1919.
John Normile was about six years old when
his parents moved to Knox County, Missouri, and
he attended rural schools there and lived on his
father's farm to the age of eighteen. On coming
to Montana in 1888 he was employed one year on
a farm near old Gallatin. For six months he was
on railroad construction, work at Cheney, Wash-
ington, and for three years worked in a sawmill
at Bozeman, Montana. In 1892 he came to the
Crow Indian Reservation in Carbon County, home-
steaded 160 acres, proved it up and made it his
home for twelve years before he sold it. There
he started in the cattle business and up to 1910 he
grazed his cattle over a large range and was one
of the prominent livestock men of Carbon County.
Mr. Normile bought a general merchandise store
at Bovd in 1910, but sold it after three years. He
establi'shed his present business in 1915, the only
hardware and lumber establishment in Boyd. Be-
sides his business property he owns a residence in
Boyd, and an irrigated ranch of 160 acres three
miles east of Joliet, and another quarter section
three miles southwest of Boyd.
Mr. Normile has always acted as a democrat in
politics. During 1905-08 he served as assessor of
Carbon County. He is a Catholic, and a member
of Billings Council No. 1259. Knights of Colum-
bus. He has been a factor in financial affairs of
Boyd, being director and vice president of the
Bovd State Bank and is a stockholder in the United
States National Bank of Red Lodge.
Mr. Normile married at Billings, February 21,
1910, Miss Agnes Ross. Her mother is Mrs. Mary
Ross of Red Lodge. For six years Mrs. Normile
was superintendent of the schools of Carbon Coun-
ty and is known to hundreds of Montana residents
for her capable work in education.
George Edward Snell. An eminently useful and
esteemed citizen of Yellowstone County, George
Edward Snell, of Billings, is not only an able rep-
resentative of the legal profession, having a large
law practice, but as an extensive landholder is
actively associated with the agricultural interests of
county and state. His far-reaching activities dur-
ing the recent World war, especially in connection
with the Y'oung Men's Christian .Association drives,
were most effective, their success in many instances
having been largely due to his business ability,
judgment and tact. A son of George Amos Snell,
he was born August I. 1879, in Pekin, Oswego
County, New Y'ork, of honored English ancestry,
being a lineal descendant, many generations re-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
moved, from one Willebrod Snell, a life-long resi-
dent of England, who discovered the refraction of
light, thus making possible spectacles and optical
instruments, and who likewise won the distinction
of being the first to measure the world by triangu-
Thomas Snell, the immigrant ancestor of that
branch of the Snell family to which the subject of
this sketch belongs, came from England to Con-
necticut about 1665, settling at West Bridgewater,
where he became one of the largest landowtiers of
that vicinity. The maiden name of his wife was
Martha Harris. Frederick Snell, grandfather of
George Edward Snell, a veteran of the War of
1812 and a lifelong resident of New York State,
was born in the Mohawk Valley and died in Oswego,
New York.
George Amos Snell was born August 14, 1848,
in Jefferson County, New York, and was there
reared and educated. An agriculturalist, he be-
came interested in dairy products, and for many
years was widely known as a cheese buyer. A
stanch republican in politics, he was active in lo-
cal affairs, and served several terms as justice of
the peace. He was a man of strong religious ten-
dencies, and a prominent member of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. His death, which occurred at his
home in Pekin, New York, in 1881, was a loss not
only to his family and friends, but to the com-
munity in which he lived. He married, July 24,
1870. "in Oswego County, New York, Etta Eliza
Brown, whose birth occurred in Richland, New
York, April 24, 1854. She survived him, and in
1885 married for her second husband Clark C.
Loomis, and removed from Orwell, New York, to a
farm in Delaware County, Iowa. Mr. Loomis died
the following year, in 1886, and Mrs. Loomis is now
living in Manchester, Iowa.
Receiving the rudiments of his education in Man-
chester, Iowa, George Edward Snell was gradu-
ated from its high school in 1899, and subsequentb'
taught school in Delaware County, Iowa, a year,
after which he served as principal of the graded
school in Manchester, Iowa, for a year. Going to
Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 1902, he studied for a year
in the literary department of the University of
Michigan. In the fall of 190,1 Mr. Snell located
in Montana, and for two years thereafter was
superintendent of the schools at Deer Lodge. De-
sirous of entering the legal profession, he studied
law in the office of Edward Sharmikow in the
meantime attending school for two summers at the
University of Michigan, where he passed the fresh-
man and junior law credits, and later took the
senior course, being there graduated with the de-
gree of Bachelor of Laws in the class of 1906.
Coming directly to Billings, Mr. Snell accepted the
position of assistant principal of the local high
school, and in 1907 he was elected principal of the
same school, and in that capacity met with decided
success. In 1908 Mr. Snell began his professional
career, and is now numbered among the leading
attorneys of Billings, as head of the well-known
firm nf Snell & Arnott, having built up an extensive
and lucrative patronage, his offices being at Nos.
310-312-314 Securities Building.
Special mention should here be made of the effi-
cient work Mr. Snell accomplished during the war
as an active and loyal member of the Young Men's
Christian Association. Devoted to the cause for
which our men were so herioically fighting, he
labored unselfishly and untiringly during each drive
of the organization with which he was so promi-
nently identified, in the first drive serving as chair-
man of that branch of it that included five coun-
ties. In October, 1918, at the request of the offi-
cials of the National War Work Council of the
Young Men's Christian Association, Mr. Snell went
to San Francisco to assume charge of the personnel
department of the Western Department of the Na-
tional War Work Department Council. During
the six months that he retained that position Mr.
Snell had supervision of the recruiting of all men
sent overseas by the association, and also of all
association secretaries placed in the home camps of
the Western Military Division, which included not
only eight states, but Honolulu.
Mr. Snell possesses excellent financial ability, and
through wise investments has acquired interests in
6,000 acres of good Montana ranch lands, and owns
a pleasant modernly constructed residence at 310
Clark Avenue. Politically he is a stanch republi-
can, and has rendered the city acceptable service
as alderman. Religiously he is a member of the
Congregational Church, which he has served as
trustee. He is also a member, vice president and
one of the directors of the Young Men's Chris-
tian Association of Billings, and a member of the
state committee of that organization. He like-
wise belongs to the Billings Golf and Country
Club, which he has served as director. Fraternally
he is a member of Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, at Billings; of Billings
Chapter No. 6, Royal Arch Masons ; of Billings
Commandery No. 5, Knights Templar ; of Algeria
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the
Mystic Shrine; and of Billings Consistory. He also
belongs to Billings Star Lodge, Independent Order
of Odd Fellows, and to Billings Camp, Woodmen
of the World.
On June 24, 1906, at Tarkio. Missouri, Mr. Snell
was united in marriage with Miss Jessie Gray Ar-
nott, a graduate of Tarkio College. Her father,
George Arnott, Sr., a retired ranchman, is now
living in Billings, Montana, with his good wife,
whose maiden name was Susie Gray. Mr. and Mrs.
Snell are the parents of two children, George Don-
ald, born October 13, 1909, and James Le Roy, born
February 12, 191 1.
John W. Corwin is the pioneer merchant of
Park City and has long been prominent in business,
banking and political affairs in Stillwater County.
Mr. Corwin was born at Cantril, Iowa, August 20,
1875. Corwin is a noted name in American history,
particularly because of the record of Tom Corwin,
one of the most conspicuous men in Ohio politics in
ante-bellum times, and congressman and twice gov-
ernor of that state. He was an uncle of the father
of John W. Corwin. The Corwins came out_ of
England in colonial times, were pioneers in Ken-
tucky, and from that state four brothers of the name
moved to Ohio. B. W. Corwin, father of the Mon-
tana merchant, was born at Lebanon in Warren
County, Ohio, in 1842. After his marriage in his
native town he moved to Iowa, settling near Cantril,
where he died in 1876. He spent all his life as a
farmer. Politicallv he was a republican and in 1861
he enlisted in the Forty-Second Ohio Heavy Artillery
and saw four years of active service, coming out of
the war with the rank of lieutenant. His wife was
Mary Tufts, who was born at Lebanon in Warren
County. Ohio, in 1847 and died at Milton. Iowa, in
1904. 'Their children were: Hattie, wife of C. E.
Drake, a retired farmer living at Bloomfield, Iowa;
Winnie, who died at the age of nineteen years; J. E.,
who is a manufacturer of silos at Des Moines. Iowa;
Frank E., a physician and surgeon at Anaheim, Cali-
fornia, who married Belle Tharp; and John W
John W. Corwin was one year old when his father
died. He attended public school at Milton, Iowa
going from the high school to the Highland Park
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Pharmacy School at Des Moines, Iowa. For a year
he had charge of a drug business at Bonaparte,
Iowa, and then engaged in the drug business with
his brother, Dr. Frank E. Corwin, for 2^ years at
Kinross, Iowa.
Mr. Corwin came to Montana in the fall of 1899
and at once identified himself with the little town
of Park City. He established his mercantile busi-
ness there January i, 1900, and it is the oldest busi-
ness of the kind in that part of Stillwater County,
and during the time of extensive live stock opera-
tions in the Lake Basin country to the north supplied
that trade for a distance of thirty miles. The store,
which handles drugs in addition to general mer-
chandise, is on the corner of Main and Clark streets.
Air. Corwin owns the controlling interest in both the
store and the building, and also has a modern home
in Park City and business property at Rapelje and
some real estate at Columbus, Montana. He is vice
president of the Farmers State Bank at Wheat
Basin, a director of the Park City State Bank, and
a director of the First National Bank of Rapelje.
A republican in politics, Mr. Corwin was elected
a member of the Legislature in 1913, when Stillwater
County was created, being its first representative.
He was re-elected in 1914 and served as a member
of the committees on federal relations, horticulture,
raiJroads and transportation, sanitary affairs and
townships and counties, also as a member of the
special typewriter committee. It was on this com-
mittee that he rendered the state perhaps the best
financial service by urging the adoption of his com-
mittee's report to rent typewriters for use during
the session instead of buying them, as had been the
custom. Between sessions the twenty-five to thirty
new machines would disappear and a like number
was to be purchased at the beginning of each session.
It is estimated that a continuation of this policy
is saving the state about $3,000 at each session of
the Legislature. Realizing the danger to public
health of the old time, careless methods of dispens-
ing drugs and poison in the state, he drafted, intro-
duced and secured the passage of House Bill No.
191. an act to regulate the manufacture and sale of
drugs and medicine in the State of Montana. While
the bill was in the interest of the public welfare, the
druggists over the state saw the need of such legis-
lation and gave it their hearty endorsement. In
recognition of his service in the interest of the
profession of pharmacy, he was elected president of
the Montana State Druggist Association in 191 5, and
as a representative of that body attended a meeting
of the National Association of Retail Druggists held
at Indianapolis, Indiana, the following year.
He is affiliated with Corinthian Lodge of Masons
at Laurel, with Billings Consistory and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena, also with
Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, Laurel Camp, Modern Wood-
men of America, and Park City Lodge, Knights of
the Maccabees.
At Kinross. Iowa. February 27. 1898. Mr. Corwin
married Miss Minnie Powell, daughter of Benjamin
and Catherine (Spain) Powell, both now deceased.
Her father was a farmer and an early settler of
Iowa. Mr. and Mrs. Corwin had two children :
Frank P., who died when twelve years old, and
Genevieve M., who was born May 28, 1902, and is
in the third year of high school at Park City.
M.\coMB B. Gray. The men whose names are
enrolled among those who have developed the busi-
ness interests of Montana are almost without ex-
ception possessed of unusual capabilities which
thev have devoted to the expansion of the concerns
with which thev have connected themselves. The
competition in the West is of too strenuous a na-
ture to permit of any leisure class among those who
hope to accomplish something worth while. The
opportunities are unlimited, but hard work and a
thorough knowledge of the industry under con-
sideration are required to raise a business above
the dead leyel of mediocrity. Therefore when any
man does succeed in placing his house among the
reliable and prosperous ones of any live western
city, he has furnished incontrovertible proof that
he possesses those characteristics enumerated above.
The whole career of Macomb B. Gray, vice presi-
dent and manager of the Gray Seed Company of
Billings, Montana, from the time he entered the
business arena until today has been one series of
successive advancements, each one giving him ad-
ditional responsibilities and dignity. At present his
company is one of the leading ones in this line
in the city, and its territory is international.
Macomb B. Gray was born at Cape Vincent. New
York, August 12, 1863, a son of Edwin and Eleanor
(Wood) Gray. The Gray family was founded in
the American colonies by Andrew Gray, who came
from the north of Ireland to what later became
New York State in 1737, his family being of Scotch-
Irish extraction. One of his descendants, Adam
Gray, the grandfather of Macomb B. Gray, was
born in Montgomery County. New York, and died
at Cape Vincent, New York, before his grandson
was born. During the War of 1812 he served his
country as an officer with gallant bravery. Early
in life he was engaged in mercantile pursuits, but
later on in life was a farmer. His wife, who was
the grandmother of Macomb B. Gray, bore the
maiden name of Margaret Loucks, and was born
in New York State.
Edwin Gray, the father, was born at St. Johns-
ville. Montgomery County. New York, in 1821, and
he died at Cape Vincent. New York, in 1899. He
was reared in his native place, but after his mar-
riage at Cape Vincent he located there and that
continued his home as long as he lived. The farm
which he bought and conducted during all of his
succeeding active years still remains in the family
and is the home of his widow. The farm was pur-
chased from the grandfather. Andrew Gray. A
democrat in politics, he exercised his right of suf-
frage, but did not care to assume the responsibili-
ties of public office, although he was very promi-
nent in local affairs, and was called "Squire." For
many years he was a member of the Odd Fellows
Lodge of Cape Vincent. The maiden name of his
wife was Eleanor Wood, and she was born in
Montgomery County. New York, in 1824. Their
children were as follows : Adam, who died at the
age of sixty-three years on the home farm ; Mary,
who married James Rector, and lives at Point
Peninsula. Jefferson County. New York, her hus-
band, who was a farmer, being deceased, having
during his lifetime taken a prominent part in poli-
tics as a republican ; Margaret, who married Joseph
Bates, a farmer, resides at Cape Vincent, Jefferson
County. New York ; Evelyn, who married Campbell
Bates, a brother of Joseph Bates, lives at Cape
Vincent. New York, her husband having retired
from his former agricultural pursuits ; Frances,
who is unmarried, lives with her mother on the
old farm : Edwin, who was a railroad conductor,
was killed when he was forty years old in a rail-
road accident between Tacoma and Seattle, Wash-
ington; Macomb B., whose name heads this review;
and Elizabeth, who married Fred Pond, a farmer
and extensive stock dealer of Cape Vincent, New
York.
Macomb B. Gray was reared at Cape Vincent
and after he had completed his studies in its pub-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
253
lie schools he was prepared for college, and then
entering Cornell University of New York State in
1882 he took the full course and was graduated
therefrom in 1886, with the degree of Bachelor of
Science. He belongs to the Greek letter fraternity
Delta Kappa Epsilon. For the first year subsequent
to his leaving college Mr. Gray was. engaged in
teaching school in the military academy at Atlanta,
Georgia, but left the educational field to embark in
the seed business at Cape Vincent, under the name
of the Macomb Gray Company, which was after-
ward merged into the Cape Vincent Seed Company,
of which he was vice president and manager un-
til 1901, when he sold his interest and, going to
Port Huron, Michigan, established the McMorran,
Gray Seed Company, directing its operations for
nine years as treasurer and manager. Once more
he disposed of his interests, and in 1910 came to
Billings, Montana, and for one year was associated
with the Northrup King Company of Minneapolis,
Minnesota, whose Billings representative he was,
resigning to go into the seed business on his own
account. In 1917 Mr. Gray incorporated the Gray
Seed Company, which has the following offi-
cials: I. D. O'Donnell, president; Macomb B. Gray,
vice president and manager ; and S. D. MacDonald,
secretary and treasurer. The offices and plant are
located on Montana Avenue and Twenty-first
Street, North. This company sells seeds all oyer
the United States, Canada and even in foreign
countries.
In 1804 Mr. Gray was united in marriage at De-
troit, Michigan, to Miss Frances Millen, a daughter
of Capt. James and Mary (Iselin) Millen, the for-
mer of whom died at Detroit, his widow still sur-
viving him and making her home at Detroit. He
was a captain of a steamer on the Great Lakes
during his younger days, but later in life became
manager of freight and passenger lines on these
same bodies of water. Mr. and Mrs. Gray have
two daughters, namely : Marie, who was graduated
from the Billings High School, is at home, and
Dorothy, who is also at home, was graduated from
Cornell University of New York State and is a
landscape gardener. She belongs to the Greek let-
ter fraternitv Chi Omega. The family residence is
at No. qi8' North Thirty-first Street. Mr. Gray
is an independent democrat. A Mason in good
standing, he belongs to Cape Vincent Lodge No.
293, Anjient Free and Accepted Masons. The Bill-
ings Chamber of Commerce and the Billings Club
also holds his membership. Big of brain and warm
of heart, Mr. Gray is a man who impresses his
personality upon all with whom he is associated,
and wins and retains friendships in no ordinary de-
gree. Under his able management his company
has expanded very considerably, and is justly ac-
counted one of the concerns which give to Billings
much of its present prestige.
Phil Grein. president of the Billings Brewing
Company of Billings, Montana, is one of the sub-
stantial "men of this part of the state, whose sound
judgment and singleness of purpose cause him to
be regarded as one in whom implicit trust may be
placed. He was born at Frankfurt-on-the-Main,
Germany, July 22, 1863, a son of John Philip Grein.
The father was born near Frankfurt, Germany in
1830, and he died at Frankfurt in 1882, having
devoted his active years to agricultural pursuits.
Like all of his countrymen, John Philip Grein gave
his land the usual military service, and also rendered
it valuable aid as a civilian during the Franco-
Prussian war in 1870, having charge of shipping
all of the beef into France for the use of the Ger-
man army during its occupancy of French soil.
The Lutheran Church held his membership. His
wife before marriage was Lena Fach, and she was
born in Germany in 1831, where she spent her life
and died in 1915. Their children were as follows:
Bertha, who is unmarried and lives at Jugenheim,
Germany; Hedwick, who married M. L. Herse, a
photographer, and lives in Germany; Phil, whose
name heads this review ; Fritz, who is a hotel pro-
prietor of Jugenheim, Germany; and Catherine, who
married B. Herfif, a member of a fertilizing firm,
and lives at Chicago, Illinois.
Phil Grein was reared in Germany and educated
in its public schools, which he left when seventeen
years old to begin an apprenticeship to the brew-
ing trade. In 1881 he came to the United States,
and spent his first year in this country at St. Louis,
Missouri, where he worked at his trade. Leaving
there, he went to Miles City, Montana, in 1882,
and was engaged in various activities in this state
for several years, among which was working as a
cow boy. In 1884 he went to Butte, Montana, to
engage with the Centennial Brewing Company as a
driver of one of their wagons, rising successively
to the positions of collector, solicitor and then
general manager, and remaining with that concern
for fifteen years. During November, 1899, Mr.
Grein came to Billings, and began at once to erect
the plant and offices of the Billings Brewing Com-
pany at the corner of Twenty-fourth Street and
Montana Avenue. The present officers of this large
corporation are as follows: Phil Grein, president;
J. Jacobson, vice president ; and Arthur Trennery,
secretary. This company is incorporated, and is
the only brewery in Southeastern Montana, sup-
plying the trade as far as Beach, North Dakota,
and Livingston, Montana. Formerly Mr. Grein was
a stockholder and director of the Farmers and
Traders Bank of Billings, and he founded the
Chrystal Ice and Fuel Company of Billings, but
sold his interests in igi8. He owns a 280 acre
ranch 3!/ miles north of Billings, where he raises
milk and Shorthorn cattle and blooded stock of
all kinds. This ranch is operated as a fancy stock
ranch, the grain grown on it being used for feed-
ing purposes. The Grein residence at 115 North
Twenty-second Street is a modern one and the
property of Mr. Grein.
In 1897 Mr. Grein was united in marriage with
Miss Amanda Benson at Butte, Montana. She is
a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John Benson, the
former of whom was a farmer of Minnesota, but
is now deceased, his wife having also passed away.
Mr. and Mrs. Grein have no children. In politics
Mr. Grein is an independent democrat, and he has
served as a member of the Billings City Council.
He belongs to Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks. Billings Eagle Eyrie
No. 274. Paternal Order of Eagles, and the Sons
of Hermann. In him the Lutheran Church has a
consistent member and he contributes generously
towards its support. Ever since coming to Bill-
ings Mr. Grein has had the good of the community
at heart and has exerted himself to advance its
best interests.
Fleming Wellington Robb. The secret of the
rapid development of Billings lies in the fact that
so many of its leading citizens belong to the younger
class of business men, who have not yet lost their
enthusiasm for their work, nor become satisfied with
what they have accomplished. In seeking to realize
their ambitions these alert and aggressive young
men are giving an impetus to all branches of activity
that cannot help but develop their city and attract
to it outside can'tal. One of these representative
boosters for a "greater Billings" is Fleming Well-
254
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ington Robb, actively engaged in the farm loan busi-
The Robb family is of English origin and dates
back in this country to colonial days, when the
progenitor of the American branch located in Penn-
sylvania. The paternal grandfather, also Fleming
Wellington Robb, was born in the Keystone state, in
the vicinity of Muncy, in 1800, and he died at
Union, Nebraska, in 1882. Animated by the same
spirit of adventure which brought his ancestor to
the American colonies from England, the elder Flem-
ing Wellington Robb went to Nebraska at an early
day in the history of that state and became one
of the pioneer homesteaders of Otoe County, where
he acquired 200 acres of land. This farm is now-
worth $50,000 and is still in the family, the ad-
vance in value not only proving the good judg-
ment e.xercised by the grandfather in his selection
of location, but also that he and his descendants
knew how to develop land to its fullest extent.
With the formation of the republican party he
gave its principles his support and voted its ticket
the remainder of his life. Early confirmed in the
faith of the Episcopal Church, he gave it his earn-
est support, and assisted in founding a church of
that denomination in Otoe County. He married
Ellen W. Montgomery, born in Pennsylvania in 1810,
and she died near Union, Nebraska in 1892. Their
only living child, W. H. M. Robb, is the father of
Fleming W. Robb of this review.
W. H. M. Robb was born in Pennsylvania in
1861, and when he was still a lad his parents took
him to Nebraska, where he was reared and taught
farming by his father. Subsequently he conducted
a grain business and owned several elevators, but
sold and engaged in farming until 1916, when he
moved to Union, Nebraska, where he has resumed
his grain operations upon a somewhat extensive
scale. He has rendered his state considerable serv-
ice, as he was steward of the penitentiary at Lincoln,
Nebraska, for four years, and also of the Insane
Asylum at Norfolk, Nebraska, for two years.
Taught from early youth the principles enunciated
by the republican party, he has adhered to them
all of his mature years. He has also followed in
his father's footsteps in religion and is a con-
scientious member of the Episcopal Church. Fra-
ternally he belongs to the Modern Woodmen of
America. The maiden name of his wife was Jessie
Walbridge. and she was born in Wisconsin in 1861.
Their children are as follows: Caroline A., who
is unmarried and resides with her parents; Hugh
M., who is a farmer of Union, Nebraska; and
Fleming Wellington Robb.
The birth of Fleming Wellington Robb occurred
in Otoe County, Nebraska, July 2. 1884, and he was
reared there, attending its rural schools until he
became a student of the Omaha, Nebraska, High
School, leaving it after two years, when nineteen
years of age. Mr. Robb then gained a practical
knowledge of the fundamentals of commercial life
in the Farmers & Merchants Bank at Verdon,
Nebraska, where he was assistant cashier for three
years. His efficiency and knowledge of the busi-
ness then gained him promotion to the position of
cashier and he held it for four years. In 1912
he came to Billings Bench, Montana, and for a
year was engaged in farming, in this way gaining
an insight into agricultural conditions in this region
which has been of value to him in his present busi-
ness, which he established at Billings in 1913, with
offices at 402 Electric Building, and of which he
is the sole proprietor. In addition to making loans
on farm properties Mr. Robb buys and sells ranches,
and has won the confidence of his community by
his scrupulously honest methods and public-spirited
service. Mr. Robb has demonstrated his faith in
the future of Billings by investing in city prop-
erty, owning his comfortable modern residence,
which he erected in 1918. He is a republican. An
Odd Fellow, Mr. Robb belongs to Verdon Lodge
No. 289 of that order. The Billings Episcopal
Church holds his membership and receives his gen-
erous support.
In 1907 Mr. Robb was married at Elmwood, Ne-
braska, to Miss Bess M. Tyson, a daughter of L.
A. and Jennie (Alton) Tyson. Mr. Tyson is one
of the leading druggists of Elmwood, and a man
who is held in high esteem by his associates. Mrs.
Robb is a graduate of the Plattsmouth High School
of Plattmouth, Nebraska, Mr. and Mrs. Robb have
two children, namely : Jane, who was born Sep-
tember 30, 1912, and John, who was born June I,
1915. Mr. Robb is a man who stands very high
in Billings, and deserves to do so for he is a tender
husband, watchful father, kindly friend, liberal pa-
tron of religious and benevolent movements, a wise
business advisor and stainless gentleman, whose
praiseworthy exertions are directed at all times to-
wards a betterment of existing conditions and a
raising of moral standards.
Henry C. Crippen. While it is a recognized fact
that many of the men of this country who have
come before the public as successful legislators and
eminent statesmen have at one time or other been
connected with the practice of the law, it has not
yet been decided whether this is due to the arduous
training necessary for entrance into his learned
profession, or the natural bringing before the elec-
tors of one who has to grapple with problems of
general interest. No matter which decision is
reached, the fact remains that these men of the
law do make intelligent and efficient representatives
of the will of the people, and that upon them de-
volves much of the work of making the laws. One
of the distinguished members of the bar of Mon-
tana, who has already served his district in the
State Assembly with dignified capability, is Henry
C. Crippen of Billings.
Henry C. Crippen was born on the prairie near
Winnebago, Minnesota, February 5, 1872, a son of
Samuel P. Crippen. The Crippen family originated
in Holland, from whence the founders of the Amer-
ican branch came to this country when it was still
an English colony, locating in Pennsylvania. Com-
mingled with the good old Dutch stock is that from
England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, through in-
termarriage, in Mr. Crippen the Scotch-Irish traits
predominating. Samuel P. Crippen was born in
Indiana in 1839, but was taken when a boy to the
vicinity of Davenport, Illinois, and there reared.
In young manhood he went to Minnesota, and
located at Minneapolis at a time when the future
metropolis was represented by two cabins on the
Minneapolis side of the river. Later he went to
Winnebago, Minnesota, where he was a pioneer and
homesteader, being engaged in farming all of his
active years, but is now retired and living at Janes-
ville, Minnesota. During the Civil war he enlisted
in 1863 as a member of the Minnesota Cavalry,
and was in Sibley's Expedition against the Indians,
.^fter a service of two years and four months he
was honorably discharged. After going to Minne-
sota Samuel P. Crippen was married to Lydia
Cheney, born in St. Lawrence County, New York,
in 184s, and she died at Janesville, Minnesota in
1885. Their children were as follows: Walter,
who is the first born; Benjamin, who is deceased;
William, who is also deceased ; Henry C. ; and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
255
Mary, who married a Mr. Charter and lives at St.
Paul, Minnesota.
Henry C. Crippen attended the public schools of
Minnesota, and was graduated from the Mankato
State Normal School of Mankato, Minnesota, in
1893, following which he engaged in teaching school,
and was a superintendent of schools in his native
state for six years. He then became a student of
the legal department of the University of North
Dakota at Grand Forks, and was graduated there-
from in 1901, with the degree of Doctor of Law.
During that same year Mr. Crippen came to Bill-
ings, and has since then carried on a general civil
and criminal practice, which has expanded until
he has during recent years been connected with
some of the most important jurisprudence of the
state. A stalwart republican, he was the logical
candidate of his party as assemblyman, and was
elected to the Thirteenth Session, 1912-1913, and dur-
ing that period was instrumental in securing the
passage of some very important legislation and
served on several committees. Professionally he
belongs to the Yellowstone County Bar Association
and the State Bar Association. His fraternal con-
nections are with Billings Star Lodge, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows; Billings Lodge, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks; and Billings Lodge,
Loyal Order of Moose. Since their organization
he has been an honored member of the Midland
and Billings clubs. He owns a pleasant modern
home at No. 620 North Twenty-second Street. His
offices are located at 406-408 Power Building.
In 1904 Mr. Crippen was married at Billings to
Miss Gertrude Dunham, born in Minnesota, and a
graduate of the Mankato State Normal School.
Prior to her marriage she was a teacher in the
city schools of Minneapolis. Mr. and Mrs. Crippen
have three children, namely : Clay, who was born
May 19, 1005 ; Bruce, who was born February 19,
1908; and Gertrude Elizabeth, who was born Novem-
ber 21, 1917. Mrs. Crippen is a descendant of John
Dunham, who left England by stealth and sailed
on the historic Mayflower under the assumed name
of Goodman, resuming his own after he reached
the safe haven of the new world. Through an
ancestor, Thomas Standish, a Revolutionary soldier,
Mrs. Crippen owes her membership in the Daughters
of the Revolution. He was a direct descendant of
Miles Standish.
Mr. Crippen is one who knows the larger world
and is at home in it, meeting its problems with
ease and understanding, and he is of the timber
which makes national statesmen. His service has
been genuine, broad and for the public benefit, and
there is no doubt but that he will be called upon
to assume advancing responsibilities and dignity,
his constituents knowing that if he does so their
interests will be represented in a manner distinctly
successful and creditable.
Charles C. Wilhelm. No community can reach
its full growth without the services of a real estate
man who is experienced in the business of handling
property. As is well known, the founders of a
town do not include in the original survey all of
the land destined to be used for building purposes,
as this would make the initial taxes too heavy.
They lay out a few blocks, relying upon other pro-
moters for additions. After several of these have
been laid out, oftentimes by the original owners
themselves, the work of developing other suburbs
devolves on the alert realty men, who not only do
the actual work of surveying, building and other-
wise improving, but educate the public in the de-
sii^bility of owning homes in the outlying districts
Vol. II-IT
where the comforts of urban life can be secured
as well as those of open space, fresh air and cleanly
living conditions. The real estate history of Bill-
ings is much the same as that of any other com-
munity of its age and extent, and one of the men
who has aided in its expansion within the past few
years is Charles C. Wilhelm, sole proprietor of
the realty firm of Charles C. Wilhelm Company.
The founder of the Wilhelm family in America
was the grandfather of Charles C. Wilhelm, who
came to this country from Germany and became a
pioneer of Muscatine, Iowa, where he worked at
his trade of cabinetmaking until his death in that
city. His son, L. Wilhelm, father of Charles C.
Willielm, was . born at Muscatine, Ipwa, in 1858,
and was there reared. In young manhood he went
to Mapleton, Iowa, being one of its pioneers, and
established himself in the mercantile business. He
became prominent in the Presbyterian Church of
that city, of which he was a member and generous
supporter. The Masonic fraternity has long had
him as a member. In politics he is a democrat.
After coming to Mapleton Mr. Wilhelm was mar-
ried to Minnie Bradfield, born at Cherokee, Iowa, in
i860, and died at Mapleton in 1907. Their chil-
dren were as follows: Charles C, who is the eldest;
Lula, who married Arthur Williams, a farmer of
Mount Pleasant; Maude, who married Louie Wil-
liams, a brother of Arthur Williams, lives in Iowa
on a farm; Fred, who is a railroad employe, lives
at Traer, Kansas ; Louie, who died at the age of
fourteen years; and Erne, who is a sergeant in the
aviation branch of the United States army, is sta-
tioned at Middletown, Pennsylvania. At present
L. Wilhelm is living at Los Angeles, California,
having retired from active participation in business
life in 1918.
Charles C. Wilhelm attended the grammar and
high schools of Mapleton, Iowa, and was graduated
from the latter in 1905. In 1906 he came to Bill-
ings, and for five years was employed in the post
office, and then in 1911 embarked in his present
business, under the name of the Charles C. Wil-
helm Company. He handles city property and
ranches within a radius of fifty miles from Billings,
and does a very large business. In 1912 Mr. Wil-
helm helped to survey the Bull Mountain country in
the Pompey's Pillar District, comprising twelve
fractional townships. He is a democrat. The
Congregational Church holds his membership. Fra-
ternally he belongs to Algeria Temple, Ancient and
Accepted Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, Ash-,
lar Lodge, No. 29, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons; Billings Lodge, Knights of Pythias; Billings
Lodge, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks;
and Billings Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
The Billings Club affords him social relaxation. A
man of means, Mr. Wilhelm owns a comfortable
rnodem residence at 420 Yellowstone Avenue, Bil-
lings, and four ranches, 480 acres near Shepherd,
two 320-acre farms near Pompey's Pillar, and 120
acres near Huntley, all of which are used for grow-
ing grain and stock.
In 1914 Mr. Wilhelm was married to Miss Marion
E. Bell, a daughter of Fred and Florence (Marsh)
Bell, the ceremony being performed at Billings. Mr.
and Mrs. Bell are now residents of Washburn,
Wisconsin, where Mr. Bell is clerk of the District
Court. Mr. and Mrs. Wilhelm have three children,
John, who was born March 5, 1916. and Ruth, who
was born January 26, 1918, and Charles, bom De-
cember 9, 1919. Mr. Wilhelm has evinced such
ability in his handling of property that he has
influenced his competitors and has raised the stand-
ards in this line of activity. His judgment with
256
HISTORY OF. MONTANA
reference to realty values is recognized to be that
of an expert, and he is often called upon to de-
cide in matters relating to the settlement of claims
based on an advance in property. Both he and
Mrs. Wilhelm are very popular, and have gath-
ered about them a congenial social circle, enter-
taining their friends upon numerous occasions at
their pleasant home, and enjoying in their turn
the hospitality of others. Mr. Wilhelm's reputa-
tion for good sense and unblemished honor is un-
questioned, and all of his operations are strikingly
characterized by resolute assurance and good judg-
ment.
Hon. Harry A. Vagg, a prosperous merchant of
Saco, has been connected with the development of
this neighborhood since 1893, and -is one of the
early settlers of the Milk River Valley country.
Honors have been conferred upon him and he had
the distinction of being the first man to represent
this district in the Upper House of the State As-
sembly, and is also a bank president.
The birth of Harry A. Vagg took place in Som-
ersetshire, England, December 14, 1868, he being
a son of William and Susan (Manley) Vagg. They
had two sons and two daughters in their family,
■ of whom Harry A. was the eldest, the others being
as follows : Frank M., who joined his brother and
was in business with him at Saco until his death
in November, 1918, when he left a widow and three
children; Miss Annie A., who is a resident of
Cardiff, Wales, where her widowed mother is now
living; and Mrs. Clara J. Smith, who is also a resi-
dent of Cardiff. William Vagg died when Harry
A. Vagg was only nine years old. The family was
in humble circumstances, depending entirely upon
the father's wages for support.
Harry A. Vagg was attending the English pub-
lic schools when his father died, but his widowed
mother, struggling with the problem of caring for
her four little ones could not afford to give him
many opportunities, and when an uncle, James Vagg
of Lockport, New York, offered to take the lad,
she sent him on the long voyage to the United
States in the charge of some friends who were
crossing at that time. This was in May, 1879.
After reaching his uncle Harry A. Vagg remained
with him for five years and completed his school-
ing and assisted in farm work. Upon leaving Lock-
port he came into the far west, his first stopping
place being Niagara, North Dakota. He had no
definite plans, simply came out to a region which
he felt was replete with opportunities, and subse-
quent events prove that he was right with regard
to the country and his own capabilities. For two
years he worked on a farm in the vicinity of
Niagara, but he had not come into the west with
the intention of continuing a farm hand, and eager-
ly embraced the opportunity when it arrived of
engaging with the construction work on the Great
Northern Railroad, which brought him into Mon-
tana in April, 1887. He was one of the general
laborers as far as Fort Benton, and then was made
foreman of the section work at Glasgow, and re-
mained there as such for five years. Leaving rail-
road work, he established himself as a merchant
at Saco.
Mr. Vagg opened a new building at Saco in 1893,
his being the first business building in the place,
and put in a general stock of goods. He has con-
tinued to keep this his main interest, although he
has been connected with a number of other enter-
prises. Some years after he came to Saco he en-
tered a homestead almost adjoining the town site,
and he is still holding it. For a time, with Dan
Garrison, he was also in the sheep business, but
later sold his interests.
During the time Mr. Vagg has been a resident
of Saco it has grown from a hamlet containing one
store to a little city of 600 people, and he has served
it as a member of the city council, still continuing
in that office. It was in Valley County when he
first came here, although previous to this, while he
was living at Glasgow, he had helped in creating
Valley County from part of Dawson, and later on
he was one of the men prominent in having the new
county of Phillips created, and was the first to be
elected from it to the Montana Senate.
Mr. Vagg encouraged the creation and building
up of the banking facilities at Saco, taking stock
in the First National Bank, of which he was made
vice president at its organization, and later invest-
ing in stock of the Farmers & Merchants Bank
when it was organized, August 16, 1916. He was
made president of the latter institution, and still
holds that responsible position. He helped to or-
ganize the Saco Creamery, which served the dairy
interests of this region until it was destroyed by
fire, and he was a stockholder of the Saco Hotel,
also destroyed by fire. The first postmaster of Saco,
he held the office for six years, and from 1905 to
1909 he was United States land commissioner, and
did the work of filing much of the land in the Saco
country during that period.
About 1890 Mr. Vagg took out his citizen papers
at Glasgow, Montana, and allied himself with the
republican party, his first presidential vote being
cast for Benjamin Harrison in 1892, and he has
voted for republican candidates ever since, save
in 1912, when he supported the progressive repub-
lican candidate, Theodore Roosevelt. He was
chairman of the Progressive Republican County
Central Committee of that year, and prior to that
served as state central committeeman for Valley
County in the regular republican organization. Mr.
Vagg was elected a representative for Valley
County as a member of the Eighth General As-
sembly, presided over by Speaker White, and was
on the judiciary committee and the ones on print-
ing, engrossment and insurance. He served one
term and attended two special sessions. His next
experience came when he was elected to the Upper
House on the republican ticket, and served dur-
ing the Fourteenth Session under Lieutenant Gov-
ernor McDowell. This was a democratic Senate
and he only served one session. During that pe-
riod Mr. Vagg was on the committees pertaining
to military affairs, irrigation and water rights, im-
migration and apportionment and representation.
Entering the Masonic order, Mr. Vagg was made
a Mason at Glasgow, Montana, in 1895, but later
demitted to Saco Lodge No. 94, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, of which he is now past master.
He took the Chapter and Commandery degrees at
Helena, later demitting to Glasgow Chapter and
Commandery, and he also belongs to Livingston
Consistory and Algeria Temple, Mystic Shrine.
In the war work of Saco Mr. Vagg took his
customary place among the energetic workers of
this region, gave a large monthly subscription to
the Red Cross, and was on the committees of all
the Liberty Loan drives, as well as one of the
heavy buyers of the bonds of each issue.
On June 28, 1897, Mr. Vagg was united in mar-
riage with Miss Bettie Wilson at Saco, Montana.
Mrs. Vagg was born in Minnesota during the '70s,
a daughter of Charles Wilson. She was educated
in the public schools of Minnesota, and reared on
her father's farm, being the eldest of his three
r^^l
t-i,X><-o»— *-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
257
children, the others being as follows : Mrs. S. C.
Small, of Glasgow, Montana; and Edgar Wilson,
of Thief River Falls, Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs.
Vagg have the following children : Roland M., who
completed his educational training with courses at
Shattuck Military Academy and Great Falls Com-
mercial College, is associated in business with his
father ; and Vivian F., who attended Saint Mary's
Hall at Faribault, Minnesota, and the Great Falls
Commercial College, is at home.
Mr. Vagg is a man of the people, who sympathizes
with their needs, and understands their require-
ments. Never having possessed himself of the
benefits of proper education and training, and being
forced to earn his own living from an early age,
he has developed great mental resourcefulness, and
responded in wonderful measure to the demand
made upon him in every direction. His every act is
characterized by a flaming sincerity, and he is not
easily deceived in men or misled in measures. He
is a natural leader of men, and has long been an
inspiration to the people of his community for activi-
ties of the best sort.
R. E. Carr. Each successive year brings an in-
crease in the business written by the standard life
insurance companies of the country as a result of
the vigorous educational campaigns carried on among
the people through the press and special litera-
ture. The average man has been awakened to
the necessity of providing for the future of his
family and for his own old age, and invests to
the limit of his resources in life insurance, if he
is of even the ordinary intellectual caliber. This
realization of the responsibilities resting upon him
during the most productive years of his life has
come about through the efforts of the insurance
representatives, and for that reason they have been
selected with great care, due attention being paid
to their capabilities along this line. Some of the
most efficient salesmen in the country are now de-
voting themselves exclusively to selling life insur-
ance, and one who has attained state-wide popu-
larity in this branch of activity is R. E. Carr, agency
manager of the Bidlake-Honey Life Insurance Com-
pany for the State of Montana, with headquarters
at Billings.
R. E. Carr was born at St. Paul, Minnesota,
February 13, 1892, a son of Robert Carr, now re-
siding at St. Paul. Robert Carr was born at New-
castle, England, in 1857, where he was reared and
married. In 1879 he left England, going direct
to St. Paul. Minnesota, after landing in the United
States, and was one of the earlv merchants of that
city, taking part in its civic affairs as an independ-
ent voter. He is a consistent member of the Epis-
copal Church, having formerly been a member of
the Church of England. In 1879 Robert Carr was
married to Mary Purvis, born at Newcastle-on-
Tjme, England, in 1861. and they became the parents
of the following children: J. G., who is district
sales manager of the Vim Motor Truck Company
of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and R. E., whose name
heads this review.
After he had been graduated from the graded
schools of St. Paul R. E. Carr learned the funda-
mentals of commercial life at St. Paul's Business
College, from which he was graduated in 191 1,
following which he entered the Commercial State
Bank of St. Paul as assistant cashier, and held
that position for three years. He then became
traveling auditor for the Northern Pacific Railroad,
and during IQ17 and IQ18 covered the State of
Montana for that company. In the latter year Mr.
Carr was appointed agency manager for the Bid-
lake-Honey agency for the Northwestern Life In-
surance Company of Minneapolis, Minnesota, for the
State of Montana, with offices at 315 Hart-Albin
Building, Billings. Mr. Carr manages the office and
handles the field men for Montana, and has eight
field men under his supervision, and he supervises
approximately 100 agents throughout the state.
On April 18, 1918, Mr. Carr was united in mar-
riage with Miss Amy Bidlake, and on April 17,
1919, they became the parents of a daughter, Sybil.
Mrs. Carr is a daughter of John and Amy Bid-
lake, who live at No. 116 Broadwater Avenue,
Billings. Mr. Bidlake is senior member of the Bid-
lake-Honey Agency. Mr. and Mrs. Carr own a
beautiful home at No. 412 Lewis Avenue, Billings,
where they delight in gathering their friends about
them. Like his father, Mr. Carr prefers to exer-
cise his own judgment in casting his vote, and is
independent in his political views. A member of
the Episcopal Church, he renders his parish valu-
able service as choirmaster, the choir being in
magnificent condition under his efficient manage-
ment. A man of great abilities, he possesses the en-
thusiasm of youth, and yet has already had years
of responsible experience which enables him to
judge men and control them in such a manner as
to avoid unnecessary friction, and yet bring forth
the most productive results. Although new in this
line of business, he has already proven his fitness
for it, and has a great future before him in de-
veloping the business of his aggressive company.
Lucius Allison Nutting. One of the most rep-
resentative men of Laurel and Yellowstone counties
is Lucius Allison Nutting, whose varied talents have
been developed through his own individual efforts,
and his business triumphs engineered through his
sagacity and sound judgment. He has been as-
sociated with some of the most constructive work
of this section, and has made a name known all
over the country as a breeder of Shorthorn cattle.
He was born in Doniphan County, Kansas, July I,
1858, a son of Lucius Nutting, and comes of one
of the oldest families in the country, being a lineal
descendant of John Nutting, born in England, who
founded the family in the new world. His name
appears on a record in the Massachusetts colony
under date of .August 28, 1650, as being tlien united
in marriage with Sarah, a daughter of Stephen
Eggleson (Eggleston)T John Nutting and his wife
lived in Woburn, Massachusetts, and had three chil-
dren born in that place, namely: John. James and
Mary. They then moved to Chelmsford, now West-
ford, Massachusetts. In 1661 they went to Groton,
Massachusetts, and in 1663 John Nutting was chosen
selectman, being again elected to that important
office October 15, 1669. In 1668 he was chosen
constable. A man of ample means and a large
land owner, he was a leader of men, both in ma-
terial things and those of a spiritual nature, as he
was very religious. During 1676 he was conspicuous
in a fight his community made against an attack
by the hostile Indians and was one of four killed.
Lucius Nutting, father of Lucius A. Nutting, was
born in Massachusetts in 1820, a son of Brvant
Nutting, also a native of Massachusetts, who died
in the vicinity of Springfield, that state, at a date
antedating the birth of his grandson, of whom we
write. Growing up in his native state, Lucius Nut-
ting came West to Illinois in young manhood, and
was there married. A physician and surgeon by
profession, he was engaged in an active practice
in that state, but was drawn from it bv the gold
excitement of 1849, and crossing the plains spent a
year in California, but returned to Illinois and re-
258
HISTORY OF MONTANA
sumed his practice. Later he went to Crescent
City, Iowa, where he built and conducted a saw-
mill. In 1857 he went still farther west, locating
in Doniphan County, Kansas, there erecting another
saw-mill, and, buying a farm, lived on it until
1878. In 1879 he went to Arizona, but after a year
in that state returned to Doniphan County and
was engaged in the drug business at Leona, Kansas.
The year 1880 saw his entry into Montana, as he
spent its summer at Bozeman, and in 1881 home-
steaded at Laurel, a claim of 160 acres and a timber
claim of 160 acres more. Oie of these farms he
sold, but the other one forms a portion of his estate
now owned by his heirs. In 1895 he returned to
Bozeman, where he remained until his death in
1903. A republican of the most pronounced type,
he was a leader in his party, and served as com-
missioner of Yellowstone County for six years.
For years a member of the Presbyterian Church,
he was very active in it, and held all of the lay
offices connected with the conduct of its affairs.
His wife bore the maiden name of Elizabeth Allison,
and she was born in Pennsylvania in 1819 and
died at Bozeman in 1901. Their children were as
follows : Julia, who married Bryant Cowan, for-
merly a well known breeder of Shorthorn cattle in
Missouri, is now connected with the Shorthorn
Breeders' Association in a literary capacity, and
lives at Santa Monica, California; Wilder, who is
a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, re-
sides at Three Forks, Montana; Lucius A., whose
name heads this review; William B., who resides
at Red Lodge, Montana, where he is engaged in
the banking business ; Lilly E., who died at Santa
Monica, California; and Roy H., who is retired,
lives at Eureka, California.
Lucius A. Nutting attended the rural schools of
Doniphan County, Kansas, which at that day offered
but limited educational advantages, but being de-
termined to improve his mind Mr. Nutting through
reading, travel, observation and other means of ac-
quiring culture has becoipe one of the best informed
men in his part of the state. When he was twenty
years of age he began to be self supporting, at
that time going to Tombstone, Arizona, and after
a short stay traveling on through Arizona, Nevada,
Utah and Idaho. He helped in the construction
of the railroad from Corinne, Utah, into Montana
during the fall of 1879. Following that he was a
cowboy and bull whacker until he located at Laurel
and homesteaded 160 acres of land. That original
farm has grown until he now owns 800 acres of
irrigated land in the vicinity of Laurel, and an in-
terest in 1,600 acres of dry ranch land. Mr. Nutting
is a breeder of Shorthorn cattle, and his methods
and successes in this branch of agriculture have
gained him more than a local reputation. He also
raises grain and is equally successful in this line.
His handsome residence on Alder Street is owned
by him, and he also owns considerable city prop-
erty. A portion of his farm was included in the
town site of Laurel, and he sold 135 acres of land
to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company.
In 1909 Mr. Nutting became interested in the
Fromberg Brick and Tile Company, buying the
controlling interest in 1913 and taking' upon himself
the management of tlie company. Under his ag-
gressive policies the affairs of the company have
been put in fine condition, and the capacity of the
plant is taxed to fill the orders for high grade brick
and tile from Billings and Southern Montana and
Northern Wyoming. The yards are located at
Fromberg, Montana, and have a capacity of 40,000
brick per day. Mr. Nutting was one of the organ-
izers of the Citizens National Bank of Laurel, of
which he was the first president, continuing in that
office for 2J/2 years, whei; he sold his interest.
A democrat through conviction, he early was ac-
corded the leadership of his party in this district,
and was elected a representative to the State As-
sembly from Yellowstone County in 1914, serving
as a member of the Fourteenth Session. During
that period he was chairman of the federal rela-
tions committee and a member of the committees on
irrigation and water rights and agriculture, as well
as others of considerable importance, and intro-
duced the drainage law bill, now on the statute
books, to secure the passage of which necessitated
an imrnense amount of work on the part of Mr.
Nutting. A booster of Laurel in every sense, Mr.
Nutting takes a very active part in the Commercial
Club, and has been instrumental in bringing out-
side capital to the city and interesting a sufficient
number to secure their location here. Fraternally
he belongs to Laurel Camp, Modern Woodmen of
.America, and Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks.
In 1891 Mr. Nutting was married at Red Lodge,
Montana, to Miss Lilly Ellis, born at San Francisco,
California, but educated at Newark, Ohio. Mr. and
Mrs. Nutting became the parents of the following
children : Ruth, who was graduated from the Uni-
versity of Montana, at Missoula, with the degree
of Bachelor of Art, is residing with her parents;
and Bryant, who was graduated from the Laurel
High School, is associated with his father in busi-
ness.
R. C. Battey, manager of the Billings branch of
the International Harvester Company at Billings,
Montana, furnishes another example in his career of
the rewards attainable through the exercise of per-
severance, industry and well-defined and worthy
ambition, combined with a policy including the
demonstration of integrity and fidelity. From the
outset of his business life he has been identified
with the great concern of which he is now a rep-
resentative, and has worked his way up from a
hurnble capacity, making the most of his oppor-
tunities, and expanding and growing with the ex-
pansion and development of the concern.
Mr. Battey was born in Shelby County, Iowa,
January 21, 1879, a son of George and Louisa Fisher
(Cooper) Battey. The family of which he is a
member originated in England, and during the seven-
teenth century was founded in America by Sampson
Battey, who took up his residence in Jamestown,
Rhode Island. In that state, at Foster, Maj. Silas
Battey, grandfather of R. C, was born in 1815. He
was reared and married in his native city, but be-
came a pioneer into Bureau County, Illinois, where
during the remainder of his life he was engaged
in agricultural pursuits in the vicinity of Sheffield,
and died at that place in 1895. He fought bravely
as a soldier during the Mexican war and rose to
the rank of major.
George Battey, father of R. C. Battey, was born
at Foster, Rhode Island, in 1837, and was reared
in his native place where he obtained a public school
education. He was still a young man when he
moved with his parents to Bureau County, Illinois,
and for a time was associated with his father in
the cultivation of the soil near Sheffield. In 1864
he enlisted in the One Hundred Thirty-ninth Regi-
ment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry, for participation in
the war between the states, and continued as a
member of that regiment until receiving his honor-
able discharge at the close of hostilities. Mr. Battey
remained as a resident of Illinois until 1877, in
which year he made removal to Shelby County,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
259
Iowa, where he first settled on a farm. Later,
however, his interest was attracted to the grain
business, and subsequently he became a banker and
an influential citizen of his community, having a
private banking house at Portsmouth, Iowa. In
1913 he removed from that i>lace, retiring from
active pursuits, and took up his residence at Oakes,
North Dakota, where his death occurred on October
I, 1915. While a resident of Portsmouth he took
an active and constructive part in civic alTairs, and
served as mayor and in other capacities, in which
he displayed marked public spirit and splendid execu-
tive ability. He was a member of the Masons.
In 1861 Mr. Battey married 'Louisa Fisher Cooper,
who was born in 1841 in Connecticut, and died at
Bismarck, North Dakota, in 1915, and they became
the parents of the following children: H. V., a
successful practicing attorney of Council Bluffs,
Iowa ; F. S., engaged in the general merchandise
business at Brampton, North Dakota; R. C, of
this notice ; and George, who is engaged in the
pursuits of farming in the vicinity of Straubville,
North Dakota.
R. C. Battey received his literary education in
the public schools of Portsmouth, following this
by a course in a commercial college at Council
Bluffs, Iowa, from which he was graduated in 1894.
He then returned to his home, where he remained
until 1899, the year which marked the beginning
of his connection with his present concern. Mr.
Battey was content to enter into the life which
this concern offered for the advancement of am-
bitious and determined young men, and as a start
took a position which paid him a salary of $30.00
per month. Gradual promotion followed, and Mr.
Battey was soon doing responsible office work,
eventually becoming cashier of the Council Bluffs
branch of the business. From this position, in order
that he might thoroughly learn the business, he
was sent out on the road as a traveling represen-
tative, and in 1904 was transferred to Minot, North
Dakota, where he was made assistant manager of
that branch of the International Harvester Com-
pany in 1908. Two years later Mr. Battey was
transferred to the branch at Bismarck, in the ca-
pacity of manager, a position which he retained
until 1917, the year in which he assumed, his duties
as manager of the Billings branch, with offices
at the corner of South Broadway and Minnesota
Avenue. The territory of the Billings branch of
the International Harvester Company includes Cen-
tral Montana and Northern Wyoming. Mr. Battey
has the confidence of his company and the sincere
esteem of his co-workers, and in business circles
generally maintains an excellent reputation and
standing. In political matters he maintains an
independent stand. While he has not been an office
seeker in public life, he has always discharged the
duties and responsibilities of citizenship, and dur-
ing his residence at Bismarck, North Dakota, served
efficiently for six years in the capacity of citv com-
missioner. His religious faith is that of the Roman
Catholic Church, and he is a member of the Knights
of Columbus, being affiliated with Bismarck Council.
Also he holds membership in the United Commercial
Travelers, in Bismarck Lodge, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, and in the Billings Midland
Club. In addition to his pleasant modern residence
at 306 Clark Avenue, he is the owner of valuable
ranches in Eastern Montana.
Mr. Battey was married February 23. 1914, at St.
Paul. Minnesota, to Miss Edith V. Russell, daughter
of P. H. and Mary Russell, residents of Trail City.
South Dakota, where Mr. Russell is proprietor of
the Trail City Hotel. Mrs. Battey is a graduate
of the Minot (North Dakota) High School. She
and her husband are the parents of one child:
R. C, Jr., born February 28, 191 5, at Billings.
Alfred C. Carlson is superintendent of the city
schools of Red Lodge and is an educator of long
and prominent experience in the Northwest. He
did his first school work twenty-five years ago,
and has always been thoroughly progressive in edu-
cational affairs, seeking every opportunity to improve
his own abilities, anc his energies and ideals have
been reflected in the very good condition of the
Red Lodge schools today. He has been at the head
of the public schools of Red Lodge for the last
eleven years.
Mr. Carlson was born at Marine Mills, Minne-
sota, December 15, 1869, a son of J. C. and Chris-
tina Carlson. His father was born in Germany in
1824, and lived there until 1859, when he came to
the United States and settled at Marine Mills, Min-
nesota, being a pioneer in that territory. Not long
afterward he joined the noted Seventh Minnesota
Regiment of Infantry, and was in all the engage-
ments of that regiment in the northwest and in the
center of the conflicting area of the Civil war.
He was wounded at Gettysburg, and was a soldier
for 3'/2 years. He then returned to Marine Mills
and lived there until his death in 1916. He was
an old-school republican in politics and a member
of the Lutheran Church. His wife was born in
Illinois in 1826 and died at Marine Mills in 1918.
Alfred C. is the youngest of their four children.
The oldest was Augustus, who was a farmer at
Big Lake, Washington County, Minnesota, and was
drowned at the age of twenty-six. Caroline, the
second child, is the wife of August Lundquist, who
is assessor of Washington County, and has his home
in Marine Mills. John, the other son, is a farmer
at Marine Mills.
Alfred C. Carlson as a boy attended the rural
schools of Washington County, Minnesota, and
graduated from high school at Stillwater. His col-
legiate work was done in Gustavus Adolphus Col-
lege at St. Peter, Minnesota, where he received his
A. B. degree in 1890, at the age of twenty-one.
Later, in the intervals of teaching he attended Yale
University, taking post-graduate courses there for
three years and was awarded his Master of Arts
degree by that old institution of higher learning
in 1905. In the meantime he had taught one year
in his native town of Marine Mills, was principal
of the schools of Stanton, Iowa, a year and for
four years held the Chair of English in his alma
mater at St. Peter. He was elected and served
three years as superintendent of the schools of Can-
non Falls, Minnesota, and spent another three years
as superintendent of the schools of Eureka. Utah.
His next work in the educational field was as super-
intendent at Weiser, Idaho. He resigned his work
there at the end of three years and spent the fol-
lowing year developing a ranch near Weiser. He
still owns that property and it is now a fruit grow-
ing prooosition.
Mr. Carlson came to Red Lodge in 1909, and has
completed his eleventh consecutive year as superin-
tendent of schools. The schools have made notable
progress under his sunervision. Red Lodge now
has six schools, a staff of thirty-one teachers, and
a student enrollment of 1.200. Mr. Carlson is a
member of the National Education Association, the
Montana State Teachers' Association, he is a liberal
democrat, a vestrvman of the Enisconal Church at
Red Lodge, is affiliated with Oriental Lodge No.
34. Ancient Free and Accented Masons, is scribe
'of Carbon Chanter No, 20. Rnval Arch Masons, and
a former member of the Odd Fellows.
260
HISTORY OF MONTANA
His home is at 321 North Word Avenue. He
married Miss May Hennings at Willmar, Minne-
sota, in 1902. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. C. Hen-
nings, are retired residents of Willmar and her
father is a veteran of the Civil, war. Mrs. Carlson
IS a graduate of the Willmar High School and of
the Normal School at St. Clou'd, Minnesota. Mr.
and Mrs. Carlson have had two children: The
older, Margaret, died at the age of nine years. Their
son is James H., born May 29, igi8.
Arthur W. Miles. The commonplace citizen who
makes himself useful to the world and achieves a
fair degree of success by adhering to the old rule
and principle of concentrating his efforts along one
line finds it difficult to appreciate the enormous
spread of influences and activities of such a man as
Arthur W. Miles of Livingston. While the phrase
IS often applied to many lesser men, Mr. Miles is
really a "man of affairs" and of affairs of importance
when taken individually and in the aggregate com-
prising a vast range of interests that directly affect
the welfare and the progress of Montana. One of
the hrst three merchants of Livingston, he has al-
ways been a merchant, built up the great department
store of A. W. Miles Company, founded the A. W.
Miles Lumber & Coal Company, was responsible
for one of the oldest organizations handling and
caring for the tourist traffic in the Yellowstone Na-
tional Park, and has also been a brick manufacturer,
lumberman, farmer, livestock raiser, banker, has
helped build and develop new towns, create new in-
dustrial and agricultural opportunities, and has also
sat as a potent figure in the Legislature and at one
time was acting governor of the state.
Arthur W. Miles is a nephew of the late Gen.
Nelson A. Miles, one of the most distinguished mili-
tary figures of the United States. He was born
at Westminster, Massachusetts, June 20, 1859, a son
of Daniel C. and Mary Jane (Puffer) Mifes. The
Miles family goes back to the colonial settlement
of America. Arthur W. Miles was the fourth in a
family of five children. The oldest, Josie M., is the
wife of M. M. Parker, a professor in the University
of Southern California, living at Pasadena. George
M., the oldest brother, is a banker and capitalist at
Miles City, Montana. Herbert J. is a retired ac-
countant and auditor living at Pasadena, California.
The youngest, Gertrude, died at the age of sixteen
years in Westminster, Massachusetts.
Arthur W. Miles graduated in 1878 from the
Wesleyan Academy at Wilbraham, Massachusetts.
He then taught a term of school and in 1879 he
accepted a position as paymaster's clerk in the regu-
lar army. He served one year at Santa Fe, New
Mexico, and was then promoted and transferred to
Fort Keogh, Montana, where he began his duties in
October, 1880. He witnessed the surrender in the
winter of 1880 of Sitting Bull and Rain in the Face,
which was during the period when the buffalo
roamed the plains. Mr. Miles therefore identified
himself with Montana at an important transition
period in the history of the territory, after the work
of the earliest pioneers had been accomplished, and
just as the building of railroads and the clearing
of hostile Indians and wild buffalo from the prairies
opened up the real industrial and commercial op-
portunities of the Treasure State. After two and
a half years with the Government he resigned, for
a few months was engaged in the hardware business
near the present site of Billings, moved to 'that
town when it was established and erected the first
store building in it, and in 1882 formed the firm of
Babcock & Miles, in partnership with A. L. Babcock.
They opened a store at Clark City, which shortly
atter\vard became Livingston, and Mr. Miles was
one of the three first men to engage in business in
the new town. He was also a member of the Vigi-
lantes Committee, which endeavored to keep law
and order in the iinorganized community. In the
meantime he and his partners opened branch stores
at Gardner, Big Timber and Red Lodge, but from
the first Mr. Miles' enterprise has been centered at
Livingston. He has been one of the chief men to
build up and give that city its business facilities.
In 1889 he built the xMiles Block, one of the finest
buildings in the state up to that time. It was
destroyed by fire in J914. He also erected the
Postoffice Block, in which is located the Park Hotel,
of which he is the founder, the Garnier-Miles Block,
and in 1916 completed the Strand Theater, which
when it was opened was characterized as the finest
picture theater in Montana. The A. W. Miles
Company, which represents the culmination of Mr.
Miles' experience as a merchant, is an immense
organization, capitalized at $300,000, and conducts a
store furnishing a complete mercantile service in
dry goods, groceries, clothing, farm implements, and
is housed in one of the most modern store buildings
in the Northwest. A separate corporation, and in
a degree supplementing the service of the A. W.
Miles Company, is the A. W. Miles Lumber & Coal
Company, which was separately incorporated in
January, 1914. In 1917 Mr. Miles was also the man
chiefly responsible for the establishment of the
Northwestern National Bank of Livingston, was its
first president, and is now director and chairman
of its Board of Directors. Mr. Miles is also presi-
dent of the Yellowstone Park Camping Company,
successors to the Wylie Permanent Camping Com-
pany, a business which has been in existence for
thirty years, and which handles an enormous tourist
business through the National Park every year. The
company has four permanent camps in the park.
The above is only a suggestive outline of Mr.
Miles' many and varied business activities, a com-
plete account of which would read like a catalogue
of the commercial progress of Southern Montana.
Mr. Miles has been an active republican, served as
the first mayor of Livingston, and in November,
1905, was elected a member of the State Senate.
During the four years in that office he was president
of the Senate and in the absence of Governor Norris
was acting governor. He has served on many public
administrative boards, is active in the Chamber of
Commerce and Commercial Club of Livingston, and
fraternally is a member of Livingston Lodge No. 32,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Livingston
Chapter No. 7, Royal Arch Masons, St. Bernard
Commandery No. 6, Knights Templar, Algeria Tem-
ple of the Mystic Shrine, Livingston Lodge No. 10,
Knights of P\-thias. and Zephyr Camp No. 151,
Woodmen of the World.
December 19, 1885, Mr. Miles married Miss Idella
M. Draper, a native of HoUiston, Massachusetts,
and a daughter of W. H. and Sarah L. (Perry)
Draper The oldest child of Mr. and Mrs. Miles is
Louise Gertrude, who finished her education at
Carlton Colleg?, Minnesota, and in November, 1910.
became the wife of Thomas E. Mitchell. Mr. and
Mrs. Mitchell now reside at Los Angeles. Mr.
Mitchell is a mining engineer and just recently re-
turned after four years of service in a technical
capacity for an English syndicate in the mines of
Burma. India. Daniel Nelson, the only living son.
is a graduate of Amherst College with the class of
1912, and a member of the Chi Psi college fraternity.
He is now the active manager of his father's busi-
ness, the A. W. Miles Company at Livingston. He
married in 1914 Esther Tervoll, of San Francisco,
uCU7?fM:Ic^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Adena Josephine, the second daughter, is a graduate
of Mount Vernon Seminary at Washington, D. C,
and in 191 5 became the wife of Charles Wright, Jr.,
a lawyer of Detroit, Michigan. The youngest.
Perry D. Miles, .died when one year old.
Walter E. Rynikf.r. Justly numbered with the
aggressive business men of Billings, Walter E.
Ryniker is well known outside his own city as vice
president and manager of the Ryniker-Winter Sheet
Metal Works and vice president of the Ryniker-
Winter Hardware Company. He was born at
Quincy, Illinois, May 25, 1885, a son of Samuel
Ryniker and grandson of Ubrich Ryniker, born at
Schunznach, Aargan, Switzerland, in 1800, and there
died in 1876. He was married to Marie Hittpolt,
who was born in 1806 in the same village as her
husband, and there she passed away in 1850. Samuel
Ryniker was born at Schunznach, Aargan, Switzer-
land, June 7, 1845. and he died at Quincy, Illinois,
October 13, 1892. .^^ifter being reared in his native
place Samuel Ryniker came to the United States
and located at Quincy, Illinois, where for many
years he carried on a merchant tailoring business
He was a devout member of the Methodist Epis-
copal Church. On October 4, 1880, Samuel Ryniker
was married to Magdaline Stauterman, born near
Quincy, August 29, 1853, and she died July 5, 1905,
at Quincy. Their children were as follows: Al-
fred Samuel, who was born August 14, 1881, is con-
nected with the Ryniker-Winter Hardware Com-
pany and lives at Billings; Ella Pauline, who was
born March 31, 1883. died April 24, 1913; Walter
E., whose name heads this review; Cora Melinda,
who was born February 14. 1887, married H. H.
Winter, president of the Ryniker-Winter Hard-
ware Company of Billings; Milton Edwin, who
was born June 18, 1889, is a resident of Los Ange-
les, California, and was mustered out of the avia-
tion branch of the United States army in Texas as
a lieutenant ; Chester Arthur, who was born March
18, 1891, is a railroad mail clerk and a resident of
Quincy ; and Samuel Wesley, who was born June
15. 1893, is a resident of New Orleans, Louisiana,
and during the great war served in France as a
member of the aviation branch of the service. The
father of these children had been previously mar-
ried, being united on October 7, 1869, to Louise
Freistein, of St. Louis, Missouri, who was born
May 24, 1851, and died June 27, 1880. By this mar-
riage he had three children, namely: Emma Fred-
erica, who was born February 21, 1873, is married
and lives on her husband's ranch at Clearwater,
Nebraska ; Matilda Emily, who was born Novem-
ber 26, 1874, is unmarried and resides at Quincy;
and Emelia, who was born May 19, 1877, died Feb-
ruary 12, 1882.
After completing the eighth grade of the public
schools when fourteen years of age Walter E.
Ryniker entered the employ of a dry goods firm
at Quincy, but eighteen months later commenced
learning the sheet metal trade. After completing
his trade he took a commercial course at the Gem
City Business College. For a year subsequent to
that he worked at his trade at Chicago, Illinois,
and then came to Billings in 1908, and he and Mr.
Winter bought the sheet metal plant established
by Cedergren Brothers at No, 109 North Twenty-
sixth Street. Since then the business has grown
to large proportions and the immense plant is lo-
cated at No. 115 North Twenty-fifth Street. The
officers of the company are as follows : H. H.
Winter, president, and W. E. Ryniker, vice presi-
dent and manager. Mr. Ryniker is also vice presi-
dent of the Ryniker-Winter Hardware Company.
His handsome modern residence is at No. 406 Yel-
lowstone Avenue. In politics Mr. Ryniker is an
independent. He belongs to the Congregational
Church. Well known in Masonry and belongs to
.\shlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, having been raised at Quincy, Illinois.
He also belongs to Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks; Yellowstone
Council No. 363, United Commercial Travelers, and
the Billings Midland Club.
On February 10, 1913, Mr. Ryniker was married
at Billings to Miss Adelene Berenice Cowen, a
daughter of H. S. and Harriet (Payne) Cowen.
Mr. Cowen was a druggist of Beardstown, Illinois,
where he died, but Mrs. Cowen survives and makes
her home at Beardstown. Mr. and Mrs. Ryniker
have two children, namely : Walter Henry, who
was born June 15, 1914, and Harriet Ella, who was
born June 6, igi8. Both Mr. Ryniker and Mr. Win-
ter are held in the highest esteem in this part of
the state, and at Billings they are regarded as valu-
able assets to tlie city's commercial and industrial
importance.
John M. S. Stiles, manager of the Billings branch
of the Nichols and Shepard Company, and owner
of one of the valuable ranches near Shelby, Mon-
tana, is justly numbered among the worth-while
men of the state. He was born at Banfield, Michi-
gan, on his father's farm, April i, 1888, a son of
David C. Stiles, now residing one-half a mile out-
side of Banfield, Michigan. David C. Stiles was
born in Southern Michigan, and has spent all of
his mature years on his present farm, being ac-
tively engaged in conducting it and dealing in
stock. A prominent man of his community, he has
often been elected to township offices, but he is
independent in his political views. The Methodist
Episcopal Church has in him a valued member.
David C. Stiles was married to Mary A. Kipp,
born in Barry County, Michigan, near Banfield,
in 1868, and they became the parents of the fol-
lowing children : Floyd E., who is a veterinary
surgeon of Battle Creek, Michigan ; John M. S.,
whose name heads this review; Fred T., who is en-
gaged in farming in the vicinity of Banfield, Michi-
gan ; Vern, who died at the age of two years ; Karl
A., who is living on the farm with his parents ;
and Leah Lucille, who is at home.
John M. S. Stiles was reared on the farm and
sent to the local schools of Barry County. Later
he was a student of the Battle Creek High School,
and the Michigan Business and Normal College,
from which latter institution he was graduated in
iQii. The previous year he had taken a course in
the Michigan Agricultural College at Lansing,
Michigan. On June 6. 19TI, he began his connec-
tion with his present firm as filing clerk and mail
carrier in the home office at Battle Creek, and was
successively promoted until in 1914 he was sent to
Billings, Montana, as cashier of the branch at this
place. The following year he was made manager
of the branch, and has so continued ever since.
The Nichols and Shepard Company are builders
of threshing machines, and in addition to the home
office and plant at Battle Creek, Michigan, have
twelve branches. The branch at Billings handles
all the business for Montana, and the office and
warehouse are located opposite the Union Depot.
In addition to the large warehouse for storing the
machines there is a well equipped repair shop,
and an immense amount of re-building of the ma-
chines is done here. A large and complete stock
of supplies is carried and Mr. Stiles has under his
supervision nine emploves. He resides at in 5
North Thirtv-first Street, but owns a ranch of 160
acres four miles north of Shelbv. Toole County,
262
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Montana, which is devoted to grain growing. Like
his father, Mr. Stiles reserves the right to cast his
vote independent of pa,rty ties. He belongs to the
Methodist Episcopal Church. On November i8,
1918, Mr. Stiles was united in marriage witti Miss
Ruby M. Wareham at Columbus, Montana. Mrs.
Stiles was born in Nebraska. Mr. Stiles' rise with
his company is assuredly .because of his fidelity to
the trusts reposed in him,' and his ability to grasp
the details of the business, and his success is de-
s'erved.
WiLLi.^M Parkhurst Ladd. In the field of
grain dealing and brokerage there are few men in
Montana who have come as rapidly to the fore-
front in recent years as has William Parkhurst
Ladd, whose operations are now centered at Bill-
ings. Still a young man, he has displayed such
initiative, resource, knowledge of the trade and its
condition and foresight in the transaction of large
deals that he has attained an enviable position and
reputation in grain circles and among traders and
operators.
Mr. Ladd was born at White Oak Springs, Wis-
consin, August 21, 1875, a son of George R. and
Mary Ellen (Skewis) Ladd, and a member of a
family which, originating in England, was founded
in Massachusetts during colonial times. George
R. Ladd was born in Massachusetts in 1851, but as
a youth was taken to Wisconsin, where he was
educated and reared, and where for some years
he was a resident of the Town of Shellsburg. In
1881 he removed to Lyon County, Iowa, where
he engaged in farming and rose to a high place
in the esteem of his fellow-citizens, who elevated
him to the office of county treasurer, a trust which
he was holding at the time of his death, which
occurred at Rock Rapids, Iowa, April 3, 1914. He
was a stanch democrat in his political allegiance,
and an active and ganerous supporter of the Con-
gre.gational Church, in which he was a director and
deacon. Mr. Ladd married Mary Ellen Skewis,
who was born in 1852, at Shellsburg, Wisconsin,
and survives her husband as a resident of Rock
Rapids, Iowa. They became the parents of seven
children, as follows : Clarence, engaged in the hard-
ware business at Inwood, Iowa: Carrie, the wife
of C. L. Tones, an attorney at Parker, South Da-
kota; William Parkhurst, of this notice; Allie W.,
who is unmarried and makes her home with her
mother ; Ben, who conducts a grain elevator at
Billings for his brother William P. ; Jennie, the wife
of R. S. Towne, a farmer of the vicinity of Sisters,
Oregon ; and Earl, an automobile agent and the
owner of a garage at Rock Rapids, Iowa.
William Parkhurst Ladd received his education
in the public schools of Inwood, Iowa, and upon
the completion of his .studies embarked immedi-
ately upon the career in which he has met with
such notable success. His initial experience, where
he received his introduction to the grain business,
was at Inwood. From Inwood he went to Presho,
South Dakota, as manager of an elevator, and
after three years made his way to Montana, ar-
riving, in IQ12, at Roundup, where he purchased an
elevator. This he continued to conduct successfully
for two years, after which he sold it profitably and
began soliciting for the H, Poehler Company, grain
commission merchants of Minneapolis, being the
representative of that concern for Montana. This
is a lar.ge and important concern with branch
houses at Duluth, Minnesota, Milwaukee, Wis-
consin, and Chicago, Illinois. Mr. Ladd is also
a partner, with F. A. Cousins, in a grain and seeds
brokerage business, a successful concern in the
management of which his ability has played an im-
portant part in gaining prosperity. In 1917 Mr
Ladd was the main organizer of the Treasure State
Grain and Seed Company of Montana, having as
partners A. E. Platz and Tom Clapper, and own-
ing elevators at Red Lodge, Fox, Boyd, Roberts and
Combs. He continued as president and directing
head of this enterprise until selling out in July,
191S, to the Montana and Dakota Elevator Com-
pany. Mr. Ladd maintains offices at 202 Electric
Building, and owns a modern residence at No. 1 109
North Thirty-first Street.
In 1900, at Inwood, Iowa, Mr. Ladd was united
in marriage with Miss Olive .Albertson, the daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. Elijah Albertson, the latter
of whom is deceased, while the former, a retired
farmer, makes his home with his children. Two
children have blessed this union : Harold, born
in 1901, and Allie Anita, born in 1905, both of
whom are attending school. Mr. and Mrs. Ladd
are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church
and have been active in church work, Mr. Ladd
being a member of the pastoral supply committee
and of the board of directors. He is a republi-
can in his political allegiance, and his fraternal
affiliation is with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and Billings Chapter
No. 6, Royal Arch Masons. He also holds mem-
bership in the Billings Midland Club and has sev-
eral other social and civic connections of impor-
tance.
John Dunn, who is postmaster of Red Lodge,
first knew this country from the standpoint of a
cowboy, worked on ranch and range for a num-
ber of years, later developed extensive cattle and
landed interests of his own, and has long been
prominent in business and public aflfairs in Carbon
County.
He was born at St. Louis, Missouri, February 2,
1862. His father, John Dunn, Sr., was born in
County Tipperary, Ireland, in 1827, came to the
United States in 1843, and a.fter a few years in
New York moved to Franklin County, Missouri.
in 1846. He was a farmer and in 1863 transferred
his home to Franklin County, Missouri, where he
lived until his death in 1908. He was a democrat
and a Catholic and served as a soldier in the Civil
war. His wife, Margaret Coffey, was born in
New York State in 1828 and died in Franklin
County, Missouri, in 1916. She was the mother of
eight children: Margaret, Ellen, and Mary, the
three oldest daughters, are still living in Franklin
County. The next in age is John. Richard is like-
wise a pioneer Montanan. coming to Madison
County, Montana, in 1882 and since 1893 has lived
at Silesia. Thomas lives on the old homestead
in Franklin County, Missouri, Frank is a physician
and surgeon in Missouri. The youngest of the fam-
ily, Cassie, lives with her brother Thomas.
Mr. John Dunn attended rural schools in Frank-
lin County and a business college at St. Louis,
and his home was on his father's farm until he
was nineteen. He came out to Montana in 1881,
His first destination was Virginia City. He soon
entered the service of the noted stockmen EUing
and Buford as a cowboy, and remained one of their
efficient and trusted employes for eleven years.
From 1883 to 1888 he handled the cattle in Madison
County and from 1888 to 1892 brought them to the
Crow Reservation. Mr. Dunn took up land at
Silesia in Carbon County in 1894 and for the next
twenty-four years wa;s an independent rancher and
cattlei operator and acquired extensive interests
both in Wyoming and Montana. He sold his cat-
tle in 1918. He has been a resident of Red Lodge
since i8o6.
./\T 6^^^^-vri/t^.--^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
263
His location at Red Lodge was due primarily to
his election as sheriff of Carbon County in 1895.
He was re-elected in 1897 and was incumbent of
the office four years, 1896-1900. He was appointed
to his present duties as postmaster of Red Lodge
in May, 1916. He also served as alderman for
six years. Mr. Dunn is a democrat, is aifiliated
with Red Lodge Camp, Woodmen of the World,
and is a member of the Red Lodge Chamber
of Commerce. His home is at 279 North Piatt
Avenue. He married Miss Nellie E. Oliver in
Madison County, Montana, in 1889. Her parents
were Mr. aind Mrs. James F. Oliver, the former a
retired farmer of Red Lodge and the latter now
deceased. Mr. and Mrs. Dunn have four children :
Mary, who is 'a graduate of the high school at Red
Lodge and attended the Billings Business College,
is now the wife of J. H. Linquist, a rancher near
Red Lodge ; Frank, who lives on a farm near Si-
lesia; John, who was born October 16, 1899, and
is now taking post-graduate work in the high school
of Red Lodge; and Margaret, born October 11,
1902, attending the University of Missoula.
Edgar W. Logan. Holding distinction as senior
member of the firm of Logan & Mullison, pioneers
in the glass business in the Northwest and the only
firm in Montana carrying a complete line of this
commodity, Edgar W. Logan has not only taken
a leading part in business affairs since locating at
Billings, in 1909, but has also risen to prominence
and influence in civic affairs. When he entered
business it was as a contractor, but he soon rec-
ognized the opportunity open in the field of glass
dealing, and the result was the founding of the
concern of which he is now the head.
Edgar W. Logan was born in Dallas County,
Iowa, September 23, 1870, a son of Alexander M.
and Hulda A. (Adams) Logan, and a member of a
family of English-Irish origin which was founded
in Virginia in colonial times. Alexander M. Logan
was born in 1832, in Westmoreland County, Penn-
sylvania, and as a young man went to Illinois, where
he was married, later going to Dallas County,
Iowa, which was his home at the breaking out of
the Civil war. Mr. Logan enlisted in the Union
army, becoming a member of the Thirty-ninth
Regiment, Iowa Volunteer Infantry, with which
he fought valiantly until a severe wound caused
his disability and consequent honorable discharge
in 1863, following which he returned to Iowa and
resumed his activities in the field of contracting
and building. He became a forceful influence in
republican politics, was deputy sheriff of Dallas
County for several years, and eventually was elected
mayor of Van Meter, Iowa, where he also served
as a member of the school board and was active
in other ways in municipal matters. He was also
an active supporter of the Christian Church and
took a keen interest in the work of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, which fraternitv he joined
young, and of which he was at one time one of
the oldest members in the State of Iowa. He never
really fully recovered from the effects of his
wound, and in 1898, in poor health, retired from
active affairs and came to Montana, where his death
occurred during the same year at Gebo. Mr. Logan
mar-ied Hulda A. .'\dams, who was born in 1838,
in Ohio, and she died in 1901, at Gebo. Montana.
There were two sons born to this worthy couple :
lohn M., a contractor and builder, who died at
Billings at the age of fifty-six years; and Edgar
W., of this notice.
Edgar W. Logan attended the public schools of
Van Meter. Iowa, and after his graduation from
the high school there in 1887 entered Western Col-
lege, Toledo, Iowa, where he pursued a course of
two years. Following this he was placed in charge
of the commerical department of that institution,
a position in which he passed four years, and in
1898 came to Montana and located at Red Lodge,
where he taught school for one year. Mr. Logan
went then to Gebo, where he taught the first school
in Clark's Fork Valley for one year, and eventually
embarked in the contracting business. He was
engaged in this line of activity when he came to
Billings in 1909, and continued to carry on con-
tracting and building for about two years. Dur-
ing this time he had come more and more into con-
tact with the glass business, and in 1911 his plans
were completed and he became one of the foun-
ders of the firm of Logan and Mullison, wholesale
and retail glass dealers, and, as before noted, the
only firm in Montana which carries a complete line
of all kinds of glass. Entire absence of compe-
tition in their field must not be taken as the reason
for their success, for the partners are men of ster-
ling ability who would have succeeded undoubtedly
in any line to which they applied themselves. Their
establishment is located at No. 2614 Montana
.Avenue, where they own their own fine brick struc-
ture, and their trade extends for a radius of 300
miles. Mr. Logan has established himself firmly
in public confidence and in the esteem of his asso-
ciates in the business world, while as a citizen he
has performed every duty in a conscientious man-
ner. His business duties are heavy and exacting,
but he has found the time, inclination and ability
to act in the capacity of police commissioner, a
post which he holds at the present time, and in
which he has done much to make Billings a law-
abiding and well-governed city. Politically he is
affiliated with the republican partv. His fraternal
connections are with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient
Free and Accepted "Masons; Billings Chapter No.
6, Royal Arch Masons; Aldemar Commandery No.
.q. Knights Templar, and .'Mgeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of
Helena. He owns an attractive modern residence
at No. T37 Terry Avenue.
Mr. Logan was married in 1892 at Des Moines,
Iowa, to Mary, A. Bailey, daughter of the late Mr.
and Mrs. William A. Bailey. To this union there
have been born two children : Bessie, who is the
wife of Tracy Slusser. a fruit grower of Oregon,
and Edmond, who is attending hi.gh school.
Cyrus K. Wyman. During more than thirty years
of residence in Montana Cyrus K. Wvman has been
a lumberman, an official of the National Forestry
Service, and since retiring from the oflice of fores't
supervisor at Dillon he has fulfilled the duties of
sheriff of Beaverhead County. He is therefore one
of the best known men in that section of the state.
Mr. Wyman was born at Whitefield, Maine, March
29, 1867, and is a member of an old and prominent
colonial family of the Pine Tree State. He repre-
sents the sixth generation of the family in Maine.
The Wymans were originally English, from which
country three brothers immigrated to America, two
locating at Boston or vicinity, and the other in
Maine. Mr. Wyman's grandfather. Ambrose Harts-
well Wyman, was born at China. Maine, in 1806, and
spent his life as a farmer in China or vicinity. He
died at Vasselboro in i8q6. His wife was a Miss
Toby, also a lifelone resident of Maine. Alphonso
Wyman, father of Cyrus K.. is also a well known
Montanan, for many years having made his home
at Phillipsburg. He was born at China, Maine, in
1843, and as a youth served in the quartermaster's
department of the Union army during the Civil war.
.\fter his marriage at China, Maine, he lived in
264
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Whitefield, where he followed the business of farmer
and lumber contractor. He came to Montana in
1881, and took charge of the McClellan mine in the
McClellan Gulch. In 1884 he moved to Granite
Mountain and resumed his former occupation as a
lumberman. His home has been at Phillipsburg
since 1886. He operated a saw mill and was one of
the leading lumbermen of that section until he
retired in 1914. He has voted as a republican from
■ the time of the Civil war and for many years has
been an active member of the Masonic fraternity.
Alphonso Wyman married Elizabeth King, who was
born in Whitefield, Maine, in 1845, and died at Phil-
lipsburg, Montana, in 1902. Their children were six
in number: Hattie J., wife of Manville Moody, a
carpenter and builder living at Providence, Rhode
Island ; Cyrus K. ; Henry S., a rancher on Rock
Creek in Granite County, Montana ; Forest A., a
miner at Phillipsburg; Annie C, who died in 1910,
at Bend, Oregon, where her husband, Charles Boyd,
operates a meat market; and Edna, wife of William
Hunt, a rancher in Arizona.
Cyrus Iv. Wyman acquired his education in the
public schools of Whitefield, Maine. He remained
in his native state for several years after his father
came to Montana, but came to Phillipsburg in 1887,
a few months before Montana became a state. He
worked with his father in the lumber business until
1889 and then became a miner in Granite County.
He had those qualities which caused men to favor
him in a political \Vay, and for two years he served
as deputy sheriff, as constable for eight years and
stock inspector two years. Mr. Wyman as a resident
of Maine and Montana acquired a thoroughly prac-
tical experience in every phase of the lumber busi-
iiess. It was this experience which inclined him
to service with the National Forest Bureau. In 1905
he became assistant forest ranger in Granite County
and a year later was promoted to forest ranger, and
three months later to forest supervisor. For ten
years he held that office at Dillon, beginning in
March, 1906. Mr. Wyman was elected sheriff of
Beaverhead County in 1916 and re-elected in 1918
is now in his second term. He is a republican
and in politics and is affiliated with Apollo Lodge
No. 15. Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
In 1898, at Damariscotta, Elaine, he married Miss
."Mice Hail, a daughter of Randall and Lucy Hall.
Her mother now resides at Wiscassett, Maine, where
her father was a farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Wyman
have one daughter, Thelma, born March i, 1902.
Charles N. Skillm.\n. Apart from the fact that
he was born in New York State and spent several
years as a youth in New England, Charles N. Skill-
man has spent his entire life in the Northwest, in
the territories and states of Minnesota, Dakotas
and Montana. He came to Montana more than
forty years ago. He knew many of the old time
characters of the territory, and has filled in his
years with varied activities as a rancher, merchant,
real estate operator and public official. He is one
of the earliest settlers and has been one of the
men most prominently identified with the upbuild-
ing of Big Timber and surrounding district.
He was born at German, Chenango County, New
York, April 14, 1835. His paternal ancestors came
from Holland, while his mother's family were Eng-
lish. His father, Francis Martin Skillman, was
born on Long Island, New York, in 1814, was
reared and married there, and at the age of twenty-
five moved to a farm in Chenango County. In
addition to the cultivation of his acres he was a
licensed local preacher of the Methodist Church
and he filled practically all the township offices
in Chenango County. In 1856 he led his family
in another move out to the western frontier, locat-
ing at Mazeppa in Minnesota Territory. Here he
broke and developed some of the virgin soil of the
farm and again became prominent in local affairs.
He was a member of the First State Legislature of
Minnesota, representing Wabasha County. He also
held local offices. He was a steadfast republican
from the organization of the party until his death.
The last three years of his life he spent retired at
Minneapolis, where he died in 1887. Francis M.
Skillman married Julia Ann Chappell, who was
born in New York State in 1816 and died near Ma-
zeppa, Minnesota, in 1879. Several of their sons
were soldiers and officers in the Civil war. Evander.
the oldest, was with the Third Minnesota Regiment
of Infantry, re-enlisted and served through the
war and in 1894 came to Montana and was a well
known rancher. He died at Livingston in 1917.
Milon, the second of the family, is a retired farmer
at Portland, Oregon, and he served two years in
Company G of Hatcher's Battalion of Cavalry in
the Civil war. Elsie lives at Portland, widow of
Thomas F. Sturdevant, who was a merchant.
Franklin, living retired on his fruit farm at Port-
land, was a first lieutenant in the Third Minnesota
Infantry and re-enlisted and went through the en-
tire war. Philip was a second lieutenant in the
same Minnesota regiment, and is still practicing
law at Olympia, Washington. Sellie lives at Port-
land, widow of Stephen Lont, who was a rancher.
Ida died at the age of twenty years at Mazeppa.
William was a merchant and died at Portland,
Oregon, in 1917. Charles N. is the ninth of this
large family. His younger brother, James, is liv-
ing retired at Portland, and the youngest is Nellie,
a widow living at Portland.
Charles N. Skillman was too young to recall any
of the incidents of the family removal to Minne-
sota Territory. As a boy he attended school at
Red Wing in that state, and completed his educa-
tion at the age of sixteen. For three years he
learned the trade and worked as a map mounter
at Hartford, Connecticut. He then went back to
Mazeppa, Minnesota, lived there four years, and
for five years was a rancher and cattleman at
Ipswich, South Dakota. In 1887 he came to Living-
ston, Montana, and for three years was employed
by G. H. Carver, a merchant of that town. He
joined the new community of Big Timber in 1890
and took up ranching. From 1891 to 189.1 he was
also associated with the Big Timber Mercantile
Company. Through all the years, however, his
chief activity has been ranching. He has bought
and sold land both on his own account and for
others and since 1895 has done a thriving real estate
business, with offices on McLeod Street in Big
Timber. He owns a ranch of 200 acres on the
Boulder River in Sweetgrass County, has eighty
acres of irrigated land a half mile west of Big
Timber, and has another place of 320 acres at Hun-
ters Hot Springs in Park County. His land is
devoted to grain and cattle.
Probably from his father Mr. Skillman inherited
a tendency toward politics and public affairs. He
has always been a leader in every community where
he has lived. While in South Dakota he served
as mayor of Ipswich three years, for three years
was county commissioner of Edmunds County and
for three years deputy sheriff. Upon the organi-
zation of Sweetgrass County he was appointed, in
February, 1893, clerk of the court and was regu-
larly elected to that office in 1896 and held it for
six years. As a public official Mr. Skillman is
doubtless best known a^ a United States commis-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
265
sioner, an appointment he received in 1895, and it
has been continuous for over twenty years. He is
a steadfast republican in poHtics. He has also
served on the school board of Big Timber, and is
affiliated with Big Timber Lodge No. 25, Knights
of Pythias, and was formerly a member of the An-
cient Order of United Workmen and Fraternal
Order of Eagles.
On November 7, 1877, at Rochester, Minnesota,
he married Miss Julia A. Prescott, daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. W. C. Prescott, both now deceased.
Her father was a rancher and active in republican
politics. Mr. Skillman has two sons, Roy and Guy
F. Roy has a fruit ranch at Afton, Virginia, and
is also a licensed pharmacist. Guy is a rancher
and stock man at Big Timber and agent for the
Continental Oil Company.
E. R. Price. Incorporated in 1917, the Price-
Moffett Company, investment bankers, has become
one of the largest and most important concerns
of its kind in Montana and in the handling of live-
stock, farm and ranch loans, and the buying and
selling of cattle, has eclipsed the majority of its
older competitors. The founder of this business,
and its present president, E. R. Price, is still a
young man as years .50 but has behind him a great
wealth and experience garnered through participa-
tion in financial affairs in various communities of
this and other states. At Billings, to which city
he came in 1907, he has establshed a substantial
reputation as a capable banker with sound backing
and important connections.
Mr. Price was born near Liberty, Clay County,
Missouri, September 11, 1887, a son of William R.
and Kate (Dudley) Price. The family was founded
in that county by the grandfather of Mr. Price,
a native of Virginia, who pioneered into Clay Coun-
ty during Indian days and was a slaveholder of
the old regime. William R. Price was born in
Clay County, Missouri, in 1824, and there passed
the greater part of his life. He passed through an
important era of the state's history, being a farmer
m territorial days and subsequently witnessing the
distressing times which marked slavery and the Civil
war. but maintained his residence in Clay County
until 1891, when he moved to Mexico, Missouri,
and engaged in stock buying. Later he retired from
active pursuits and resided quietly at his home
until his death in January, 1913. Mr. Price's ex-
periences were many and varied. When gold was
discovered in California he was one of those lured
by the promise of easy and sudden wealth, in
search , of which he became a "forty-niner" and
crossed the plains. After a period of prospecting
he engaged for a time in the cattle business and
remained two years, then returning to Missouri.
Later he again went to California, where he re-
mained twelve years, but eventually returned to
his old home in time to enlist in the Union army
toward the close of the Civil war, in which he
served six months. He was a stanch republican
in his political belief. Mr. Price married Miss Kate
Dudley, who was born in 1846, near Lexington,
Kentucky, and died at Mexico, Missouri, in 1915,
and they became the parents of four children :
Virginia, who is the wife of R. W. Luckey, of
Houston, Texas; James D., a traveling salesman,
who died at Mexico, Missouri, at the age of twenty-
seven years ; Elizabeth J., unmarried, a school
teacher of St. Louis, Missouri; and E. R., of this
notice.
E. R. Price was educated in the rural schools of
Audrain County, Missouri, and after his graduation
from the high school at Mexico, Missouri, in 1905,
operated his father's farm for a period of two
years. He was next employed in a bank at Mexico
for one year as bookkeeper, and in 1907 first came
to Billings, where he entered the First National
Bank in the same capacity and for the same period
of time. Subsequently he went to Columbus, Mon-
tana, as assistant cashier of the Columbus State
Bank, but a year later returned to Billings at the
organization of the Merchants National Bank at
this place. He became note and exchange teller
in the credit department, acting in this capacity
one year, and then resigned his position to assist
in the organization of the Farmers and Traders
State Bank, of which he became cashier. In the
following year he was elected cashier, and held that
position until the bank was consolidated with the
Billings State Bank and the Bank of Billings as the
American Bank and Trust Company, in 1914. He
was the cashier of this institution until February,
1915, at which time he resigned, feeling the need of
an extended rest due to overwork. He then engaged
in the loan and livestock business on his own ac-
count and in 1917 incorporated his present business,
under the firm style of the Price-Moffett Company,
with offices at No. 2716 First Avenue, North, in the
Securities Building. The officers of this concern
are: E. R. Price, president; J. K. Moffett, vice
president; P. A. Heath, secretary and treasurer.
The business is really conducted as an investment
banking enterprise, handling livestock, farm and
ranch loans and buying and selling cattle extensively,
and is one of the largest of its kind in Montana, hav-
ing handled some of the largest loans in the state.
Mr. Price is a republican, but not a politician, and
belongs to the Billings Midland Club and the Billings
Rotary Club. He is fraternally affiliated with Bill-
ings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Or-
der of Elks; Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons; Billings Chapter No. 6,
Royal Arch Masons ; and Aldemar Commandery No.
S, Knights Templar. His home is at No. 121 North
Thirty-fifth Street.
In October, 1912, at Mexico, Missouri, Mr. Price
was married to Miss Eliza Gibbs, daughter of C. R.
and Mary B. (Buckner) Gibbs, of Mexico, Missouri,
where Mr. Gibbs is connected with the Meyer Broth-
ers Drug Company of St. Louis. Mr. and Mrs.
Price are the parents of one child, Mary Katherine,
born April 14, 1916.
Albert Patrick O'Leary, M. D. The professional
services of Doctor O'Leary as physician and surgeon
has been given to Big Timber since 1906. The only
hospital advantages enjoyed by Sweetgrass County
have been established and developed by Doctor
O'Leary, and this well equipped private hospital is
only one of many services by which his name is
held in honor in that section of the state.
Doctor O'Leary was born at Flint, Michigan.
August 26, 1870, and is a graduate of the University
of Michigan, department of medicine and surgery.
The previous generations of his family lived in
County Cork, Ireland. His grandfather, Cornelius
O'Leary, spent his life as a farmer there and died
when about thirty-seven years of age. He was a
man of prominence in his locality and during the
Irish famines of 1845 and 1849 was appointed dis-
tributing officer. He married a Miss Williams, who
was of pure Welsh ancestry.
Their son John C. O'Leary has long been promi-
nent as a rancher both in Montana and Oregon. He
was born in County Cork, at Millstreet, in 18.^2,
and lived in his native land until he was sixteen
years of age. On coming to the LTnited States he
settled in Michigan, where he was connected with
the pioneer lumber industry. At one time he was
superintendent of a large lumber plant owned by
266
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Governor Crapo of Michigan. In 1877 he moved
to The Dalles, Oregon, and engaged in the sheep
business. From there in 1899 he moved his head-
quarters to Idaho and continued cattle and stock
ranching until 1907, when he came to Carbon County,
Montana, and is now living at Edgar in that county.
He has extended ranch interests in both Carbon and
Sweetgrass counties, owning 640 acres in his home
place and also has 1,000 acre ranch in Grass Valley,
Oregon. Politically he is a republican, is a member
of the Catholic Church and is a third degree Knight
of Columbus, affiliated with Livingston Council.
The wife of this veteran rancher bore the maiden
name of .A.lice M. Vernon, and was born at Avon,
New York, in 1845. Doctor O'Leary is the second
of their seven children, and his twin brother, Alfred,
died at the age of five years. Another son, Charles,
died when three years old. The oldest of the family
is John Vernon, engaged in the mining business
at Butte. Mollie is the wife of A. F. Rice, manager
and one of the owners of the Butte Business Col-
lege. Frank was a government buyer of horses
during the war. Edith G. is a talented teacher
of expression and oratory now connected with the
Junior High School at Butte.
Doctor O'Leary was about seven years old when
his parents moved to Oregon, and he acquired his
early education in public and private schools at
The Dalles, and in 1892 graduated from the Wasco
Independent Academy and Normal School. He fin-
ished his course and received his M. D. degree
from the University of Michigan in 1898. One year
he spent as interne in a hospital at Portland, Oregon,
and has always kept up with the advances in his
profession, particularly in surgery, in which he spe-
cializes. He attended the Chicago Polyclinic in
1915. He began practice at Butte in 1899 and for
two years had the chief responsibilities in con-
trolling the smallpox epidemic. Later he spent two
years at Boulder Hot Springs and Alhambra Hot
Springs, practiced at Billings six months, and in
1906 located at Big Timber, where he has been
busily engaged in a general practice. He built his
hospital in 191 1 and is sole owner and proprietor.
This hospital, the only one in Sweetgrass County,
is located at McLeod Street and Fourth Avenue,
and has accommodations for ten patients. Its facili-
ties have frequently been taxed, and patients come
from as far as sixty miles away. Doctor O'Leary
is a member of the State and District Medical
Societies, and is county health officer of Sweet-
grass County.
He served as a member of the city council of
Big Timber in 1917-18-19. is a republican, a Catholic,
and a former member of the Knights of Columbus
at Butte. He is associated with his father in the
ownership of 1,000 acres of ranch land in the Grass
Valley of Oregon, and he individually owns 280
acres in Carbon County. Doctor O'Leary is un-
married.
RoscoE G. Martin has recently identified himself
with the business community of Red Lodge, is the
undertaker for the town and most of the surround-
ing community, and is also serving as county coroner
of Carbon County.
He was born at Colorado Springs. Colorado, Sep-
tember 14. i89i, a son of Robert M. and Hannah
(Foster") Martin. His father, who was born in
Kansas in 1857. was reared in that state, married
at Topeka. and then removed to Colorado Springs,
where he hecame captain of the city police force.
He died at Colorado Springs in 1899. He was a
republican in politics. His wife, who was born at
.Mberta, Kansas, in 1863, is now living at Berkeley,
California. She is the mother of two children,
Mabel and Roscoe. The former resides with her
mother and is a graduate of the University of
California at Berkeley.
Roscoe G. Martin was only five years old when
his father died. He attended school principally at
Long Beach, California, completing the junior year
in the high school there in 1913. For 2^^ years
he was employed in the Long Beach postoffice. He
first came to Red Lodge in 1915, working for six
months with the local elevator company. Then
after a visit back to California for three months
he bought R. B. Mooney's undertaking business,
the only establishment of its kind in Red Lodge.
He has the equipment and a highly organized service
with headquarters at 22 North Broadway. Mr.
Martin was elected coroner of Carbon County in
1916 and was re-elected in 1918. He is a republican,
a member of Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534 of the
Elks and of the Red Lodge Chamber of Commerce.
He married Miss Evangeline Budas at Red Lodge
in 1915. They have one child, Jovita, born October
28, 1916.
Albert Budas, father of Mrs. Martin, was a pioneer
merchant at Red Lodge, and has been active in
business and civic affairs there for over thirty years.
He was born at Tornio, Sweden, in 1865, a son of
Henry and Eva (Rukkola) Budas. His father was
born in the same locality of Sweden in 1833 and
spent his life in that country as a miller, dying in
1868. He had also served in the Swedish army.
His wife was born in 1837 and died in 1873. Albert
and Herman were their two sons, the latter dying
at the age of nineteen. Albert Budas had a public
school education in his native land and in 1884
came to the United States, spending a few months
at New York Mills in Minnesota and in 1885 going
to Butte, Montana, where he worked in the mines
for three years. On coming to Red Lodge he en-
gaged in the mercantile business, but since 1909
has conducted the leading fire insurance and real
estate agency.
He has been prominent in local affairs, is a re-
publican, has served on the City Coimcil of Red
Lodge and in November, 1918, was elected member
of tine Sixteenth Session of the State Legislature.
In the following session he was chairman of the
irrigated water rights committee and member of
the committees on mining, public morals and public
utilities. He is a member of the Chamber of Com-
merce, Bear Tooth Lodge of Elks, and is president
of the Roberts State Bank of Red Lodge.
Mr. Budas married Miss Katie O'Connor in 1895.
Her father, James O'Conner, was a Pennsylvania
coal miner. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Budas
are Evangeline and Albert, Jr.
Ernest T. E.\ton. One of the most cultured and
accomplished educators of the Northwest, endowed
with rare ability and a strong personality, Ernest
T. Eaton, of Billings, financial director of the Bill-
ings Polytechnic Institute, is thoroughly public
spirited and progressive, and ever found among the
leaders of any movement with which he becomes
associated. A native of New England, he was born
at -Atkinson, Maine. September 11, 1877, a son of
Capt. Thomas O. Eaton, and a descendant of John
Eaton, who immigrated from England to Haver-
hill. Massachusetts, in 1638, and whose grandson,
Johnathan Eaton, settled in l^Iaine, becoming the
progenitor of the Eatons of that state.
Thomas O. Eaton, now a respected resident of
Pnlvtechnic. Montana, was born in 1841. in Sebec,
Maine, and was reared and educated in his native
state. Soon after the outbreak of the Civil war
c^^^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
267
he enlisted in the First Maine Artillery, which
guarded Washington, District of Columbia, during
the next two years. Subsequently accompanying
his regiment to the scene of action, he took an
active part in the battles of Spottsylvania, Cold
Harbor, North Anna and Petersburg, in the latter
engagement being severely wounded. For a num-
ber of years after the close of the war he was
employed in tilling the soil in the vicinity of Charles-
ton and Foxcroft, Maine, served as captain of the
State Militia, and occupied many other positions
of trust in the life of his community. In 1886
he moved to Iowa, where he was engaged in the
live stock and meat business at Earlville and Man-
chester, Iowa, until 1904. He moved to Deer Lodge,
Montana, in 1904, when his sons re-established the
College of Montana. He remained there four years.
He located at Billings in 1908 and bought a ranch
joining what was later to be the Polytechnic farm
and campus. Here he still lives, watching and
aiding in the development of the great institution
his sons are building. He is a faithful member
of the Congregational Church, liberally contribut-
ing towards its support ; a staunch old line repub-
lican in politics, and a Mason.
His wife, whose maiden name was Delia Bolster,
was born in Foxcroft, Maine, in 1843. She was
educated in Foxcroft Academy and taught school for
a number of terms, marrying Captain Eaton in
1865. She died at her home in Polytechnic, Montana,
in October, 1917, their married life having covered
a period of fifty-two years. Their children were
Lewis T., educational director of the Billings Poly-
technic Institute; Ernest T., the subject of this
sketch ; a daughter, Alice D., who died at Deer
Lodge, Montana, in 1904; and a son, Volney, who
died in 1887.
As a boy and youth Ernest T. Eaton attended
the public schools of Maine and Iowa, and in 1897
was graduated from Lenox College at Hopkinton,
Iowa, with the degree of Bachelor of Science, and
three years later, in 1900, was there honored with
the degree of Master of Science. He attended the
University of Iowa, 1898 and 1899, graduating with
the class of '99, with the degree of Bachelor of
Philosophy. In the fall of 1899 Mr. Eaton was
engaged in newspaper work, and in the spring of
1900 became a teacher in Oak Park High School,
Des Moines, Iowa. Later in the year he was elected
principal of the school, and in 1901 became super-
intendent of schools in the Oak Park District.
While teaching he studied law and completed two
years of a law course. In 1902 he was elected
superintendent of the schools at Deer Lodge, Mon-
tana, and during the three years that he was thus
employed established at Deer Lodge the Powell
County High School, of which he was the first
principal. He served as principal of this high school
for four years, resigning January i, to become
financial director of the College of Montana, of
which his brother, Lewis T. Eaton, was then presi-
dent. The two brothers reorganized, rebuilt and,
endowed that pioneer Montana institution.
They went to Billings in the summer of 1908 and
organized the Billings Polytechnic Institute, Ernest
T. becoming financial director, an office for which
he is admirably qualified, and Mr. Lewis T. Eaton
becoming educational director. Under the manage-
ment of^ these gifted brothers the institution has
grown with surprising rapidity, having already given
diplomas to 150 Montana and Wyoming boys and
girls, while 126 of its boys took part in the recent
war, eight of them sacrificing their lives for their
country.
The school is finely located three miles north of
Billings, and with its faculty of eighteen members
is doing notable work, admitting students without
examination, giving them educational advantages
from the lower grades to the junior year in col-
lege, its standards being accepted by state schools
and eastern institutions of learning. Mr. Eaton
has been very active and successful as financial
director of the institute, having been largely in-
strumental in securing from friends in the East
funds amounting to $300,000, and as business man-
ager has wisely expended this sum in the con-
struction of the many beautiful buildings connected
with the institute, including Science Hall, Kimball
Hall, Prescott Commons, the Losekamp Memorial
Building, a fine gymnasium and the shop building.
A Young Men's Christian A.ssociation building will
soon be completed, and work commenced on Har-
wood Girls Dormitory, the 'funds for which are
already available.
A stalwart republican in politics, Mr. Eaton takes
an active and intelligent interest in public affairs,
and is rendering his fellow citizens valuable service
in the State Legislature, to which he was elected
in 1916 and re-elected in 1918, representing Yellow-
stone County. Prominent in the work devolving
upon him in that capacity Mr. Eaton is chairman
of the committee on education, and is a member of
various other important committees, including that
of affairs of cities, state institutions and public
buildings, fairs and expositions, public morals, char-
ities and reform. True to the religious faith in
which he was reared, he is an active member of
the Congregational Church. Fraternally he belongs
to the Knights of Pythias.
At Deer Lodge, Montana, in the autumn of 191 1,
Mr. Eaton married Miss Augusta Valiton, a daugh-
ter of Judge Henry G. and Mary Rae Valiton,
pioneer residents of Montana. Judge Valiton was
mayor of Butte, Montana, two terms during his
residence in that city, and is now serving as justice
of the peace at Deer Lodge. Mr. and Mrs. Eaton
liave no children.
They have a beautiful suburban home planned
especially for the pleasure and entertainment of
the Polytechnic faculty and students. It is situated
just west of the Polytechnic. Mr. Eaton, in addi-
tion to his duties as financial director and business
manager of the Polytechnic, has taken much interest
in the production of pure seed and in the raising
of fruit. He has served for five years on the State
Fair Advisory Board as the member from Yel-
lowstone County and has had much to do with
the Agricultural and Horticultural Exhibits at both
the State and Midland Empire fairs. His selec-
tion of vegetables, corn, grain and apples have
carried off many premiums at these and other fairs.
Charles Francis Murphy. The men having
charge of the conduct of the large interests of the
Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railroad are without
exception especially fitted for the positions they oc-
cupy, and through their knowledge of men and rail-
road work, all parties concerned benefit. One of
these alert, responsible and effective executives of
this road is Charles Francis Murphy, superintendent
of the company, and one of its most valued men.
He was born at Caledonia, Minnesota, May 4, 1861,
a son of John Murphy. John Murphy was born in
County Cork, Ireland, March 4, 1813, and died at
Elktoii, South Dakota. February i. 1892. Reared in
Ireland, he left that country in 1837 and came to
the United States, first selecting Boston, Massa-
chusetts, as his place of residence, where he was
employed in a tan yard. In 1857 he came as far
west as Caledonia. Minnesota, and until 1878 was
there engaged in farming, but then left it for Elkton.
South Dakota, where he lived in retirement until
HISTORY OF MONTANA
death claimed him. A democrat and Roman Cath-
olic, he lived up to his beliefs. On February I,
1840, he was married at Boston, Massachusetts, to
Johanna Ford, born in County Cork, Ireland, on
February 22, 1819. She died at Elkton, South Da-
kota on September i, 1896. Their children were
as follows: Johanna, who was born on July 4,
laji, died at Boston, Massachusetts, in 1857; Wil-
liam H., who was born December 21, 1842, is city
assessor of Brookings, South Dakota ; Margaret, who
was born March 22, 1846, died at Elkton, South
Dakota, in 1880. as the wife of Nicholas Murphy, a
veteran of the war between the states, and a retired
railroad man still residing at Elkton; John, who
was born, July 10, 1848, was a railroad man, and
died at Great 'Falls, Montana, in 1907; Mary Ann,
who was born, January 6, 1851, is the widow of
John A. Flynn, formerly a jeweler of Wells, Min-
nesota, where Mrs. Flynn is still residing; Edward,
who was born, August 9, 1853. is a retired farmer
of Elkton, South Dakota ; Ellen, who was born,
September 10, 1855, died at Great Falls, Montana,
November 6, 1916. as the wife of John Fogerty,
formerly a railroad man, but now also deceased ;
Matthew, who was born February 4, 1858, lives at
Bowman, North Dakota, where he is engaged in
grain and stock raising; and Charles Francis, who
was the youngest of this large family.
Charles' Francis Murphy was reared on his father's
farm at Caledonia. Minnesota, and attended the
public schools of the neighborhood until he was
eighteen years old, at which time he left home and
entered the employ of the Chicago & Northwestern
Railroad as a section hand and remained in the
track department for two years. Coming west to
South Dakota, he spent three years as deputy sheriflf
and deputy United States marshal, with headquarters
at Huron, but at the end of that time returned to
the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad, this time as
a brakeman and held that position with the road
for two years, and then in October, 1889, he came
to Glendive and until 1894 was with the Northern
Pacific Railroad as brakeman, switchman and con-
ductor. Mr. Murphy then made another change
and was made yard master of the Great Northern
Railroad at Butte, Montana, holding that position
until 1896. In the latter year he entered the em-
ploy of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railroad
Company as yard master, and served as such at
Anaconda for two and one-half years. Mr. Murphy
then returned to the Great Northern road for four
and one-half years, during that period being yard
master at Great Falls, Montana, when he was made
trainmaster, and after two years, assistant superin-
tendent. In 1909 he was elected mayor of Great
Falls, and served as such for two years, and at the
same time operated a real estate business. In the
fall of 191 1 he reassumed the duties of yard master
for the Great Northern road at Grand Forks, North
Dakota, but a month later was offered the position
of superintendent of the transportation department
of the Butte, .\naconda & Pacific Railroad, which
he accepted and held for two years, when his serv-
ices received further recognition by his promotion
to the superintendency of the road on December i,
1913, which position he still holds, his offices being
in the general office building of his road on West
Commercial Avenue, Anaconda. A democrat, in ad-
dition to being mayor of Great Falls he was also
a member of the City Council of that city for three
consecutive terms, or six years. Bred in the faith
of the Roman Catholic Church, he has embraced
it as his own. He belongs to the Rotary and Com-
mercial clubs, and to .Anaconda Lodge No. 2,^9,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and the
Order of Railroad Conductors. Mr. Murphy owns
his residence at No. 708 Hickory Street, Anaconda,
and a 160 acre ranch on Pondera River, in the
county of that name, Alontana.
In 1896 Mr. Murphy was married at Huron, South
Dakota, to Miss Mary Coddington, a daughter of
Maurice and Annie (Reynolds) Coddington. Mr.
Coddington died at Great Falls, Montana, after hav-
ing had various experiences as a pioneer. In 1849
he was one of the gold seekers who crossed the
plains to California, later going to South Dakota
and becoming one of the pioneer butchers of Huron,
and finally locating at Great Falls, Montana. Mrs.
Coddington lives with Mr. and Mrs. Murphy. Mr.
and Mrs. Murphy became the parents of five chil-
dren, namely: Raymond, who was born August 20,
1897, was graduated from the Anaconda High School,
and then became a student of the University of
Minnesota, but on May 3, 1917, he enlisted iii the
United States Navy for service during the great
war, and is now a first class pharmacist mate in
the medical department of the transport service and
is on his twelfth trip; Clyde Francis, who was born
on October 3, 1899, left the Anaconda High School
during his senior year to enlist as pharmacist mate
in the United States Navy, and is now on the de-
stroyer Breeze, at Newport News, Virginia, having
made nine round trips to Europe; Eugene, who was
born on February 4, 1902, is attending the Anaconda
High School; Marie, who was born on September
7, 1904, is also attending the Anaconda High School;
and Irene, who was born on February 7, 1907.
A clean-minded, considerate, dependable man, Mr.
Murphy is a decided addition to any community
in which he takes up his place of residence. Hav-
ing spent practically all of his mature years in the
railroad business, and worked up through the dif-
ferent positions, he understands conditions as only
a practical man can, and is thus enabled to deal
with the problems of his department wisely, fairly
and expeditiously, and while he gives to his duties
the full attention their importance demand, his men
know that in him they have a friend and fellow
worker.
CH.^RLES W. Campbell. Since coming to Mon-
tana eight years ago Charles W. Campbell has found
his talents and services as a lawyer appreciated
and in great demand in connection with a large
general practice. Mr. Campbell is a member of
the Big Timber bar, and as one of the younger rnen.
of the community his interests in business and civic
affairs are steadily growing.
Mr. Campbell was born at Hamburg, Iowa. Oc-
tober 6, 1885, but spent most of his early life in
Nebraska. The Campbells were a Scotch family.
His father, James W. Campbell, was born in Ohio
in 1856. was reared in the State of Missouri, was
married and followed farming near Hamburg, Iowa,
and in 1890 moved to Fullerton, Nebraska. He
still lives there and has been greatly prospered as
a farmer, owning 320 acres in Nebraska, and has a
property of 320 acres in Montana four miles
southeast of Willow Creek. He is an independent
democrat in politics, a member of the Masonic
fraternity and the Modern Woodmen of America.
James W. Campbell married Anna Wages, who
was born in Galesburg. Illinois, in 1869. Charles
W. Campbell is the older of two children, his
sister. Thelma, being still a school girl.
He was educated in the public schools of Nance
County. Nebraska, graduating from the high school
at Fullerton in 1903, at the age of eighteen. He is
also an alumnus of the University of Nebraska
at Lincoln, where he finished his classical course
HISTORY OF MONTANA
269
and received his A. B. degree in 1907, and was
awarded his LL. B. degree by the law department
in 1910. While at university he was a member
of Alpha Tau Omega social fraternity and the
Phi Delta Phi legal fraternity. On leaving uni-
versity Mr. Campbell spent a period in the employ
of the, United States forestry service at Steamboat
Springs, Colorado, where he remained until Novem-
ber 20, 1910. The spring of the' following year
found him at Livingston, Montana, and the follow-
ing July he located at Big Timber and was soon
immersed in a busy general civil and criminal prac-
tice. He has his offices in the Brownlee Building
on McLeod Street. Mr. Campbell has served as
city attorney of Big Timber, is a stockholder in
the Scandinavian-American Bank and has a partner-
ship interest in a ranch on the Boulder River.
Mr. Campbell, who is unmarried, is a republican
in politics, is affiliated with Livingston Lodge No.
246, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, Big
Timber Lodge No. 25, Knights of Pythias, and
Big Timber Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
The National Park Bank. This is not only
one of the oldest banks of the state, but its integrity
and service have made it notable as a banking
organization. It is successor to the first banking
house at Livingston, established as the Bank of
Livingston, a private institution in 1882 by H. W.
Mund. The business grew and prospered, and in
1886 was housed in a substantial building of its
own. In that year the bank was reorganized, and it
was chartered as a national bank in December, 1886.
The capital stock at the beginning was $50,000,
and the first directors were W. R. Stebbins, W.
M. Wright, H. W. Mund. George T. Chambers,
C. S. Hefferlin, A. L. Love and E. Goughnour.
In 1890 the capital was increased to its present
figures, $100,000. Nearly thirty years later, in 1919,
the bank showed a surplus of $100,000, with un-
divided profits of nearly $270,000. At that time
the deposits aggregated over $3,000,000, and the
total assets are more than $3,500,000. It is esti-
mated that during its existence the bank has paid
out more than $1,500,000 in- interest to depositors.
At the time of the first Liberty Loan the National
Park Bank subscribed $100,000, and no other bank
in the state supported that loan more liberally. In
191 7 among the 7,000 and more National banks
in the country the National Park Bank stood 117
in the roll of honor and first in the State of Mon-
tana. The bank is the United States depository
for the Postal Savings Fund.
Its present officers are J. C. Vilas, president; D.
A. McCaw.' vice president; F. A. Krieger, vice
president; D. J. Fitzgerald, cashier. Other direc-
tors are Fred L. Gibson, L. M. Miles, J. M. Seaman.
Will B. Shore, M. D. As a physician and surgeon
Doctor Shore has had an interesting and varied
experience in the Northwest for over fifteen years,
and for the past five years has been one of the
leading men of his profession at Red Lodge.
He was born at Mount Vernon, Indiana, May
3. 1877. His grandfather was born in North Caro-
lina in 1809 and became an early settler in Southern
Indiana, where he cleared up land and made a farm.
He was a farmer the rest of his life and died at
Mohawk, Indiana, in 1889. J. L. Shore, father of
Doctor Shore, was born at Mohawk in 1854, and
left there in early manhood and located at Mount
Vernon, Indiana, where he married and where he
was for a time agent of the Louisville and Nash-
ville Railway and also in the lumber business. He
retired from business in 1909 and has since lived
at Spokane, Washington. He is a democrat in
politics, a Mason and for many years an elder in
the Presbyterian Church. J. L. Shore married Sue
Beauchamp, who was born in Union County, Ken-
tucky, in 1856.
Doctor Shore, only child of his parents, attended
the public schools of Mount Vernon, Indiana, grad-
uated from high school at Peoria, Illinois, in 189S,
and did his undergraduate medical work in the
University Medical College at Kansas City, Missouri-
He finished the four year course there in 1903.
He was a member of the Esculapian Society of
that institution. Since then besides his individual
experience he has taken post-graduate work, at-
tending surgical and general medical courses in
the New York Polyclinic in 1907 and doing special
work in surgery and genito-urinology at the Uni-
versity of Louisville in 1908; Doctor Shore came
to the Northwest in 1903, passing tlje State Board
examination at Spokane, Washington, and practic-
ing there one year. He was also surgeon of a
steamship plying between Seattle and Alaska. In
1904 he passed the examination of the State Board
of Montana and for one year practiced at White-
fish, where he was contract surgeon while the rail-
road was being constructed. After a few months
in Carson City, Nevada, he established his home
in Gardiner, Montana, in 1905, and was in practice
there for eight years. The following summer he
spent at Cody, Wyoming, and in the winter of
1914 came to Red Lodge, where he has enjoyed a
thriving general medical and surgical practice. Dur-
ing one year of the war he was on the local ex-
amining board. He was then commissioned a first
lieutenant in the Medical Reserve Corps and was
sent to the Medical Officers Training Camp at
Camp Riley, Kansas. He received his honorable
discharge November 29, 1918, a few days after the
signing of the armistice. January i, 1919, Doctor
Shore established a hospital at Red Lodge, and
its facilities have been availed of by his patient!
not only from Montana but Wyoming. His offices
are at 17 South Broadway.
Doctor Shore resigned his position as city health
officer of Red Lodge when he entered the army
service. He is a member of the County and State
Medical societies and the .American Medical Associa-
tion, is a Presbyterian, belongs to the Red Lodge
Chamber of Commerce and in politics is a republican.
January 3, 1917, at Red Lodge, he married Miss
Myrbith Franklin, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Albert
Franklin of Helena, Montana. Her father is a
mine owner.
Rev. Joseph Blaere is a native of Belgium, was
educated for the priesthood in the famous Univer-
sity of Louvain, and the field of his practical labors
as a missionary priest and pastor have been en-
tirely in Montana, where he has served devotedly
and successfully for over twenty years. He is now
pastor of St. Mary's Church at Livingston.
He was born at Oedelem in West Flanders, Bel-
gium, October 22, 1874, the third in a family of five
children and the only one to come to America. His
father. Henry Blaere, was born in 1836 and died
in 1887. spending his life in West Flanders as a
teacher and instructor of schools. The mother,
Sadonia Cosfenoble, also spent her life in West
Flanders, and died eight years after the birth of
Father Joseph Blaere.
The latter acquired his early education in the
government schools of his birthplace, spent six years
in classical studies in the College of St. .'\madeus
at Courdray, for two years was a student of philos-
ophy in Roulers Seminary, and finished with a four
270
HISTORY OF MONTANA
years' theological course in the American Seminary
at Louvain. He was ordained a priest in April,
1897, and almost immediately set out for the scene
of his future labors in America.
For one year he was assistant pastor of the Sa-
cred Heart Cathedral at Helena. In 1898 he became
assistant pastor of St. Patrick's Parish at Butte,
remaining there two years, and then becarne parish
priest of Our Lady of Lourdes at Marysville. His
next regular assignment was as pastor of Sacred
Heart at Miles City, where he remained eight
months, and in 1902 came to what seems his per-
manent field of labor, Livingston, as pastor of St.
Mary's Parish. The boundaries of this parish are
coincident with those of Park County. It is one
of the old parishes of the Catholic Church in Mon-
tana, but under no pastor has it enjoyed so much
material and spiritual growth and advancement as
under Father Blaere. He has built a number of
churches as a' missionary priest,' and his most not-
able addition to the parish at Livingston is a hand-
some parochial school, finished in 1914. The build-
ings at Livingston comprise the church, parsonage
and parochial school.
Father Blaere is a member of Livingston Council
No. 1274, Knights of Columbus, is a member of the
Catholic Order of Foresters, and belongs to the
Livingston Chamber of Commerce.
Morris P. Monberg was the responsible factor in
giving Livingston City and Park County one of its
best industries, the Park County Creamery, and
Mr. Monberg is an expert butter maker and received
his early training in the greatest butter making
country in the world, Denmark.
He was born near Vejle, Denmark, July 13, 1887.
His father, Martin Monberg, was born in the same
country in 1850 and was in the Danish armies in
the struggle against German oppression during the
'60s. He spent his active career as a farmer and
for sixteen years held an office corresponding in
America to sheriiif. He was a member of the Luth-
eran Church. _ He died in Denmark in 1915. His
wife was Serine Mourison, who was born in Den-
mark in 1857 and is still living in the old home
community. Morris P. was the second in a family
of five children. Mary, the oldest, is the wife of
Paul Sorensen, a stone mason in Denmark; Marinus
lives with his mother on the home farm ; Lawrence
and Alfred, twin brothers, are still in school in
Denmark.
Morris P. Monberg was educated in the public
schools of his native community, graduating
from high school in 1905. Farm reared and trained,
he has known the dairy industry as practiced in
Denmark from almost his infancy. For one term
he took instructions in a dairy school in Denmark.
He became head butter maker in a creamery at
Vejle and for 2^4 years held a similar position with
the Kilde Velde Creamery Company in his native
country. After coming to America in 1910 Mr.
Monberg spent two terms in an American dairy
school. He followed his trade three months at Man-
kato, Minnesota, was at Arco in that state two
years, spent two years in San Francisco, and in
IQ14 came to Livingston, Montana. The Park
County Creamery was built in the summer of 1914,
and the first butter was manufactured on the 15th
of August. At first it was a stock company, but
Mr. Monberg is now sole proprietor. From the
first he has presided over the butter making ac-
tivities of the creamery, and is responsible for its
fine record. The Park County Creamery has fre-
quently produced butter with a score of 94, and its
exhibits have won prizes in various dairy shows.
The creamery has done much to stimulate the dairy
industry, and furnishes a direct market for the
farmers of Park, Sweetgrass and Gallatin counties.
The creamery is a modern plant, with every fa-
cility for the manufacture of butter, ice cream and
cheese. Its products have a ready sale in local mar-
kets, also in Butte, Helena and Anaconda, and
some of the surplus has been shipped to Chicago.
Mr. Monberg is a live citizen and has been highly
gratified with the success which has attended his
efforts since coming to America. He owns a ranch
of 160 acres in Wyoming, and is a director in the
Livingston Ice and Cold Storage Company. He is
a member of the Chamber of Commerce and Com-
mercial Club at Livingston, is affiliated with Living-
ston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, Livingston Chapter No. 7, Royal Arch Masons,
and Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks. He is a
member of the English Lutheran Church and politi-
cally is an independent republican.
On April 5, 1913, in San Francisco, he married
Miss Caroline Jorgensen. Her parents, Mr. and
Mrs. Peter Jorgensen, live in Denmark, her father
being a horse trainer. Mr. and Mrs. Monberg have
one daughter, Juanita, born July 4, 1918.
Edward Alex.ander Stiefel. As the demand for
only sound banking institutions increases, and the
value of such concerns to their communities is being
more and more appreciated, the character of the
men who administer their affairs receives closer
attention, and when these men have been proven
efficient and worthy, confidence in their financial
institutions is increased. The influence of a sound,
conservative banking house is wide and its practical
results far reaching. Without such an institution
in its midst, no community can hope to take its
proper place among its sister cities. Therefore it
may be truthfully said that the growth and develop-
ment of any town or city depends largely upon its
banks and their quality, and this means the sagacity
and integrity of the men who stand at their head.
One of the sound financial institutions of Montana is
the Farmers Bank of Belgrade, which has benefited
for years by the wise, conservative and efficient
executive direction of Edward .Alexander Stiefel,
its president. Not only is Mr. Stiefel prominent in
this connection, but in various other ways, particu-
larly through his identification as treasurer and
manager with the Belgrade Company, Ltd., one of
the leading department stores of Southern Montana
and the largest enterprise of its kind in Gallatin
County.
Edward Alexander Stiefel was born at Baltimore,
Maryland, April 11, 1867, a son of Edward W.
Stiefel, who was born in 1825, in Germany. As a
young man the father immigrated to the United
States, first locating for a short time in Pennsyl-
vania and then removing to Baltimore, Maryland,
in which city he was married, and where he was a
member of the Home Guards during the Civil war.
He was an all-around business man and successful
in his undertakings, which had principally to do
with mining, in which he was greatly interested.
A democrat in politics, he stood high in the councils
and confidence of his party and served as a member
of the Board of Commissioners of Baltimore County
for a number of terms. Mr. Stiefel was a faith-
ful member of the Lutheran Church and was affili-
ated with the Masonic fraternity for many years,
being one of its old and honored members at the
time of his death at Baltimore in 1003. Mr. Stiefel
married Miss Jane Holtzman, who was born in Mary-
land, in 1840. and they became the parents of six
children, namelv : Sophia T., residing with her
brother Edward A., widow of Charles Beerstecher,
who was an attorney in Michigan and California
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and died in the latter state ; Dora, who resides at
Baltimore, Maryland, widow of -the late D. S. Blair,
who was first an educator and for the last fifteen
years of his life was employed in the United States
Customs Service ; A. W., a plumber, who died at
Baltimore in 1894; Jane, who died young; Edward
Alexander; and Minna, who died single at Balti-
more at the age of thirty years.
Edward A. Stiefel was educated in the public
schools of Baltimore, and when he left high school
at the early age of fifteen years began learning
telegraphy. After a period spent with the Baltimore
& Ohio Railroad in Maryland, he transferred his
services to the Southern Pacific Railroad, in Cali-
fornia, Utah and Colorado, and in 1895 came to
Helena, Montana, in the traffic department of that
road. Leaving Helena in 1900 Mr. Stiefel came
to Belgrade to become manager of the Belgrade
Company, Ltd., a position which he holds today,
in addition to discharging the duties of treasurer,
and also owns considerable stock in this enterprise,
which, as before noted, is the largest department
store in Gallatin County and one of the largest of
Southern Montana. This business was primarily
established in a small way, but under wise, capable
and energetic management its growth has been
phenomenal and its achievements form a new page
in the business history of this growing section of
the state. The officers of this concern are : Presi-
dent, T. C. Power, of Helena ; vice president, C.
B. Power, Helena ; secretary, G. J. Joyce, Helena ;
treasurer and general manager, E. A. Stiefel, Bel-
grade. The massive structure housing this great
and constantly-growing enterprise is situated on the
corner of Northern Pacific Avenue and Broadway
Street, and is the main business block of Belgrade,
with floor space 125 by 130 feet, two stories in height,
the upper story being let for office purposes.
In addition to the above Mr. Stiefel has numerous
other interests of large importance. He is a director
in the Montana Life Insurance Company, owns a
modern residence on Weaver Street and three other
residence properties at Belgrade, and also has a
ranch of 1,280 acres, situated twelve miles west of
this city. As a banker he is president of the Farmers
Bank of Belgrade, which was established in igi6
as a state bank, and is situated on Broadway Street.
The officers of this institution are: President, E.
A. Stiefel; vice president, M. W. Penwell ; and
cashier, M. C. Smiley. The capital of this institu-
tion is $50,000, and its surplus and profits, $12,000,
while its deposits amount to $200,000. Mr. Stiefel
is acknowledged to be a man of marked financial
capacity, conservative, shrewd, far-seeing and ex-
tremely careful of his depositors' interests, a man
of sterling honesty, unquestioned ability and high
ideals. Possessed of energy and public spirit, he
has at various times been connected with civic
matters of importance, and has been a member of
the City Council. At this time he belongs to the
board of trustees of the Gallatin County High
School at Bozeman and is a member of the board
of directors of the Gallatin County Fair Associa-
tion. Faithful in every relation of life, he has risen
from small beginnings to an enviable position, and
in doing so has left a record of success secured
fairly and without animosity.
William Hruza came to Montana thirty-five
years ago. As one of the builders of the City of
Livingston the people of that community have al-
ways -called him, with an accent of esteem and ad-
miration, "Bill" Hruza. He gave to Livingston a
splendid industry for the manufacture of meat prod-'
ucts, and his ability in that line returned him the
Vol. 11—18
modest fortune which in later years he has used to
develop extensive private interests as a livestock
man and rancher, though still a resident of the City
of Livingston.
Mr. Hruza was born in Bohemia, Austria, June
25, 1859. His father, Thomas Hruza, was born in
the same country in 1821, and twice served with
the Austrian armies in some of the Central Euro-
pean wars. He fought in 1848 against Germania
and again in 1866 against Prussia. He was proprie-
tor of a cafe in his native country and in 1877 came
to the United States and was in business at North
Bend, Nebraska, until his death in 1905. In the mat-
ter of politics he was identified with the democratic
party and was a member of the Catholic Church. In
Bohemia he married Barbara Novak, who was born
in 1828 and died at North Bend, Nebraska, in 1905,
at the age of seventy-seven. Frank, the oldest of
their children, was a butcher and died at North
Bend, Nebraska, at the age of fifty-six. William
was the second in age. Adolph became an attorney
and died at North Bend at the age of thirty-five.
Mr. Hruza received a common school education in
his native land, and also had expert training there
at the butcher's trade. After coming to this country
he lived for a time at North Bend, Nebraska,
worked at his trade, and from there went to Denver
and resumed his trade in that then great mining
metropolis for three years. He also spent a period
at Omaha, where he had valuable experience in one
of the largest packing industries of that city.
Mr. Hruza came to Livingston in 1884 and trav-
eled by stage route through the Black Hills district.
He reached Livingston without money and had to
give a practical demonstration of his skill as a
butcher before he was accepted as an employe by the
pioneer Livingston meat man, S. L. HoUiday. Then
for nine years he worked for Mr. Holliday and for
another firm, at the end of which time he embarked
his modest capital and his individual skill in a busi-
ness of his own on South Main Street. He estab-
lished the Cold Storage Market, and in connection
built near Livingston a model killing and packing
plant, where he introduced facilities for the slaugh-
ter and preparation of many thousands of pounds of
beef, pork, mutton and other meat products every
week. This business grew and prospered and it con-
tinued under the personal direction and ownership
of Mr. Hruza until 1915, when he sold out. In the
meantime and since he has been identified with the
production of meat on the hoof, and today owns two
ranches. One consists of 720 acres a mile from Liv-
ingston on Flushman Creek, and he also has a ranch
of 1,100 acres seven miles from Livingston. He is
a director of the First State Bank of Livingston,
and owns a beautiful modern home at 315 West Cal-
lender Street.
Mr. Hruza is a republican and during the nineties
served a term on the city council. He is affiliated
with Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks, and has
been active in the Commercial Club. He is also
a member of Zephyr Camp No. 151, Woodmen of
the World.
Mr. Hruza has had an ideal domestic life, and
his three children are young people who have given
good accounts of themselves. In 1883, at North
Bend, Nebraska, he married Miss Mary Kunes,
daughter of James and Anna Kunes. Her father
was a pioneer rancher in Nebraska and is now de-
ceased, her mother living at Morris Bluffs in that
state. Minnie, the oldest child of Mr. and Mrs.
Hruza is a talented vocal and instrumental musician,
a graduate of the Boston Conservatory of Music,
and is the wife of Henry Jandruw. Mr. Jandruw
is a railroad engineer, and he and his wife have
272
HISTORY OF MONTANA
their home on Yellowstone Street in Livingston.
Ada, the second daughter, was her father's book-
keeper for several years and is now the wife of
Charles Reber, their home being on the Hruza ranch.
John, their only son, lives with his parents and is
assistant cashier of the First State Bank.
Edward H. Moorman. In the following para-
graphs are briefly outlined the leading facts and
characteristics in the career of a gentleman who
combines in his makeup the elements of the prac-
tical man of affairs and the energy of the public-
spirited citizen, and all who come within range of
his influence are profuse in their praise of his ad-
mirable qualities. The high regard in which he is
held by all classes indicates the possession of at-
tributes and characteristics that fully entitle him to
the respect and consideration of his fellow men.
Edward H. Moorman, secretary and treasurer and
assistant general manager of the Yellowstone Park
Camping Company, was born at Cincinnati, Ohio,
December iS, 1875, and is the son of John B. and
Mary (Ernst) Moorman. The father was born in
Germany in 1830, and two years later was brought
by his parents to the United States. They located
in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he was reared, married
and spent the remainder of his life, his death occur-
ring in 1894. During his active years he was one
of the best known newspaper men in Cincinnati,
having served for ten years as general superinten-
dent of the Cincinnati Commercial-Gazette, and for
thirty-five years in a like capacity with the Cincin-
nati Volksblatt, in which he was a stockholder and
which at that time was one of the leading papers
printed in the German language in the United States.
In politics he was a republican and in religious
belief was a Catholic. Mrs. Mary Moorman was
born in 1839 in Cincinnati, and died there in 1899.
To this worthy couple were born the following chil-
dren : G. L., who is connected with the American
Book Company at Cincinnati ; Edward H., the next
in order of birth; Fred; Ernst, who operates an
automobile dray line in Cincinnati; Alfred, also of
Cincinnati.
Edward H. Moorman received his education in
the public schools of Cincinnati, and at the age of
fifteen years he entered the office of the Mosler Safe
and Lock Company, with whom he remained for two
years. During the following six years he was em-
ployed by the Globe Iron Roofing and Corrugating
Company. In 1900 Mr. Moorman came to Bozeman,
Montana, and entered the employ of the Wylie Per-
manent Camping Company in the capacity of camp
manager. He was later promoted to the position
of auditor of the company. In December, 1916, the
company was reorganized as the Yellowstone Park
Camping Company, Mr. Moorman continuing with
the new company as auditor and also becoming its
treasurer. In May, 1919, the Yellowstone Park
Camping Company changed ownership and under
the consequent reorganization Mr. Moorman became
secretary and treasurer and assistant general man-
ager, responsible positions which he is still satisfac-
torily filling. The other officers of the company are
as follows : President A. W. Miles ; vice president
and general manager, Howard H. Hays. The com-
pany is incorporated and has its principal offices at
Livingston.
For many years the Yellowstone National Park
has been the most popular of America's vacation
spots, hence its popular title of "The Nation's Play-
ground." One of the most important elements con-
tributing to the enjoyment of the thousands of vis-
itors who come here for an outing has been the
system of camps, which has been maintained here
through the years for nearly three decades. Ap-
proximately 50 per cent of visitors to the park
prefer the camping life, which is made easy, com-
fortable and safe under the management of the Yel-
lowstone Park Camping Company. This company
undoubtedly provides pleasure seekers with the
greatest vacation at the lowest cost oiifered any-
where in America. Wonderful scenery, startling
phenomena, fishing unequalled anywhere, gorgeous
flowers and trees, hundreds of animals, including
elk, deer and bear, and the purest water and most
invigorating air, combine to make Yellowstone Park
a natural vacation spot, but, in addition, the hand
of man offers such inducements to visitors as com-
fortable and safe automobile rides through wild
canyons and over mountain peaks, splendid cuisine,
restful beds, bath-houses and every other comfort
and pleasure-giving device that can be assembled
here for the entertainment of visitors. The kitchens
and dining halls of the company are revelations in
camp conveniences and sanitation. A laundry is
maintained in each camp ; mountain water from
ice-cold springs is piped to all camps and milch
cows supply fresh cream and butter daily. Natural
hot springs furnish water for bathing purposes and
if visitors sufifer from over enjoyment doctors and
nurses are provided to bring them back to a normal
condition. Mr. Moorman has had a large part in
the perfecting of the system under which the camps
are now conducted, and has thus in a definite way
contributed to the enjoyment of thousands who
have come to Wonderland for rest and recupera-
tion.
Politically Mr. Moorman is an independent re-
publican, though he does not take an active part
■in public aiifairs. • Fraternally he is a member of
•Bozeman Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and is also a member of the Livingston
Chamber of Commerce. In January, 1919, he sold
his splendid ranch of 1,600 acres and now occupies
a comfortable home on South Fifth Street, Livings-
ton.
In 1909 Mr. Moorman was married to Gertrude
Clark, the daughter of Robert and Mary (Rule)
Clark, who reside near Shelbyville, Indiana. To
them has been born one child, Helen Louise, born
on May 27, 1910. In every phase of activity to
which he has applied himself, Mr. Moorman has
demonstrated ability of high order, and his fine per-
sonal qaulities have won for him a large circle of
friends.
William C. Busche. No city is greater than
the sum of its energies and enthusiasm derived
from its best citizenship. The peculiar power and
prestige of Livingston has been enhanced by the
presence there of many men of great force, re-
sourcefulness and varied executive talents. One of
these is William C. Busche, who built up and is
proprietor of the largest bakery establishment in
the Yellowstone Valley, and from the success of
his own business has radiated his energies far and
wide as a city builder. To his bakery products
he gave the trade name "Best Yet," and that title
has become one of the main city slogans.
Mr. Busche is not only a master baker but a
master business man and citizen. He was born
at Bremen, Germany, August 5, 1875. His father,
Conrad Busche, was born in the same free city of
Germany in 1841 and died there in i893- He spent
all his active life as a baker. During the Franco-
Prussian war in 1870-71 he was a German soldier.
He was also a member of the Lutheran Church.
His wife was Johanna Schulenberg, who was born
in Bremen in 1845 and died in that city also in
the year 1893. William C. was the oldest of their
HISTORY OF MONTANA
273
children. Mary is the wife of Henry Roevekamp,
secretary for a large corporation of cotton spinners
at Bremen. Minnie is also married and living in
Bremen. Herman is manager of the German-Amer-
ican Oil Company at Munich, Germany.
William C. Busche was educated in private schools
and at the age of thirteen began a thorough ap-
prenticeship at the baker's trade under his father.
In 1891, when sixteen years old, he came to the
United States and the following two years worked
steadily at his trade in the bakery of Regan Brothers
at Minneapolis. His father's death called him home
and until he was twenty-one years of age he ran
the business and was guardian of the estate. When
the estate was settled he returned to Minneapolis
and rejoined Regan Brothers for two years. Mr.
Busche acquired the bulk of his extensive know-
ledge of the northwestern country while a travel-
ing representative for the Northwestern Bakers Sup-
ply Company of Minneapolis. He covered all the
territory between Minneapolis and the states of
Washington and Oregon, and in that time made
personal acquaintance and gained the confidence and
esteem of nearly all the retail bakers in this territory.
In 1907 Mr. Busche bought a small bakery in
Livingston from B. A. Hicks. He had the advan-
tage of not only knowing the baker's art but also
all the most perfect facilities and appliances for
increasing the quality and quantity of the baking
business, and at the same time he has improved
his plant until without question it ranks first among
the bakeries of Southeastern Montana. He has
installed all the labor saving devices and also the
facilities to safeguard the sanitary quality of his
products. From his plant on South Second Street
the bread and other products go to supply a large
and generous demand in a territory 100 miles north,
east, south and west, and a large proportion of
the homes of Livingston for years have known no
other "staff of life," than the "Best Yet" bread.
On coming to Livingston Mr. Busche at once
identified himself with the civic and business or-
ganizations. While president of the old Commercial
Club he was chiefly instrumental in organizing the
Park Creamery, one of the institutions of which
Livingston is now most proud. He is a member of
the Chamber of Commerce, is a past exalted ruler
of Livingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks and a
member of Yellowstone Lodge No. 10 of the Knights
of Pythias. For the past seven years he has served
as trustee and financial secretary of the English
Lutheran Church. Politically he is a non-partisan.
At Spokane, Washington, in 1904, he married
Miss Bessie C. Rudolf, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Louis Rudolf. Her parents are now deceased. Her
father was a pioneer baker at Spokane. Mr. and
Mrs. Busche have three children : Rudolf, born ■
September 16, 1906; Edward, born April 15, 1910;
and Mary Louise, born April 19, 1916.
William Sworder. It is a well attested
that the greatness of the state lies not in the ma-
chinery of the government, or even in its institu-
tions, but in the sterling qualities of its individual
citizens, in their capacity for high and useful effort
and unselfish endeavor and their devotion to the
public good. To this class belongs William Sworder,
who for more than a do.zen years has honored Liv-
ingston by his citizenship. Although- an American
by adoption only, he has been most loyal to its
institutions, and his example has been worthy of
emulation.
William Sworder was born near Hertford, Eng-
land, on May 10, i86g, and is the son of William and
Ellen (Cooper) Sworder. The father was born
near Hertford in 1843 and died there in 1917, having
spent his entire life in that vicinity. He followed
the vocation of farming, but retired in 1902. He
was a conservative in politics and served as alder-
man of Hertford. He was a member of the
Church of England and was a Freemason of the
thirty-second degree. He served in the English
Volunteer Cavalry and in many ways was a useful
man. His wife was born in 1840, near Hertford,
and she died there in 1899. To this worthy couple
were born the following children: Helen, who is
still unmarried and resides at Hertford; the subject
of this sketch was next in the order of birth ; Annie
resides at Hertford; John Cooper lives at Hitchin,
England; Mary lives at Hertford; Charles is a
traveling salesman and lives in London, England ;
Rose is a nurse in the British Government service
in the Island of Ceylon.
William Sworder received his education in the
public schools of Hertford and then learned the
trade of carpenter. 'Desiring a field of larger op-
portunities, in March, 1887, he came to the United
States, locating first at Adrian, Minnesota, where for
five years he engaged in farming. He then returned
to his former vocation until 1899, when he went
to Ulen, Minnesota, and again went to farming.
Two years later he went to Twin Valley, Minnesota,
and worked as a carpenter and builder until June,
1906, when he came to Livingston and has since
been actively engaged in business here, first as a
contractor and builder, but since that time as a
cabinet maker and woodworker. He owns a good
building on South B Street and is thoroughly pre-
pared for any kind of a job in the way of wood
work, nothing being too intricate for him to handle.
Mr. Sworder's experience has led him through every
department of his work, the results of which speak
for themselves. He is also a stockholder in the
Park Milling Company of Livingston. In civic af-
fairs he has taken the same keen interest that has
made for his success in business endeavors, and he
occupies an enviable position among the business
men of his city.
In February, 1893, at Adrian, Minnesota, Mr.
Sworder was married to Jennie McNeely, who was
born in New York City, and to them have been
born the following children : Jennie Ellen, who is
the wife of G. C. Bussard, a painter and decorator
at Strawn, Illinois; Hazel Alvina, the wife of F. H.
Goodson, a fireman on the Northern Pacific Rail-
road ;VVilliam Lester, who enlisted in December,
1917, in the United States Navy, in which he is a
first-class fireman, and has had four trips overseas;
Stanley Charles is in the signal service of the
Northern Pacific Railroad.
Politically Mr. Sworder is an independent demo-
crat, taking a keen interest in passing public events,
and gives his support to those men and measures
which in his judgment will best advance the best
interests of the people. His fraternal relations are
with Livingston Lodge No. 559. Loyal Order of
Moose, and Livingston Lodge No. 10, Knights of
Pythias, which he has served as vice chancellor.
The prosperity which is the legitimate result of
earnest effort is today his, and he enjoys the confi-
dence and respect of the entire community.
S.^MUEL James Crouch. The interests of Gallatin
are being well conserved by the county's repre-
sentative in the Lower House of the State Assembly,
Samuel James Crouch, who is also a well known
figure in financial circles, as he is cashier of the
sound banking house o£ Three Forks, the First
National Bank. He is a man of unusual capabilities,
and although in the very prime of life, has become
274
HISTORY OF MONTANA
experienced in dealing with human nature, so that
his judgments are sound and seldom at fault. He
was born near Three Forks, Montana, December
9, 1877, a son of C. L. Crouch, born in Montgomery
County, Missouri, in 1839. There he was reared
and lived until 1863, when he came west to Broad-
water County, Montana, and homesteaded 160 acres
of fand. A practical farmer, he increased his hold-
ings until he now owns 1,000 acres located three
miles north of Three Forks, across the county line,
and is numbered among the most successful ranch-
men of this region. Politically he is a democrat.
His fraternal connections are with the Masonic
order. C. L. Crouch was married to Angeline Tate,
born in Missouri in 1853, and died on the ranch in
1884, having borne her husband the following chil-
dren: Elizabeth, who married a Mr. Haskell, lives
with her father; Samuel James, who was the second
in order of birth; William T., who lives on a ranch
near his father's property; Stella, who died at the
age of twelve years ; and Clara,- who died in infancy.
Samuel James Crouch was reared on the ranch
and attended the schools of Gallatin County, the
Montana State College, and was graduated in a
business course in 1897. Completing his educational
training, Mr. Crouch returned to his father's ranch
and was there engaged in stock raising until 1902,
when he began farming on his own account on a
ranch adjacent to that of his father, containing 160
acres that he still owns, as well as other ranches
in Jefferson, Broadwater and Gallatin counties,
amounting to about 2,500 acres in all. In 1913 Mr.
Crouch located permanently at Three Forks, and
became cashier of its First National Bank, which
position he still holds, and he is also interested to
a considerable extent in some valuable mining prop-
erties.
A democrat, he early began to take an active part
in politics, and was elected to the State Assembly
as the representative of Broadwater County and
served in the Eleventh and Twelfth sessions, hav-
ing been elected to succeed himself. In 1918 he
was returned to the State Assembly as the repre-
sentative of Gallatin County, and served in the
Sixteenth Session. During the time he was in the
Legislature he served on the new counties, privilege
and election, banks and banking and other important
committees ; and he also introduced the bill creating
Pershing County, which was defeated. In every
way he has served the best interests of his con-
stituents, and is recognized as an able and broad
minded man, and one who can be relied upon to
work for constructive measures. Since coming to
Three Forks Mr. Crouch has been very active in
civic matters, serving in the City Council for two
terms, and has been a forceful factor in the Chamber
of Commerce, of which he was the first president.
While still living in Broadwater County, he was
on the school board of the Jefferson River District,
and did much to raise the educational standards in
that locality. He is now serving as president of
the Sacaiawea Club and is a member of the Elks
Lodge. Very little of moment is undertaken with-
out he is consulted, as his fellow citizens recognize
that he is able and willing to exert himself in be-
half of his community, and are glad to avail them-
selves of his valuable services.
On April 27, igi6, Mr. Crouch was married to
Gertrude Edna Boomer at Lone: Beach. California.
She is a daughter of Robert H. and Melissa (De
Ormand) Boomer, now residents of Logan, Mon-
tana, although formerly. Mr. Boomer was a farmer
in the region about Bozeman, and it was on this
property that Mrs. Crouch was born. Mr. and Mrs.
Crouch have no children. Mr. Crouch's
to his district are not completed, for the future
looms large with economic problems such men as
he will be called upon to solve. During the past
few years he has reached an understanding of the
needs of his constituency directly and surely, and
his associates recognize and admire his views, which
are convincing in their simplicity and integrity, so
that he is liable to be called upon to assume respon-
sibilities of increasing importance as time passes.
Ralph Rowland Ege, a graduate civil engineer,
has spent his active career as an expert in motor
mechanics and has developed one of the largest and
most complete organizations of its kind in Southern
Montana, known as the United Motor Corporation
of Livingston, of which he is president.
Mr. Ege was born on a farm in Whiteside County,
Illinois, December 13. 1891. His father, William L.
Ege, spent all his life in Illinois as a farmer and
died in Whiteside County in 1895. He was a re-
publican and a Methodist. The mother. Viola
Rowland, was born in Illinois in 1867 and is now
living with her two children at Livingston. Her
daughter is Hazel H., wife of William A. Ortmeyer,
treasurer of the United Motors Corporation of
Livingston.
Ralph R. Ege, the only son, received his first
advantages in the rural sch,ools of Whiteside County,
Illinois, and afterward attended Cornell Academy
and Cornell College at Mt. Vernon, Iowa. He
graduated with the degrees Bachelor of Science and
Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering in 1913,
and the following year received his Master's degree
in Civil Engineering. In 1914 he came to Montana
and at Wilsall established the Shields Valley Garage.
One year later he organized the Ege Motor Company
of Wilsall, Livingston and Bozeman, and was its
manager until January 12, 1917. He lived at Wilsall
until May i, 1916. and since then has made his home
at Livingston. On January i2, 1917, he organized
the United Motors Corporation for the purpose of
doing a general garage business and handling the
sales in local Montana territory for the Buick and
Cadillac cars and the G. M. C. and Master trucks.
The offices, salesroom and garage at Livingston
are at 209-211 South Second Street. Mr. Ege is
president of the corporation, F. M. Foerschler is
vice president. W. A. Ortmeyer is treasurer, and
^'ard Smith secretary.
Mr. Ege is a stockholder in the Northwestern Na-
tional Bank at Livingston and the Farmers Exchange
of Wilsall and personally is interested in Montana
agriculture, owning a farm of 160 acres in the
Shields Valley. He is a member of the Chamber of
Commerce and the Railway Club of Livingston, is
a Mason, with affiliations in Mount Vernon Lodge ^
in Iowa, and a member of Livingston Consistory of
the Scottish Rite and .Algeria Temple of the Mystic
Shrine at Helena. He is also a member of the
Order of Elks. Politically he is independent and
non-partisan, and is a member of the Methodist
Church, a faith in which he was reared. Mr. Ege
resides in the Park Hotel.
Samuel E. Leard. M. D. In the quarter of a
century since he came to Livingston Dr. Leard has
builded wisely and well his professional reputation
and prestige. The recognition accorded him by his
large private clientage as a competent and skillful
physician and surgeon has gradually extended over
many sections of the state. For the past fourteen
years he has served as city health officer of Living-
ston, and in 1919 was appointed county health officer
of Park County. For two years he was head phy-
sician of the state organization of the Modern
HISTORY OF MONTANA
275
Woodmen of America, and in 191 1 was elected
president of the State Health Officers' Association.
Doctor Leard was born in Armstrong County,
Pennsylvania, at Middlesex, October 5, 1864, but grew
up in Illinois and came to Montana when about
thirty years of age. His grandfather and great-
grandfather bore the name Thomas. They were
from County Down, Ireland, where grandfather
Thomas was born in 1784. The great-grandfather
brought his family to America in 1802 and was a
pioneer of Western Pennsylvania, homesteading land
in Armstrong County, where his son Thomas spent
his life as a farmer and died in 1874, at the ad-
vanced age of ninety. Doctor Leard's father was
also named Thomas and was born in Armstrong
County in 1824. He spent his early life there as a
farmer and after 1875 lived on a farm near Prairie
City, Illinois, where he died in 1893. He was a
republican in politics and a member of the Presby-
terian Church, a faith he inherited from a long line
of ancestors. He married Isabel Kiskadden, who
was born in Butler County, Pennsylvania, in 1839,
and died at Holdrege in Western Nebraska in 1912.
Doctor Leard is the third of their five children.
Hattie, the oldest, is the wife of William Martin,
a farmer at Holdrege, Nebraska; William F. was a
farmer and died at Prairie City, Illinois, at the age
of fifty; Laura died in infancy; and Sadie Blanche
is the wife of John McDonald, a beet sugar grower
at Longmont, Colorado.
Samuel E. Leard was eleven years old when his
parents moved to Illinois, and he finished his early
education in country schools at Prairie City. He is
a graduate of both the Knox Academy and Knox
College at Galesburg, Illinois, taking the Bachelor
of Science degree in 1889. The following four
years he spent in the Chicago Medical College,
graduating in 1893, and in the same year receiving
the Master of Science degree from his alma mater
at Galesburg. Doctor Leard did special work in
diseases of the eye, ear, nose and throat at the
Chicago Post-Graduate Medical School in 1904.
While at Knox College he had four years of military
training under Lieutenant, afterward Colonel Ed-
wards. For three years he was also a member of
the Second Montana Regiment of the Montana
Militia. Soon after the beginning of the war against
Germany Doctor Leard gave up his profession tem-
porarily at Livingston and was commissioned a
first lieutenant in the Medical Corps on August 4,
1917. He served with the army in the training camp
at Chickamauga Park, Georgia. His earlier military
training stood him in good stead and made him one
of the useful members of the Medical Corps. He
was mustered out December I, 1918.
.^fter graduating from Medical School Doctor
Leard practiced at Omaha and in the fall of 1895
came to Livingston and embarked upon his career as
a general physician and surgeon. His offices are in
the Garnier-Miles Block. For ten years he served
as county coroner, being elected five consecutive
times. He is a member of the County and State
!\IedicaI Societies, the American Medical Association,
is affiliated with Livingston Lodge of the Knights of
Pythias, the Livingston Chamber of Commerce, is
a member of the Congregational Church and is a
republican.
He formerly owned some ranch properties but
sold them in 1917. His residence is a modern home
at 317 South Yellowstone Street. Doctor Leard
married at Warren, Pennsylvania, in 1893, Margaret
A. Newmaker, daughter of John W. and Sarah
(Story) Newmaker, both now deceased. Her father
was a furniture manufacturer and lumber dealer in
Western Pennsylvania. Doctor and Mrs. Leard
have one son, Thomas Clyde. In July, 1917, he
joined the Second Montana Regiment and was mus-
tered into the United States service in the One
Hundred and Sixty-Third Regiment and was on
duty with the Coast Artillery at New York until
mustered out in September, 1918. He is now an
employe of the Northern Pacific Railway in Idaho.
W. L. Kearns. Among the individuals of the
class that may be called progressive in Southern
Montana is W. L. Kearns, cashier of the Yegen
Bank at Gardiner. His record is the account of a
life which is uneventful, indeed, as far as stirring
incident or startling adventure is concerned, yet is
distmguished by the most substantial qualities of
character. Like his father before him, his life his-
tory exhibits a career of virtuous private industry,
performed with moderation and crowned with suc-
cess. It is the record of a well balanced mental and
moral constitution, strongly marked by those traits
of character which are of such essential value in
such a state of society as e.xists in this country.
W. L. Kearns was born in Adair County, Iowa,
on May 22, 1888, the son of George L. and Elizabeth
(Lynam) Kearns. George L. Kearns, who now re-
sides in Vermilion, South Dakota, was born in 1864
in Scott County, Iowa, and was there reared and
educated. He has been a life-long farmer and has
been successful in his vocation. In 1901 he removed
from Iowa to Delmont, South Dakota, where he
remained until 1911, when he located in Vermilion.
He is a democrat in his political belief. His wife
was born in Scott County, Iowa, in 1867. She has
borne her husband the following children : W. L.,
the immediate subject of this brief review; Owen,
who is a farmer at Vermilion, South Dakota; Kath-
leen is at home with her parents ; Keith, who died
on April 4, 1919, was a ranch foreman near Gardi-
ner; George, who enlisted in the United States Army
in 1917, was sent overseas and served in the Army
of Occupation; Lillian is a student in the public
schools at Vermilion.
W. L. Kearns received his elementary education
in the rural schools of South Dakota, attending the
high school through the junior year. Then, in 1907,
he attended the Capital City Commercial College at
Des Moines, Iowa, upon the completion of which
training he entered the Delmont State Bank at Del-
mont, South Dakota, as bookkeeper. Six months
later he went to the Citizens State Bank at Armour,
South Dakota, in the same capacity, from which
he was later promoted to the position of assistant
cashier. Three years later he accepted the same
position with the Armour State Bank, where he
remained eighteen months. In 1914 he went to
Corwin Springs, Montana, and during the following
two seasons he ran the hotel there for C. S. Heffer-
lin. Then for a time he engaged in farming, but on
December 10, 1917, he came to Gardiner and entered
upon his duties as cashier of the Yegen Brothers
Bank, a position which he is still occupying. This
bank, which is capitalized at $20,000, is situated on
Main Street, and has for its president Chris Yegen,
and for its vice president Peter Yegen. It is one of
the strong and reliable financial institutions of this
section and enjoys the confidence of the community.
Mr. Kearns has demonstrated business and executive
qualities of a high order and enjoys the warm regard
of all who come in contact with him.
In addition to his banking duties Mr. Kearns is
secretary of the Gardiner Light and Water Com-
pany, and he unhesitatingly gives his support to
every measure looking to the advancement of Gardi-
ner in any way. Politically he supports the demo-
cratic party.
276
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In 1909, at Delmont, South Dakota, Mr. Kearns
married June Baker, the daughter of W. S. and Ida
(Austin) Baker, who now reside in Los Angeles,
California, though Mr. Baker was formerly a farmer
in South Dakota. Mrs. Kearns received a good
education, having been a student in the South Dakota
Normal School. Mr. and Mrs. Kearns have two
children, Marjorie, born March 12, 1918, and Lois
June, born October 18, 1919-
There are found in Mr. Kearns a reiteration of
those sturdy qualities which characterized the pio-
neers of the great Central West, among whom was
numbered the subject's paternal grandfather, Law-
rence Kearns, who was among the true pioneers of
Iowa and who, after an honorable career as a tiller
of the soil, died at Stuart, Iowa, in 1909. The
descendants of these people are now reaping the
fruitage of their labors and they occupy a secure
place in our country's history.
C. V. Brown. For fully twenty years Mr. Brown
has given his whole energies, thought, study and
enthusiasm to school teaching and school adminis-
tration. He taught in his native State of Michigan
for a number of years, but since graduating from
the University of Michigan his work has been in
Montana. He is principal of the Park County High
School at Livingston.
Mr. Brown was born at Monroe, Michigan, No-
vember 18, 1878. He is of Scotch ancestry. His
grandfather, James R. Brown, was born near Edin-
burg, Scotland, in 1809, was a shoemaker by trade,
and on coming to America settled at Delhi, New
York, where he followed his trade for a number
of years. He died at Mount Pleasant, Michigan,
in 1904, at the venerable age of ninety-five. He
married in New York State Margaret Muir, a native
of Scotland. Robert Brown, father of C. V. Brown,
was born at Delhi, New York, in 1841, was reared
and married in his native village, and taught school
there for a time. In 1876 he moved to a farm at
Monroe, Michigan, and in i88o to Mount Pleasant,
that state. He was a Michigan farmer, and in 1900
accepted a post with the Indian Bureau as an agri-
cultural expert among the Indians of New Mexico.
While thus employed he died at Santa Rosa in 1901.
He had represented Isabella County in the Michigan
Legislature in 1895. He was a steadfast republican
in politics, and very devout in his membership in the
Presbyterian Church. Fraternally he was affiliated
with the Odd Fellows. Robert Brown married Jean
V. Russell, who was born at Walton, New York, and
is living in Mount Pleasant, Michigan. Of her
three children C. V. Brown is the youngest. The
other two, both living at Mount Pleasant, Michigan,
are James A., a farmer, and May Estelle, a teacher.
C. V. Brown attended the rural schools of Isabella
County, Michigan, and took both the preparatory
and regular courses in the Central Michigan Normal
at Mount Pleasant, graduating with a state certifi-
cate in 1899. For three years he was a teacher
in the graded schools at Menominee, Michigan. In
the fall of 1902 he returned to Mount Pleasant and
for one year was employed as a critic teacher in the
normal school. He then resumed his studies there
for a year, and in 1904 was granted a life teacher's
certificate. One year following he taught in the
high school at Albion, Michigan, and for four years
was superintendent of schools at Grass Lake. In
the meantime he attended summer sessions at the
University of Michigan and beginning in the fall of
1909 took a full year's work with residence at Ann
Arbor. After another year as superintendent of
schools at Ovid, Michigan, he re-entered the uni-
versity in the summer and received his A. B. degree
in August, 191 1.
Mr. Brown was for four years principal of the
Sweetgrass County High School in Montana at Big
Timber, and in July, 1915, was called to his present
post at Livingston as principal of the Park County
High School. Under his supervision are a staff of
fourteen teachers, while the enrollment of the high
school is 280. The new high school building was
constructed in 1917-18 at the corner of Callender
and Fifth streets.
Mr. Brown is prominent in educational and also
in local civic affairs. He is a member of the Mon-
tana State Teachers Association, the National Edu-
cational Association, the Association of Secondary
School Principals, and is chairman of the Montana
Interscholastic Athletic Association. He is a director
in the Livingston Rotary Club, a member of the
Railway Club, is a trustee in the Congregational
Church, is a republican, and is affiliated with E.x-
celsior Lodge No. 116, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, at Grasslake, Michigan. Mr. Brown owns
a farm in Mecosta County in his native state.
In 1906, at Grand Rapids, Michigan, he married
Miss Estella C. Schneider, daughter of Henry and
Frederika (Schroeder) Schneider. Her father is a
wholesale lumber merchant and with his wife resides
in Grand Rapids. Mrs. Brown is a graduate of the
Michigan State Normal at Ypsilanti. They are the
parents of two children: Virginia Louise, born
September 6, 1907, and Clifford V., Jr., born Febru-
ary IS, 1917.
John D. Hirst. In recent years many of the
transactions by which city and farm properties have
exchanged hands in Eastern Montana have been
accomplished through the medium of John D. Hirst,
a well known real estate man of Billings. Mr.
Hirst knows Montana thoroughly, having been a
homesteader and having developed a farm from a
wilderness condition.
His life has been a busy one, most of it spent
in the West. He was born at Grafton, West Vir-
ginia, June 12, 1875. His maternal great-grand-
father was Jasper' Everhart, and he and his wife,
Mary, called Polly, were both natives of Germany.
Mr. Hirst's paternal great-grandfather was John
Hirst, a native of England. His grandfather was
Daniel Hirst, born in Devonshire, England, and
with a brother crossed the ocean to America. The
two were separated at New York City and he never
saw his brother again. He moved to Virginia, was
a teacher and surveyor, and spent the rest of his
life in the Old Dominion. Francis M. Hirst, father
of John D., was born in Loudoun County, Virginia,
January i, 1839. He grew up in his native county,
moved to West Virginia, where he married and
lived until 1878 and then went to the western
frontier in Nebraska, homesteading, in 1882, 160
acres at Central City, near what was then Lone
Tree on the Platte River. He was a carpenter in
early life, for seventeen years was an engineer on
the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and after moving
to Nebraska developed his claim and lived on
the homestead until his death on March 19, 1910.
Though a native of \'irginia, he was a strong Union
man and voted the republican ticket practically
from the beginning of the party. In 1861 he joined
a regiment of calvalry, the 22nd Pennsylvania
Cavalry, "Ringold Cavalry," all of the members of
which furnished their own equipment and horses.
This regiment played a notable part in the war and
his own record was that of the regiment in seventy-
two engagements. He was in the battle of Five
Forks, Lookout Mountain, Missionary Ridge, Gettys-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
277
burg and was with General Sheridan at the battle
of Winchester. Francis Hirst had three horses shot
from under him and was twice wounded. His serv-
ice was practically from the beginning to the end
of the war, comprising four years, si.x months,
twenty-one days. He was for many years a member
of the Grand' Army of the Republic, and was a
very zealous churchman. He was a Baptist, served
as deacon, and was church clerk and treasurer for
many years. He was identified with the Masonic
fraternity and in political affairs was a leader, being
honored with several county offices. He was road
commissioner for many years. After the war he
railroaded for ten years and then for three years
was a stationary engineer. He married in West
Virginia Elizabeth C. Sinsel, who was born at Graf-
ton in that state. She died at Central City, Nebraska,
at the age of fifty-two, on December 9, 1895. Three
of their children died young and the others to reach
mature years are: Edward S., born November 11,
1865, a farmer at Archer, Nebraska ; William F.,
born March 23, 1869, who for a number of years
has been traveling agent and manager for the State
of Iowa of the Dayton Computing Scale Company,
his home being at Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Ernest H.,
born September 28, 1870, a farmer at Baker, Mon- ■
tana ; John D. ; Ada^ M., born May 14, 1877, wife of
Jesse Kerr, a prominent farmer, miller and owner
of the telephone exchange at Hurd's Field, North
Dakota ; James A., born September 29, 1879, living
on the old home farm at Archer, Nebraska ; Delilah
B., born August 10, 1884, wife of Frank L, Cush-
man. a farmer at Broadview, Montana.
John D. Hirst was a small child when his parents
moved to Nebraska, and he grew up on his father's
farm, attending school at Archer and Central City,
including the high school of the latter place. He
was also a student in the Baptist College at Grand
Island, Nebraska, and on leaving that institute in
1897, for three years worked at the photography
trade. Next, as a representative of the Standard
Oil Company, he established a business at Wood
River. Nebraska, and developed a large patronage.
He came to Montana in 1909, filing on a homestead
at Broadview and proving it up. He lived on his
160 acre farm there until November, 1916, when
he removed to Billings and entered the real estate
business, handling city properties and farms. While
living on his homestead he was president of the
school board and was instrumental in building the
consolidated school "Progressive No. 32." His offi-
ces are in 2620 First Avenue, North, and he owns
a modern residence at 2^ Burlington Avenue.
Mr. Hirst is an independent republican, a member
of the Baptist Church, belongs to the Masonic Club,
has been a member of The Highlanders for eighteen
years, and is affiliated with Billings Lodge No. 113,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
At Wood River, Nebraska, November II, 1903, he
married Miss Jessie E. McDaniels. She is a mem-
ber of one of the earliest families of the State of
Nebraska. Her great-grandfather McDaniels was a
native of Scotland, and was rated as a lumber king
in this country. He died about 1845 at Rising Sun,
Indiana. Madison McDaniels, grandfather of Mrs.
Hirst, was born October 27, 1812, at Pierpoint Manor,
New York. For many years he was a traveling
salesman for a firm at Watertown. New York, also
operated a big hotel in that city, but salesmanship
was his chief vocation. He died at Plattsburg,
Missouri, May 12, 1871. October 12, 1834 he mar-
ried Permilla Graves, who was born March 11,
1810, and died February 2, 1872, at Plattsburg,
Missouri.
James Nelson McDaniels, father of Mrs. Hirst,
was born January 18, 1841, at Ellisburg, New York,
and was attending school at Union Academy at
Bellville in his native state when the Civil war broke
out. In 1861 he joined as a private in Company C
of the iioth Regiment, New York Infantry, and
was with General Banks and in General Emery's
Division in 1862 in the Fort Donelson, Pittsburg
Landing and other battles in that section. Taken
ill, he was discharged from hospital, but in Septem-
ber, 1864, re-enlisted and joined Company H, 185th
New York Infantry, serving as corporal and being
promoted to sergeant for efficiency and bravery in
battle. Besides those mentioned some of the other
battles in which he participated were Port Hudson,
First Hatchers Run, 1863, Weldon Roads, Watkins
Farm, Second Hatchers Run in 1864, Gravelly Run,
Five Forks in 1865, Quaker Roads, Church Roads
Crossing, and at Appomattox at the final surrender
in April, 1865. He also participated in the Grand
Review at Washington. On September 11, 1867, in
New York, he married Hattie A. Porter, of Water-
town. Her father was Gould M. Porter, a Methodist
minister, who was born March 29, 1802, and died
February 14. 1880. Gould Porter married on March
7, 1827, Ruth E. Sowle. She was born October 21,
1804, and died November 23, 1857. Her father,
Robert Sowle, was born in Massachusetts Novem-
ber 3, 1767, a son of Joseph Sowle, who was de-
scended from George Sowle of the Mayflower Pil-
grims of 1620. Joseph Sowle married Charity Tripp,
and his son Job married Lillis Allen, a sister of
Gen. Ethan Allen, one of the heroic figures of
the Revolutionary war. Two of the sons of Joseph
Sowle were sharpshooters in the Revolutionary war.
In 1872 James N. McDaniels moved to Plattsburg,
Missouri, and in September of the same year moved
to Hall County, Nebraska, and homesteaded 160
acres at Cameron. He lived there until November,
1892, when he moved to Wood River, Nebraska,
and he died April 24, 1896. He was a member of
the Grand Army of the Republic. At the close of
the war he was offered a lieutenancy, but at that
time was sick of war and thinking only of home,
he did not tarry long enough to receive his papers.
He was a member of the Good Templars. He had
owned a farm at Boylston, New York. Mrs. Hirst's
mother was born near Watertown, New York, Feb-
ruary 24, 1846. There were three children in the
McDaniels family: Allie E., born August 9, 1868,
wife of Charles Cox, living in Billings, Montana;
Ida, born July 17, 1870, and died at the age of
twenty-four ; and Mrs. Hirst, who was educated in
the public schools of Wood River, Nebraska, and
for some time before her marriage was a teacher
of music. Mr. and Mrs. Hirst have three children:
James Marion, born May 23, 1907; Harriet Eliza-
beth, born November 11, 191 1; and Wilbur Dean,
born August 27, 1913.
Charles Curtis Simonson. Of the men of Bill-
ings who have fought their way from humble posi-
tions to stations of trust and importance in the
business life of their community, one whose career
should be encouraging to young men just entering
the battle of business life is Charles Curtis Simon-
son, manager of the Billings district of the Montana
Power Company. Mr. Simonson was born at Anoka,
Minnesota, April 24, 1877, a son of Nelson and
Helen (Anderson) Simonson.
Nelson Simonson was born in 1849, at Christiana,
Norway, where his early training included attend-
ance at the public schools, service in the Norwegian
army and the mastering of the trade of millwright.
He was married in his native land to Helen Ander-
son, and in 1871 they immigrated to the United
278
HISTORY OF MONTANA
States, first locating at Anoka, Minnesota, where
Mr. Simonson followed his trade until 1896, then
removing to Brainerd. He has now been retired
for some years and is accounted one of the sub-
stantial men of his community. Politically he is a
republican, but politics have played little part in his
life, as he has only desired to be a good citizen
and an industrious business man. Mrs. Simonson
died at Anoka, Minnesota, in 1887, the mother of
three children : Julia, who died at the age of seven
years ; Charles Curtis ; and Harvey L., who is in the
United States Army in France.
Charles Curtis Simonson attended the public
schools of Anoka, Minnesota, and after his gradua-
tion from the high school there with the class of
1895 attended the University of Minnesota, at Min-
neapolis, for one year. Like many young men just
entering life's arena, he was at first undecided as
to the proper course to pursue, and for a time drifted
from one occupation to another, never finding his
own particular vocation. Eventually, however, he
attached himself to the electrical business, and this
shaped the course of his entire subsequent career.
At St. Paul he was employed by several concerns
in humble capacities, and when he located at Butte,
Montana, in 1897, it was at the bottom of the ladder
in the service of the company which preceded the
Montana Power Company. He was forced to make
his own way, to merit each promotion, and to
thoroughly learn the duties of each position as ad-
vancement came to him, and his persistence and
faithfulness, coupled with real ability, finally won
him the post of manager of the Livingston (Mon-
tana) branch of the company. A short time later
he was transferred to a more responsible position at
Lewistown, where he remained for six years, and
in 1916 was made manager of the big branch at
Billings, where he has since continued. He is
accounted one of the most thoroughly informed and
efficient men in his line in the state, and this is all
the more creditable in that he is self taught. The
offices of the Montana Power Company are situated
in the Electric Building, a five-story reinforced con-
crete structure of the mushroom construction type,
one of the main business buildings of Southeastern
Montana, Mr. Simonson's offices occupying the entire
first floor and basement. This company supplies
from this branch power for the district including
Hunters, Hot Springs, Big Timber, Reed Point,
Columbus, Park City, Laurel, Joliet, Fromberg,
Bridger and Billings. Under Mr. Simonson's super-
vision there are seventy regular employes. Mr.
Simonson's home is in the Wreford Apartments,
at Second Avenue and Thirty-fourth Street, North,
where he occupies suite No. 9. He is a republican,
but has confined his political activities to the casting
of his ballot, although he has been an active citizen
in promoting good movements in each of the com-
munities in which he has resided. Particularly was
this so at Lewistown, which city he did much to
assist in its development, contributing in various
ways to its welfare. It was Mr. Simonson who built
the Bank Electric Building, a four-story office struc-
ture, composed of concrete, of the Turner system
of mushroom construction, with brick curtain walls.
At Billings he has also shown a keen interest in
civic movements and public-spirited enterprises, and
is an active member of the Billings Rotary Club, in
addition to which he holds membership in the Billings
Club and the Billings Midland Club, as well as
Butte Lodge of the Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks. He has various business connections and
is a director in the American Bank and Trust
Company.
Mr. Simonson was married September 16, 1907,
at Butte, Montana, to Katherine Hyatt, daughter of
.Mrs. Mary A. Hyatt, who resides with Mr. and
Mrs. Simonson. There are no children.
W. A. Hall. The true measure of individual
success is determined by what one has accomplished,
and so, judged by this standard, there is eminent
propriety in including within this volume a brief
record of the career of W. A. Hall, a successful
merchant and leading citizen of Gardiner.* Mr.
Hall is a native son of Missouri, and since he came
to Montana has taken an intelligent interest in the
promotion of her best interests and today he en-
joys an enviable position in the community.
W. A. Hall was born in Missouri on April 30,
1861, and remained in his native state until attain-
ing his majority, when he came to Montana and
settled in Paradise Valley, near the banks of the
Yellowstone River, where he operated a ranch. A
short time later he moved to Electric, this state,
remaining there until 1892, when he bought a gen-
eral store in Cinnabar. He was fairly successful in
the mercantile business, but the moving of the rail-
road destroyed the mercantile importance of that
place, and, as a matter of self-preservation, he
followed the railroad to Gardiner, where he estab-
lished the leading department store. This enter-
prise has been successful from its inception and is
now operated by Mr. Hall's sons, Arthur W., Earl
H., Warren E. and James Raymond. Mr. Hall di-
vides his time between Gardiner and Belgrade, hav-
ing near the latter place a 400 acre ranch all culti-
vated and under irrigation. Large quantities of
fine hay are produced and Mr. Hall is giving special
attention to the raising of pure-bred live stock, in-
cluding Oxford sheep, draft horses, driving horses
and saddle ponies. The ranch is one of the best
equipped in this part of the state and Mr. Hall
takes a justifiable pride in the animals which leave
his hands. He also owns the large store building
on Park Street, Gardiner, a splendid modern resi-
dence there, four other dwellings and two large
warehouses, as well as other real estate. He is a
man of keen and far-sighted judgment, whose busi-
ness interests have been handled with skill, and he
is today numbered among the successful business
men of this section of the state.
Politically W. A. Hall is a stanch democrat, while
his religious membership is with the Church of
Christ. Scientist. Fraternally he belongs to Livings-
ton Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons ; Eastern Montana Consistory of the Scottish
Rite (thirty-second degree) Algeria Temple, An-
cient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at
Helena, and to Livingston Lodge No. 10, Knights
of Pythias. He was also a charter member of Old
Faithful Lodge of the Knights of Pythias at Ald-
ridge.
W. A. Hall was united in marriage to Lula F.
Brown, who was born in Missouri in 1871, and to
them have been born the following children : Ar-
thur W., Earl H., Warren E. and James Raymond.
Arthur W. Hall was born at Emigrant, Montana,
on January 24, 1888, and is the son of W. A. and
Lula F. (Brown) Hall. He received his elementary
education in the public and high schools of Boze-
man, Montana, and then attended the Montana
State College at Bozeman, followed by a course in
the Phelps Commercial College in the same city.
He thus left school at the age of twenty-one years
well equipped to enter upon a business career. He
has from the beginning been his father's assistant
in the store at Gardiner and on the ranch, and has
had a large part in the development of the business.
W. A. HALL
HISTORY OF MONTANA
279
He is secretary of the W. A. Hall Company and is
indefatigable in his business habits.
Arthur W. Hall is a democrat in his political
alignment and has taken an active part in fraternal
affairs, being a member of the same Masonic bodies
as his father, as well as the Gardiner Aerie No. 669,
Fraternal Order of Eagles. He is a member of the
Gardiner Band, one of the best in this portion of
the state, and in other ways shows a commendable
interest in local public affairs.
In 1909, at Gardiner, Mr. Hall married Lillian
L. Black, the daughter of Fountain and Josephine
Black, the former of whom now lives at Belgrade,
on the W. A. Hal! ranch. The mother is deceased.
Earl H. Hall was born at Emigrant, Montana,
on July 9, 1889. He attended the public schools of
Livingston and Bozeman, and was then a student
in the preparatory department of the State College
at Bozeman. Since nineteen years of age he has
been connected with his father's extensive interests,
being now treasurer of the W. A. Hall Company.
He is a democrat in his political faith, and is a mem-
ber of the Livingston Masonic Lodge and the East-
ern Montana Consistory of the Scottish Rite. He,
too, is an active member of the local band, playing
a cornet.
Earl H. Hall married Bertha E. McLeod at Boze-
man in 1909, and they have one child. Earl Harold,
born on July 8, 1913. Mrs. Hal! is the daughter of
John and Jennie (Williams) McLeod, the former
of whom is deceased and the latter resides in Port-
land, Oregon. John McLeod was a pioneer rancher
in Gallatin County, Montana, and held several of-
fices of public trust and responsibility, having served
as representative to the Legislature and as clerk
of the courts. In early civic affairs of that county
he was an important factor.
Warren E. Hall was born on September II, 1895,
and received his public school education in the
schools of Livingston and Bozeman. He is a grad-
uate of the Phelps Commercial College, and is now
devoting the greater part of his time to his father's
ranch. On October i, 1919, he married Miss Mar-
garet Hodgson, of Gooding, Idaho. On December
II, 1917, he enlisted in the United States Army and
was sent to Camp Fremont, California. He was
promoted to the rank of quartermaster sergeant
and was mustered out of the service on January
II, 1919. He belongs to the same Masonic bodies
as does his father. He possesses splendid personal
qualities and is w^ll liked by all who know him.
James Raymond Hall, who was born on Novem-
ber 7, 1900, is a student in the high school at Boze-
' S. Arne Erickson is a civil engineer by profes-
sion. He received his technical training and had
an extended experience in Europe before coming to
America. For the past fifteen years he has been
on the civil engineering staff of the Northern Pa-
cific Railway.
Mr. Erickson was born in the famous city of
Trondhjem, Norway, August 29, 1879. His father,
Emil Gerard, was born in 1844 and spent all his life
in Trondhjem. where he died in 1902. He was a
banker, had served in the Norwegian army and was
a member of the Lutheran Church. He married
Johanna Jackwitz, who was born in 1849 and died
in 1901, her life being spent in Trondhjem. Einar,
the oldest of their children, is a merchant at Ber-
gen, Norway, while S. Arne is the second in age.
Haakon is a physician and surgeon at Christiania.
Norway. Fridtjof is a ship building engineer at
Trondhjem, Edward T., an American citizen, en-
listed at the beginning of the war with Germany
and was among the first to go overseas. He became
a captain of infantry, was severely wounded three
times, and in the spring of 1919 was still in hospital
recovering from his wounds. Thorleif, the youngest
of the family, is a pharmacist in Norway.
S. Arne Erickson attended the public schools of
his native city and is a graduate of the Polytechnic
Institute there in 1898, having taken the full civil
engineering course. He also served a year in the
Norwegian military establishment, and had profes-
sional experience for two years at Christiania, two
years at Zurich, Switzerland, and a year and a half
in Copenhagen, Denmark. Mr. Erickson arrived in
New York City in 1904 and after a few weeks in
St. Paul came to Livingston in August, 1904. In
October of that year he was put on the staff of the
Northern Pacific Railway Company as an engineer
and has devoted his time to those duties ever since.
His offices are opposite the main station of the rail-
road in Livingston.
Mr. Erickson, who is unmarried, is a member
of the American Association of Engineers and is
president of the Railway Club of Livingston. He
is a republican and is affiliated with Livingston
Lodge No. 246 of the Elks. His home is at 103
North Fifth Street.
Walter B. White. Although a resident of Liv-
ingston but a comparatively short time, the name
of Walter B. White has already become well known
to the citizens of Park County, where he has as-
surned a leading place in the profession of under-
taking. He has deemed it a rare privilege to min-
ister to the needs of the people in their hours
of greatest distress and has conscientiously and ably
gone about his work in a manner that has won
both the confidence and unive.rsal esteem of all
classes.'
Walter B. White is descended from a long line
of sterling Scotch ancestry, his paternal grandfather
having emigrated from the lands of hills and heather
to Pennsylvania, locating at Prompton, where he
was engaged as a farmer and stock raiser. He
probably met with foul play, for he was never heard
from after starting from home to market with a
large herd of cattle. One of his sons was George
D. White, who was born on July 20, 1864, at Promp-
ton, Pennsylvania. He was reared there and later
located at Carbondale, that state, where he con-
ducted one of the first barber shops. In 1895 he
moved to Paterson, New Jersey, where he served
as superintendent of a jilk manufactory, in which
he was financially interested. In 191 1 he was trans-
ferred to the mill at Carbondale, Pennsylvania, and
in 1917 went to Essington, Pennsylvania, and joined
the Westinghouse Company. Two years later he
went to Charleston, South Carolina, where he now
resides. His religious membership is with the Pres-
byterian Church, while in politics he is a republican
and was honored with local offices while a resident
of Carbondale. In 1887, at Carbondale, Pennsyl-
vania, George D. White married Elizabeth Boyd,
who died in 1903 at Paterson, New Jersey. To
them were born five children, namely: Lillian is the
wife of Albert Dary, who is superintendent of a
machine shop at Shelton, Connecticut ; Walter B. ;
Harold, who died at Carbondale at the age of
twenty-one years, was an appointee to and about to
enter the Annapolis Naval Academy; Marion is a
stenographer for the Birmingham Foundry Com-
pany at Shelton, Connecticut ; Jessie is attending
school at Shelton.
Walter B. White was born at Carbondale, Penn-
sylvania, July 16, 1892. He received his education
in the public schools at Paterson, New Jersey, at-
tending the high school two years. In 1905 he was
apprenticed to the machinist trade, serving four
280
HISTORY OF MONTANA
years, and then was employed for a similar period
in the shops of the Delaware & Hudson Railway.
Then, seized with the spirit of the wanderlust, he went
from place to place, working at his trade in Pennsyl-
vania, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine,
Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, North Caro-
lina, South Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Alabama,
Texas, Nevada, Colorado, North Dakota and Illinois.
In 1913 he came to Montana and for two years and
three months was employed in the Northern Pa-
cific Railroad shops at Livingston. Not satisfied
with that line of work, Mr. White in 1915 went to
Philadelphia and entered the Eckels College of Em-
balming and Sanitary Science, where he graduated
the following year. Then followed two years of
valuable experience with the noted undertaking firm
of J. Lewis Good & Son of Philadelphia. He then
returned to Livingston and on November i, 1918,
engaged in the same line of work. On April 7, 1919,
he bought out James W. Whitfield, at that time the
leading undertaker there, and he is now considered
one of the leading funeral directors of this section
of the state. In connection with his office is a
chapel, where funeral services may be conducted
when desired, and in every way he is equipped to
satisfactorily attend to the needs of his patrons.
Politically Mr. White is a republican and takes
•an intelligent interest in local public affairs. From
December, 1918, to May 5, ipig, he served as dep-
uty county coroner, since which time he has served
acceptably as coroner. His religious membership
is with the Presbyterian Church. Fraternally he is
a member of Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, Livingston Chapter No.
7, Royal Arch Masons, and St. Bernard Comman-
dery No. 6, Knights Templar, Carbondale (Penn-
sylvania) Camp, Woodmen of the World, Livings-
ton Lodge No. 559, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and National Park Lodge No. i68, Inter-
national Association of Machinists.
Mr. White was married on August 14, 1914, at
Livingston. Montana, to Willie Bassett, the daugh-
ter of J. T. and Mary (Williams) Bassett. The
latter is deceased, but the father now resides at
Marshall, Texas. Mrs. White is a graduate of
the Yellowstone Business College at Livingston.
CoL. George W. Morse. In the history of every
commonwealth there are records of the lives of
men which stand forth from those of the majority
because 9f the forceful influence toward constructive
citizenship these same men exerted, and their efforts
in behalf of the development of their local com-
munities and the state, .''imong these, none is more
worthy of permanent preservation than that relative
to Col. George W. Morse, now living retired at
Drummond, for he is one of the pioneers of Mon-
tana, and one of its most honored citizens.
Colonel Morse was born at Whitefield, Lincoln
County, Maine, December 2, 1838, a son of Daniel
Morse who was born in England in 1788 and died
at Whitefield, Maine, in 1863. Daniel Morse came
to the United States in young manhood and bought
a farm in the Town of Whitefield, although he
followed the seas all of his active life, or until he
was stricken with paralysis fifteen years prior to his
death. He had just returned from a voyage, and
was employing his leisure time in building a barn,
and becoming overheated, unwisely bathed his feet
in the water from a cold spring. As a result, he
was paralyzed. While following a seafaring life
he was in the employ of Billv Gray, owner of some
ninety vessels, and the largest maritime man of his
day. In politics Daniel Morse was a Whig. A very
religious man, he early became a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church and continued firm in
its faith until his death. He married Mary Norris,
who was born in the Town of Whitefield in 1796,
died in the Township of Whitefield in 1886. Their
children were as follows : John, who came to Mon-
tana in 1869, located at Philipsburg, where he died
in 1914, aged seventy-eight years, after having con-
ducted a feed store for a number of years; James,
who died in the Town of Whitefield when about
forty years of age, was a very prominent man,
having been a successful merchant, sheriff of Lin-
coln County and warden of the penitentiary; Daniel,
who was a farmer died in the Town of Whitefield,
when sixty years old ; Hester, who died in the Town
of Whitefield when thirty years old ; Mary, who died
in the Town of Bradley, Penobscot County, Maine,
in 1917; and Colonel Morse, who was the second
in order of birth.
Colonel Morse attended the rural schools of Lin-
coln County, Maine, and grew up on his father's
farm, where he remained until he was fourteen years
old, at which time he began working on the Penob-
scot River in a sawmill, receiving $13 per month for
his services, which amount was turned over to his
mother who was left with a large family to support
as well as care for her paralyzed husband. He con-
tinued to work in the sawmill during the summer
and attend school in the winter until 1856, when
with $36 as his capital, he started West, and reached
Stillwater, Minnesota, where for four years he was
engaged in lumbering on the Saint Croi.x River.
Leaving Minnesota, Colonel Morse went to Louisi-
ana, and for a year was engaged in work on the
Texas & Shreveport Railroad. The westward trend
of empire then took him to Pike's Peak and he was
engaged in prospecting and mining in its vicinity
for four years. It was during 1862 that Colonel
Morse first entered Montana, coming at that time
to the present site of Deer Lodge, and prospected
for a short time, and he was also engaged in min-
ing for wages at Orafino, Idaho, and also leased
ground for himself. He then went to .'\uburn, Ore-
gon, and mined for wages and dug a ditch for the
Oregon Navigation Company, earning qliite an
amount of money in the four months he was thus
employed. Leaving Oregon, he returned to Idaho
and until 1865 was engaged in prospecting and min-
ing with considerable success. In 1865 he came back
to Montana and for a short time was engaged in
mining at Bear Gulch, from whence he went to
Helena and found gold in paying quantities on
Indian Creek. His next prospecting was done at
Mercer, Montana, and then for five years he was
engaged in gold mining on Elk Creek with marked
success. Colonel Morse then went to Utah and buy-
ing 600 head of cattle drove them to Rock Creek,
Montana, and for the subsequent seven years was
engaged in ranching and cattle raising, but then
sold at a profit. While he was thus engaged he did
business upon an extensive scale, selling 1,200 head
of cattle at one time. He then bought a ranch at
New Chicago, Montana, and erected a house on it
in which he lived until 1914- This ranch comprised
2,200 acres, and on it he raised cattle to such an
extent that they consumed 1,200 ton of hay annually.
In 1914 he retired and coming to Drummond, built
a fine residence which, in conjunction with 320 acres
of land he sold in 1919 for $65,000. A whig, with
the organization of the republican party he espoused
its principles and has held to them ever since. He
was presidential elector and cast Montana's first
electoral vote for President Harrison. Colonel
Morse was delegate at the Chicago Convention in
1912 which nominated Roosevelt. For two terms
he served old Deerlodge County as county commis-
sioner, and later held the same office for Granite
County. Fraternally Colonel Morse belongs to Ruby
Lodge No. 36, .Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
HISTORY OF MONTANA
281
Deer Lodge Chapter, Royal Arch Masons ; Saint
Omar Commandery, Knights Templar of Missoula;
and is a charter member of Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine of
Helena, Montana. He was elected president of the
Montana Society of Pioneers in 191 5. Colonel Morse
has always been interested in the growth of Drum-
mond and is a heavy stockholder in the Drummond
State Bank.
In 1S68 Colonel Morse was married at Ogden,
Utah, to Miss Nettie Milliken, a daughter of Edward
Milliken, a native of Elsworth, Mame, formerly a
miner of Montana, but now deceased. Colonel and
Mrs. Morse became the parents of the following
children : George A., who operates a grain elevator
at Drummond; and Averill, whose sketch ?ippears
below. Colonel Morse is a member of the Pioneer
Society of Montana and served as its president for
one year. Genial in his nature. Colonel Morse is
typical of the hardy prospector of his day, through
whose endurance, perseverance and optimism the
great west was explored and thrown open to set-
tlers. Great of brain and big of heart, he has ever
been ready to assist others less fortunate than he,
and no history of Montana would be complete with-
out an extended mention of this fine citizen and up-
right man.
Averill P. Morse, cashier of the Mission State
Bank of St. Ignatius, was born at New Chicago,
Montana, January 7, 1882, a son of Colonel Morse,
and attended the public schools of his native place,
and the State University of Montana, from which
he was graduated after a three years' course in 1902.
Mr. Morse then went to Spokane, Washington, and
took a year's course in a business college, follow-
ing which he took a position in an office at Columbia
Falls, Montana, and held it for four years. In 1907
Mr. Morse located at Drummond and entered upon
a mercantile career, conducting a large establishment
until 1913, when he sold, and comin? to St. Igna-
tius took the position of cashier of the Mission State
Bank, which he has since held. The bank was estab-
lished in 1913 as a state institution, and Mr.
Morse's associates in the bank are George H. Beck,
president, and Joseph Grenier, Jr., vice president.
The capital stock of the bank is $20,000, its surplus
is $4,000, and its deposits average $200,000. Like his
father Mr. Morse is a republican.
In 1907 Mr. Morse was married at Columbia Falls
to Miss Florence Snyder a daughter of D. A. and
Pauline Snyder. Mr. Snyder was a farmer, but is
now deceased, and his widow, surviving him, lives
at Spokane, Washington. Mr. and Mrs. Morse have
a daughter, Verna, who was born July 5, 1913.
J. R. Kaiserman. Specific mention is made of
several of the worthy citizens of Livingston within
the pages of this work, citizens who have figured in
the growth and development of this favored locality
and whose interests are identified with its every
phase of progress, each contributing in his sphere of
action to the well-being of the community in which
he resides and to the advancement of its normal and
legitimate growth. Among this number is he whose
name appears above, a gentleman who, as manager
of one of the most important public utility plants in
this section of the state, occupies a place of large
relative importance in the community.
J. R. Kaiserman, manager for the Montana Power
Company at Livingston, was born at Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, on February 20, 1884, and is the son of
John and Julia (Raithel) Kaiserman, both of whom
were natives of Germany. John Kaiserman was
born in 1858 and came to the United States in about
1876, locating at Peoria, Illinois. Later he removed
to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where until 1896 he was
successfully engaged in the meat and provision busi-
ness. He then removed to Richland Center, VVis-
consin, where he conducted a general merchandise,
meat and provision store until his retirement in 1915.
He still resides in Richland Center. He is a member
of the Lutheran Church and of the Masonic fra-
ternity. The subject's mother was born in 1859 and
became the mother of seven children, namely:
Louisa, who is the wife of William Hagen, a hard-
ware merchant at Marshall, Minnesota; J. R., the
next in order of birth; Bertha, who died in child-
hood ; John, Jr., who was associated in business with
his father at Richland Center, and later succeeded
to the entire ownership of the store, and died at
the age of twenty-seven years; Frederick, who died
in infancy; Hilda, the wife of Horace Burnham, who
conducts a lumber business at Richland Center. He
enlisted in 1918 for service, took special work in the
Rockefeller Institute and was assigned to the Medical
Corps, being sent to Norfolk, Virginia, where he
remained until mustered out in May, 1919. Gretchen
is a teacher in the high school at Mazomanie, Wis-
consin.
J. R. Kaiserman received his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of Milwaukee and Rich-
land Center. Then, having decided to pursue a
technical course, he entered the Armour Institute
of Technology at Chicago. Upon the conclusion of
his studies m that famous institution, in 1903, he
came to Big Timber, Montana, and entered the
employ of the Big Timber Electric Light and Power
Company, of which he became manager in 1905.
Four years later that company was absorbed by the
Montana Power Company and Mr. Kaiserman was
retained as manager, a position of large responsi-
bility. Subsequently, in igi6 he was transferred to
Livingston and placed in charge of the Montana
Power Company's branch at this place, a place he
IS still filling to the entire satisfaction of the com-
pany and of its patrons. This company supplies
light, heat and power to the entire city of Livings-
ton, and is thus probably the most important public
utility plant in the community. The Northern Pa-
cific Railroad Shops are also supplied with light
and power which is derived from the large and
well equipped generating station at Livingston,
where a large number of men are under Mr. Kaiser-
man's direction.
Politically Mr. Kaiserman has always been affili-
ated with the republican party and has taken a keen
interest in public affairs, especially as pertaining to
community interests. He rendered appreciated serv-
ice as mayor of Big Timber in 1913-15, and since
coming to Livingston has become' prominently
identified with the important commercial life of the
city, being now a director of the Chamber of Com-
merce and a member of the Commercial Club. His
religious membership is with the English Lutheran
Church, while fraternally he belongs to the Knights
of Pythias and to Lodge No. 246, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, in which he is now going
through the official chairs.
In June, 1909, at Billings, Montana, Mr. Kaiser-
man married Sebrah Clark, the daughter of E O
and Lena B. (Baker) Clark. E. O. Clark was num-
bered among the leading citizens of Sweetgrass
County, where he was successful as stockman and
merchant, and of which county he served as treas-
urer. His wife came to Big Timber as a pioneer
and took active part in the development of that
locality, in various ways contributing to the cul-
tural advancement of the community. It was largely
through her instrumentality that the library project
was started and she served as librarian from its
organization until 1917. She is now assistant li-
brarian of the library at Livingston, but intends
282
HISTORY OF MONTANA
eventually to return to her former home at Big
Timber. Prior to her marriage Mrs. Kaiserman
had received special training as a nurse. To her
union to Mr. Kaiserman have been born four chil-
dren, namely: E. Clark, born May 25, 1910; John
R., June 25, 1911; Maximilian, April 5, 1915; and J.
Louis, July 8, 1918.
Although modest and unassuming, Mr. Kaiser-
man possesses a strong and vigorous personality,
being in the best sense of the term a leader of men
and well fitted to manage important enterprises.
He and his wife have won a host of warm personal
friends in the city of their adoption.
Lawrence W. Steele, who is favorably known
in business connections as president of the Berry-
man Plumbing Company at Billings, has exemplified
in his career the value of a useful trade and the
rewards accruing through diligent application to
a given line of effort and the following out of a
policy of integrity and honorable dealing. Within
the space of a few short years he has bridged the
distance between an apprenticeship to the presi-
dency of a large and constantly growing business,
from obscurity to a position of prominence among
the substantia! business men of his chosen com-
munity.
Mr. Steele was born on a farm in Westmoreland
County, Pennsylvania, January i, 1881, a son of
Joseph and Martha (Furgeson) Steele. The Steele
family originated in Ireland, from whence immi-
grated the grandfather of Lawrence W. Steele, the
original immigrant. He located in Westmoreland
County, where he followed farming throughout the
remainder of his life, and where in 1833 was born
his son Joseph. The latter followed in his father's
footsteps, also adopting farming as a vocation, an
occupation which he followed with a measure of
success throughout a long and active career, his
death occurring on his homestead in 1902. He was a
stanch republican and a member of the Presby-
terian Church in which he served as an elder for
forty years. His widow, who was born in West-
moreland County in 1840. still makes her home
there in hale old age. They were the parents of
the following children : Jennie, who is unmarried
and makes her home with her mother : Emma, the
wife of D. H. Sloan, a farmer of Ashland, Ohio;
Jackson, who is engaged in the hardware and im-
plement business at Latrobe, Pennsylvania ; Anna,
who married J. J. Larier and resides on a ranch
twelve miles east of Billings ; Thomas, who is an
agriculturist of Derry, Pennsylvania; Lizzie, the
wife of J. H. Hazlett, employed in the pottery works
at Latrobe, Pennsylvania; Amanda, the wife of E.
C. Hazlett. a merchant of Noblestown, Pennsylva-
nia: Martha, who married the Rev. O. E. Barker, a
Methodist Episcopal minister with a charge in Colo-
rado; J. M., who resides with his mother at La-
trobe, Pennsylvania, a stenographer and bookkeeper
and the owner of stock in a bri,ck yard ; P. H., book-
keeper in the First National Bank of Latrobe,
Pennsylvania ; Lawrence W., of this notice ; and
George E., employed in the office of the Latrobe
Steel Company, at Latrobe.
Lawrence W. Steele was educated in the rural
schools of the vicinity of his father's farm in
Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, where he
spent his boyhood, and subsequently attended the
high school at Latrobe for two years. At the age
of eighteen years he 'eft his school books and began
work for a heating firm, subsequently becoming a
fitter, and in this way gradually mastered the plumb-
er's trade. He followed that vocation at Latrobe
for a period of eight years, and during that time
was in the service of the same employer, and when
he resigned entered the steel mills, where he re-
mained two years. Deciding that there was a better
field for the display of his abilities in the West,
in 1908 Mr. Steele came to Billings, where he se-
cured employment in a plumbing shop as a journey-
man and continued to be thus employed for six
years. In January, 1914, in partnership with F. L.
Golding, he purchased the Berryman Plumbing
Company, and after the death of Mr. Golding en-
tered into partnership with F. F. Kuschke, who
bought into the business and became secretary and
treasurer of the concern, the other officials being Mr.
Steele, who occupies the position of president; and
Mrs. Leah Steele, who is vice president of the con-
cern. The plant and office are located at No. 3015
Montana Avenue, and the operations of the concern
in the way of plumbing and heating contracting
have developed and increased to large proportions
and now include the entire Billings and outlying
communities. Mr. Steele lives at 3015 Fourth
Avenue, North, and owns other dwelling houses,
and has a number of important business connec-
tions. He is well and favorably known in business
circles as a man of integrity and commercial sound-
ness, and his associates rely absolutely upon his
ability and judgment. Politically he is a republi-
can, but during his career he has found little time
to engage in political matters. He is a faithful
member of the Presbyterian Church, in which he is
serving as a member of the board of trustees, and
holds membership in the Billings Rotary Club, the
Billings Midland Club, Billings Lodge No. 113,
.\ncient Free and Accepted Masons, Billings Con-
sistory, Thirty-second Degree, Algeria Temple, An-
cient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine,
and Billings Tent, Knights of the Maccabees.
In 1909, at Billings, Mr. Steele was united in mar-
riage with Miss Leah Stine, daughter of F. A. and
Henrietta J. (Heisz) Stine, residents of Billings,
where Mr. Stine is engaged in business as a car-
penter and contractor. There are no children.
Judge Cloyde E. Comer. To Judge Cloyde E.
Comer belongs the honor of serving as the first judge
of the newly organized Twentieth District, to which
office he was appointed in April, 1919, but he has
been prominently identified with the professional and
civic life of Montana since 1909.
Judge Comer was born near Walnut, Illinois, Sep-
tember 27, 1882, and he early became familiar with
the work of the farm and continued as a farmer
boy until the age of twenty years, in the meantime
attending the country school, the high school at
Eagle Grove, Iowa, for two years, and later the
high school in Worthington, Minnesota. His lit-
erary training was completed by a course of study
in Mankato. His father, Stephen Comer, is one of
the recent settlers in the State of Minnesota, where
he is engaged in agricultural pursuits near Worthing-
ton. He was born at Newark, New Jersey, a son of
a Civil war soldier who gave up his life in that
struggle. This patriot ancestor was a farmer and
was descended from early New Jersey settlers of
English and Irish extraction. He was born in New
Jersey, about 1802.
Stephen A. Comer was reared as a farmer lad,
and while the education he received was not thor-
ough, it was yet a liberal training for his day, and
he became a well read man. About the time he
attained his majority he left his native State of New
Jersey for Illinois, where he farmed for a time
near Walnut. Mr. Comer was married in that
locality to Mary Bodine, whose father was one of
the pioneer farmers of that region, but Mrs. Comer
was born in Michigan. The young couple soon
moved farther west, to Iowa, while in 1903 they
HISTORY OF MONTANA
283
again took up the westward march and estabhshed
their home at Worthington, Minnesota. Their hrst
children were born in Ilhnois, and in time four sons
and two daughters were born into their home,
namely; Cloyde E., the Montana lawyer and judge;
Mabel, the wife of Severt Sorum, of Worthington,
Minnesota ; Walter, who also resides at Worthing-
ton • Irvin, whose home is in Minneapolis ; Edna, who
died at Worthington; and Merl, the youngest child
of the family. Mr. Comer, the father, has always
been a republican voter, but exercises his right of
franchise merely as a patriotic and progressive citi-
Cloyde E. Comer came to Montana from Minne-
sota, in which latter state he spent about six years,
chiefly as a student. Before taking up his prepara-
tion for the law he pursued the literary course m
the University of Minnesota, and before completing
his law course in that institution his funds became
exhausted and he came to Montana to earn the
means to complete his professional studies. Arriving
at Culbertson, Montana, in April, 1909, he served as
a law clerk until the following fall, when he took
the bar examination in Helena, but continued his law
work in Culbertson until October, 1910, when he
opened a law office at Medicine Lake and followed
a general law practice there until his appointment
by Governor Stewart as the first judge of the
Twentieth District.
As a Sheridan County citizen Judge Comer has
borne his full share in the civil and military bur-
dens of the community. In September, 1918, he
volunteered for military service as a member of
Company K, Central Officers Training Corps, at
Camp McArthur, Texas, where he remained through-
out the war and was discharged there about the
1st of December, 1918. He was also chairman of
the Sheridan County Council of Defense. The work
of the democratic party has also claimed a share
of his time and attention, and in 1916, three years
before he was elevated to the bench, he was the
democratic candidate for district judge of the Seven-
teenth District, but was defeated. In his fraternal
affiliations he is an Odd Fellow and a Master Mason,
and a layman of the order.
After coming to Montana, Judge Comer exercised
his homestead right near Colridge, in Sheridan
County, where he built for himself what was con-
sidered a good country home for a pioneer, and
there he began his married life. He had married
at Medicine Lake, May 15, 1913, Miss Hilda Peter-
son, who was born in Sweden in 1890, but was
educated in Minnesota and became a teacher, follow-
ing her profession in country schools in Minnesota
and in the Medicine Lake schools. Her father was
a Swedish settler of Hinkley, Minnesota. The mar-
riage of Judge and Mrs. Comer has been without
issue.
Jasper W. Day. The real estate and loan busi-
ness established at Billings by Jasper W. Day in
1917, while still practically in its infancy, has gone
hand in hand with tlie development of the city since
that year, and undoubtedly has contributed materi-
ally toward the advantageous disposal of property
and the honorable and satisfactory placing of loans
during the comparatively short period of its exist-
ence. Mr. Day, a progressive and enterprising citi-
zen of his community, is likewise engaged in ranch-
ing, and in each of his ventures is meeting with the
kind of success that rewards well directed efforts
that .are governed by honorable principles and in-
tegrity.
Mr. Day, was born at Rubicon, Wisconsin, August
14, 1875, a son of James and Sarah (Hodson) Day.
James Day was born at Ipswich, England, in 1834,
on the old manor farm of his father, also named
James Day, who passed his entire life in Ipswich,
where he cultivated his estate. The younger James
Day was reared and educated at Ipswich, where
he resided until he was eighteen years of age, and
at that time immigrated to the United States and
became a pioneer farmer of Dodge County, Wis-
consin. Settling down to the pursuits of the soil,
he rounded out a useful and successful career as
an agriculturist, and died in 1913, at Hartford, Wis-
cojisin, within ten miles of his old homestead, which
he had cleared and reclaimed from the wilderness.
He was a republican, but never sought the honors
of public life, being content with his farm, his home
and his family. In Wisconsin he was married to
Sarah Hodson, who was born in 1837, in Sheffield,
England, and who survives him as a resident of
Hartford, Wisconsin, and they became the parents
of the following children: George T., a farmer of
the vicinity of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin; James B.,
a large property owner and real estate broker of
Hartford; Albertus, the owner of much farming
property and a real estate broker of Fond du Lac ;
Mary J., the wife of George W. Baker, a Texas
ranchman ; Frederick, the owner of valuable coal
mining property at Farmington, Illinois ; Frank, a
real estate broker and large property owner of
West Bend, Wisconsin; Caroline, who is unmar-
ried and makes her home with her mother ; Jasper
W., of this review; and Walter R., who is engaged
in agricultural pursuits in the locality of Horicon,
Wisconsin.
Jasper W. Day received his education in the public
schools of Dodge County, Wisconsin, and after a
two-year course in the Hartford (Wisconsin) High
School attended the Dixon Business College at
Dixon, Illinois, from which he was graduated in
1895. Mr. Day's next experience was in the line
of farming, a vocation for which he had been fitted
by his early training on his father's farm, but after
one year became attracted to railroading, as are
so many country youths, and was station agent and
telegraph operator for the Chicago, Milwaukee &
St. Paul Railroad at various points in Wisconsin
until 1901. From the latter year until 1906 he was
located in the same capacity at Huntley, Montana,
for the Northern Pacific Railway, and during this
time, in the fall of 1905, branched out into a new
line of activity, when lie opened the first store at
Huntley, an enterprise which he conducted for
five years before disposing of his interests. Realiz-
ing the opportunities in that growing and thriving
little city, Mr. Day turned his attention to the real
estate and loan business, which he followed at
Huntley until 1917, doing much to develop and ad-
vance the interests of the community, but in the
year mentioned felt that he should have a wider
scope for the demonstration of his abilities, and ac-
cordingly came to Billings, where he has since car-
ried on extensive and constantly-growing opera-
tions, with offices at No. 210 Stapleton Building.
Mr. Day handles farms, farm loans and city prop-
erties, and has been the medium through which
some large transactions have been brought to a
satisfactory conclusion. He owns his own modern
home at No. 112 Wyoming Avenue. As a rancher,
Mr. Day is the owner of 3.000 acres of splendid
land in Yellowstone and Stillwater counties, on
which he grows grain and alfalfa, and has likewise
been an extensive cattle raiser. All of his operations
have been characterized by strict adherence to high
business ideals and principles and he has accord-
ingly secured a position high in the confidence of
his business associates. t- j
Mr. Day was married January 20, 1896, at bond
284
HISTORY OF MONTANA
du Lac, Wisconsin, to Miss Sadie A. Mann, daugh-
ter of the late John W. and Sarah (Bloor) Mann,
farming people of Neosho, Wisconsin, both now
deceased. One child has been born to this union:
Hazel F., who was the first white child born at
Huntley Montana, while this was still within the
boundaries of the Crow Reservation. She is now a
junior in the Billings High School.
Mr. Day is a stanch republican in his political
adherence, but has not found time to enter actively
into public or political life. His fraternal connec-
tion is with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, and he holds membership also in
the Billings Midland Club.
Judge D.wid M. Durfee. There are some men
who both as lawyers and jurists treat law as a
science, founded on established principles. Such
men never make any arguments in court without
displaying their habits of thinking, resorting at once
to some well-founded principle of law and draw-
ing their deductions logically from their premises.
One of these ornaments to the bar and bench is
Judge David M. Durfee now engaged in the prac-
tice of his profession at Philipsburg. In his prac-
tice he has risen to lofty heights of professional
eminence by his profound penetration, his power
of analysis, the comprehensive grasp and strength
of his understanding, and the firmness, frankness
and integrity of his character. Judge Durfee was
born in Schenectady County, New York, July 22,
1855, a son of David P. Durfee, and a member of
one of the old-established families of this coun-
try. Thomas Durfee, the founder of the family,
came to the American colonies from England in
1660, and located at Portsmouth, Rhode Island,
and one of his descendants, who bore his name,
became chief justice of Rhode Island. Another
descendant of the original Thomas Durfee. Earl Dur-
fee, the great-grandfather of Judge Durfee, served
as a soldier in the American Revolution. A son
of Earl Durfee, Abraham Durfee was the grand-
father of Judge Durfee, and he was born in Rhode
Island in 1777, and died in Schenectady County,
New York, in 1863, having been one of the pioneer
farmers of that region. He married a Miss Pot-
ter, who belonged to the same family as Bishop
Potter of New York.
David P. Durfee, father of Judge Durfee, was
born in Schenectady County, New York in 181 1, and
died in the same county in 1889, having spent his
entire life there following the occupation of a
farmer. A Jacksonian democrat, he remained
steadfast to the principles of the great leader, and
was elected on his party ticket highway commmis-
sioner of his county. For many years he was a meni-
ber of the Masonic fraternity. His wife, who bore
the maiden name of Margaret Rector, was born
in the same county as her husband, in 1817, and
died there in 1878. Their children were as fol-
lows : Francis M., who died at Philipsburg when
sixty-two years old, came west to Colorado in
1861, to Virginia City, Montana, in 1864, and Phil-
ipsburg in the '70s, being a pioneer rancher, lum-
berman and miner and operated his sawmill at
an early day at Clancy, Jefferson County, Mon-
tana ; James E., who was a miner and rancher, died
near San Diego, California, in 1914: Louisa E.,
who married Louis Ruff, now deceased, a farmer
of Schenectady County, New York, resides in that
county; Oscar F., who is a farmer of Schoharie
County, New York; -Adelaide, who married Thomas
Botscheider, a contractor and builder of Philips-
burg, and a rancher and banker; Judge Durfee,
whose name heads this review ; and Leonard A.,
who was a pioneer lumberman of Philipsburg in
business with his brother, Francis, died here in 1879.
Judge David M. Durfee received his preliminary
educational training in the schools of Schenectady
County, and the Schoharie Academy at Schoharie,
New York, following which for two years he was
engaged in teaching in the schools of his native
state. He then entered the law office of N. P.
Hinman of Albany, New York, and remained there
for a year, and then for three years resumed the
duties of a school master in Somerset County, Mary-
land, and at the same time kept on with his legal
studies to such good purpose that he was admitted
to the bar of Maryland at Annapolis by the Su-
preme Court of the state, in 1882. Realizing that
the openings for an ambitious young man in his
profession were better in the more recently de-
veloped sections of the country, Mr. Durfee came
west to Philipsburg, and until . he had established
himself in practice spent six months in the lumber
woods, and also taught school, being thus employed
for three years. In 1885 he began to realize upon
his good judgment in selecting this region, and
entered upon an active practice, and has the dis-
tinction of being the first of his calling in Philips-
burg. In 1886 his fellow citizens honored him by
electing him county attorney of Deerlodge County,
which then included Philipsburg, and he held the
office for two years, and in that time so proved
his mettle, that in 1889 he was selected as one of the
delegates to; the constitutional convention. His
record up to this time was of such a nature as to
make him the logical candidate for judge of Deer-
lodge County, and he was elected to the office in
the fall of 1889 with a flattering majority, and
served for three years, the short term, and in this
office, as in his first one, he was the first man to
be elected to it. In 1892 Granite County was or-
ganized, and Judge Durfee returned to Philipsburg
the following year, preferring to cast his lot with
the new county, and here he has since been engaged
in a general civil and criminal practice. During
the period which ensued. Judge Durfee has not
been permitted to remain out of public life, but
has held the office of prosecuting attorney for six
terms, of two years each, and is the present in-
cumbent of that important office. Since casting
his first vote Judge Durfee, like his father, is a
follower of the principles enunciated by Andrew
Jackson, and is a strong factor in the democratic
party. His offices are conveniently located in the
McDonald Theatre Building on Sansome Street.
Judge Durfee is a Catholic. He belongs to Philips-
burg Lodge. Knights of Pythias, having joined this
order in Maryland ; Missoula Council, Knights of
Columbus, in which he has taken the third degree;
Selah Tribe, Improved Order of Red Men of
Philipsburg, and the Philipsburg Commercial Club.
The convenient modern residence occupied by the
Durfee family on the corner of Pearl and Sutter
streets is owned by Judge Durfee as well as three
dwellings in Missoula, Montana.
On February I, 1888, Judge Durfee was united
in marriage with Miss Emelie J. Irving of Balti-
more, Maryland, a daughter of Thomas and Emelie
(Delmas) Irving, both of whom are now deceased.
Mr. Irving was a prominent man and successful
merchant of Baltimore. The marriage ceremony
of Judge and Mrs. Durfee was performed by Car-
dinal Gibbons. In 1902 Mrs. Durfee was acciden-
tally shot at Missoula. Montana. Their children
were as follows : Eulalie, who married Buford
CoUings, a farmer of Kansas City, Missouri;
Thomas Irving, who is an electrical engineer for
the Minnesota Steel Company, resides at Duluth,
o<^ -^c 0&.^t^^CC-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
285
Minnesota; Adelaide, who married EUery C. Proc-
tor, a merchant of Proctor, Montana ; Marie J., who
is a graduate nurse, resides at Missoula, Montana.
In November, 1903, Judge Durfee was married
to Miss Elizabeth E. Kelley at Missoula. Mon-
tana, a daughter of Patrick Kelley of San Francisco,
California, a well known builder and contractor
who died in 1918. Judge and Mrs. Durfee have one
daughter, Eileen, who was born October 31, igi2.
For some years Judge Durfee has been connected
with every important case in Granite County, and
in their conduct has proven himself to be one of
the most enlightened, intrepid and persevering
friends of law and order this section possesses,
and constantly inspires admiration and lively inter-
est for the intensity and sagacity with which he
pursues his investigations. As a jurist he was
masterly in his handling of testimony, and his whole
soul was enlisted in securing impartial justice for
those brought into his court. Montana has few men
of Judge Durfee's calibre, and Granite County is
proud of the distinction conferred upon it by his
presence within its confines.
Frederick Panton Rixon. Prominent among the
business men of Billings who have found time from
their personal affairs to devote to the interests of
their community is found Frederick Panton Rixon.
While Mr. Rixon is a Canadian by birth, having
been born ia the Province of Ontario, November 23,
ii<74, he is a thorough Montanan by training, and
has been a resident of Billings for thirty-eight years,
during a large part of which time he has been en-
gaged in the drug business. His public service rec-
ord is a long and honorable one, and includes the
accomplishment of much valuable and constructive
work as county treasurer and a member of the
Montana House of Representatives.
Mr, Rixon belongs to a family which originated
in England and the founder of which in Canada
emigrated first to Baltimore, Maryland, he being
the great-grandfather of Frederick P. Rixon. From
Baltimore he went to the Province of Ontario,
where his son. Frederick P. Rixon's grandfather,
was born and where the latter spent the remainder
of his life engaged in agricultural pursuits. John
Rixon, the father of Frederick P., was born in
1839. in Canada, and was there reared, educated
and married. During the greater part of his life
he was engaged in farming and journalism, and his
career was one in which he displayed versatile and
marked, if not eminent talents. In 1881 he came
to the United States, coming into Miles City, Mon-
tana, by railway, and then driving overland by team
as a pioneer to the straggling little village of Bill-
ings, at that time situated beyond the point to
which the railways had yet extended. .At Billings
he entered the office of the Herald, one of the city's
first newspapers, and from that time forward until
his death in November, 1904, was identified with
newspaper work. He was a republican in his po-
litical adherence, and was a member of the Episco-
pal Church and a devout churchman. Mr. Rixon
married Susanna Panton, who was born in Ontario,
Canada, in 1845, and who survives her husband and
makes her home at Billings. They became the par-
ents of the following children : .Anna, the wife of
P. L. Reece, a railroad contractor of Nicholson,
Pennsylvania : Mary, who died at the age of seven-
teen years : Rebecca, who married Leslie Bates,
manager for a large fire insurance company at San
Francisco. California; Eleanor, the wife of John B.
Fritschi. also connected with a fire insurance concern
at San Francisco; Frederick Panton, of this review;
William P., engaged in the real estate and insur-
ance business at Billings; Winifred, the wife of
Charles J. Chappie, a druggist of Billings, and Har-
old Alfred Rixon, who is assistant cashier of the
Security Bank of Billings.
Frederick Panton Rixon received his education
in the public schools of Billings, having accompanied
his parents here as a lad of seven years. When he
was thirteen years of age he decided that he had
sufficient education to start himself off in life, and at
that time entered a drug store and received his in-
troduction to the vocation which was to later
become his life work. Also, for two years, he was
in the service of the Northern Pacific Railway, but
eventually, at the age of seventeen years, decided
that his educational training was not sufficient for
his needs, and accordingly returned to his studies,
which he pursued for several years. When he con-
sidered that he was adequately equipped he returned
to the drug business, which he thoroughly mastered,
and in 1904 became a member of the drug firm of
Holmes & Rixon, an association which continued
successfully over a period of sixteen years. In
1916 Mr. Rixon became sole proprietor of the busi-
ness, when he bought the interests of his partner,
and the establishment, located in the Yellowstone
National Bank Building, is today one of the leading
pharmacies of Billings. Mr. Rixon is an excellent
business man, noted for his integrity and a sense
of business honor that makes certain the handling
of only reliable goods and the careful preparation
of prescriptions, while his unfailing courtesy has
also contributed to the factors which have given
him business success. A republican in politics and
a citizen who believes in the responsibility of every
man to perform public service, for some years he
has been before his fellow-citizens in official capaci-
ties. Elected city treasurer in 1896, he established
an excellent record, but did not run for a second
term. He next served for three years as deputy
clerk of the court, and in 1914 was sent to the
House of Representatives in the fifteenth session
of that body. There his services were constructive
in character and beneficial to his district and his
state. He also served one term as county treasurer.
Mr. Rixon is a member of the Episcopal Church and
senior warden thereof. He belongs to the Billings
Midland Club and is prominent in fraternal circles,
holding membership in Ashlar "Lodge No. 29, An-
cient Free and -Accepted Masons, Billings Lodge
No. 394, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
Billings Lodge Knights of Pythias, and Billings
Camp Woodmen of the World.
Mr. Rixon's modern home is located at No. 24
North Thirty-first Street. He is unmarried.
George P. J. Arnold, Jr. It is not within the
ability of every man to be successful both_ as an
employer and employe. Certain characteristics are
necessary in order that a man may represent both
capital and labor. He must be fair in his judg-
ments, upright in his actions, and open to argu-
ment. While George P. J. Arnold, Jr., is not ex-
actly a mediator between capital and labor as the
term generally applies and is understood, still in
his capacity as general manager of the Lewistown
branch of the Banking Corporation of Montana,
the largest investment banking cornpany in the
Northwest, he occupies a position calling for a dis-
play of much executive ability and the exercise of
tact and good judgment.
Mr. Arnold was born in the city of New York,
July 30, 1873, a son of George P. J. and Elizabeth
(Hammersctimidt) Arnold, natives of Germany,
the former of whom died at the age of sixty-eight
years, in IQ04, while the latter passed away Novem-
ber 10, 1893. They were married in New York
286
HISTORY OF MONTANA
city and became the parents of two sons and two
daughters, of whom three children are living,
George P. J. having been the second child in order
of birth. George P. J. Arnold, the elder, was
drafted into the Prussian army, and served in the
Franco-Prussian war as a drummer boy. Subse-
quently he learned the cigar making trade, and
followed it in his native land until he was twenty-
seven years of age. For a long time he had been
dissatisfied with the German form of government,
and had wished to becomg a citizen of a free
country, but had been hampered by a lack of
finances. After his arrival in New York city he
secured employment at his trade, and later, after
having accumulated some capital, embarked in busi-
ness on his own account, his first establishment be-
ing in New York City and his second at Jersey City,
where his last years were spent. While he was a
member of the German Mainz Society, he was al-
ways a stanch citizen of his adopted land. In poli-
tics he was originally a whig and later a repub-
lican.
George P. J. Arnold, Jr., is a self-made man. He
attended the public schools of New York City only
until he was fourteen years of age, at which time
he went to work for a wholesale liquor dealer at
a wage of $3.00 per week. Subsequently he learned
the gold-beater's trade at Jersey City, and after
spending about five years in that vocation turned
his attention to the coal and ice business at Jersey
City and continued as the proprietor of such an
enterprise there until 1899. Mr. Arnold's next ven-
ture was in selling and contracting asbestos material,
but this he gave up in 1903 when his activities and
energetic nature carried him into an entirely differ-
ent line of work as first assistant steward on the
steamer City of Memphis, for the Ocean Steamship
Company. Six months of experience sufficed to
convince Mr. Arnold that he did not care to make
this his life work, and his inclinations took another
radical change, this in the direction of general farm-
ing near Clinton, Connecticut, which occupation he
followed for three years. In 1906 he moved to Del-
aware and followed fruit farming, he having pur-
chased a property of this character. He sold this
farm in May, 1908, and on the 30th of that month
arrived at Lewistown, Montana, where, June 8, 1908,
he homesteaded on 160 acres of land in Fergus
County, eight miles from the present site of Den-
ton. There he built the first cabin, into which he
and his wife moved, and began operations which
have since increased his holdings in that community
to 640 acres. This property he rents out. On
March i. 1914, Mr. Arnold became branch manager
for the E. C. Shoemaker Company, farm mortgages,
at Stanford. Fergus County, and in the spring of
1915 became assistant manager for the same concern
at Lewistown. In December, 1916, the business of
this company was taken over by The Banking Cor-
poration of Montana, now the largest investment
banking company in the Northwest, and in 1917,
Mr. Arnold was advanced to his present position as
general manager of the business at Lewistown. A
man of unusual public spirit, interested in local
affairs and jealous of the reputation of the city of
his adoption, he has become a powerful factor in
the furtherance of any measure which has for its
aim the advancement of the people or the better-
ment of existing conditions. He invariably acts
from conviction, and is steadfast in his friendships
as he is in the sincerity and integrity of his actions.
."Mthough his interests are widespread and the de-
mand upon his time imperative, he is uniformly
courteous, listening patiently and acting wisely ac-
cording to the judgment his ripe experience has
given him. His political convictions cause him to
support the republican party.
Mr. Arnold was married May 17, 1896, to Miss
Emma A. LaDue, who was born at White Plains,
New York, a daughter of Alonzo and Susan A.
(Baxter) LaDue, natives of Poughkeepsie, Dutchess
County, New York, and Johnsonville, Rensellaer
County, New York, respectively. Mrs. Arnold's
ancestors on both sides of the family came from
France and settled in America at an early date of
the colonial era, forming a settlement in New York.
Mr. LaDue passed his days as a farmer in New
York and Connecticut, his death occurring in the lat-
ter state in December, 1902. He and his wife were
the parents of four daughters and two sons, of
whom four children are living, Mrs. Arnold having
been the second child in order of birth.
Joseph Bertrand is a well known Montana mer-
chant, and established the first place of business in
the town of Roberts in Carbon County. He is still
the active head of this business, which has grown
and prospered under his direction.
Merchandising has constituted Mr. Bertrand's
life experience. He was born at the city of Quebec,
Canada, July 16, 1854. His people were French and
were identified with the French colonization of Can-
ada. His father, George Bertrand, was born in the
Province of Quebec in 1823 and spent his life there,
dying in 1859. He was a tailor by trade, and in
religion, like all his ancestors, was a Catholic. His
wife was Genevieve Falardeau, who was born in
Quebec in 1829 and died there in 1907, when nearly
eighty years of age. Joseph Bertrand was the old-
est of their three children. Odilon was a painter
and decorator by trade and died at Quebec in 1904,
while Edmond died in 1869, at the age of twelve
years.
Joseph Bertrand at the age of fifteen left school
and found self-supporting employment. He had some
experience in stores in Canada and in 1882 went to
Detroit, Michigan, where he clerked in stores and
in 1885 went to Chicago and gained considerable
knowledge of merchandising in that city.
Mr. Bertrand came to Montana in 1887, more
than thirty years ago, and for nine years was em-
ployed by the well known firm of T. C. Power &
Brother at Lewistown. In 1896 he engaged in busi-
ness for himself, and had a prosperous establish-
ment at Lewistown until 1905, when he sold out
and moved to the new town of Roberts, where he
established the pioneer general store. This store
is one of the larger businesses of its kind in Car-
bon County and its trade comes from the country
surrounding Roberts in a radius of sixteen miles.
Mr. Bertrand owns both the store and the building
in which it is located, and also has a modern home
in Roberts.
As a voter Mr. Bertrand is a republican, is a
Catholic, is affiliated with Billings Council No. 1259,
Knights of Columbus, and is a fourth degree knight,
and is a member of the Detroit, Michigan, branch
of the Catholic Mutual Benefit Association.
He married Miss Margaret McCann, of Lewis-
town, Montana, in 1889. She is a daughter of James
and Sarah (Creighton) McCann, the former a
farmer now deceased, while the mother resides at
Roundup, Montana. For many years much of the
inspiration for Mr. Bertrand in his business career
has been his children. He is the father of a large
household, twelve sons and daughters having been
born to him and his good wife. George, the oldest,
was in France with the Aviation Corps of the
American armies during the World war. Margaret,
the second child, is at home. Arnold helps his
father in the store at Roberts. Helen is in a nurse's
HISTORY OF MONTANA
287
training school at Billings. Bernard is an appren-
ticed machinist at Livingston. Blanche is a grad-
uate of St. Vincent Academy at Helena and is a
teacher at Boyd, Montana. Dorothy and Frances
are both students of the St. Vincent Academy at
Helena. Esther is in public school at Roberts.
Irene attends St. Vincent's Academy, while Geral-
dine and Julius, the youngest of the family, are in
school at Roberts.
RuFUS B. Kelley spent his early youth on the
Minnesota frontier, has been a hard worker for
over forty years, and in that time has been a farmer,
mason contractor, lumberman, auctioneer and real
estate dealer, and in the last two vocations is estab-
lished today at Columbus.
He was born in Crawford County, Wisconsin,
December 26, 1854. Mr. Kelley has an ancestry
made up of an a'dmi.xture of French, Holland and
Welsh strains. Through his mother he is descended
from King William IV of Holland. His great-
grandfather Kelley was a native of Scotland and
came to America in colonial times. Elisha P. Kelley,
father of Rufus B., was born at Windham in Wind-
ham County, Connecticut, in 1819. He grew up
in his native county, at the age of eighteen went
to Ottawa, Illinois, where he married, and next
removed to Crawford County, Wisconsin, when
there were only three white families in the entire
county. During 1866-1880 he lived near Albert Lea,
Minnesota, where he was again a pioneer. In 1880
he moved to Morrison County, Minnesota, and
spent the rest of his life there, dying in November,
l88i. He was a farmer in all these various locali-
ties. In politics he voted as a democrat. Elisha
P. Kelley married Clara Gillette. She was born
at Peekskill, New York, in 1826 and died near
Albert Lea, Freeborn County, Minnesota, in 1876.
She was the mother of eight children : Regina E.,
who married Harvey T. Rittenhouse and died at
Minnesota City, Minnesota, in 1909, where her hus-
band still resides; Miranda, wife of John L. B.
Howe, a retired farmer of Glenville, MinnesQta ;
Casper C, a farmer in Cass County, Minnesota ;
Luella, living at Absarokee, Montana, widow of
Albert Seeley, who was a farmer and trader ; Rufus
B., fifth in age; David B., an implement dealer
, near Fairmount, Minnesota; Ida, wife of F. E.
Runner, a prominent banker, capitalist, rancher and
stock man of Absarokee, Montana; and George G.,
who lives at Absarokee.
Rufus B. Kelley was about twelve years old when
his parents moved to Minnesota, and he acquired
his education in Freeborn County, that state. He
lived on his father's farm to the age of twenty-
five and then went to the northern districts of
Minnesota, working as as mason, farmer and lum-
berman. He came out to Montana and located at
Columbus in 1907, but soon afterward moved to
the Absarokee community, where he was in busi-
ness as a mason contractor and a farmer for eight
or nine years. In September, 1916, he returned
to Columbus, and has since engaged in auctioneer-
ing and in the real estate business as a partner of
Julian D. Ray. Their offices are in the Simpson
Building and they do a large general real estate
business, handling city and ranch properties. Mr.
Kelley individually owns a residence surrounded by
large and well appointed grounds on Fourth Ave-
nue and other local real estate.
He is a democrat in politics. He has long been
identified with the Odd Fellows fraternity, serving
as noble grand for many terms and was a member
of the Grand Lodge of Minnesota as well as of
Montana. His local affiliation is with Yellowstone
Vol. n— !•
Lodge No. 85. He is also a member of the Chamber
of Commerce at Columbus.
December 21, 1880, at Verndale, Minnesota, he
married Miss Harriet Eddy, daughter of Abel and
Harriet (Bristol) Etidy. Abel Eddy was born at
Utica, New York, in 1810, grew up in his native
state, was married in Michigan, lived in Illinois
for a time, next settled at Clarksville, Iowa, and
finally, in 1878, moved to Verndale, Minnesota, where
he died in 1897. He spent all his active career as
a farmer and carpenter and was a democrat in
politics. Abel Eddy married Miss Harriet Bristol,
who was born in New York State in 1820 and died
at Verndale, Minnesota, in 1896. Of their children
George, Sarah, John and Mary, the first four, are
all deceased; Chester is a merchant at Sumner,
Washington; Andalusia is deceased; Cheney is a
farmer at Donley, Minnesota; Lydia, Charles and
Eustasia are deceased; Frank is a large and pros-
perous land owner at Morris, Minnesota; while
Mrs. Kelley is the twelfth and youngest of the
family. She was reared and received her educa-
tion in the public schools at Verndale. Mrs. Kelley
is an active member of the Congregational Church,
belongs to the Woman's Club at Columbus, the
Rebekahs and was an active Red Cross worker
during the war.
Mr. and Mrs. Kelley have an interesting family
of seven children. Murta May, the oldest, is the
wife of Frank Young, a real estate broker at
Absarokee, Montana; the second child, Albert Lee,
died when six years old; Gladvs is the wife of
Harley Beasley a farmer at Absarokee; John L.
is in the real estate business at Billings; Earl A.
was in the Medical Corps of the armv during the
war. being stationed at Camp Bowie, Texas; Fred
H. is a carpenter by trade and lives at home; Boyd,
the youngest, enlisted in June, 1018. at the age of
seventeen, was sent to Mare Island, California, and
later to Galveston, Texas, where he trained for
the Marine Corps and was mustered out in March,
1919. He is now engaged on the county survey
and lives at home.
Robert Thornton Boatman. Until recently,
when he disposed of many of his holdings, Robert
Thorton Boatman directed ranching and stock rais-
ing interests that made him one of the most promi-
nent men in that line in the state. Mr. Boatman
is a resident of Dillon and still owns a ranch and
has by no means retired from the career he began
here more than thirty years ago. He is one of the
comparatively few men past the age of fifty who
can claim Montana as their native state. He was
born in the Ruby Valley, April 21, 1S66, and is a
son of George T. Boatman. His grandfather,
Robert Boatman, was of Scotch ancestry and spent
his active life as a farmer, and died during a cholera
epidemic near Frankfort, Kentucky, in 1833.
The late George T. Boatman, who died at Dillon,
March 26, 1919, was a distinguished Montana pio-
neer. His life was specially distinguished by the
sturdy industry and business ability which enabled
him to do a great deal for every community in
which he lived. He was born at Frankfort, Ken-
tucky, August 24, 1832, and a year after his birth
his parents moved to Pleasant Green, Missouri,
where he lived until he was grown. He was a
farmer there, also operated a grist, flour and saw
mill, and the extent of his enterprises made him
a man of consequence in the community. During
the Civil war he served as a Confederate soldier
in the armies of General Price. One of his fore*
fathers had fought on the American side in the
Revolutionary war.
288
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In 1865, about the close of the war, he left Mis-
souri and with ox team crossed the plains to Mon-
tana his first destination being Alder Gulch. His
first work there was making spilings and mining
timber. Soon afterward he settled in Ruby Valley,
homesteading 160 acres six miles southwest of Sheri-
dan. In addition to developing his claim he made
himself useful to his community by resuming his
milling interests, operating for seven years the Sil-
ver Springs mills, one of the chief sources of flour
supply in that early day. In 1887 he settled on a
ranch five miles north of Dillon, on what is now
known as the Beaverhead ranch, and owned 1,280
acres there. He improved the land and by irrigating
made it one of the most valuable farms in that
section of the state. He finally left his ranch to
spend his last years in Dillon. He was a demo-
crat in politics and a very active member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. His minister said of
him: "Brother Boatman's life was a positive in-
fluence for good. He was for many years a class
leader in the Methodist Church. He enjoyed wor-
ship in God's house and whenever his strength
permitted he was on hand at the public services.
He lived a consistent, honored, faithful witness to
the saving power of Christ. God was not a stranger
to him and he looked forward with anticipation to
his heavenly home."
George T. Boatman married in Missouri, Har-
riet L. Johnson, who is still living at Dillon. They
walked as companions along life's highway fof
over sixty years. She was born near Zanesville,
Ohio. September .-^o. 1836. Her brother, Henry R.
Johnson, also a resident of Dillon, is a retired
rancher, and came to Montana in 1864, homestead-
ing in the Beaverhead Valley. Mrs. Boatman's
father was William Johnson, who was born in
New York State in 1800, was reared there, was
married in Ohio, and in 1838 moved to Missouri and
settled near Pleasant Green. He followed the trade
of stone mason and was also a farmer and died
at Pleasant Green, Missouri, in 1852. Politically
he was a whig and was an active member of the
Methodist Church. William Johnson married Mary
Armstrong, a native of Pennsylvania and of Scotch
ancestry. She also died at Pleasant Green. Her
father, James Armstrong, was a native of Scotland
and on coming to this country settled in Ohio.
George T. Boatman and wife had a large family
of nine children. Mary, the oldest, was first mar-
ried to Thomas Martin, a merchant at Glendale,
Montana, and also in the ore transportation busi-
ness. She is now the wife of J. B. Townsend, a
farmer and fruit grower at Stevensville, Montana.
Sarah J., the second of the family, lives at Dillon,
widow of Elmer J. Terry, who in early life was
a school teacher and later was a gardener and
farmer near the Little Pipestone in Montana. The
third of the family, William H. Boatman, lives at
Cedar Rapids. Iowa, and the next in age is Robert
Thornton. Laura I. is the wife of John H. Brund-
age, a rancher and stockman in the Centennial
Valley of Montana. George T., Jr., lives at Madi-
son, Wisconsin. Etta is the wife of William O.
Metzel, who recently sold his ranch properties in
the Upper Ruby Valley. Mr. Metzel was killed in
an automobile accident near Spokane, Washington,
in July, 1919. His widow resides in Dillon, with
her two sons. Ruby M. is also a resident of Dillon
and in IQI9 disposed of some valuable ranch inter-
ests in the Centennial Valley.
Robert Thornton Boatman spent his early life
in Montana Territory and received his early edu-
cation in the rural schools of Ruby Valley in Madi-
son County. At the age of fifteen he ran away
from home, seeking new adventures and experi-
ences. That was in 1881, and he hired out as a
cattle driver, assisting in taking a herd of cattle
to Calgary, Canada. He remained on the western
prairies of Canada for seven years, during most
of that time being employed by I. G. Baker & Com-
pany, a large cattle, horse and freighting concern.
While in Canada Mr. Boatman had his nearest
approximation to military service. While at Mc-
Leod in 1885, in charge of a freighting outfit the
teams were taken over by the Canadian Government
and divided into four horse teams, used to trans-
port ammunition and artillery. That was the pe-
riod of the Riel Rebellion in Western Canada, Riel
having stirred up some of the Indian tribes to
hostilities. Accepting his new role in the army
transport service, Mr. Boatman drove a team from
McLeod to Calgary and tliere joined a large com-
mand under Major General Strange. They took
the artillery from Calgary to Edmonton on the
North Saskatchewan, and finally to Fort Pitt, which
had been destroyed and was still smoking ruins.
In that vicinity the Canadian troops engaged in
several battles with the Indians. Prior to the first
battle with the Indians, Major General Strange went
to the drivers personally and gave them instruc-
tions as to their duties during the fight. This was
at Frenchman's Butte, about four miles north of
Fort Pitt. The general was very particular in his
instructions to the drivers to stay with their ar-
tillery, no matter what happened, and under no
circumstances to leave it. The drivers were nat-
urally anxious regarding the behavior of their
horses when the artillery began firing, and it may
also be said that they were not unconcerned re-
garding their own behavior in this, their first time
under fire. However, the horses stood firm and so
did the men and made a very fine showing. The
artillery shelled the Indians out of the trenches
tliey had dug and forced them to cut their way
north through the heavy timber. The Indians had
dug their trenches just behind a row of muskeags
and had covered them so skillfully that it was
only by the help of powerful field glasses that their
position was ascertained. General Strange after
the battle made a speech to the men, stating that
he could have captured the Indians right there by
ordering a charge over these muskeags, but it would
have entailed a heavy loss of life in his command,
and as he knew it was a matter of but a short
time when he would capture them without this
loss of life -he considered it best not to order the
charge. After the battle the troops were instructed
to fall back about three miles to where the camp
was corralled in battle formation and proceeded to
make further preparation for the capture of the
Indians. The first shot of the artillery was fired
for 700 yards, as that was the distance figured to
the trenches, but it was discovered that the shot
went over the trenches, so the range was reduced
to 600 yards and this proved to be correct and
drove the Indians out. After the battle it was
discovered that the first shot must have exploded
right in the Indians' camp, where the old men,
children, dogs, etc., were, this being called the squaw
camp, for evidences were found that the shell did
big damage to the inhabitants there. It was the
first time that the' Indians had had shrapnel used
against them and caused them to remark after-
wards that the white man did not fight fair, as they
shot the same bullet twice. Mr. Boatman also ac-
companied the forces north to Beaver. River and
Cole Lake, where the last remnants of the rebel
tribes were scattered. He was released from his
at Fort Pitt.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In i88S he returned to Montana at Dillon and
for several years worked with some cattle outfits.
In 1S92 he began buying and shipping horses and
mules, which he still continues, and during the past
quarter of a century he has been probably the larg-
est individual shipper of horses out of Montana.
In the early days he shipped horses and mules to
Kansas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and other
southern states. In 1898 he took charge of the
Home Park Ranch in the Upper Ruby Valley, but
in 1907 moved into the Centennial Valley, where
he had acquired some extensive land holdings. He
used these lands chiefly for cattle raising and feed-
ing. He owned 2,700 acres there and also had
3,000 acres under lease. Most of his ranch prop-
erty he sold in 1917 to Ed Roe. Mr. Boatman also
owned 1,920 acres on the north side of the lake in
Centennial Valley, but sold this in the sprmg of
1919, with his cattle, to the Centennial Land and
Cattle Company.
Mr. Boatman owns a modern home at 325 South
Dakota Street in Dillon. He also has under lease
a ranch in the Big Hole Basin, and is using it to
run his cattle and other stock. At Home Park
he was postmaster four years under McKinley's
administration, and in 1894-95 was a justice of the
peace in Centennial Valley. He is a stanch re-
publican, is affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal
Church, and is a member of Virginia City Lodge
No. I, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Vir-
ginia Lodge No. 7, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and is also an Elk.
In 1906 Mr. Boatman married Elizabeth J. Peter-
son, who died at Dillon in 1914. She was the
mother of four children : Thornton, who died at
the age of eight years; Harriet, born May 10, 1910;
Robert G., born October 15, 1914; and Ralph F.,
,twin brother of Robert. On December 20. 1916,
Mr. Boatman married Martha E. Minter, daughter
of C. H. and Mary J. (Scale) Minter. Her father
was born in Virginia in 1844, and was married
near Booneville, Kentucky, where he was a farmer
and miller and later engaged in the timber and
logging business. In 1899 he moved to the vicinity
of Bethel, Ohio, where he lived on a farm until
his death in 1911. He was a republican and a mem-
ber of the Methodist Church. Mrs. Boatman's
mother resides at Dillon. Mrs. Boatman was edu-
cated in the public schools near Booneville, Ken-
tucky. She is an active member of the Methodist
Church.
John Logan was a railroad telegrapher and agent
for the Northern Pacific lines until he entered the
service of the Columbus State Bank ten years ago,
and is cashier of that institution, the first bank
established in Stillwater County.
Mr. Logan was born at Melrose, Iowa, August
8, 1886. His father, Luke Logan, still living at
Melrose, was born in Kings County, Ireland, in
1844, and came to the United States about 1865.
He moved out to Melrose, Iowa, in 1870, and was
married at Georgetown in that state. His wife
was Margaret Lahart, who was born at Tyrone,
Iowa, in 1854. They were married in the Big Stone
Church at Georgetown. At that time this was the
largest church between the Mississippi River and
the old Missions of California. Luke Logan became
a pioneer farmer near Melrose, later was a merchant
for a number of years, and then returned to his
farm. He was a democrat and a Catholic.
John Logan attended public school at Melrose,
his education being continued to the age of seven-
teen. For one year he taught school in Monroe
County, Iowa, and in 1906 came to Columbus, Mon-
tana. After a few months as an employe in the
Northern Pacific freight house he served two years
as telegraph operator for that railroad, and then
for two years was station agent. He entered
the Columbus State Bank in 1910 as bookkeeper,
was promoted to assistant cashier, an4 since 1914
has been cashier.
The Columbus State Bank was established in
190J under a state charter, and in its prosperous
record of the past ten years Mr. Logan has been
an influential factor. The bank is capitalized at
$40,000 and has a surplus of $10,000. A. C. John-
son of Helena is president and the vice president
is F. V. DeClercq.
Mr. Logan is president of the Stillwater Club
and is a member of the Catholic Church and a
democrat in politics. He married at Billings, Mon-
tana, in 1912, Miss Daisy Penman, daughter of
David and Marjorie (Preston) Penman, both de-
ceased. Her father came from Maryland with
the Northern Pacific Railway for the purpose of
opening mines at Timberline and Cokedale. He
died at Columbus in 1914. Mrs. Logan is a gradu-
ate of^ the University of Montana at Missoula.
To their marriage were born two daughters, Mar-
garet, born June 6, 1913, and Helen, born March
3, 1915.
Heber Guy Morgan, M. D. While the town of
Roberts in Carbon County has only one physician
and surgeon, the community is peculiarly fortunate
in having access to such talents and wide experi-
ence as those exemplified by Doctor Morgan.
Doctor Morgan, who first came out to Montana
about thirteen years ago, was born at Smith Lake,
Minnesota, February 13, 1883. He represents an
old Virgmia family of Welsh origin. The Morgans
came from Wales and first settled on the eastern
shore of Maryland. Doctor Morgan's ancestor
Morgan Morgan settled at Bunker Hill, in that
portion of old Virginia now West Virginia, as early
as 1726, nearly two centuries ago. Doctor Morgan's
grandfather was Achilles Morgan, who was born
In Virginia in 1819 and died at New Martinsville,
now West Virginia, in 1905. He spent his life as
a farmer. His wife was a Miss Massey, a native
of Maryland, who died when quite young of diph-
theria. John W. Morgan, their son, was born in
New Martinsville in 1857, lived there to the age
of_ twenty-one, and in 1878 settled at Smith Lake,
Minnesota, where he was engaged in the grain and
mercantile business for eight years, and during that
time his son Doctor Morgan was born. He then
went back to New Martinsville, West Virginia, and
farmed there but is now living retired. He is a
democrat and an active supporter of the Christian
Church. John W. Morgan married Belle Irene
Bowser, who was born in Ohio in 1857 and died
at New Martinsville, West Virginia, April i, 1914.
Doctor Morgan is the older of their two sons.
Achilles, the other son, died at the age of twenty
years, at Morgantown, West Virginia.
Doctor Morgan attended public school at New
Martinsville, graduating from high school in 1902.
He then entered the College of Physicians and
Surgeons at Baltimore, and completed his course
and received the M. D. degree on May 30, 1906.
He is a member of the Phi Beta Pi honorary medi-
cal fraternity. For three months in 1906 he served
as interne in the State Insane Hospital at Mount
Pleasant, Iowa, and in September of the same
year came to Montana and for two years was con-
nected with the State Insane Hospital at. Warm
Springs as an interne. In 1908 he went to Twin
Falls, Idaho, and remained there in practice as a
290
HISTORY OF MONTANA
contract surgeon with the United States Govern-
ment for three j'ears. For a brief time following
that engagement he was connected with the State
Insane Hospital at Engleside, Nebraska, then re-
turned to his old home at New Martinsville, West
Virginia, where he lived from July, 1913, to 1915.
Doctor Morgan settled permanently at Roberts,
Montana, in 1915, and is the only representative
of his profession and finds his services in great
demand. In 1917 he established the only drug
store at Roberts and he owns the building in which
it is conducted and has his own residence there.
Doctor Morgan is an independent democrat.
He married at Hastings, Nebraska, in 1913, Miss
Genevieve L. Simmons, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
William Simmons, who reside at Cherokee, Iowa.
Her father is a farmer. Doctor and Mrs. Morgan
have one daughter, Edna.
Walter L. Hurd. As homesteader, rancher,
editor, legislator and business man Walter LeRoy
Hurd has become widely known outside his home
community of Columbus, and is in fact one of
Montana's most progressive and liberal minded citi-
zens.
He represents a long line of sturdy American
ancestors. The Hurd family was introduced to
the American colonies from England by three
brothers who settled in Massachusetts. One of
these brothers was named Timothy Hurd. A cur-
rent tradition in agricultural history is that Timothy
Hurd introduced the grass seed to the colonies that
has always been known as "Timothy" and is one
of the most popular and widely used pasture and
hay grasses. The great-grandfather of Walter Le-
Roy Hurd was an Episcopal minister in New York
State. He was noted not only for his ministerial
calling but also for his powerful physique. One
of his sons, Curtis Hurd, afterward became at-
torney general of the State of New York. Elisha
H. Hurd, grandfather of Walter L., was born in
New York State in 1814. and lived the life of a
farmer, partly in New York and partly in Iowa. He
died at Williams, Iowa, in 1889. As a young man
he had served in the New York State jiilitia. He
married Fannie DeKay, who was born in New
Jersey in 1816 and died at Austin, Minnesota, in
1907, when past ninety years of age.
Reuben J. Hurd, father of the Columbus business
man, was born near Franklinville, New York, in
1843, and grew up in Winnishiek County, Iowa.
Since the age of twenty he has lived in Hamilton
County Iowa, and is one of the few pioneers still
left in that community. While his main business
has been farming and stock raising he has acquired
other interests, helped organize the First National
Bank of Williams and was its president and is
still a director, is an extensive land owner, and
is honored throughout Hamilton County not only
for his success but for the probit>- of his character.
Always averse to politics, voting merely as a dem-
ocrat, he has, nevertheless, served as a member
of the town council and the school board at Wil-
liams. Reuben J. Hurd married Winifred J. Crane.
She was born in Fayette County, Iowa, in 1857,
and they were married in Hamilton County. Their
family of children are: Lulu B., wife of Robert
Lynch, a farmer and stock buyer at Blairsburg.
Iowa; Walter LeRoy; Ralph R., who is a surveyor
and civil engineer and lives on a ranch near Wil-
liams, Iowa; Gladys, wife of Ivan Smith, a farmer
near Williams; Stanton F., who has a farm near
Alden, Iowa; and Howard H., who trained in an
army camp enlisted in February, 1918, and was sent
April 4, 1918, serving as a non-commis-
sioned officer with the third division of regular
troops and after the signing of the armistice was
sent with the Army of Occupation to Germany.
Walter L. Hurd was educated in the public schools
of Williams, Iowa, graduating from high school in
1904. For one year he attended the academy at
Grinnell, Iowa, and then took the regular college
course of the Iowa College at Grinnell, graduating
with the degree Ph. B. in 1909. The following year
he spent in the real estate business at Williams
and in Webster City, Iowa, and in the fall of 1910
identified himself with Columbus, Montana. He
homesteaded 160 acres and still owns that, which
is a part of his rather extensive landed posses-
sions. He has 1,280 acres of land, one section
being located nine miles north of Columbus and
the other in Eastern Montana.
In December, 1914, Mr. Hurd bought the Still-
water County Democrat and was its editor for 2}4
years. Early in the war he was made secretary
and chief clerk of the local exemption board of
Stillwater County, and at the sacrifice of many other
private interests he devoted his time to the duties
of office and other war work until the signing of
the armistice. In April, 1919, he engaged in the
insurance business at Columbus.
He had previously served as a justice of the
peace, and was elected a representative to the Leg-
islature from Stillwater County in the fall of 1916.
He served in the regular Fifteenth Session and the
extra session of February, 1918. He was chairman
of the printing committee and a member of the
committees on labor, townships and counties, cor-
porations, mines and mining. An important bill
of which he was author and which he introduced
while chairman of the printing committee was the
bill fixing the ma.ximum rate for county printing,
generally regarded as a wise measure of economy.
He also took a great deal of interest in all agri-
cultural legislation while he was in the House.
Mr. Hurd is a democrat and a member of the
Columbus Chamber of Commerce.
June 29, 1916, at Williams, Iowa, he married
Miss Daisy Gibbon, daughter of Robert E. and
Emily Gibbon. Her parents reside at Williams,
where her father is a mail carrier. Mrs. Hurd
is a graduate of the Williams High School and
finished her education in Ellsworth College at Iowa
Falls. Mr. and Mrs. Hurd are the parents of one
child, Walter L., born July 18, 1919.
Henry I. Grant came to Montana thirty-five
years ago, and at one time owned some of the
large herds of sheep grazing in the Yellowstone
Valley. He is still a prominent rancher, but his
interests for many years have been centered at
Columbus, where he is a merchant and is also presi-
dent of the Stockmen's National Bank.
Mr. Grant has lived in America since he was
ten years of age. He was born near Christiana,
Norway, August 7, 1865. His father, Iver Grant,
who was born near the capital city of Norway in
1824, is still living at the advanced age of ninety-
five, at Sioux City, Iowa. He was a Norwegian
farmer and also served his time in the Norwegian
army. In 1869 he brought his family to America
and settled at LeMars, Iowa, where he followed
the carpenter's trade. About 1885 he moved to
Sioux City and continued his business as a car-
penter and contractor until he retired through the
infirmities of years. He is a republican and for
many years has been an active supporter of the
Lutheran Church. His wife was Bertha Berg, who
was born near Christiana in 1832 and died at Sioux
City, Iowa, in 1914, at the age of eighty-two. They
ovfpv '^^:^^-t>c-/
HISTORY OF MONTANA
children : Paul, an architect at Sioux
City; Ella, wife of H. Vigen, owner of a dray
and transfer line at Sioux City; Ole, a clothing
merchant at St. Louis, Missouri ; Mary, wife of
H. H. Stone, a property owner at Sioux City;
Henry I.; Christine, wife of O. Berg, a clothier
at Sioux City; and Bertha, who is department
manager for a large dry goods store in Sioux City.
Henry I. Grant attended public school at LeMars,
Iowa, and left high school in 1883. The following
two years he was bookkeeper in F. B. Durstin's
store, and in the spring of 1885 came to Melville,
Montana. One year he spent as clerk in the store
of H. O. Hickox, then spent a short time at Big
Timber, and from that embarked in the sheep busi-
ness in the Lake Basin country. Later he moved
his headquarters to the head of Grove Creek in
what was then Yellowstone County, now Stillwater
County, becoming a resident of this county in 1891.
He ran as high as 10,000 head of sheep on the
range and leased lands, but sold his sheep in 1894
and then bought an interest in the Columbus Mer-
cantile Company. He was with that well known
concern until 191 3, when the partners divided their
interest, Mr. Grant taking over the grocery, harJi-
ware and implement departments. That was the
beginning of his present independent mercantile
activities, and he is today proprietor of the leading
store of the kind in Columbus. He also owns the
building in which his business is conducted on
Pike Avenue, has a modern home and another
dwelling in Columbus and his ranching interests
comprise two large tracts of land on the Stillwater
River. One ranch consists of 810 acres northeast of
Columbus.
Mr. Grant helped organize the Stockmen's Na-
tional Bank of Columbus in 1918, and has since
been its president. He served on the City Council
five years, was postmaster under President Mc-
Kinley and has been a member of the school board.
He is also president of the Miller-Grant Mercan-
tile Company of Springtime, Montana. Mr. Grant
is a member of the Commercial Club and a repub-
lican in politics.
In 1897, at Columbus, he married Cecilia Lavelle,
daughter of Patrick and Margaret (O'Brien) Lavelle.
Her father was one of the earliest settlers of Co-
lumbus and the family is one of the best known
in that section of the Yellowstone Valley. Mrs.
Grant is a graduate of the Columbus High School.
To their marriage were born six children : Helen,
who died at the age of nine years; Paul, who was
born in 1900 and is now attending the School of
Mines at Golden, Colorado ; Mildred, born in 1905 ;
Cecilia, born in 1907 ; and Nellie, born in 1909, all
students in the Columbus schools, while the young-
est is Henry I., Jr., born in 1915.
George R. Green, of Columbus, is one of the
men fully competent by experience to tell the story
of the development of the great Northwest during
the past forty years. In fact his range of experi-
ence covers many states and territories. As a
youth he was a trail driver in the southwestern
country, and in Oregon, Idaho and Montana has
packed goods over the trails, has worked at me-
chanical trades, has been a homesteader and rancher,
and in the latter capacity has been identified with
the country around Columbus for over twenty years.
Mr. Green was born at Mason, Michigan, April
20, 1854. Some of his qualities are probably due
to his inheritance of Scotch, French, Welsh and
Yankee blood. His grandfather, Adolphus Green,
might be described as having been a full-blooded
Yankee. He was born in Maine in 1809, was a
pioneer in the State of Michigan, and from his
early home in the woods of that state he had to
pack his supplies through the timber for 120 miles.
He was a farmer and died near Howell, Michigan,
in 1894. Milo Green, father of George R., was
born in Michigan in 1830, when Michigan was still
a territory, and was also a farmer. During the
Civil war he became a soldier in Company K of
the Tenth Michigan Cavalry, and died of typhoid
pneumonia while still in the service, in 1863. He
was a republican in politics. Milo Green married
Lucretia Woods, who was born in the territory of
Michigan in 1830 and is still living at the advanced
age of eighty-liine at Greenville, Michigan. George
R. was the oldest of her children by her first hus-
band. Charles is a builder and carpenter at Grand
Rapids, Michigan. Mrs. Emma Payne died at Green-
ville, where her husband is still living, and is fore-
man in a factory. Elmer was a mill worker and
mechanic and died at Grand Rapids in middle age.
Mrs. Milo Green married for her second husband
Henry Jennings, who had also a record as a Civil
war soldier and by occupation was a farmer. For
a number of years tliey lived in Hamilton County,
Nebraska. Their children were: Mrs. Nettie Peck,
wife of the foreman of a casket factory at Indian-
apolis, Indiana ; Mrs. Eva Crosby, whose husband is
a machine foreman at Greenville, Michigan ; and
Mrs. Cora Jebb, wife of a prominent manufacturer
of Columbus, Ohio.
George R. Green attended public school at Dexter,
Michigan, and was nine years old when his father
died. After that he began working on farms and
was paid the nominal wage of from $5.00 to $10.00
a month for his labor. In 1871, at the age of
seventeen, he went with his stepfather and mother
to Nebraska and spent two years on their farm
in that state. That was the beginning of his work
and experience. In 1873 he was at San Antonio
and Austin, Texas, and for three seasons helped
drive cattle over the great southwestern trails to
Wichita, Kansas. In 1876 he returned to Nebraska,
married at Central City and was a farmer in that
locality until 1879.
Just forty years ago Mr. Green came out to the
northwestern country, spending a short time in
Eugene City, Oregon, and then going to McCam-
mon, Idaho, and for three years worked on rail-
roads in Idaho and Utah. He went back to Oregon
with teams over the trails and from 1891 to 1896
was engaged in contract mason work. Mr. Green
came to Columbus, Montana, in 1896, and for sev-
eral years operated a saw mill in conjunction with
farming. Gradually he has concentrated his entire
interests upon farming, and his farm is located
four miles north of Merrill. He resides at Co-
lumbus, where he owns a home. Mr. Green is a
republican in politics.
In 1876, at Central City, Nebraska, he married
Miss Rachel Scott, a daughter of J. M. and Ar-
villa (Jennings) Scott, the latter now deceased.
Her father is a retired resident of Columbus, Mon-
tana. Mr. and Mrs. Green have five children :
Elvaretta, wife of C. W. Doyle, a machinist at
Columbus ; Charles E., in the public garage busi-
ness at Columbus ; John E., a farmer and stock
raiser near Fishtail ; Lloyd S., who owns 680 acres
of ranch land on Berry Creek, four miles north
of Merrill ; and Roy, who lives at home and a.s-
sists his father.
William B. Richardson. A ranchman on Pow-
der River adjacent to Powderville foi more than
two decades, William B. Richardson came into
Montana as a youth of nineteen years, July 15,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1898, bringing with him unbounded spirit and de-
termination and the experience of a Missouri farmer.
Under the guidance of his brother "Dick Richard-
son, one of the first settlers of this region, who
induced him to stop in this locality, he bridged
safely the first few years, and has since developed
into one of the prominent and prosperous men of
his section.
Mr Richardson was born in Hancock County,
Illinois, August 6, 1878, a son of George Richard-
son, and was five years of age when he removed
with his parents to Knox County, iMissouri, where
he received his education in the country schools.
There he remained, assisting his father, until his
nineteenth year, when his brother "Dick" forwarded
him transportation and he came to Montana, as
noted, and became a hand on his brother's ranch.
He was soon attracted to sheep shearing and be-
came an adept with the clippers which removed the
fleece, and followed the business in season until the
spring of 1905. The price of shearing was 7 cents
a head and board, and by an expert 100 head could
be turned off daily.' In 1899, in company with Loren
Gillman and Kenneth McKenzie, he took a bunch
of horses into Dakota and sold them out for the
McKenzies, and the boyish trio disposed of them
in three months and returned with a new experi-
ence and with some credit as horse salesmen. To
keep the horse band together it was necessary for
the boys to stand night guard over the 165 head, and
three "broke" saddle horses were all that were in
the bunch. These and other experiences came to
Mr. Richardson while he remained a wage worker by
the month.
In the spring of 1905 Will Richardson had ac-
cumulated a bunch of horses and joined Peter C.
Jensen in a sheep enterprise, taking a bunch on the
shares of Hunter & Anderson. They located them
on Timber and Crow Creeks and divided up after
three years, Mr. Richardson coming to Powder
River with 2,200 head. He held them here and was
in the sheep business until the fall of 1916, and his
profits from them laid the foundation for his future
and larger enterprise. Before quitting sheep, some-
thing he did because of poor and cramped range
facilities, he engaged in the cattle business. He
started this in 1901 with a bunch of natives, or
mixed bloods, branded with the "Lazy H. E." After
a time he sold this brand along with his ranch, but
when he bought the ranch back a few years later
he adopted the brand "A Lazy R," and this he is
running still. He became a shipper when in the
wool business, and makes annual trips to either the
Omaha or Chicago markets with his cattle.
Mr. Richardson was in this country before the
Government surveyed the lands, and located his
homestead in 1900. He took a squatter's right, and
this subsequently became his homestead, and Mrs.
Richardson entered a desert claim nearby. Both
subsequently purchased adjacent tracts and now have
title from the Government to more than 700 acres,
to which may be added three sections of railroad
lands purchased, this forming Mr. Richardson's
ranch, save for a school section under lease. His
ranch is all fenced and he is farming enough land
to grow feed and alfalfa for his stock. Mr. Rich-
ardson's first home of his own was a log house of
several rooms, still being used as a residence, and
he bached it in one room until he married and took
Mr. Richardson there. His modern residence suc-
ceeded the log cabin in 191 5, this being an eight-
room bungalow overlooking the river valley to the
north.
Mr. Richardson was married at Miles City, Mon-
tana, October 13, 1908, to Miss Clara E. Walters,
who was born in Custer County, Montana, February
7, 1886, a daughter of Nicholas Walters, and grew
up in the home of a sister. Her parents returned
to their native Switzerland in her childhood and
when grown she visited them, and the parents sub-
sequently returned to Montana where J\lr. Walters
died, although his widow still survives. Their Swiss
home was at Mooreland, where Mr. Walters was a
small farmer. Their children were : Reno ; Leopold,
a ranchman of Custer County ; Sarah, the widow of
Rudolph Sumers, a rancher of Tongue River ; Fred,
of Custer County; Mrs. Richardson; and Edith, the
wife of Vernon Zinner, a Custer County ranchman.
Mr. and Mrs. Richardson are the parents of two
sons: George Walter and Claude Brainard.
In his political adherence Mr. Richardson is a
republican in national affairs, and his first presiden-
tial vote was cast in favor of the candidacy of
Major McKinley in 1900. In county elections he
does not recognize party factions or lines, but votes
for the man he deems best qualified for the office
at stake.
.William L. Kyle, chairman of the Board of
County Commissioners of Stillwater County, is emi-
nently well qualified for the responsibilities indicated
by his office. He knows Stillwater County from
the standpoint of a homesteader and rancher, a
merchant at Columbus, and the community of Co-
lumbus has long recognized him as one of the
most stalwart and effective workers for everything
connected with the advancement and progress of
that locality.
Mr. Kyle was born at Austin, Minnesota, Febru-
ary 12, 1872, son of Joseph Kyle. His father was
born in Ireland in 1817. On coming to the United
States he located at Council Hill, Illinois, and
when this country became involved in civil war
he enlisted in an Illinois regiment of infantry and
served 2^ years as a Union soldier. He after-
ward became a pioneer at Austin, Minnesota, where
he conducted a meat market. He died there in
1876. In politics he was a republican and was
a member of the Episcopal Church. Joseph Kyle
married Mary Ann Alderson, who was born in
1844, of English descent, and died at Austin, Min-
nesota, February 20. 1873. Their children were :
Ida M.. living in Seattle, Washington, widow of
James R. Harvey, who was a railroad man ; Fred-
erick B., a farmer at Austin, Minnesota; Ella,
wife of Osborne Nutt, employed in the offices of
the Coleman Docks ; Joseph, a railroad employe who
died at Spokane, Washington; Hester A., wife of
William Fitzpatrick, a plumber at Memphis, Ten-
nessee; and William L., who was left an orphan
when he was four years of age.
He spent his early boyhood at Austin, attended
public schools there, but at the age of thirteen
went to work as a farm hand in Mower County,
Minnesota. He lived in Mower County until he
came to Montana in 1892. .\t that early day in
the Yellowstone Valley Mr. Kyle took up a home-
stead near Columbus, on the Yellowstone River.
He lived on his quarter section seven years, and
still owns it as a highly developed farm. This
homestead is two miles from Columbus on the
Flaherty Flats. On leaving the ranch Mr. Kyle
spent six years with the Columbus Mercantile Com-
pany, and then engaged in the grocery business.
His partner the first year was J. L. Montgomery,
at the end of which time Air. Mandeville bought
Mr. Montgomery's interest and the business is now
the partnership of Kyle & Mandeville. They handle
both groceries and hardware and have one of the
leading stores of its kind in Stillwater County.
Mr. Kyle is also owner of a good home in Co-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
lumbus. Anything that concerns the welfare of
that city is a matter of concern to him personally.
He has been a leader in all civic and material im-
provements and takes much pride in the progress
of the last twenty years. He is president of the
Shane Ditch Company and has occupied that position
for several years. He was elected a commissioner
in the fall of igiS for a six year term and was
elected chairman of the board. He also served four
years on the City Council. Mr. Kyle is an ardent
republican, and has always been identified with the
policies and standards of the Grand Old Party. He
is a past grand of Yellowstone Lodge No. 85 of
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, a member
of Columbus Camp No. 6408 of the Modern Wood-
men of America, and belongs to the Stillwater Club.
In 1894, at Austin, Minnesota, he married Miss M.
Minerva Eddy, daughter of W. H. and Abigail
Eddy. Her father was an early settler and farmer
of Mower County, Minnesota, and is now retired,
making his home with Mr. and Mrs. Kyle. Mr. and
Mrs. Kyle have one daughter, Mary Abigail, born
April s, 1898. She is a graduate of the Columbus
High School, spent one year in Bozeman College,
and in igi8 attended Billings Business College.
Julian D. Rav, who came to Montana in the
capacity of an educator and was formerly head of
the public school system of Columbus, is by choice
and diligent study a practical and scientific agricul-
turist, and has developed one of the fine ranches of
Stillwater County. He is also engaged in the real
estate and insurance business at Columbus.
Mr. Ray was born at Hagarstown, Fayette County,
Illinois, May 22, 1886. He is related to several
prominent and old time Illinois families. The Rays
originally came from Scotland and were colonial
settlers in Pennsylvania. His grandfather, James
Ray, was born in Pennsylvania in 1820, and was a
pioneer Illinois farmer. When past forty years of
age he volunteered with an Illinois regiment and
served four years in the Union army. He died at
Vera, Illinois, in 1865, just seven days after his re-
turn from the war. J. D. Ray, father of Julian
D. Ray, was born near Vandalia in Fayette County,
Illinois, in 1850, and was a small boy when his sol-
died father died. He is a miller by trade but since
1890 has been a farmer near Hagarstown. He has
held local offices, being elected as a republican, is a
consistent member of the Methodist Episcopal
Church and is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen
of .\merica. J. D. Ray married Josephine E. Hen-
ninger, who was born in Fayette County, Illinois, in
May, 1858. Julian is their only child. Josephine
E. Henninger is a daughter of William Henninger,
who was born in Virginia in 1817 and in 1835, at the
age of eighteen, came to Fayette County, Illinois,
where he was one of the early settlers. He acquired
land, developed important interests as a stockman,
and was a well known drover of cattle, horses and
hogs at the St. Louis market. He died at Hagars-
town, Illinois, in 1880. His wife was Mary I. Og-
lesby. who was born in Kentucky in 1819 and died
at Hagarstown in 1008. The Oglesbys are a dis-
tinguished family of Kentucky. Missouri and Illinois
and are also related to the Marmadukes. Both the
Marmadukes and Oglesbys came from England in
colonial times. Through this relationship Julian D.
Ray is eligible to membership in the Sons of the
American Revolution.
Julian D. Ray attended rural schools in his native
Illinois County, and spent one year in the prepara-
tory department and four years in regular college
work at McKendree College at Lebanon, Illinois.
He graduated A. B. in 191 1. He was a member of
the Platonian Literary Society, and the many promi-
nent graduates of old McKendree who were mem-
bers of the same society have made it almost a na-
tional institution. On leaving college Mr. Ray was
for two years principal of the high school at Alta-
mont, Illinois, and in 1913 came to Montana and
took up his duties as superintendent of city schools
at Columbus. He rendered a valuable service to the
educational affairs of the town until 1917. He then
spent a year proving up his homestead four miles
northeast of Columbus, and has since operated a fine
farm, at present owning 320 acres. For three sum-
mers and one full year he has been a student in the
agricultural school of the University of Illinois,
and both in school and on his Montana ranch has
been a close student of agricultural science.
' In February, 1918, Mr. Ray engaged in the real
estate business at Columbus, where he resides in a
modern home at the corner of B and Third streets.
He also has the local agency for the Central Life
Insurance Company at DesMoines. He is in part-
nership with R. B. Kelley in the Columbus Land and
Livestock Company, and the firm does a large busi-
ness in city properties and ranches. Mr. Ray is a
republican, a member of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, and is affiliated with Stillwater Lodge No.
62, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Yellowstone
Lodge No. 85, Independent Order of Odd Fellows,
Hagarstown, Illinois. Camp of the Modern Wood-
men of America, and Billings Lodge No. 394 of the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. He is
also secretary of the Columbus Commercial Club.
He married at Billings in May, 1917, Miss Ida
May Ehrenreich. Her parents Mr. and Mrs. John
Ehrenreich are residents of Albany, Oregon, on a
farm. Mrs. Ray is a graduate of the Oregon State
Normal College.
L. B. Banks has been a resident of Montana
nearly twenty years, and for a large part of that
time has been associated with the business interests
originally established by the late Senator J. B. Annin
at Columbus. He is a Columbus merchant, and is
also vice president of the Stockmen's National Bank
in that city.
Mr. Banks was born at New Berlin, New York,
January 26, 1872. He is of English ancestry, his
people having been identified with the colonial set-
tlement of Connecticut. His father L. B. Banks, Sr.,
was born in Connecticut in 1830, and spent practic-
ally all his mature years at New Berlin, New York,
where he was a farmer. He died at New Berlin in
1900. He was a republican and a member of the
Episcopal Church. His wife, Polly Lottridge, is
still living at New Berlin, where she was born more
than three quarters of a century ago, in 1842. L.
B. Banks was the third of their four children. C.
L. Banks is a hotel proprietor and farmer at New
Berlin; Nellie died at the age of twenty-four; and
Belle is the wife of L. C. Van Wagner, physician
and surgeon at New Berlin.
L. B. Banks attended public school in his native
town and lived on his father's farm until he was
fifteen years old. He was a farmer in the New
York community where he was born and reared
until he came to Livingston, Montana, in igoo.
During the next twenty-two months he was em-
ployed in a local store and then became associated
with the late J. B. Annin in a mercantile business
at Cokedale. When the mines were closed at Coke-
dale he removed to Columbus in 1903. Senator An-
nin had established a store at Columbus in 1892,
and for the past fifteen years Mr. Banks has been
its manager and he and the Annin estate own the
entire business. It is one of the leading department
stores in the Upper Yellowstone Valley.
Mr. Banks also owns a ranch on the Stillwater
HISTORY OF MONTANA
River, having 150 acres of irrigated land. He is a
republican and a member of the Stillwater Club.
Mr. Banks has never married.
F. E. Runner, a prominent rancher and banker at
Absarokee, is an old time Montanan, having come
here nearly forty years ago. His chief business has
been cattle and sheep, and he has been one of the
leading figures in that industry in the Yellowstone
Valley.
Mr. Runner was born in Hancock County, Illinois,
August 7, i8t;8. His ancestors some generations
ago came out of Germany and settled in Pennsyl-
vania, where his grandfather, Alexander Runner,
spent all his life. Alexander Runner, father of the
.\bsarokee banker, was born in Ohio in 1830. He
grew up and married at Mount Vernon in that state,
and then removed to Hancock County, Illinois. He
was a lawyer by profession, but in 1862 he removed
to Keokuk, Iowa, retired from his profession and
devoted the rest of his life to farming in Lee
County, that state. He died at Keokuk in 1897.
He was a democrat in politics and a member of
the Masonic fraternity. Alexander Runner mar-
ried Miss Elizabeth Ailing, who was born in Ohio
in 1834 and died at Keokuk in the same year as her
husband, in 1897. She was the mother of three
children: Emma, the oldest, died in Colorado at
the age of thirty-five, the wife of Mr. Cole. The
two sons are Milton H. and F. E. Runner, the
former also a rancher at Absarokee.
F. E. Runner attended rural schools in Lee
County, Iowa, and was four years old when his
parents moved to that county. He lived on his
father's farm to the age of eighteen and in 1876
began his career of western experience and adven-
ture. From 1876 to 1880 he was a miner in the
Black Hills of North Dakota. He came to Miles
City, Montana, in 1880 to carry out a contract for
building a portion of the Northern Pacific Rail-
road between Miles City and Rosebud. He was en-
gaged in that contract for a year and a half and
after that followed different occupations. In igoi
he bought the pioneer store of Absarokee, which
had been founded by Mr. Simonson. This business
grew and prospered under his supervision until it
became the largest store in that part of the state.
Mr. Runner sold out in 1909. In the meantime he
had become engaged in ranching as a sheep and cat-
tle man, and he still owns igoo acres in the vicinity
of Absarokee. His home is a quarter of a mile
from town.
For the past two years Mr. Runner has been
president of the Stillwater National Bank of Absa-
rokee. This bank was established in 1909 as a
private bank by O. H. Hovda. In 1915 it was re-
organized as the Stillwater Valley State Bank and in
1917 took out a national charter. Besides Mr. Run-
ner as president H. N. Howland is vice president
and A. W. DeGroot is cashier. The bank has earned
the solid support of the community it serves and is
capitalized at $25,000 and has surplus and profits of
$10,000.
Mr. Runner married at Big Timber, Montana, in
i8gg. Miss Ida M. Kelley, a native of Minnesota.
They have one son, Edward Gillette, born March
22, igir, now attending the public schools of Absa-
rokee.
M. W. Penwfxi.. For over a half century the
name of Penwell has been weU and favorably
known in Montana. It is a familiar name also in
the Middle West and even in New England, for to
that section came the earliest Penwells from Eng-
land. John Penwell was a handsome Welsh jeweler
called to exercise his craft by an English baron.
He promptly fell in love with his employer's red
haired daughter and was sent out of the country
by her irate father. Landing in Philadelphia about
1730, he met every boat for seven years, when his
sweetheart finally, having escaped her watchful
parents, arrived and they were married. To this
union four sons were born, Solomon, John, David
and Samuel. Solomon when grown returned to
England and no more was heard of him. John died
a bachelor. David had seven sons, John, David,
Joseph, Samuel, Isaac, Reuben and Henry; of these
John married Esther Hyde, and they had four sons,
George, Reuben, John Nelson and David, the latter
being, it is believed, the father of M. W. Penwell.
There was also a Penwell among the passengers
on the Mayflower, Grandmother Penwell being a
descendant of Admiral Jonathan Carver of the
Mayflower fleet. Interesting as is this fact to con-
sider, it is still more interesting to follow the ca-
reer of the Penwell who came pioneering to Mon-
tana, an adventurous youth of twenty-three years,
and to find him today numbered with the represen-
tative ranchmen of this great state.
M. W. Penwell was born near Bentonville in
Fayette County, Indiana, September 24, 1840. His
parents were David H. and Samantha (Carver)
Penwell, the former of whom was born in Indi-
ana, in' 1809, and died at Shelbyville, Illinois, in
1866. The latter was born in Steuben County', New
York, in 181 1, and died at Eureka, Kansas in 1895.
Thev were the parents of the following children :
Louisa and Marcellus both of whom are deceased ;
Oscar E., who owns a ranch situated fifteen miles
south of Helena, Montana, resides at Los Angeles,
California; M. W., whose home address is Bel-
grade, Montana ; Jonathan, who is a farmer and
stockman near Eureka, Kansas ; George, who is also
interested in farming and stockraising near Eureka ;
Susan, who is the widow of William Ward, for-
merly a farmer near McAlester, Oklahoma; and
Esther, who is the wife of Ervin Homerighouse, a
jeweler, of Shelbyville, Illinois. In 1848 the father
of the above family removed to Wabash County,
Indiana, where he engaged in farming until 1856.
when he went to Missouri, but spent only one
summer there, returning then to Illinois, and his
death occurred at Shelbyville. In addition to farm-
ing he followed the carpenter trade. He was never
undulv active in politics but had united with the
republican party on its formation.
M. W. Penwell remained at home on his father's
farm until twenty-one years old, in the meanwhile
securing a fair amount of educational training in
the Shelbyville schools, then bought a threshing
machine and operated it until 1863. It was in that
year that he came to Montana, and after a visit
of several days at Bannock went on to Virginia
Citv and tried mining for a year. _ He found hirn-
self then in a nosition to invest in land, and his
first move in this direction was the pre-empting of
t6o acres on the nresent site of Belgrade. This
was the nucleus of his srreat fortune in land, the
beginning of his acquisition of thousands of acres
in the Mountain State. He still owns the valu-
able 160 acres, situated four miles northeast of
Belgrade, that he subsequently homesteaded, which
is a part of his ranch of 030 acres there, .\ddi-
tionally he owns T.030 acres in the Horseshoe Bend
in Broadwater County. 480 acres located fifteen
miles from Rosebud, and additionally has 5,000 acres
in the northern part of Rosebud County.
The accumulation of this great amount of land
and its profitable use in diversified farming and
/?h "ycZl^^.^^
HISTORY GF xMONTANA
stockraising has necessarily engaged the close and
careful attention of Air. Penwell for many years.
Great as have been his responsibilities in this di-
rection, they have not precluded activity as a pub-
lic-spirited citizen ever ready to be useful to his
state and community. He has been a generous con-
tributor to many important progressive movements
here, and as a member of the State Legislature, to
which he was elected in 1918, on the republican
ticket, he is serving his constituents faithfully and
honestly. *
AtShelbj'\-ille, Illinois, in 1867, Mr. Penwell was
united in marriage to Miss Mary Anna Biggs, a
daughter of Robert and Martha Biggs, both of
whom are deceased. The father of Mrs. Pen-
well was born in Kentucky and moved from there
to Illinois, where he was a farmer. Eight chil-
dren have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Penwell, as
follows : Florence, who was educated at the Mon-
tana State College, resides at home; Park, who is
a graduate of the Montana State College, Boze-
man, is a prosperous farmer near Forsythe in Rose-
bud County ; Guy, who lives at Moscow, Idaho,
is connected with the Combined Harvester Com-
pany, and is a graduate of the Montana State Col-
lege and was also a student in the Montana Wesley-
an University at Helena ; Grace, who is a graduate
of the Montana State College at Bozeman, is the
wife of William Cochran, a hardware merchant at
Lewistown, Montana ; Delia who is a graduate of
the Montana State College, is the wife of Preston
Gallaher, who is in business at Belgrade ; Clyde, who
was graduated from the department of electrical
engineering at the Montana State College, is an
electrician in the power plant at Great Falls, Mon-
tana, having subsequently been graduated from
Cornell College, Ithaca, New York ; Jean, who at-
tended the Montana State College, owns a home-
stead in Garfield County, Montana ; and Carrie,
who is a graduate of the Montana State College,
resides with her parents at Belgrade. A family of
such educational attainment necessarily is influential
in social life, and the Penwell home is one of great
hospitality.
On April 25, 191 7. this worthy couple celebrated
their golden wedding, which was an important so-
cial event of the district.
H. N. HowLAND came to Montana seventeen
years ago, and has been active in business both
at Billings and Absarokee, where he became pro-
prietor of the only hardware business and is also
vice president of the Stillwater Vallev National
Bank.
Mr. Howland was born at Farwell in Isabella
County, Michigan. July 25, 1882. His grandfather
was Albert Howland. who was born at London,
England, in 1815, and for a number of years was
superintendent and owned an interest in a chalk
mine in England. He also served his time in the
regular British army. He brought his familv to
the United States in 1875, and devoted the rest
of his years to farming and stock raising in Isa-
bella County, Michigan. He died there in 1904.
James W. Howland, father of the Absarokee busi-
ness man, was born at Gravesend, a suburb of
London, in 1850 and came to the United States in
1871, at the age of twenty-one. • For several years
he was an employe of the Lake Shore & Michigan
Southern Railway in Ohio, and in 1880 he moved
to Farwell. Michigan, and developed a farm in that
new locality. He continued farming until he re-
tired in 1905, and has since lived at Pomona, Cali-
fornia. He is a republican. As a youth he served
in the British army. He married ,'\lice Ames,
who was born in Ohio in 1854 and died at Farwell,
Michigan, in 1900. H. N. Howland is the oldest
of their four children. Carlessa is the wife of Art
O'Donald, living on a ranch near Billings; Clifford,
a resident of Cleveland, Ohio, enlisted in 1917 in
the heavy artillery, was sent overseas, and was in
the service until mustered out in 1919. The young-
est of the family is Minnie, who lives with her
father in California.
H. N. Howland attended public school near Far-
well, Michigan, and also spent two years in the
Normal School at Mount Pleasant in that state.
For about two years he was employed with a saw
milling concern at Cadillac, Michigan, and left there
in 1902 to come to Montana. The first five years
in Montana Mr. Howland spent as ranch manager
for I. D. O'Donnell, known as "Montana's best
farmer." In 1907 he bought the Windsor livery
barns at Billings, and was proprietor of that busi-
ness four years, when he sold out and came to
Absarokee in 191 1. Here he established a hard-
ware business, and it is not only the only hardware
store in the town but is one of the leading supply
houses for those materials in this part of the Yel-
lowstone Valley. On May 19, 1919, he sold this
place to M. L. Severs. Mr. Howland owns town
property, including a modern home, and, as noted
above, is vice president of the Stillwater Valley
National Bank. He is a republican and is affiliated
with Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks.
He married at Billings in 1906 Miss Ethel L.
Lockwood, a daughter of Albert and Lavina (Lucas)
Lockwood. Her father was a dairyman in Ontario,
Canada, and both her parents are now deceased.
Mr. and Mrs. Howland have two children: Arnold
James, born March 29, 1909, and Robert L., born
June 19, 1914-
Henry A. Torgrimson has in a few brief years
built up one of the largest general mercantile supply
houses in Southern Montana, at Absarokee. He
is a thorough business man, a citizen of sturdy
mould and character, and is a fair representative
of a family which has carved its name deeply m
the annals of both Montana and Minnesota.
Mr. Torgrimson was born at Grand Meadow,
Mower County, Minnesota, March 19, 1877. His
father, E. Torgrimson, was born at Valders, Nor-
wav, February 2.3, 1841, and was reared and married
there. He was liberally educated, and was a teacher
in a Norwegian religious school for eighteen years.
On April 9, 1869, he and his wife embarked for
the United States, and he sought a home on the
northwestern frontier at Fountain in Fillmore
County, Minnesota. He taught school there. In
1881 lie went to Spring Valley, Minnesota, and en-
gaged in the general merchandise business, while
in 1887 he moved to Grand Meadow and was a
general merchant there imtil 1899. On selling out
his store to his two sons, Torval and Gabriel, he
returned to visit the scenes of his birthplace in
Norway, and though nominally retired since then
has been associated with various members of his
family in important business affairs. In 1901 he
went to Deering. McHenry County, North Dakota,
and with his sons Casper and Emil and his daughter
Emily homesteaded, each taking up 160 acres. Emil
sold his homestead later to his father, who now
owns 1,280 acres in that locality. He resides at
Grand Meadow. He is a vigorous republican _ in
political doctrine and a member of the Norwegian
Lutheran Church and is affiliated with the Modern
Woodmen of America. On March 24, 1869, E.
Torgrimson married Olada Torkelson. The oc-
HISTORY OF -MONTANA
casion of their golden wedding on March 24, 1919,
was made a happy event when numerous children,
grandchildren and friends gathered to congratulate
this tine old couple, among the most esteemed resi-
dents of Grand Meadow, Minnesota. The oldest
child is Elisa, wife of Jacob Fjelde, a professor
in Madison College at I\Iadison, Minnesota. Mrs.
Fjelde has for a number of years been noted for
her literary skill, especially as a poet, and has
written both in the Norwegian and English lan-
guages. On the occasion of her parents' golden wed-
ding she wrote a poem in their honor, and it was
subsequently translated into English. It contains
six stanzas, and while the translation does not re-
veal all the rich flavor of the original, one of the
stanzas should be quoted ;
"Half a century you traveled together;
Not a rose-covered pathway you trod ;
What with sunshine and all kinds of weather
Worry, work, cares, were blessings from God !
So from out of this blossom profusion
Choose the sweetest, most beautiful one
Symbolizing the happy conclusion
Of the fifty short years that are gone!"
The second of the fkmily was Torval, who owned
the general store established by his father and died
at Grand Meadow, Minnesota, in L907. Casper,
also mentioned above, is in the real estate and
loan business at Minot, North Dakota. Gabriel is
now proprietor of the store at Grand Meadow.
The next in age is Henry A. Emil is a farmer in
Alberta, Canada, while Emily is still at home with
her parents.
Henry A. Torgrimson attended public school at
Grand Meadow but from the age of fourteen was
acquiring business experience by work in store in
the intervals of his schooling. He came to Ab-
sarokee, Montana, in 1900, buying a squatter's right
to 160 acres on the West Rosebud. He proved up
and lived on the claim seven years and which he
still owns. In Absarokee for four years, until 1911,
he was employed by the Absarokee Trading Com-
pany, and then rented a general store and under
his energetic direction this has become one of the
leading mercantile enterprises of that community.
Mr. Torgrimson bought the building on Main Street
in May, 1919. It is a stone structure and in the
rear is a large warehouse 30 by 60 feet, and he
also has another warehouse in Columbus of similar
construction and size. As a merchant Mr. Tor-
grimson handles- groceries, dry goods, shoes, cloth-
ing, machinery of all kinds, hardware, farm imple-
ments, glass ware, automobiles and accessories, coal,
furniture, beds, springs and mattresses, threshing
machines, and not only the qualit>- and quantity of
his merchandise appeal to an increasing patronage,
but also the service that accompanies them. Mr.
Torgrimson owns a half interest in another general
store partnership, known as Torgrimson & Rash,
at Reed Point.
His prosperity since coming to Montana is rep-
resented by other interests, including 320 acres at
Millstone in Musselshell County, 520 acres twelve
miles south of .Absarokee on the' West Rosebud, and
he is a director in the Stockmens National Bank
at Columbus.
Probably the most complete and attractive modern
home at Absarokee is the place Mr. Torgrimson
has provided for his family. It has all the modern
improvements, including running water, furnace heat,
electric light, and the home is in the midst of eight
acres of ground in the heart of town. Mr. Tor-
grimson is a republican in politics and a member
of the Lutheran Church.
On August 28, 1898, at Grand Meadow, Minnesota,
he married Miss Margaret Hovda, daughter of
Herman O. and Betsey (Simonson) Hovda. While
her father lives at Grand Meadow, he is also well
known in Southern Montana, having supplied some
of the financial power to Absarokee. Mrs. Tor-
grimson's mother is deceased. They have two chil-
dren: Elmen, born September 6, 1899, a graduate
of a business college at Helena and actively as-
sociated with his father in the business ; and Byron,
born March 8, 1904, a sophomore in the Absarokee
HigB School.
L. H. Vaughn is a pushing and successful young
merchant at Columbus, is proprietor of a thoroughly
equipped and stocked department store and is still
under thirty years of age. However, he has been
in the mercantile business practically since early
boyhood.
He was born at Elkton, Missouri, August 18,
1891. The Vaughns are of Scotch-Irish stock and
were early settlers in Kentucky, where his grand-
father, John Vaughn, was born. John Vaughn when
a boy went to Southern Missouri, but was of a
family inclined to allegiance with the Union and
enlisted in the Civil war in the Union army. He
contracted pneumonia and died in Hickory County,
Missouri, while the war was in progress.
W. H. Vaughn, father of the Columbus merchant,
was born in Missouri in 1862 and spent all his life
as a farmer in Hickory County. He now lives at
Flemington, Missouri. He is a republican and an
active member of the Christian Church. W. H.
Vaughn married Kitty Williams, who was born in
Hickory County in 1866. Altha, the oldest of their
children, is the wife of James Robbins, a farmer
in Polk County, Missouri ; Fred is in the produce
business at Buffalo, Missouri; L. H. Vaughn is the
third of five children; Carlos is connected with
the June McCracken department store at Living-
ston, Montana ; while Tine is a farmer in Hickory
County.
L. H. Vaughn attended rural schools in Hickory
County, also Weaubleau College one term, and the
Southwestern Baptist College at Bolivar, Missouri,
one vear. During 1909-10 he was a student in the
Central Business College at Sedalia. Meanwhile
he had acquired considerable experience in the mer-
cantile business as a clerk. His first employment
was in a store at Ellston, two miles from his home,
and he walked back and forth every day to his
work. His wages were $12.50 a month. Mr. Vaughn
came West in the spring of 1910, first visiting m
Colorado Springs, then spending six months with
Uie Blackwell-Weiland Company, book and stationery
merchants at Oklahoma City, and following that
for a year and a half was employed by J. H. Mc-
Caslin, a merchant at Flemington, Missouri. He
bought a store at Rogersville, Missouri, but sold
out after six months and then came to Livingston,
Montana, and on September i, 1914, began work
for June McCracken in his department store. At
the end of nine months he had achieved a partner-
ship and still associated with Mr. McCracken opened
a department store at Columbus. He has since
been its manager and in March, 1919, bought the
McCracken interest.
Mr. Vaughn is a republican, a member of the
Christian Church, .and is affiliated with the Still-
water Club. He married at Springfield, Missouri,
in 1916 Miss Blair Cox, who was born at Hermi-
tage, Missouri, and was educated in the high school
at Bois D'Arc. They have one daughter, Kathryn
Blair, born January 8, 1919.
Rev. Frederick Dunstan Lucas took up his work
as a Catholic missionary in Montana in 1912, and
^(P^^eiai
HISTORY OF MONTANA
291
since 1917 has been pastor of St. Mary's Church
at Columbus and has supervision of several out-
lying missions in the Yellowstone Valley.
Father F. Lucas is an Englishman by birth. He
was born at Birmingham January 10, 1872. His
father, John Lucas, was born at Brighton, England,
in 1845, and spent his active life at Birmingham
and Coventry, dying in the latter place in 1897.
For many years he was engaged in bicycle manu-
facture. He was liberal in politics. His wife was
Miss Eliza Harris, who was born in South Wales
in 1847 and died at Coventry in 1897. Their family
consisted of si.x children: Arthur, a retired mer-
chant at Coventry, England ; Walter, who lives _ in
London ; Frederick Dunstan ; Samuel, a physician
and surgeon at Coventry; Alice, wife of Mr. Fetch,
who is in the bicycle business at Coventry; and
William John, a veterinary surgeon at Coventry.
Frederick Dunstan Lucas had a splendid prepara-
tion for his career in some of the best schools in
England and on the continent. He received his
primary education in private schools at Birmingham
and for two years was a student in the Brothers
School at Malines, Belgium. He had a three years
preparatory course in St. Edmund's College^ at
Hitchin, England, and in 1902 came to the United
States and entered the Fathers of St. Edmund's
Seminary at Swanton, Vermont. He was diligently
engaged in his philosophical and theological studies
for seven years and was ordained a priest in 1909.
The following two years he taught history and
religion in St. Michael's College at Winooski, Ver-
mont. Father Lucas came to Montana in 1912 and
for fifteen months was cliaplain of Ursuline Acad-
emy at Great Falls. He was chaplain of the
Cheyenne Mission St. Labres, and on returning to-
Great Falls was made assistant at St. Anne's Cath-
edral. He remained there three years and in 1917
came to his present work as pastor of St. Mary's
Church at Columbus. His mission charges are at
Big Timber, Absarokee, Reed Point, Melville and
Greycliflf. The church edifice at Columbus was
built about 1912, and the parsonage was erected
in 1917, the same year that he became pastor.
Father Lucas is a member of Great Falls Council,
Knights of Columbus, and is a third degree Knight.
TnoitAS P. McGrath. It is not given to every-
one to succeed in both business and politics, but
Thomas P. McGrath is an exception and not only
has attained to prosperity, but is making a fine
record for himself as county commissioner of Deer-
lodge County, and is recognized as one of the repre-
sentative men of Anaconda. He was born in Hough-
ton County, Michigan, September 14, 1874, a son
of Thomas McGrath. The birth of Thomas Mc-
Grath took place in County Tipperary, Ireland, in
1832, and his death occurred at Hancock, Michigan,
in 1886. He came to the United States when not
much more than a lad and located at Syracuse,
New York, from whence, after his marriage, he
moved to Houghton County, Michigan, being all his
life a general workman. In politics he was a demo-
crat, and in religious faith a Catholic. He mar-
ried Margaret Alurray, born in County Tipperary,
Ireland, in 1833, who died at Anaconda, Montana,
in October, 191 1. Their children were as follows:
Michael, who died at Anaconda, April i, 1914, was
a mechanic, and is survived by his widow and five
children, who live at No. 609 West Park Avenue,
Anaconda ; Anna, who married Morgan Conway, a
watchman ■ for the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany of Anaconda ; John, who was a painter and
decorator, died at Anaconda in July, 1915 ; Martin,
who was a painter and decorator, died at Anaconda
in July, 1903 ; Bridget, who is deceased, having
passed away at Anaconda in 1907, married Michael
Cronnelly, who is now a miner of Butte, Montana;
and Thomas P., who was the youngest born.
When he was thirteen years of age Thomas P.
McGrath left the schools of Houghton County,
which until then he had been attending, and began
working in the concentrators of the mills of his
native county, so continuing for ten years. In 1897
he came to Anaconda to enter the employ of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company, and spent two
years in its concentrating department. He then estab-
lished himself in a cafe and grocery business and
conducted it until January 11, 1919, when he sold
and since then has been devoting himself to his
duties as county commissioner. Mr. McGrath was
elected to this office in the fall of 1916, for a term
of six years, and assumed its duties in January,
191 7. He is a democrat and active in his party.
The Roman Catholic Church has his membership,
and he belongs to Anaconda Council No. 822,
Knights of Columbus, of which he is a third degree
knight ; the Mount Haggen Court No. 629, Catholic
Order of Foresters ; Anaconda Lodge No. 557, Loyal
Order of Moose; and Anaconda Aerie No. 18, Fra-
ternal Order of Eagles. Mr. McGrath owns his
modern residence at No. 700 West Third Street.
In 1904 Mr. McGrath was united in marriage with
Miss Katherine Weiss, a daughter of Jacob and
Ann Weiss, both of whom are now deceased. Mr.
Weiss was a rancher in British Columbia. Mr. and
Mrs. McGrath have two children, namely : Ger-
trude, who was born December 25, 1905 ; and Wil-
liam, who was born May 25, 1907. Since coming
to Deerlodge County Mr. McGrath has taken a
deep interest in the development of this section and
as county commissioner has been more productive
of good results than many others who have held
official positions in this section, and the record he
is now making may well lead to higher honors in
the future.
E. B. Fellows, serving his second term as sherifl
of Stillwater County, is an old time Montana resi-
dent. He came out to this territory when a boy
about thirteen years old, and has had a varied
experience as cowboy, stage driver and homesteader,
and has been a resident of the community around
Columbus for a number of years.
He was born at Cornwallis Valley in Kings
County, Nova Scotia, June 13, 1873. His father,
William H. Fellows, was born in England and was
a youth when he came with his parents to Nova
Scotia. Grandfather Fellows died in Kings County,
Nova Scotia. William H. Fellows spent his active
business life as a hardware merchant in Nova
Scotia and died in Kings County in 1913. His
wife, Augusta Fellows, was born in Nova Scotia
and her mother was a member of the Randolph
family of Virginia. She died at Cornwallis in
1875. She was the mother of four children, E.
B. Fellows being the youngest. The second and
third child, Fred and Nellie, died in childhood.
Blanche is the wife of Egbert Ransome, who is
connected with the Richardson Scale Works at
Passaic, New Jersey.
E. B. Fellows attended public schools in his
native town to the age of thirteen and then for
a time drove a milk wagon on the streets of the
City of Boston. Late in 1886 he arrived at Helena,
Montana, and soon afterward went to Great Falls,
where he entered the employ of one of the numer-
ous cattle outfits operating the ranges, and as a
cowboy he functioned usefully for several years.
At the age of sixteen he was driver of a stage from
Great Falls to Geyser. He also drove a delivery-
298
HISTORY OF MONTANA
wagon at Marysville one year and then returning
to Helena was train checker for the Helena Cab
Company eight years. For one j'ear he was agent
for a transportation company in the Yellowstone
National Park.
Mr. Fellows came to Columbus in 1908 and took
up a homestead of 320 acres above ,\bsarokee on
the Stillwater River. He proved up his land and
subsequently sold it. For eiglit months he was
also proprietor of the Corner Store at Absarokee,
selling out at a good profit. Mr. Fellows has an
irrigated ranch fourteen miles south of Columbus
and is able to look back over his career in Mon-
tana with the satisfaction of a man who has ma-
terially prospered and who has gained the confi-
dence and friendship of most of the best citizens.
He was elected sheriff of Stillwater County in
1916. In 1918 he made no contest for re-election
but was chosen by the largest majority of any
candidate on either ticket. He has had his home
in Columbus since 191 7. Mr. Fellows is a republican
and a member of the Stillwater Club of Columbus.
He is also affiliated with Yellowstone Lodge No. 85
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
He married Miss Helen Fairburn at Helena in
1908. She is a daughter of John and Hannah
Fairburn, the latter now deceased. Her father is
a farmer and bee man living at Whittemore, Iowa.
Mr. and ^Irs. Fellows have one son, Charles E.,
born March 6, 1914.
Hon. Joseph Burt Annin. A career of general
distinction, broad and beneficent service, leaving a
lasting impress on the material and civic progress
of Columbus and Stillwater County, was closed in
the death of the late Joseph Burt Annin at his
home in Columbus June 22, 1918.
The brief record of his life reveals an early
struggle with poverty, a self reliant independence
in achieving success in spite of difficulties, and a
steady courage and public spirit in all the rapidly
increasing variety and importance of later relation-
ships.
He was born October 26, 1865, at Leroy, New
York, and when he was five j'ears old his parents'
moved to New Jersey and settled on a fruit farm.
His father died there in 1876, and Joseph and
his mother then returned to New York State. He
was paying his way and getting experience as clerk
m a grocery store at the age of fourteen. In 1886
he came West, and lived at Evanston, Wyoming,
until 1889, being manager of a mercantile store
there for two years. He then became manager
of the Thompson Brothers grocery store at Liv-
ingston, Montana, and was a resident of this state
nearly thirty years. Later he engaged in general
merchandising at Cokedale, eight miles west of
Livingston, and in 1892 came to Columbus, then
known as Stillwater, where he established the firm
of Annm & DeHart. This was later merged into
the Columbus Mercantile Company, and he was
manager of the company until it dissolved in 1915.
From that time until the close of his life he was
engaged in the dry goods business under the name
.^nnin & Banks. He also acquired large land in-
terests to the extent of about 800 acres, and he
always kept in close touch with agricultural progress.
A good business man. he never had an ambition
to becorrie wealthy but to make his abilities serve
the broader welfare of his people and state. Many
services and achievements are properly credited to
liim, not least of which is the establishment and
development of a first class public school system
at Columbus, .^s an instance of his public spirit
he mortgaged his stock of goods in order that the
first bridge might be built across the Yellowstone
River. He was a real leader in public affairs, was
elected county commissioner of Yellowstone County
in 1896, his election as a republican being a striking
evidence of his popularity in a campaign when
republicans were in decided disfavor in Montana.
He served as commissioner six years, was senator
from Yellowstone County during the Tenth and
Eleventh Sessions, beginning in 1906, and in 1912
was again chosen to the Legislature, this time in
the House of Representatives. In 1914, after the
creation of the new County of Stillwater, he was
elected senator from Stillwater and, was active
during the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Sessions. He
was a man of real power in the Legislature, and
that power was due not only to his ability as a
parliamentarian but to. the confidence felt in his
judgment and his undoubted strength of character.
He was also a candidate for lieutenant governor in
the campaign of 1916.
By many years of consecutive effort he had ac-
quired a modest competence, had served dutifully
and well, and might properly have laid aside re-
sponsibilities and enjoA-ed a leisure but for the
destiny which made circumstances peculiarly trying
for him as for the world. For several years he
had endured the anxiety caused by the illness of
his wife, and when America entered the war with
Germany his two oldest sons entered the service
and he felt it necessary to assume additional burdens
during their absence. He was a leader in Red
Cross and Liberty Loan campaigns and work and
neglected no patriotic duty. It is a matter of gen-
eral regret among his family and friends that he
did not live a few months longer to see the triumph
of the allied cause.
As was natural, many heartfelt tributes were paid
his memory, and from the funeral address delivered
by Reverend Mr. Pope of Billings it is appropriate
to quote a few passages that will serve the better
to describe his character and the quality of his
citizenship.
"Mentally and physically Mr. Annin was a very
active man. He read widely upon political and
public questions. He was mentally alert. He could
analyze a question quickly. His judgment was
seldom far afield. He was courageous. He was
no moral coward. And when once his mind was
fully made up as to his duty he would not permit
considerations of . friendship to interfere with or
to thwart his duty as a citizen. This was exemplified
in his attitude upon the prohibition issue. He be-
lieved the liquor traffic to be a menace to public
welfare. With him it was not a matter of political
advantage or of political loss. He had many per-
sonal and political friends — and few men rnore
highly valued friends than he — who were financially
interested in the liquor business. The natural bent
of his heart would make difficult indeed any public
action of his that would injure the feelings or the
business of his friends. But he had a duty to his
own household, he felt a duty to this community,
he was under obligations to the state. He could not
and he would not permit the claims of personal,
but selfish, friends to supercede the claims of
society. No personal consideration, political or
financial, could stand between him and the per-
formance of his duty. His championship of the
cause of prohibition is perhaps his greatest con-
tribution to society. It was he who introduced
the amendment to the constitution in the State
Senate which resulted in a substitute measure being
submitted to the people, and he fathered the com-
prehensive measure providing for law enforcement,
to go into effect January i, 1919.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
"In business he displayed the same qualities of
mind- and heart as in his private and public life.
He was kind and generous and trusting. In the
early days of the settlement of this country he
trusted many settlers far beyond the point to which
they were entitled, measured by the rules of good
business practice. He did business enough to get
rich. He did not get rich. He could not and would
not oppress the poor. In many instances he doubt-
less was imposed upon by unscrupulous persons.
He apparently preferred to be embarrassed himself
rather than embarrass the poor in their struggle
for a foothold and a living. He did not die a rich
man. But he took with him to the world beyond
the only riches that will count in the kindom of
our Lord — a clean heart and a wholesome life.
"He was a patriot. He was devoted to his coun-
try and its flag, and to this he was willing to give
to the last measure of devotion. His two oldest
sons were in uniform and fought overseas in the
service of humanity. He gave tlie last great measure
of a father's heart to his country."
Mr. Annin married Janet H. Haldane at Helena.
She and three sons survive. The oldest son, James
T. Annin, was a lieutenant in the 'American army ;
Hawthorn Bert was a lieutenant; and Douglas was
.sixteen years of age when his father died.
James T. Annin, oldest son of the late Joseph
B. Annin, whose career has been described above,
was born at Livingston, Montana, April lo,
1 890. He graduated from the Columbus High
School in 1906 and received his Bachelor of Science
degree from the Montana State College at Boze-
man in 191 1. The following two years he farmed
near Columbus, and in 1912 bouglit the Columbus
News and has since been busily engaged as a news-
paper man. In September, 1917, the Columbus
News was consolidated with the Columbus Demo-
crat. The company is incorporated with H. H.
Harrison, president, E. D. Shaffer, vice president,
and James Annin, secretary and manager. The
Columbus News was established in 1901 and the
Columbus Democrat in 1913. The Columbus News
is independent in politics, and is the leading paper
in Stillwater County, being the official paper of
the county and the city of Columbus. The com-
pany has complete modern facilities and one of
the best equipped plants in the Northwest.
James T. Annin is a republican in politics. He
enlisted September 19, 1917, in a machine gun unit,
was trained at Camp Lewis, Washington, and in
June, 1918, was sent overseas, being first sergeant
of Company D of the Three Hundred Forty-eighth
Machine Gun Battalion. November I, 1918, he was
commissioned second lieutenant. He served in sev-
eral phases of the great battle of Meuse-Argonne,
and was honorably discharged April i, 1919.
Hawthorn Burt Annin, brother of James T. Annin,
was born at Cokedale, Montana, March 28, 1892.
He graduated from the Columbus High School in
1907, and for 2^ years was a student in the United
States Naval Academy at Annapolis. After re-
turning to Columbus he worked in his father's store
for two years and in 1914 bought a garage, of
which he is still proprietor and which is the leading
establishment of its kind in Stillwater County. He
has a large space devoted to the garage, and also
a well equipped shop and handles all automobile
accessories. He is agent for Ford cars and also
for the Fordson tractors.
At Denver, Colorado, June 27, 1917, he married
Miss Caryl Hodgson, a daughter of W. and Mina
D. Hodgson, residents of Denver, where her father
is a fireman in the Union Pacific shops. Mrs.
Annin is a graduate of the State Normal School
in Colorado. They have one son, Joseph Burt,
born July 3, 1918.
Frank E. Wright. A Montana pioneer, Frank
E. Wright, who died May 25, 1917, was the type
of citizen who both in early and later times had
the character and ability to impress himself upon
the life and affairs of his community and state.
He was one of the foremost business men and citi-
zens of Lewistown, where he had lived for many
years.
He was born at Independence, Iowa, December
23, 1857, and a year or so later his parents returned
to their old home at Penn Yan, New York. Frank
Wright grew up in New York, had a substantial
education, and was about twenty-three years of
age when he came to Montana in the spring of
1880. He lived at Helena and Phillipsburg until
early in 1882, when he engaged in the general mer-
chandise business at Utica. In 1887 he assisted
in organizing the Bank of Fergus County, of which
he became assistant cashier, and on the death of
J. H. Moe in 1894 became cashier. That office
he held, and through it he rendered a signal serv-
ice to the business community of Lewistown until
1906, when he retired from the active responsi-
bilities of the bank, but remained as its vice presi-
dent until 1916.
It was consistent with his ability as a leader of
men that he should take an active part in Fergus
County from the time of its organization. He was
the first man honored with the office of county
treasurer, and held that post for eight years. He
was long a prominent republican. He was one of
the organizers of the Judith Club at Lewistown,
and for many years its secretary. One of his chief
interests was Masonry. He took his first degrees
in Lewistown Lodge No. 37, served it later as
worshipful master, was a member and past high
priest of Hiram Chapter No. 14, Royal Arch Ma-
sons, a member and past eminent commander of
Lewistown Commandery No. 14, Knights Templar,
and belonged to Algeria Temple of the Mystic
Shrine. The Knights Templar formed his escort
of honor at his funeral.
In 1891 Mr. Wright married Miss Minnie Sloan,
of Penn Yan, New York. He was survived by
Mrs. Wright and also by two sisters and four
brothers. Two of these brothers are Montana citi-
zens, Edmund, of Lewistown, and .A.rthur, of Butte.
Many tributes were paid Frank E. Wright when
he passed away. His old friend and pastor deliv-
ered a touching address, in which he spoke as
follows : "Mr. Wright came to Montana in the
morning of his life, in the hours when youth and
ambition urged on to accomplishment. He was
here at the beginning of things and helped to lay
the foundations of the county and city. He was
for many, many years a prominent figure in the
business life, and yet there were many men in
the city and county who excelled him in business,
but Frank Wright had one gift that none excelled
him in. This was the gift of making friends. He
journeyed through life binding men to him with
bands of steel. In times of business distress he
had met all who sought his counsel with a smile
and had given to them of his strength, so that they
went away refreshed and with new courage. And
always he had that same smile while back of the
smile was a warm, generous, cheerful and cour-
ageous heart. What was the secret he had of mak-
ing all men his friends? It was his deep interest
in men. in their welfare, in their happiness. This
interest was not assumed, but deep, genuine and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
sincere. The response to it was natural and irre-
sistible. . . , r If
"So he passed this morning m the noon ot me
and entered into the afternoon. So, when at last
the eveningtime came, there was light, i-rom all
parts of the city and from the places outside the
city people turned to the church where this service
was being held until it was too small to accom-
modate all of those who loved and mourned him.
That was the light at eveningtime. To everyone
who knew Frank Wright his passing meant that
for such an individual life had lost something
he held sweet, dear. This was love's tribute to
the man who had passed on. It was the light that
came at eveningtime."
Chaeles D. Allen, who has spent most of his
life in the Northwest, has been a lumberman, has
helped build railroads and operate them, has been
a prospector and miner and in recent years has
followed the settled occupation of farming and
stock raising, and is especially prominent in pub-
lic afJairs as chairman of the Board of County
Commissioners of Fergus County.
Mr. Allen was born in Jackson County, Michi-
gan, September 28, 1867, a son of Elijah T. and
Stella (Doolittle) Allen. His father settled in
Michigan in the early '60s, and soon after going
to that state enlisted in Company E of the Eighth
Regiment, Michigan Infantry, serving three years.
He shared in the brilliant record of that regi-
ment, participating in thirty-nine battles and
skirmishes. He was in one specially brilliant ex-
ploit of the war. After the destruction of a por-
tion of a Confederate fort volunteers were called
for to storm and take possession of the enemy
position. Four hundred and eighty men volunteered
for the dangerous task, Elijah Allen among them,
and out of this storming party only 220 came back
alive, most of them badly wounded. Elijah Allen
lost his left eye in that encounter. ' After the war
he engaged in farming in Jackson County, Michi-
gan until 1881, when he moved to Aberdeen, South
Dakota, and followed the business of carpenter,
contractor and painter. He entered a tract of
Government land and improved the homestead and
remained there until his death in 1898, at the age
of sixty-three. His wife was born in Michigan
and died in 1893, at the age of forty-three years.
Elijah Allen was a republican in politics, a mem-
ber of the Grand Army of the Republic and affili-
ated with the Masons and Odd Fellows.
Charles D. Allen is the first in a family of four
children, two of whom arc still living. He was
about thirteen years old when his parents moved
to South Dakota. In the meantime he had ac-
quired his education in the public schools of Jack-
son and Ingham counties, Michigan. When ten
years of age he earned his first money by pulling
weeds out of a cornfield at twenty-five cents a day.
At the age of sixteen he left home and went to
work for a railway contractor who was construct-
ing a railway out of Aberdeen. Later he worked
in the lumber woods of Minnesota on the head-
waters of the Mississippi River, and in 1895 arrived
in Helena, Montana. Here his services as a lum-
berman were employed in cutting timber for the
mines of the Lump Gulch Mine. In September,
1896, he went by train to Fort Benton and into
the North Moccasin Mountains, where he pros-
pected and mined for about two years. He lo-
cated what was later known as the Kendall Mine,
and sold his interest in that noted property to
Henry Kendall for $500. He remained as man-
ager of the mine for about 1^/2 years, and when it
was sold to Finch & Campbell continued as super-
intendent and manager until January 15, 1906. -This
gave him an extensive experience in the mining
industry. From Montana he went to Nevada soon
after the great gold discoveries there, and with
headquarters at Goldfield became a buj'er and seller
of mine leases. He was in that business for about
two years, and then after six or seven months of
travel in the Southwest and California returned
to Lewistown and in October, 1909, engaged in
farming. He owns 320 acres, and besides han-
dling that property is interested in a number of
business ventures at Lewistown and elsewhere.
Mr. Allen was elected a member of the County
Board of Commissioners of Fergus County, in 1912,
and has served as chairman of the board for six
years. He is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No.
37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hiram
Chapter No. 14, Royal Arch Masons, Lewistown
Commandery No. 15, Knights Templar and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena He is
also a member of Lewistown Lodge No. 456 of the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. In poli-
tics Mr. Allen is a democrat.
January 22, igflo, he married Anna E. Robinson,
a native of California. They have one daughter,
Lavie Gertrude.
James M. Sligh, M. D. The modern physician
and surgeon of necessity has to be a man of won-
derful energy, broad views and fine initiative, com-
bined with inexhaustible energy and capacity for
work. His long training fits him to cope with many'
problems outside of his profession so that he is
usually one of the leading factors in municipal de-
velopment. Dr. 'James M. Sligh, of Anaconda, be-
longs to this type of the profession ; he is endowed
with natural gifts which he has utilized to the best
advantage in his calling. He was born at Rochester,
New York, May 19, 1845, a son of James W. Sligh,
and grandson of Robert Sligh. Robert Sligh was
born in Ayton, River Tweed, Scotland, in 1785, and
died at Grand Rapids, Michigan, in 1857. About
1854 he came to the United States, and locating at
Grand Rapids, Michigan, lived in retirernent, al-
though he had been a shipwright in his native land.
James W. Sligh was born on the River Tweed,
Scotland, in 1820, and when only thirteen years of
age came to the United States and settled at Roches-
ter, New York, where in time he became a dealer
in furnishing goods for men. In 1861 he enlisted
for the Civil war in Company E, First Michigan
Engineers, and was killed while in the service in
1863, near Tullahoma, Tennessee. He was an ad-
vocate of the principles of the then newly organized
republican party, and had long belonged to the
Masonic fraternity. The maiden name of his wife
was Elizabeth Wilson, and she was born in 1821
in County Armagh, Ireland. Her death occurred
at Grand Rapids. Michigan, in 1889.' Her parents
brought her to the United States when she was a
child, settling at Rochester, New York. She and
her husband had the following children : Doctor
Sligh. who was the eldest; Elizabeth, who mar-
ried _M. L. Hawkins, a wholesale grocer of Grand
Rapids, Michigan, who survives her, she having
died in that city in 1896: Charles, who is a suc-
cessful business man oit Grand Rapids, owns and
operates the largest bedroom furniture factory in
the world ; Julia, who resides at Grand Rapids, is
the widow of Judge Follett, who died in Texas,
and was probate judge and a man of ample means;
and Robert, who was a deputy sheriff, died in Colo-
rado in 1884.
Doctor Sligh attended the public schools of Grand
HISTORY OF MONTANA
301
Rapids, Michigan, and was graduated from its high
school. In August, 1861, he enlisted in the First
Michigan Engineers and served all through the
Civil war, rising from private to be captain, and as
such was mustered out in September, 1865, having
served on the staff of General Thomas as a non-
commissioned officer and later as a commissioned
one. He participated in the engagements at Green
River, where General ZoUicoffer was killed ; the 100
Days Campaign from Chattanooga to Atlanta ; and
that at Nashville, Tennessee. .
Following his discharge Doctor Sligh entered the
Detroit Medical College, from which he was grad-
uated in 1880 with the degree of Doctor of Medi-
cine. Subsequently Doctor Sligh has done post-
graduate work, during 1893 at the New York Post
Graduate School, and in 1906 at the Chicago Post
Graduate School. Until 1887 Doctor Sligh was en-
gaged in a general practice at Grand Rapids, but in
that year went west to Seattle, Washington, where
he spent a short period, and then during the re-
mainder of 1887 and 1888 was at Helena, Montana
as surgeon of the Montana Central Railroad. From
1889 to 1896 he was surgeon of the Granite and
Bimetallic mines in Granite County. In the fall
of 1896 he came to Anaconda, being one of the
pioneers in his profession in this city, and has since
continued in a general practice. His offices are at
No. no West Third Street. Like his father, he is
a republican and was the first man to be elected
to the Upper House of the State Assembly from
Granite County, his election taking place in 1890.
At present he is city health officer, and has been .
county health officer, his efforts in behalf of his
community resulting in a noticeable improvement
in sanitary conditions and requirements. The Epis-
copal Church holds his membership. He belongs
to Oriental Lodge No. 240, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, of Detroit, Michigan, and to the
Rotary Club. Professionally he maintains member-
ship in the Deerlodge County Medical Society, the
Montana State Medical Society, and the American
Medical Association. He owns his office, as well as
his residence, the latter being at the same location
as the former.
In 1867 Doctor Sligh was married at Grand
Rapids, Michigan, to Miss Sara Hill, a daughter
of Mrs. Sara Hill of Grand Rapids, Michigan, who
is now deceased. Doctor Sligh has the following
children: Lilla, who was graduated from the De-
troit, Michigan, High. School, married A. B. Ken-
nan, a government employe for many j'ears, lives
at Newport. Rhode Island, Bessie, who was also
graduated from the Detroit High School, is the
widow of Judge Mclntyre, judge of the District
Court of Helena, Montana, died in that city m
1917, and there Mrs. Mclntyre still maintains her
residence; Carrie, who was graduated from the
same high school as her sisters, married George
Sigler, a farmer, and they live at Florence, A'rizona;
and Charles, who is in California. The fourth child,
a daughter, Catherine, died at the age of twenty
years.
Doctor Sligh has always been a splendid ex-
ample of what physician ought to be, and has al-
ways inspired confidence in a marked degree.
Wherever he has been located he has had an im-
mense practice, and at present he is really over-
worked caring for those who look to him for as-
sistance. In his official capacity Doctor Sligh has
been productive of more practical good than any-
one who has held these positions, and Anaconda
and Deerlodge County owe him a debt not easily
discharged. He is a ceaseless worker and a stimu-
lus to those about him, and in addition to his ever
growing practice does a large amount of work for
charity's sake alone. It is not an exaggeration to
say that Doctor Sligh has done as much for medi-
cine as any other man of his profession in Mon-
tana, and beyond all this he is a man who draws
other men to him and holds them in the closest
bonds of friendship.
Hazen M. Parker. Some of the most capable
business men of any community are those who
have fitted themselves for professional careers. The
long and arduous training for any of the learned
callings and the experiences therein so develop and
equip a man that he can readily turn to whatever
branch of business activity appeals to him with
a greater certainty of achieving a fair measure of
success. This is illustrated in the career of Hazen
M. Parker, who was formerly engaged in the prac-
tice of law in Minneapolis, Minnesota, but is now
in the loan and insurance business in Billings. Mr.
Parker was born at Peacham, Vermont, March 26,
1855, a son of Dr. Luther F. and Louisa M. Parker,
and a grandson of Isaac Parker.
The several branches of the Parker family were
early established in America, the progenitors of
the different branches, four brothers, coming from
England and locating in Massachusetts within twen-
ty years after the landing of the Mayflower. They
soon began to migrate to different parts of New
England, and are now scattered all over this coun-
try and have everywhere become interwoven with
the social fabric.
Early in the development of Vermont one of
these emigrants settled in Cavendish, Vermont, and
it was at that place that Isaac Parker was born
on September 23, 1790. He was graduated from
Middlebury College, Middlebury, Vermont, in 1815,
having entered that college immediately after the
War of 1812. All of his life thereafter he lived
at Coventry, Vermont, and there died July 31,
1882. He was a proficient student of the Latin
and Greek languages as well as of general edu-
cational subjects, and. although his vocation was
that of farming, he always took an active part in
educational matters and was a man of great in-
fluence in affairs of the state.
On December 24, 181 8, he was married to Ara-
bella Cobb, who was born June 24, 1795, and died
at Coventry, November 14, 1872. Isaac Parker and
his wife reared a large family.
Dr. Luther F. Parker, their second son, was born
at Coventry, September 21, 1821, and died at
Peacham, September 12, 1898, having been engaged
in the practice of medicine at Peacham for more
than forty years. Doctor Parker was a thorough-
ly-equipped and successful physician. He spent
two years at the University of Vermont at Bur-
lington and then became a student in the medical
department of Dartmouth College, from which he
graduated with the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
He was always a leader in social and political ac-
tivities and in church and educational matters. His
sympathies were always broad and intense and he
was always fearless in attacking and exposing wrong
wherever it appeared. For many years he was
active trustee of the Caledonia County grammar
school, commonly called "Peacham Academy," and
was ever}' year on the examining board. This
school was one of the three schools established
by the state prior to 1800, and is still in flourish-
ing condition. It is to the influence of Doctor
Parker that this school owes much of its efficiency.
For several sessions he took a leading part in the
Legislature of the state, as representative of his
302
HISTORY OF MONTANA
town. He was a consistent, but intrepid, member
o£ the Congregational Church.
On June 6, 1S50, Doctor Parker was married to
Louisa Martin, who was born in Peacham in 1822,
and who died in iSyb. Their children who reached
maturity were as follows ; Jennie M., who married
Edward C. Hardy, of Framingham, Massachusetts,
engaged in mercantile business in Boston; Hazen
M., whose name heads this review; Elizabeth A.,
who is unmarried and lives on the old homestead
in Peacham; Ellen L., who married Walter H. Bay-
ley, a farmer in Peacham; and Alma A., who mar-
ried Col. George Harvey, the owner and editor
of the North American Review, and lives at Deal,
New Jersey.
Hazen M. Parker is connected with some of the
prominent people of Vermont. The eldest sister
of his grandfather, Isaac Parker, named Hannah
(Parker) Redfield, was the mother of Isaac F.
Redfield, for many years chief justice of the Su-
preme Court of Vermont, and the author of sev-
eral legal treatises, and the mother of Timothy
P. Redtield, for a long time one of the associate
justices of the Supreme Court of Vermont. An-
other sister of Isaac Parker, Grace (Parker) Proc-
tor, was the mother of Redfield Proctor, who es-
tablished the Vermont Marble Company, was gov-
ernor of Vermont, secretary of war under Presi-
dent Benjamin Harrison, and afterward United
States senator from Vermont.
After attending the common schools of Peacham,
Vermont, Hazen M. Parker prepared for college
in Peacham Academy and entered Middlebury
College and took the regular classical course and
was graduated therefrom in 1880, with the degree
of Bachelor of Arts. He was one of the Phi Beta
Kappa men of his class and a member of the Delta
Upsilon fraternity. In 1880 he began the study of
law in Montpelier, Vermont, and in the succeeding
year went to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and finished
his legal course and was admitted to the bar in
that city in April, 1883. Until the spring of 1905
Mr. Parker was successfully engaged in the gen-
eral practice of law at Minneapolis, when he closed
out his law business and began railroad construc-
tion work with Winston Brothers Company of
Minneapolis, extensive railroad contractors, and
continued actively in railroad construction work
till the fall of 1913, when he settled in Billings,
sold his construction outfit and began the busi-
ness he is now in. Much of his railroad work had
been in Montana, and when Mr. Parker came to
Billings and became acquainted with the city and
the tributary country he thought he saw a good
opening and began to establish himself in a loan
and insurance line with offices in the Stapleton
Block, where he still is located, and has built up
valuable connections. However, he has not been
able to forget his old habits and still does a limited
amount of law work.
Mr. Parker lives in his home at 224 Avenue D,
owns a small ranch east of town a few miles, de-
voted mostly to stockraising.
Mr. Parker is a zealous student of economics and
of social questions and takes a lively niterest in
civic matters, but is not a politician and is not bound
by party ties. He is a democrat in the broad, but
not party sense, and votes for principles and affili-
ates with such political organizations and supports
such men as he thinks most nearly represent such
principles.
On December 6, 1882, Mr. Parker was married
to Miss Julia T. Douglas, of Middlebury, Ver-
mont. Mrs. Parker is a descendant of the famous
"Black" Douglas of Scotland, on her maternal side.
and belongs to one of the best strains of New
England stock. She was born in February, 1855,
in Western Vermont, near the shore of Lake Cham-
plain, and was reared mostly in Middlebury, amid
the gorgeous sunsets of the Adirondacks.
Mr. and Mrs. Parker, have only one child, a son,
Fletcher Douglas Parker, who was born in Minne-
apolis, Minnesota, in July, 1888. He was educated
in the graded and high schools of Minneapolis
and of Proctor, Vermont, and in Williams Col-
lege, from which he was graduated in 191 1 with
the degree of Bachelor of Arts. He entered col-
lege a stranger from the West, but was graduated
as president of his class, a Gargoyle man and a
member of Phi Delta Theta fraternit}-. Having
determined to enter the Christian ministry, he took
his theological course at Hartford Theological
Seminary, from which he was graduated in 1915.
Two months before his graduation he was called
to the pastorate of the Trinitarian Congregational
Church of New Bedford, Massachusetts, at a larger
salary than any new graduate from that institution
had received for forty years. The following Sep-
tember he began his work with that church and
continued as its pastor for 3"^ years. He soon
became recognized as a leader in ministerial and
civic affairs. During the European war he devoted
much time to work for soldiers in camp and in
the field. In the Autumn of 1918 he was called
to become secretary and superintendent of Boston
City Missions. By reason of this call he resigned
his pastorate of New Bedford and on February
I, 1919, began his new work. In 1916 he was mar-
ried to Katharine Ordway, of Winchester, Massa-
chusetts, and has resided at Winchester since he
left New Bedford.
It is an interesting coincidence that in the year
1640 the immigrant Parker ancestor first appeared
in American records in Woburn, Massachusetts,
which included Winchester, and that in the same
year the immigrant Douglas ancestor first appeared
in American records in Boston, Massachusetts.
Their descendant, Fletcher Douglas Parker, now
lives where his Parker ancestor lived and his work
is where his Douglas ancestor lived.
From this sketch it is seen that Mr. Hazen M.
Parker is in a line of men who for several gen-
erations have done and are doing real work in
the world. They have done it unselfishly with no
aim to amass wealth. His grandfather and his
father met the questions and faced the issues of
their day with intelligence and courage and with
a view to social good. He believes that greater
questions of social welfare and more momentous
social issues are at stake now than they ever
dreamed of and he is trying to meet these ques-
tions and these issues with the same ' vigor and
the same fidelity and with the same view to social
justice that characterized them and has tried to
pass on to his son the same deteimination.
An omission has been made in this sketch and
the above only half tells the story. In the back-
gtound loom up the peers of all of these men,
their wives and mothers. These women all came
from the best tj-pe of New England families and
exerted their full share of influence. If Doctor
Parker inherited from his father, Isaac Parker,
an ability and a fondness for study, he also in-
herited from his mother, Arabella (Cobb) Parker,
the physical vigor and many of the sturdy quali-
ties which characterized him. If Hazen M. Parker
inherited good qualities from the Parker side, he
had equally good inheritances from the Martin
side. His life was molded by one of the most
competent and lovable mothers that ever breathed
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the Green Mountain air. If Fletcher Douglas Par-
ker has in his makeup a composite of the qualities
derived from his Parker, Martin and Cobb ances-
try, he also has the resolute vigor and devotion of
his Douglas and Potter maternal ancestry.
Harry C. Carpenter, of Billings, is manager of
the Carpenter Paper Company of Montana, and
son of one of the founders of that well known
paper house, which was established at Omaha,
February ist, 18S7, and is the medium through
which much o£ the paper for printing and other
purposes is distributed throughout the West.
Mr. Carpenter was born at Omaha, April 9, 1889.
The Carpenters are of Scotch and French stock,
have been in America since colonial times. His
(grandfather, Chester L. Carpenter, was born in
Delaware County, New York, in 1816, was an early
settler and farmer at Marengo, Illinois, and late
in life retired and moved to Omaha, where he
died in 1905. One of his sons, John C., now de-
ceased, was a veteran of the Civil war.
J. Frank Carpenter, father of Harry C, was
born at Marengo, Illinois, in i860, grew up on a
farm there, and on leaving the farm went to Chi-
cago. He began his career in that city as a paper
peddler and later became city salesman for one of
the leading paper houses in Chicago. With a com-
petent knowledge and experience of the paper
business he went to Omaha in 1887 and with his
brother, I. W. Carpenter, established the Carpenter
Paper Company. During the past thirty-five years
this has grown to be a great business, and branch
houses have been established all over the Middle
West from the Mexican to the Canadian borders
and from Salt Lake Citv to Des Moines, Iowa. J.
Frank Carpenter was secretary of the company
and died at Omaha. Nebraska, in 1907. He was a
republican, a member of the Baptist Church, and
was affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows and the Woodmen of the World. J. Frank
Carpenter married Marion Avery, who was born
in Marengo, Illinois, in 1862, and is still living at
Omaha. She is the mother of four children ; Gil-
bert, treasurer and salesman at Omaha for the
Carpenter Paper Company; Harry C, of Billings;
and Marion and Eleanor, both unmarried and liv-
ing at home.
Harry C. Carpenter graduated from the Omaha
High School in 1909, following which he com-
pleted a liberal education with one year in the
University of Wisconsin and two years in Cornell
University at Ithaca, New York. On leaving col-
lege he went to work for the Carpenter Paper
Company at Omaha as sales clerk. He was rapidly
promoted, first to stock clerk, then as assistant
salesman, and in April, 1917, came to Billings as
assistant manager. In November, 1918, he was
made manager of the Billings branch. In this
■state the business is incorporated as the Carpenter
Paper Company of Montana. The offices are in the
Oliver Building at Billings, and from that office
the business is directed over Northern Wyoming
and those portions of Montana east of Bozeman,
Helena and Great Falls. The company handles a
complete line of print paper, also wrapping paper,
and represents the manufacturers of wrapping sun-
dries, such as wooden butter dishes, twine, toilet
paper, congoleum, etc.
Mr. Carpenter is a republican, is subscription
secretary of the Baptist Church at Billings, a mem-
ber of the United Commercial Travelers, the Bill-
ings Club, the Rotary Club and the Midland Club.
He owns a modern home at 320 Clark Avenue.
He married Miss Elva Hammer at Harlan, Iowa,
in 1915. Her parents are Mr. and Mrs. P. A. Ham-
mer of Billings, her father being a real estate sales-
man. Mr. and Mrs. Carpenter have two children :
Naomi, born September 15, 1916, and Harry C, Jr.,
born October 25, 1918.
Stewart McConochie, who began the practice of
law at Lewistown in 1912, is serving his second
term as county attorney of Fergus County. He
has made a splendid record both in office and as
a private lawyer, and is looked upon as one of the
younger men of exceptional attainments in the
state.
He was born at Cambria in Columbia County,
Wisconsin, February 29, 1880, a son of Robert N.
and Annie J. (Rowe) McConochie. His father was
a native of Wisconsin and his mother of Bowman-
ville, Ontario, Canada. Robert N. McConochie was
a Wisconsin farmer, and afterward became promi-
nent in business affairs in Columbia County, serv-
ing as president of the Portage Loan and Trust
Company from its organization until his death.
He also served one term in the Wisconsin Legis-
lature and was chairman of the Board of County
Supervisors. He was a republican, a Presbyterian
and an Elk. He and his wife had two children,
Stewart and Margaret.
Stewart McConochie had a liberal education. He
prepared for college in Wayland Academy at
Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, and graduated from the
University of Wisconsin with the class of 1906.
While in University he was prominent in various
student activities, being editor-in-chief of the Daily
Cardinal, associate editor of the Badger, and was
manager of the university basketball team and for
his work in that department of athletics received
the university letter. He was also a member of
the Iron Cross, an honorary society, and the Delta
Kappa Epsilon fraternity.
Mr. McConochie was admitted to the Wisconsin
bar in 1908, and for several years was engaged in
practice at Madison, Wisconsin. He located at
Lewistown, Montana, in 1910 and was in the real
estate business until admitted to the bar in 1912,
and has been engaged in the practice of law since
May of that year. He was assistant county at-
torney from 1912 to January i, igiS- In 1916 he
was elected to the full responsibilities of the office
of county attorney. He took office January i, 1917.
and was re-elected for his second term in Novem-
ber, 1918. Mr. McConochie is a democrat, and
is affiliated with Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks, and with Lodge
No. 1239 of the Loyal Order of Moose.
June 25, 1913, he married Hazel M. KauU, who
was born in Redfield, South Dakota. They have
one daughter, Jean Marie.
Charles Spear. The acknowledged and recog-
nized prestige attained by the leading men of large
communities is chiefly due to that spirit of advance-
ment which urges them onward and upward. The
possession of this ambition to gain imposing pre-
eminence is shared by all who attain to successful
position, and even the humblest may develop into
a man of high standing provided he possesses the
ability to forge ahead. Many a life has been re-
constructed from small beginnings, and few of the
really able men of the country have been born with
the proverbial "silver spoon" in their mouths. Of
the leading citizens of Billings, one who has exem-
plified in his career the rewards to be gained through
properly directed ambition, and who has himself
risen from obscurity, is Charles Spear, president
of the American Bank and Trust Company, a lead-
304
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ing ranchman and a citizen who has been honored
by election to positions of marked trUst and re-
sponsibiHty.
Mr. Spear was born on a farm in Atchison Coun-
ti', Missouri, May 15, i860, a son of Willis and
Jane (Ferguson) Spear. His great-grandfather,
David Spear, a soldier of the Continental line from
Massachusetts during the Revolutionary war, spent
the greater part of his life in that state, being
engaged in farming, but later removed to Con-
necticut, where he passed the remainder of his
days in the pursuits of the soil. He married Mary
Clark also born in Massachusetts, who was a de-
■ scendant of Richard Clark, one of the passengers
of the Mayflower. Of the children of David and
Mary Spear, John Spear, the grandfather of
Charles, was born in February, 1788, in Massachu-
setts, and died in Nodaway County, Missouri, in
October, 1886. He lived successively in Connecti-
cut, New York, Ohio and Indiana, and removed
finally to Missouri, in which state, as also in In-
diana and Ohio, he was a pioneer farmer. He mar-
ried Polly Osborne, who was born in Connecticut,
daughter of Moses Osborne, a farmer who died in
that state.
Willis Spear was born in 1824, in Western New
York, and was a small boy when his parents re-
moved to Ohio, the family settling near Ashtabula.
He resided there until 1S45, when he went to Iowa,
then a territory, in 1846 moved on to New Orleans,
Louisiana, and in 1847 joined the United States
troops, with which he went to Mexico, subsequently
serving throughout the Mexican war. He went
to the City of Mexico with the victorious army,
where he received his honorable discharge, having
served as a scout from the time the troops left
Vera Cruz. After the declaration of peace he re-
mained in Mexico for one }'ear, and in tlie spring
of 1849 went to Texas, where he was residing when
he learned of the discovery of gold in California.
With about ninety other hardy and adventurous
souls he went through Northern Mexico into Cali-
fornia, where he was engaged in mining and other
vocations until 1S53, and then returned to near
South Bend, Indiana. The call of the West sounded
clear to him, however, and he soon again turned
his face toward the setting sun, locating at Des
Moines, Iowa, at that time only a small settlement
surroundmg the fort. After two years of farm-
ing he went to the northwestern part of Missouri
and engaged in farming until 1874, when he went
to Wyoming and resided one year. In 1875 he
came to Montana and lived at Phillipsburg' and
Drummond until 188.?. when he went to near Sheri-
dan. Wyoming. When he retired from active pur-
suits he settled at Billings, in 1895, but soon re-
turned to Sheridan, Wyoming, where his death oc-
curred in 1912. He was a republican in his po-
litical views. Mr. Spear was truly a product of his
times, with the spirit of adventure and unrest which
at all times led him into adventure and to the new
places. His associates always found him a man
■of honor, who was self-reliant and forceful, will-
ing to stand upon his own feet, and courageous in
any undertaking in which he enlisted. He married
Jane Ferguson, who was born in 1826 in Ohio, and
died at Billings in 1905, and they became the par-
ents of six children: Oceana, who died at Roches-
ter, Minnesota, as the wife of M. L. Hoyt, formerly
a resident of Billings but now of Big Horn, Wyo-
ming, who is office manager for W. M. Spear and
his associates in the cattle business ; Mary, the wife
of Paul McCormick, a retired pioneer, now a resi-
dent of Billings, formerly a prominent cattle raiser,
merchant and all-round business man : Charles ;
W. M., of Sheridan, Wyoming, who has large cat-
tle interests; Emily, the wife of J. S. DeWitt, for-
merly a blacksmith and jeweler and now a resi-
dent of Long Beach, California; and William H.,
a leading stockman of Sheridan, V\'yoming.
Charles Spear was educated in the public schools
of Missouri and Montana and resided with his par-
ents until he reached the age of twenty-one years.
At that time he secured a position with the Paul
McCormick Company at Junction, Montana, re-
maining in the employ of that concern for 7^ years,
from October, 1882, until 1890. In the latter year
he engaged in the grocery and hardware business
at Billings, as Donavan & Spear, there being -but
one other firm of the kind in the city at that time,
that of Yegen Brothers. In 1900 he disposed of
his interests in this business, and two years later
became one of the organizers of the Billings State
Bank, of which he was first cashier and later pres-
ident. At the time of the consolidation of the
three leading banks at Billings into the American
Bank and Trust Comp'any Mr. Spear became vice
president of the new institution, and March I, 1919,
was elected president, a position which he still
retains, and in which he is directing the policies of
the bank in a capable, confident and conservative
manner. Mr. Spear has various other interests and
is president of the Billings Building and Loan
Association. Since 1917 he has devoted a large
share of his time to his 4,000-acre cattle ranch at
Kane, Wyoming, where he runs 1,400 head of cat-
tle, and in addition is the owner of another ranch
of 160 acres in the Yellowstone Valley. In addi-
tion to his own residence, at No. 1015 North Thir-
tieth street, Mr. Spear owns considerable realty
at Billings, including several valuable and desirable
dwellings. His political belief makes him a repub-
lican. He has always been a good and public-
spirited citizen and has found time from his various
business activities to serve his city as alderman
for two terms and his county as a member of the
board of commissioners . one term, and his public
record is an excellent one. Fraternally Mr. Spear
is affiliated with Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons; Billings Chapter No.
6, Royal Arch Masons ; Aldemar Commandery No.
9, Knights Templar ; Algeria Temple, Ancient Ar-
abic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine of Helena,
and Edna Chapter, Order of the Eastern Star. He
also holds membership in the Billings Club and the
Billings Midland Empire Club.
Mr. Spear was married July 27. 1886, at Junction,
Montana, to Frances Gruwell. daughter of C. O.
and Sarah B. (Bohannan) Gruwell, who reside
near Twin Falls, Idaho, where Mr. Gruwell is
engaged in farming. Mrs. Spear was born at Fort
Benton, Montana, in 1868, and is a representative
of one of Montana's pioneer families. To Mr. and
Mrs. Spear there have been born eight children :
Clara, the wife of Ira Scribner, of New York
City, one of the few men who follow the unusual
profession of stage architect ; Dora, the wife of W.
F. O'Day, of Billings, assistant cashier of the
American Bank and Trust Company; Gladys, the
wife of Earl Bemis, a resident of Louisville, Ken-
tucky; Frances, the wife of Basil Brooks, of Chey-
enne, Wyoming, at present in the United States
service ; Charles Gruwell, at home, his father's
assistant ; and Martha, John and Mary Jane, who
reside with their parents.
_ Patrick M. H.\lloran. Indentified almost con-
tinuously since boyhood with railroad interests,
few men of his years may lay claim to wider ex-
perience along certain lines, or better preparatory
(fi7nM^u.-a^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
training for the exceedingly important offices he
now holds than Patrick M. Halloran, auditor, treas-
urer and secretary of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific
Railway Company, at Anaconda, Montana.
Patrick M. Halloran was born November ii,
i860, at Hamilton, in the Province of Ontario,
Canada. His parents were Patrick and Jane (De-
vine) Halloran, both natives of Ireland, the father
born in County Clare in 1827, and the mother in
County Sligo, in 1832. In early manhood the father
emigrated to Canada and located at Hamilton when
that city had a population not exceeding 5,000.
He was married there, and both he and wife died
in that city, the father, in June, 1902, and the mother,
January 4, 1919. For many years he had been
engaged in a grocery business. In early political
life he was a conservative but later united with
the liberal party. Both parents were members of
the Roman Catholic Church. The following chil-
dren were born to them : James Williams, who
was born October 5, 1S56, operates the grocery
store at Hamilton that his father established ; John
M., who was born December 16, 1858, is a general
merchant at Spokane, Washington; Patrick M. ;
Edward J., who was born December 25, 1863, is
manager of a large wholesale carriage goods house
at Toronto, is a prominent business man of that
city; Catherine, who was born January 26, 1866,
resides with her brother, James W., at Hamilton,
Canada; Sarah, 'who was born December 28, 1867,
is a nun in Canada, who from 1889 resided
in St. Joseph's convent at Hamilton, as mother of
novices and in 1919 was promoted to mother su-
perior at Arthur, Ontario ; Mary, who was born
May 26, 1872, has, like her older sister, devoted
her life to the service of the church, was mother
of novices in the Loretto order, at Toronto, and
in 1919 was promoted to mother superior in the
Loretto Academy at Englewood, Chicago, Illinois.
Patrick M. Halloran was educated in the parochial
schools at Hamilton, and was only fourteen years
old when he became self-supporting as a clerk in
the car accountant's office, of the Great Western
Railway. When he reached the age of nineteen
years he left familiar home surroundings and his
native land. After reaching Chicago he secured a
position in a grocery store, but after three months
of work as a grocery clerk, he decided to return
to the railroad, and, as he had had previous ex-
perience, secured a clerkship in the car accountant's
office of the Northwestern Railroad, Chicago, with
a salary of $30 a month. After eleven weeks with
the Chicago office he was sent in the same capacity
to Milwaukee, where he then became car accountant
for the Milwaukee, Lake Shore & Western Rail-
way. Rapid promotion followed until he became
chief clerk and general bookkeeper, with a salary
of $125 a month, continuing as such until April,
1887, during this time occasionally serving also as
auditor. In the above month and year he once
more essayed mercantile life, embarking in a fur-
nishing goods business at Hurley, Wisconsin, but
shortly afterward lost his store and stock in a fire
that almost destroyed the entire city.
Mr. Halloran then became station agent at Hur-
ley and remained there for T^ years, when other
sections appeared more desirable than the mining
town and this led to his becoming chief clerk at
Colorado Springs for the Colorado Midland Rail-
way, where he remained imtil 1802. Failing health
then indicated needed rest, and he spent a season
in his old home in Canada and at Toronto. In
October, iqoi, he came back to Chicago and for
several months assisted in the office of the audi-
tor of freight receipts with the Wisconsin Cen-
tral Railway, then became general freight and pas-
senger agent and auditor at Marshfield, Wiscon-
sin, for the Marshfield & Southeastern Railway,
now a part of the Soo System. Mr. Halloran
remained there for four years, or until the lumber
importance of that region gave out, when he became
an employe of the Wisconsin Central Railway in
the ticket office at Milwaukee for a few months.
Later, for the same railway, he was rate clerk at
Manitowoc, where he remained one year. Just
about that time, in March, 1897, came his appoint-
ment as auditor, treasurer and secretary for the
Butte, Anaconda and Pacific Railway, in answer
to an application for position made three years
previously. This offer he immediately accepted and
his efficient services have been given to this trans-
portation line ever since. He has seven clerks un-
der his supervision and his offices are with the
general offices of the road, on West Commercial
Avenue, Anaconda.
On October 2, 1891, Mr. Halloran was united in
marriage to Miss Mary S. Harte, who died July
2, 1903. Her parents were Patrick and Barbara
(Higgins) Harte, both now deceased. At one time
Mr. Harte was a well known teacher and journalist
at Hamilton. To the above marriage children were
born as follows : Angela, who was born September 13,
1892, at Marshfield, Wisconsin, is city physician for
crippled children in New York City, having prepared
for this noble work by a course of three years in
a nurse's training school at Hamilton, and a year
in the Women's Hospital, New York City; William
P., who was born November i, 1893, at Marshfield,
is chief clerk to the general freight agent of the
Butte, Anaconda and Pacific Railway Company at
Anaconda, and additionally conducts a successful
shorthand school here, having been educated in
Gonzaga College, Spokane, Washington, and Mount
St. Charles College, Helena, Montana; Rachel
Jeannette, who was born October 19, 1897, at Ana-
conda, is clerk in a business house at Hamilton,
Ontario, and formerly taught school ; Catherine, who
was born February 8, 1899, is a teacher at Hamilton,
Canada ; John F., who was born June 16, IQOO, was
graduated from the high school at Hamilton at the
age of fifteen, left Notre Dame University to enter
the navy, but the ending of the great war made his
sacrifice unnecessary and he will complete his col-
lege course ; Paul Francis, who was born January
29, 1902, is employed in Hamilton ; and Mary, who
was born June 25, 1903, was a pupil in the Hamilton
High School and is now attending Loretta Convent
at Toronto, Ontario.
On September 29, 1908. Mr. Halloran was married
to Miss May La Belle, who is a daughter of Joseph
La Belle and wife, the latter of whom is deceased.
The father of Mrs. Halloran is a farmer in Alberta,
Canada. They have four children, namely : Inez,
who was born November 12, 1909; James, who was
born November 20. 191 1; Helen, who was born
June 16. 101,=;: and Philip, who was born November
I, 1919. Mr. Halloran belongs to the Roman
Catholic Church. He is quite prominent in the order
of Knights of Columbus, a member of Anaconda
Council No. 882 and treasurer of this council for the
past thirteen j-ears, and since its organization fifteen
years ago has been treasurer of the State Council.
For the past twenty-five years he has been a mem-
ber of the Catholic Order of Foresters. He is a
man of social impulses and enjoys out-door sports,
finding pleasure as a member of the Anaconda
Curling Club and the Anaconda Tennis Club, and
is president of the latter. He belongs also to that
rather exclusive organization, the Anaconda Country
Club. Politically a democrat, he takes a good citi-
306
HISTORY OF MONTANA
zen's interest in party success as well as the general
welfare. Puring 1918 he was president of the City
School Board and still belongs to this civic body,
and in innumerable ways works to benetit city and
Robert T. Allex, Sr., of Billings, is one of the
few lawyers still active in practice who tried their
first cases while Montana was still a territory. He
has been a resident of Billings over thirty-five years,
and is widely known for his talents as a lawyer
and as one of the leading citizens.
He was born in Noble Countv, Ohio, June 6,
i8w, of an old faniilv of that state and the still
older State of Virginia. His grandfather, John
Allen, was born in Virginia, grew up and married
there, and went as a pioneer to Ohio and died in
Monroe County, that state, in 1866. He was a
farmer, and served in the Mexican war. He mar-
ried MoUie Blondon, a native of Virginia. The
Aliens as a family were colonial settlers in Virginia,
coming from England.
Robert Allen, father of the Billings lawyer, was
born in Virginia in 1814. He became a farmer
and wagon maker in Noble County, Ohio, and died
there in 1850, the same year his son was born. He
was a member of the Methodist Church. Robert
Allen married Rachel Guiler. She was born in
Pennsylvania March 4, 1828, and died at Billings.
Montana, December 24, 1917. Her father, William
Guiler, was born in Ireland in 1780, came to Amer-
ica in early life, served with the Americans in
the War of 1812 and was a pioneer farmer in
Ohio. He died near Freedom in Noble County in
1864. His wife, Marv Franklin, was also a native
of Ireland. Robert Allen and wife had two chil-
dren, Dr. W. A. Allen, a dentist at Billings, and
Robert T.
Robert T. Allen acquired his early education in
the rural schools of his native Ohio county. In
1864, when he was fourteen years old, his widowed
mother moved to Centerville, Iowa, and he grad-
uated from the high school there in 1868. His
preparation for the legal profession was made in
the University of Iowa at Iowa City, where he
graduated with the LL. B. degree in 1875. For
a time Mr. Allen taught school, and for one year
practiced law with the firm of Hall & Baldwin at
Burlington, Iowa. He came to Billings in 1882, and
was associated with all the pioneer lawyers of
that day. He still gives his time to an active prac-
tice, with offices in the Chicago Building. Mr.
.Mien has perhaps been chiefly distinguished as a
criminal lawyer. One of his most notable cases
was the prasecution of the Bussy case. Bussy had
taken refuge in a box and was shot fifteen times
and killed. His assailant through the efforts of
Mr. Allen was convicted and sentenced to six years
in the penitentiary. Mr. Allen served as county
attorney one term, cit>' attorney one term, and one
term as justice of the peace.
He is a republican, and is a prominent Methodist.
He was one of the seven organizers of the Methodist
Church at Billings, and has filled every lay office in
that church. He is a former member of the Good
Templars and a member of the Commercial Club.
Mr. Allen lives in a modern home at 317 North
Thirty-second Street. He married at Fountain City,
Wisconsin, in 1885 Miss Minnie Finkelburg. Her
father, J. A. Finkelnburg, who died at St. Augustine.
Florida, was at one time judge of the District
Court of Buffalo County, Wisconsin, and afterward
served in the Wisconsin State Senate. Mr. and
Mrs. .Mien have three children. Roscoe F. is a
mining engineer with offices at Los .Angeles, and
in the practice of his profession has spent three
and a half years in old Mexico and two and a half
years in Central America. Pattie, who is unmar-
ried, was for eight years a teacher in the Billings
High School and in 1918 took up a new work as an
educator at San Antonio, Texas. Bernice is the
chief stenographer of the Merchants National Bank
at Billings.
Thomas M. Kehoe. The career of Hon. Thomas
M. Kehoe, one of the foremost citizens of Billings,
as been one of intense and unceasing activity, of
participation in events which have made history, and
of achievements as a business man, rancher, soldier
and statesman. His rise from clerkship in a drug
store to the ownership of large tracts of valuable
Montana lands and the incumbency of positions of
importance and responsibility in various walks of
life has been at the same time somewhat spectacular,
thoroughly consistent and entirely well merited.
Mr. Kehoe was born at Bailey's Harbor, Wis-
consin, July 19, 1870, a son of Patrick and Mary
(Madigan) Kehoe. His father was born in 1836, in
County W'icklow, Ireland, and at the age of seven-
teen j-ears accompanied his parents to America, the
family first locating in the Province of Ontario.
Canada. One year later the eighteen-year-old youth
made his way to the United States and after spend-
ing two years in Illinois, where he was married,
went to Bailey's Harbor, Wisconsin, and embarked
in the lumber shipping business, which he followed
for several years on the Great Lakes. In 1874 he
removed to Worth County, Iowa, where he em-
barked in farming, and continued to be an agricul-
turist in that state until 1900, when he practically
retired from active affairs and took up his residence
at Minneapolis, Minnesota. Shortly thereafter, how-
ever, he went to Fergus Falls, Minnesota, and
there his death occurred September 4, 1916. Mr.
Kehoe was a man of strong and rugged personality,
of sound integrity, and of real native ability. He
was a stanch democrat, and his religious faith was
that of the Roman Catholic Church. He married
Mary Madigan, who was born in 1838 in County
Limerick, Ireland, and in her early girlhood was
brought by her parents to America, the family
first settling in Ontario, Canada, from whence they
subsequently removed to Illinois, where she met
and married Mr. Kehoe. Mrs. Kehoe died in Worth
County. Iowa, in 1889, the mother of two sons:
Edward J., a farmer in the vicinity of Fergus
Falls. Minnesota; and Thomas M.
Thomas M. Kehoe attended the public schools
of Worth County, Iowa, while spending his boy-
hood on his father's farm, and subsequently en-
rolled as a student at the Minneapolis Academy,
from which institution he was graduated as a mem-
ber of the class of 1894. He next took a three-year
course in the University of Minnesota, at Min-
neapolis, and was graduated in pharmacy in 1897.
During his college career he was one of the mem-
bers of the varsity football team, with which he
won his letter, was a great favorite with the
students, and displayed remarkable prowess not only
upon the gridiron but in all lines of athletic sport.
Following his graduation he secured a position in a
drug store at Minneapolis, but at this time Iiis
career was interrupted by the outbreak of the
Spanish-American war. Mr. Kehoe offered his ser-
vices as a volunteer and was accepted as a mem-
ber of the Fifteenth Minnesota Infantry, being ^eut
for training to Camp Ramsey and later to Fnrt
Snelling. He then went with his command to Camp
Meade, Pennsylvania, and was later sent to Camp
McKenzie. Augusta, Georgia, but the war came
HISTORY OF MONTANA
307
to a termination before lie could get into active
service and he was mustered out with the rank of
sergeant. In March, 1899, he returned to St.
Paul, Minnesota, where he was located in the sum-
mer of the same year when a call was made for
100,000 volunteers to put down the Philippine in-
surrection. He at once volunteered and was ac-
cepted, becoming a member of the Forty-Fifth
United States Volunteers, and in this enlistment
saw much active service, going through the cam-
paign on" the Island of Luzon, Philippine Islands, as
a member of Gen. John C. Bates' division. Fol-
lowing the surrender of Aguinaldo he returned
to the United States and was mustered out at San
Francisco with the rank of sergeant, and returned
to St. Paul, where he again resumed his prosaic
duties as a drug clerk.
Mr. Kehoe's entry into Montana occurred in the
fall of 1901, when he located at Missoula and
secured a position in a drug store. In the summer
of 1905 he changed his location to Billings and
opened the Red Cross Drug Store, of which estab-
lishment he was proprietor for five years, during
which time he built up a large and prosperous busi-
ness. Mr. Kehoe was appointed a member of the
Montana State Board of Pharmacy in 1910, by
Governor E. L. Norris, and served efficiently in
that capacity for four years, and in 1915 was chosen
deputy sheriflf of Yellowstone County, and acted in
that position for two years. In the meantime he
had commenced farming operations, which he has
since developed to impressive proportions. Grad-
ually, but surely, Mr. Kehoe had been coming more
and more before the people, his natural qualities
of leadership asserting themselves and making them-
selves carry an influence upon others. His fitness
for the post of state legislator made him the logical
choice of the democratic party in his district in
the fall of 1916, and he was sent to tlie Legislature
as representative from Yellowstone County. In
that distinguished body, during the Fifteenth Ses-
sion, he immediately displayed his abilities and as-
sumed a position among the leaders of the House.
In addition to acting as speaker pro tem he was
chairman of the important way and means com-
mittee, and a member of the insurance, education
and corporations other than municipal committees,
and in addition to other important, valuable and
constructive work was the father of the successful
bill for the commission manager form of govern-
ment for cities.
Since his retirement from the Legislature Mr.
Kehoe has devoted himself largely to the improve-
ment of his ranches, although he makes his home
at Billings, where he has quarters at the Billings
Club. His main ranch is located six- miles north of
Pompey's Pillar, consisting of 640 acres devoted
to the growing of grain, and in addition he owns
a propertv of a like acreage, as yet unimproved, in
the same 'locality. He is a member of the Roman
Catholic Church, and is prominent in the Knights
of Columbus, in which he is a fourth degree knight,
a member of Billings Council No. 1250. and past
state deputv for the state of Montana. He belongs
also to the' Billings Lodge No. ,-^94. Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, and is vice president of
the Billings Club. Likewise, he is a member of
Camp Bruce Wallace of the United Spanish War
Veterans, and past department commander for the
State of Montana. Mr. Kehoe is unmarried.
Charles D. Thurber. American enterprise has
developed one section of this vast country after
another. As soon as one community becomes too
congested the more aggressive members of it go
forth to less thickly settled regions, taking with
them indomitable courage and faith in their new
environment. Thus it is that Billings has had so
remarkable a growth. Its leading business and
professional men are those who have come here
because they did not find in their old home suffi-
cient opportunity for development of their capabil-
ities, and because they recognized the possibilities
of the great State of Montana for those willing
to work hard to make them actualities, Charles
D. Thurber, proprietor of the Billings Carriage
Works, is just such a man, and his success is
indicative of the man and his community. He was
born at Hillsboro, Vernon County, Wisconsin, Sep-
tember 29, 1867. coming of Scotch ancestry, his
forebearers leaving that country for the American
colonies and here helping to determine the policies
of New York.
George W. Thurber, father of Charles D. Thurber,
was born in 1843 at South Bend, Indiana, to which
place the family had come with the westward tide of
civilization, and he died at Barron, Wisconsin, in
1899, having gone to that state from Indiana when
eighteen years of age. In 1861 George W. Thurber
set an example which his grandson followed many
years afterward, that of fighting for his country by
enlisting in the Sixth Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry,
and serving during the whole of the Civil war. He
participated in the battle of Gettysburg, where he
was captured and sent to Belle Isle, from which he
escaped. Unfortunately he was re-captured and
confined at Andersonville, from which he was not
released until after peace was declared. Returning
to Wisconsin, he resumed his agricultural work,
and spent the remainder of his life in that State.
A republican of the stanchest type, he was called
upon to fill a number of the township offices. The
Baptist Church held his membership and benefited
by his generosity of time and money. For many
years he was a member of the Masonic fraternity.
George W. Thurber was united in marriage w-ith
Lottie Jane Hill, born at Hillsboro, Wisconsin,
which was named for her father, William W. Hill,
the first settler in the township, as well as the first
in the eastern part of Vernon County. Her death
occurred at Baron. Wisconsin, in IQOI, when she
was forty-eight years old. She and her husband
had the following children ; Charles D„ whose
name heads this review ; .Mice, who died at the
age of twenty-five years ; Inez, who married Sam
Bailkey, manager of the Excelsior Mill of Oshkosh,
Wisconsin ; Myrtle, who married E. C. Leonard, now
deceased, was foreman for the Verick Motor Corh-
pany, and his widow resides at Minneapolis, Min-
nesota; William, who resides at Fargo, North Da-
kota, is engaged in farming; and Arthur, of whom
nothing definite is known.
Charles D. Thurber attended the schools of Hills-
boro and Baron, Wisconsin, and remained on his
father's farm until he was twelve years old, at
which time he began learning the blacksmithing
trade, before school and on holidays. After com-
nleting his trade he followed it at Baron and in
Minnesota, and in 1905 came to Montana and for
four years was in the employ of the Witmer Car-
riage Works at Helena, leaving there in 1909 for
Basin. Montana, where he was connected with the
Heinze machine plant until ion. In that year he
came to Billings and established his present business,
of which he continues to be the proprietor. His
plant is located at No, 2311 First Avenue. North.
and here he carries on a general blacksmithing and
repair business on carriages and automobiles. His
is the leading establishment nf its kind at Billings,
and so excellent is his work that his trade is
drawn from a wide _ territory. Mr, Thurber is
independent in his political views, but takes a deep
308
HISTORY OF MONTANA
interest in the improvement of civic conditions.
His fraternal connections are with Billings Lodge,
Knights of Pythias, and Billings Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America. His family residence, which
is a comfortable one, is at No. 107 North Nineteenth
Street.
In 1889 Mr. Thurber was married first to Miss
Bessie Treat, born at Bloomer, Wisconsin, and she
died at Baron, Wisconsin, in 1898, having borne
her husband the following children: Wilbur, who
as a member of the National army on overseas
service was sent into Germany after the signing
of the armistice; Hazel, who married Trueman
Hopkins, a smelter, lives at Anaconda, Montana;
and Verna, who is married and lives at Wallace,
Idaho, where her husband is interested in mining.
Mr. Thurber was married second, in 1904, at Sleepy
Eye, Minnesota, to Miss Ida Ehlenburg, born in
Illinois, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Ehlen-
burg. Mr. Ehlenburg, who is a retired railroad
man, lives at Gilberta, Illinois. Mr. and Mrs.
Thurber have three children, namely: Harold, Cleo
and Charlotte, all of whom are attending the public
schools of Billings.
James William Drake. One of the oldest rail-
way train men and conductors in the Northwest,
James William Drake has had an active e.xperience
of thirty years and of nearly a quarter of a century
in Montana. He is now one of the veteran railway
conductors for the Chicago, Milwaukee and St.
Paul.
Mr. Drake, whose home is at Lewistown, was
born in Clay County, South Dakota, on his father's
farm. May 27, 1870, son of Frederick M. and Nellie
E. (Rotnor) Drake. His parents were both born
in Elgin, Illinois. Frederick Drake at the age of
sixteen enlisted in the Union army and was with
his command in all its skirmishes and battles until
the close of hostilities, when he received his honor-
able discharge. He then engaged in the drug busi-
ness at West Union, Iowa, later located at Decorah,
Iowa, and engaged in general contracting, building
state and county roads. From there he moved to
St. Paul, Minnesota, and in 1883 went to work for
the Great Northern Railway as a freight conductor.
Later his home was in Minneapolis, where he was
on the police force for several years. He died in
1903, at the age of fifty-six. He was a republican
in politics. His wife died in 1905, also aged fifty-six.
James William is the oldest of four sons and has
one brother living.
Mr. Drake received his education in the public
schools of St. Paul and Minneapolis, and his first
employment was with the St. Paul and Dulutli
Railway in the train service. Later he was with
the Minneapolis & St. Louis Railway as passenger
conductor, and in October, 1895, came to Montana
and had his first headquarters at Livingstone. He
was with the Northern Pacific as passenger con-
ductor on the main line and some of the branches
until 190.S. In that year he removed to the Province
of British Columbia and spent some time in proving
up a homestead. In 1907 he returned to Alontana
and resumed his work as a railroad man with
the Jaw Bone Railway and continued in the service
when this line was taken over by the Chicago, Mil-
waukee & St. Paul. Mr. Drake has been a member
of the Order of Railway Conductors for twenty-
one years, and state chairman for the legislative
board of the four great railroad organizations dur-
ing the four years following the Twelfth Legislative
-Assembly.
He is also active in Masonry, having become a
Mason at Billings, where he was identified with
Ashland Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, Billings Chanter No. 6, Royal Arch Masons,
Aldemar Corhmandery No. 5, Knights Templar. He
is now a member of Lewistown Lodge No. 37,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hiram Chapter
No. 14, Royal Arch Masons, and Lewistown Com-
mandery No. 15, Knights Temfllar. Politically he
is independent.
July 3, 1899, Mr. Drake married Miss Nettie
Vicam. They became the parents of two, children,
Ora v., who died in infancy, and Dorothy'D.
Aldert Schlechten. While Mr. Schlechten owns
a fine ranch near Helena, his profession and voca-
tion for a number of years has been artistic photog-
raphy. He has built up a business recognized as
the foremost of its kind in Gallatin County.
Mr. Schlechten was born near the City of Berne,
Switzerland. January 14, 1876. His parents spent
all their lives in the same locality. His father.
Christian, was born in the same locality in 1850 and
died in 1917. He was a cabinet maker by trade,
served the regular time in the Swiss army, and
was a Protestant in religion and a member of the
State Church of Switzerland. His wife was Mar-
guerite Krebs, who was born in 1840 and died in
1918. Albert is the oldest of their children. The
next, Alfred, is in the photographic business at
Bozeman. The following two, Emma and Lena,
both live in Switzerland. Anna, the youngest, is
the wife of Jack Schneider, employed by the Boze-
man Bottling Works.
Albert Schlechten secured the equivalent of a
grammar and high school education in Switzerland.
He was sixteen years of age when he came to this
country in 1892. For four years he lived near Sted-
man, Missouri, and worked as a farm hand. He
learned photography in a studio at Cenfralia, Mis-
souri. He rapidly acquired a knowledge of the
photographic technique, and soon became noted for
his fine work in the photographic profession.
Equipped with his unusual skill, though with a very
modest capital, Mr. Schlechten came to Bozeman
in igoo and established his present business. His
studio is now the chief one patronized for artistic
work in Gallatin County. He built the Schlechten
Block in 1903 at 12 South Black .\venue. This con-
tains his studio with every apparatus and facility
for high class photography, and also furnishes
quarters for business offices and living apartments.
Mr. Schlechten owns other real estate in Bozeman.
His ranch near Helena comprises 320 acre^ of im-
proved land with water rights on the Spokane
Bench.
Mr. Schlechten served with Company A, Second
Regiment Montana State Militia. He is an inde-
pendent republican in politics and is affiliated with
Bozeman Lodge No. 463 of the Elks. In 1912, at
Bozeman, he married Miss Clara Schmidt. She
was born in Denmark and was educated there. They
have two children, Albert Wilbur, born in 1915, and
Betty Marguerite, born in August, 1918.
Charles A. MacCallum. There is no such thing
as chance. Advancement in any line comes through
ability, concentration and industry, not luck. Good
judgment is the outgrowth of accumulated experi-
ence and observation, and when it is a characteristic
of a person and is combined with the faculty of per-
forming painstaking and conscientious work, chance
is placed on the shelf and certainty takes its place.
Charles A. MacCallum, secretary, treasurer and man-
ager of the MacCallum-Cloutier Mercantile Com-
pany of .\naconda, is a man who early recognized
that if he wanted to get ahead in the world he must
'-^"^ *f^
^/^^^..-'^^i— ^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
309
not rely upon a hoped-for good fortune, but upon
his own gray matter, and as a result his concern is
one of the leading ones of its kind in this region.
Charles A. MacCallum was born at Montreal,
Canada, January 29, 1870, a son of Charles F. Mac-
Callum, a native of Montreal, Canada, where he was
born in 1836, and he died at Anaconda, Montana, in
1904. His family originated from Scotland, and its
representatives have been noted for their excellent
common sense and shrewd business acumen. Grow-
ing up at Montreal, Charles F. MacCallum became
public weigher for the city, and held that position
until he came to the United States in i8go, having
retired and found pleasant surroundings at Ana-
conda. While living in Canada he served in the
militia, and he supported the policies of the con- ■
servative party. He was a Roman Catholic. His
wife, who bore the maiden name of Anna Maria
Cushing, was born in the Province of Quebec, Can-
ada, in 1833, and she died at Anaconda in 1905. Their
children were as follows : Maria, who was married
to U. S. Tuttle, now deceased, resides in California;
Morlcy, who died at St. Paul, Minnesota, was a
merchant of that city; Victoria, who is deceased,
married A. P. Cloutier, a merchant, who is also de-
ceased; Albert Cushing is a very successful insur-
ance man and banker of Seattle, Washington;
Amelia, who married D. F. Hallahan, a merchant of
Spokane, Washington ; and Charles A., who was the
youngest.
After being gr_aduated from the Montreal High
School Charles A. MacCallum took a two years'
course in McGill College, and in April, 1888, came
to Anaconda to join the selling force of the depart-
ment store of MacCallum & Cloutier, which was es-
tablished in 188s by A. C. MacCallum and A. P.
Cloutier. In 1902 the company was incorporated as
the ^MacCalhim-Cloutier Mercantile Company, at
which time Mr. MacCallum bought an interest in the
business, and continued with it until 1910. In tliat
year he went to Vancouver, British Columbia, and
there conducted a real estate business for five years.
In 1915 inducements were offered him to return to
the old company, and he accepted them, and assumed
the management of the store, located on East Park
Avenue, from 419 to 423, and it supplies the greater
part of Deerlodge County. The stock is timely and
of superlative value, facts appreciated by the careful
buyers of this region, and the annual business shows
a healthy increase.
In 1896 Mr. MacCallum was married at Anaconda
to Miss Mary Cannovan, a daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. John Cannovan, the later of whom is de-
ceased. John Cannovan lives at Columbia Falls,
Montana. He is a veteran of the war between the
North and South. Mr. and Mrs. MacCallum have
had the following children born to them: Gerald
Cushing, who was born in June. 1897. is a graduate
of the Anaconda High School, and is a member of
the sales force of his father's store: Eleanor, who
was born in 1902, is attending the Anaconda High
School ; Charles T., who was born in 1905, is attend-
ing the public schools of the city : Constance, who
was born in 1907 .and Doris, who was born in 191 1,
are both attending school : and Raymond, who was
born in 1914, is the youngest. Mr. MacCallum re-
cently sold his residence and now lives at No. 403
West Third Street. He is a republican. The Roman
Catholic Church holds his membership. Fraternally
he belongs to Anaconda Council No. 882, Knights of
Columbus, of which he is a third degree knight;
Anaconda Camp No. 154, Woodmen of the World;
and Mount Haggin Court No. 629, Catholic Order of
Foresters.
J. P. Fabrick is associate general manager at
Bozeman for the North American Mortgage Com-
pany. He has the supervision of a large territory
where the business of this corporation is represented
in the Northwest. He is a man of unusual quali-
fications and business judgment. He was reared
and trained as an expert dairyman in the greatest
dairy center of the world, and by practical experience
knows farming under European and Western Amer-
ican conditions.
Mr. Fabrick was born in the Province of Fries-
land in the northern part of Holland February 15.
1883. His father, Peter Fabrick, was born iri the
same province in 1854 and spent the greater part
of his life there as a farmer. In 1908 he came to the
United States and acquired farming interests at
Manhattan, Montana, but is now living practically
retired. Since coming to America he has acquired
the full rights of an American citizen, is a demo-
cratic voter and a member of the Presbyterian
Church. Peter Fabrick married G. de Ruiter, who
was born in Friesland in 1854 and died there in 1915.
All of their children live in America, as follows :
A. P., associate manager of the Hollam Company,
real estate and loans, at Great Falls, Montana;
Jennie, wife of C. Venderschaaf. a farmer at Three
Forks, Montana; Joseph, a farmer at Three Forks:
J. P.; Wilma, wife of John Vanderlaan, a clerk
in a store at Manhattan ; Grace, wife of Joseph
Verwolf, a merchant at IManhattan : Dick, who is
employed by the Adams Investment Company at
Three Forks.
J. P. Fabrick secured a public school education in
his native province. He attended a dairy college at
Fulda, Germany, and had a thorough course of
technical and practical experience in dairying in
the creameries and dairies of Denmark. In 1906
he settled on a farm in the Province of Manitoba,
Canada, and followed farming there until 1912. In
that year he located at Bozeman, becoming agent
for the North American Mortgage Company. This
is a foreign corporation loaning monies on real
estate in the United States, and Mr. Fabrick is
now associate general manager, with offices in the
Owenhouse Block, and has under his supervision
eight employes who handle the business for this
corporation over the Bozeman territory.
He is also president of the Egerton-Fabrick Com-
pany, Investment Bankers. Mr. Fabrick has ac-
quired some extensive landed interests of his own,
owning 2,500 acres of land in several ranches in
Broadwater, Rosebud, Custer and Musselshell coun-
ties. He also has a modern home at 602 West
Olive Street in Bozeman.
Mr. Fabrick is a member of the Presbyterian
Church, affiliated with Manhattan Lodge of Masons,
Riverside Lodge of Odd Fellows at Manhattan,
and is an active member of the Bozeman Chamber
of Commerce. Politically he is independent. He
married in his native land in 1906 Gertrude Lan-
tinga, daughter of F. and Sjoukje (Woudsna) Lan-
tinga. Her parents both died in Holland, where
her father was a physician and surgeon. Mrs.
Fabrick acquired the equivalent of a high school
education in Holland. They have two children :
Sjoukje, born December 27, 1907, and Jennie, born
May 19, 1909.
George P. Finch, a retired rancher at Bozeman.
is one of the interesting old time characters still
surviving whose theater of activities for many years
was the wide plains of the Far West, though for
over thirty years his work and home have been in
the mountain valleys of Montana. Mr. Finch rep-
resents an era of the great West when in order to
310
HISTORY OF MONTANA
do the essential work of the country the conditions
required men of personal courage, endurance,
strength, coolness in danger and a never ceasing
activity. Mr. Finch was cowboy and bull-whacker,
riding and driving over the great trails of the
Southwest, West and North, and for many years
lived a life brimful of experience and adventure.
He was born in a quiet country community near
Sandwich, Kendall Count>-, Illinois, January 28, 1863.
His grandfather, Cyrenus Finch, was one of the
earliest settlers in that section of Northern Illinois.
He had a farm and stock ranch there in the early
days and died in Kendall County in 1866. His
ancestors came originally from England and were
early settlers both in Ohio and Illinois. Martin
George Finch, father of George P., was also born
near Sandwich in Kendall County, grew up in the
country and in 1861 enlisted in the One Hundred
and Twelfth Illinois Infantry. He was a Union
soldier three years and nine months. After the
war he returned to Kendall County, was a farmer,
and afterward moved to Kansas and followed the
business of building, contracting and carpenter work
at Paola until his death in 1912. He was a republi-
can. Martin G. Finch married Phoebe Covey, who
was born in Illinois and died in Kendall County
in 1869. Geroge P. was the oldest of their chil-
dren. Elizabeth married Lee Rose and died at
Peoria, Illinois, where her husband was a civil
service employe of the Internal Revenue Depart-
ment. Hubert was proprietor of a meat market
at Buda, Illinois, where he died at the age of forty-
two. Bert is a meat cutter at Bozeman.
George P. Finch, when seven years of age and
after his mother's death, was bound out to a stock-
man near Central City, Nebraska. He remained
there seven years, but it was a hard experience
which he does not like to recall. In the meantime
his education was advanced only to a modest ac-
quaintance with the second reader studies. Since
then, however, by reading and study and contact
with men and the world he has acquired the equiva-
lent of a substantial education. When he ran away
from his employer and master at Central City he
entered upon that life of travel and adventure which
was his lot until he finally settled down upon a
ranch in Montana. He was through the states of
Iowa and Missouri working at odd jobs to pay his
way. During 1877-79 he was a cowboy in the em-
ploy of the Prairie Cattle Company, operating in
New Mexico. His next employers were Lee &
Reynolds, and for whom he drove an ox team,
freighting between Dodge City, Kansas, and through
Indian Territory and Texas. In 1881 he accom-
panied a herd of cattle north to Buffalo, Park,
Kansas, but soon returned to his job as a freighter
and cowboy in Texas. In May, 1882, he took an-
other herd of cattle north over the trail to Ogallala,
Nebraska. For a time he was in Northwestern
Nebraska working as a bull-whacker between Sid-
ney and Red Cloud, and in the fall went into the
Black Hills district in South Dakota. At that time
he came into Montana as far as Junction City,
driving a mule team for the Northwestern Stage
and Transportation Company and operating be-
tween Pierre and Deadwood and through all the
Black Hill towns of that date. In 1884 he accom-
panied a mule train to Fort Custer, Montana. This
outfit had a contract with the Government to stack
hav at Fort Custer. After the contract was fin-
ished. Mr Finch went back to the Black Hills. He
was again in Junction City, Montana, in 1884-85,
and in the spring of 1885 in the course of his trav-
els one day pitched his noon camp in the Judith
Basin, and the site of that camp is now included
in his present ranch located 4'/ miles south and
east of old Youbet. From 1886 until December,
1887, Mr. Finch had charge of Guerney & Woods
mule outfit. Following that for a period of ten
years he freighted on his own account. In the
meantime he pre-empted a ranch of 160 acres and
a tree claim of 160 acres, proving up on both and
finally selling this property in 1897. In 1893 he con-
tracted with the Government to transport supplies
to the camp of workmen engaged in constructing
ditches on the Crow Reservation.
In June, 1897, Mr. Finch sold out his freighting
outfit and on February 22, 1898, he married and
returned to Judith Basin, to the ranch which he
had pre-empted in 1888. After selling his home-
stead he located on his present ranch between
Garnell and Judith Gap. Mr. Finch now owns 920
acres. In 1898 he bought what was known as the
D herd of horses, and the horse business was his
chief activity until iQo5. He is widely known
among Montana horsemen. In 1906 Mr. Finch
leased his ranch and has since lived in Bozeman,
where he has a modern home with private garage
at 201 6th Avenue, South.
It would be a long story to tell all the experiences,
privations and hardships Mr. Finch endured in the
days of his cowboy, freighting and other pioneer
life. He frequently came in contact with hos-
tile Indians. In the fall of 1878 he and several
companions were surrounded by the Apache In-
dians on a hill and were kept in a state of siege
from 10 o'clock one day until 2 o'clock in the after-
noon of the day following. They shot their horses
and lay behind them for protection. Mr. Finch
was nominally a republican for many years but
for the past twelve years has voted independently.
He served several years as a stock inspector in
Alontana. He is affiliated with Gallatin Camp No.
5245, Modern Woodmen of America, Bridger Camp
No. 62, Woodmen of the World, Bozeman Lodge
No. 18, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Zoma
Chapter No. 12, Royal Arch Masons, St. John's
Commandery No. 12, Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena.
On February 22, 1898, at Billings, he married
Miss Mollie Lewis, a daughter of H. V. and Anna
Lewis. Her parents are residents of Ashland,
Nebraska. Her father is a veteran Union soldier,
and attained the rank of captain. Mr. and Mrs.
Finch have two children : Carl V., born October
28, iqoi, a student in the Gallatin County High
School, and Halley E., born February 19, 1904, who
is in grammar school at
Frank Wiggins. The gentleman whose life his-
tory is herewith outlined is a man who has lived
to good purpose and achieved a satisfactory de-
gree of success, solely by his individual efforts.
By a straightforward and commendable course
Mr. Wiggins has made his way to a respectable
position in the business world of Park County,
winning the hearty admiration of the people of his
community and earning a reputation as an enter-
prising, progressive man of affairs, which the pub-
lic has not been slow to recognize and appreciate.
Those who know him best .will readily acquiesce
in the statement that he is eminently deserving of
the success which is his and of the popularity which
he enjoys in his home community.
Frank Wiggins, cashier of the First State Bank
at Clyde Park, Park County, is descended from
sterling Irish stock, his paternal grandfather, Jere-
miah Wiggins, having been born in the northern
part of Ireland in 1821. In mature years he im-
migrated to -America, locating in the province of
Ontario, Canada, where he became a building con-
tractor. Subsequently he came to Postville, low^a.
CHARLES O'DOXXELL
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and still later located in Luverne, Minnesota, where
he spent the remainder of his days, practically re-
tired from active business pursuits. In his native
land he was a 'soldier in the British army and had
a good military training. His son, William Wig-
gins, was born in Postville, Iowa, in iSoi, and was
there reared and received his education. He became
a railroad contractor and followed that business
for many years, his headquarters during the major
portion of that time being Kansas City, Kansas. In
1891 he moved to Luverne, Minnesota, and for four
years was engaged in the grain business. Since
that time he has been occupied in farming and stock
raising, in which he has been successful. He is a
democrat in politics and at one time served as as-
sessor of Rock County, Minnesota. In Ottawa,
Kansas, Mr. Wiggins was married to Mary Mc-
Carty, who was born in 186S in Southern Ireland
and who was brought to the United States by her
parents in 1875. Her father being a railroad con-
tractor, their home was wherever he was located
for the time being, and thus they lived in Ohio,
Indiana, Missouri and Kansas. To these parents
were born nine children, namely : Frank, whose
name heads these paragraphs ; John, who is a sales-
man for the United Motor Corporation at Living-
ston, Montana; William, Jr., who lives with his
parents, enlisted in the United States army in June,
1918, was sent overseas the following month, and
was mustered out in February, 1919, with the rank
of corporal ; Muriel, who also is with her parents,
is a teacher ; Raymond is associated with his father
in the home ranch, as are Edward, Gerald and
Burt; Dorothy is a student in the public school.
Frank Wiggins was born at Kansas City, Kan-
sas, on December 9, 1S87. He received his ele-
mentary education in the rural schools of Rock
County, Minnesota, and the high school of Luverne.
He then entered Valparaiso University, at Val-
paraiso, Indiana, which he attended for two years,
taking commercial and special courses. In 1910
Mr. Wiggins engaged in the clothing business at
Luverne, to which he devoted himself about 3^
years. In March, 1914, he came to Wilsall, Mon-
tana, and entered the Farmers State Bank as assist-
ant cashier. In November, 1917, he became as-
sistant cashier of the Reed Point State Bank, where
he remained until October, 1918, when he accepted
a similar position with the First State Bank of
Livingston, Alontana. On May I, 1919, when the
First State Bank of Clyde Park opened its doors,
Mr. Wiggins began his connection with the insti-
tution as cashier, and is devoting himself inde-
fatigably to the interests of this bank. The bank,
though one of the youngest in this section of the
state, has already earned an enviable reputation as
a sound and conservative financial institution. The
present officers of the bank are : President, L. R.
Nye; vice president, Walter J. Hill, and cashier,
Frank Wiggins. It has a capital of $25,000 and
undivided profits of $5,000.
Politically Mr. Wiggins is a stanch supporter of
the democratic party and fraternally is a member
of Luverne Lodge, Knights of Pythias, of Luverne,
Minnesota.
On December 3, igi6, at Wilsall, Montana, Frank
Wiggins was married to Cora McDonald, the daugh-
ter of J. P. and Florence M. (Wittenberger) Mc-
Donald. Mr. McDonald is the proprietor of a
bakery at Wilsall and is numbered among the en-
terprising men of that city. Mrs. Wiggins re-
ceived a splendid education, being a graduate of
the Colorado Springs High School and of the Con-
servatory of Music at Colorado Springs, Colorado.
She is a skilled pianist and is also an e.xpert stenog-
rapher. To Mr. and Mrs. Wiggins has been born
one child, Gerald Francis, whose birth occurred on
i\ugust 31, 1917.
George Bastz. Among the strong and influential
citizens of Gallatin County, the record of whose
lives have become an essential part of the history
of that section, the gentleman whose name appears
above has exerted a beneficial influence through-
out the community where he resides. His chief
characteristics are keenness of perception, a tire-
less energy, honesty of purpose and motive and
every-day common sense, which have enabled him
not only to advance his own interests, but also to
largely contribute to the moral and material ad-
vancement of the locality.
George Bartz was born at Poughkeepsie, New
York, on March 29, 1865. His father, Nicholas
Bartz, was born in Germany in 1835 and died at
Des Moines, Iowa, in 1907. He came to the United
States about 1864 and settled in Poughkeepsie,
New York, where he lived for a short time, mov-
ing then to Des Moines, Iowa, where he became
the pioneer florist of that locality. He was suc-
cessful in business and enjoyed a high reputation
because of his ability and worth. He was a re-
publican in his political views. His wife, Barbara,
was born in Scotland, and to them were born the
following children : John, who is a farmer at Avon,
Iowa; William, who died in 1905, was a meat dealer
at Des Moines, Iowa; Jennie is the wife of Samuel
Ruble, a carpenter at Des Moines; and the subject
of this sketch was the last born.
George Bartz was educated in the rural schools
of Polk County, Iowa, and remained at home until
he had attained his majority. At the age of twen-
ty-one he began to work on his own account, work-
ing mainly on farms in that locality until 1887,
when he came to Bozeman, Montana, and during
the following two years was employed as a farm
hand. Then for three years he was employed in
an implement store, followed by employment as a
clerk in a grocery store, until 1909. In that year
Mr. Bartz bought an interest in the T. H. Rea
Grocery Company, but two years later he sold his
interest in that company and established a store
of his own on West Main Street. He has given
his undivided attention to this business, witli the
result that he has developed the business until to-
day it ranks as one of the leading grocery stores
in Gallatin County. Mr. Bartz is a hard worker
and conscientious in his business methods, so that
the people with whom he has had dealings are
among his best friends.
Politically Mr. Bartz is an earnest supporter of
the republican party, and fraternally is a member
of Bozeman Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, and Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Benev-
olent and Protective Order of Elks. He is also a
member of the Chamber of Commerce at Boze-
man.
In 1888, at Castle, Montana, Mr. Bartz was mar-
ried to Jennie Hall, who was born at Arnot, Penn-
sylvania, and to them have been born the following
children : Lyle, who is his father's assistant in
the store; Mildred, who is at home, was a student
in the Wisconsin State University, at Madison, until
the senior year ; Florence is a graduate of the
Gallatin County High School; Vera is a student
in the public schools. Mr. Bartz's personal rela-
tions with his fellowmen have been mutually pleas-
ant and agreeable, and he is highly regarded by all,
being easily approached, obliging and straightfor-
ward in all the relations of life.
Mrs. Helena Elizabeth Curtis is proprietor of
the Curtis Hospital at Dillon. She has lived in Mon-
312
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tana for over thirty years, and after the death of
her husband, who was a prominent merchant and
mining engineer, she entered in 1900 the Murray
Hospital at Butte, and was the first to graduate as
a trained nurse from that institution.
For nearly twenty years she has given all her
energj- and enthusiasm to her great and noble call-
ing. She practiced at Butte and other localities in
Montana and on September I, 1914, came to Dillon
and opened the Curtis Hospital. The hospital is
the old Dr. Kingsbury residence and is located at
19 South Washington Street. It has accommoda-
tions for twelve patients and Mrs. Curtis has suc-
ceeded in imparting to it the wholesome and mag-
netic spirit of her own personality. She is a mem-
ber of the Montana Association of Graduate and
Registered Nurses.
Mrs. Curtis was born at Halifax, Nova Scotia,
January 27, 1868. Her father was Chancellor Charles
O'Donnell. The O'Donnells were an old family of
Belfast, Ireland, and ancestry goes back into the
traditional era of the kings of Ireland. Her grand-
father, Michael O'Donnell, on coming from Ireland
settled on the banks of the River St. John in New
Brunswick and was a pioneer farmer there. He
married Hannah Mowbray, a native of Woodstock,
New Brunswick, and of Scotch ancestry.
Chancellor Charles O'Donnell was born at Wood-
stock, New Brunswick, in 1845, and when a young
man moved to Halifax, where he married and where
he engaged in business as a merchant. From 1869
to 1872 he was in business at Chicago, and then
returned to Woodstock, New Brunswick, and began
the study of law. He graduated with the LL, B.
degree from the Frederickton Law College at New
Brunswick, and in 1882 came to Montana and was
one of the early members of the bar of Butte and
achieved eminence as a Montana lawyer. He was in
active practice until his death on May 18, 1917.
Politically he was an old school republican and a
member of the Catholic Church. He was also a
charter member of Butte Council, Knights of Colum-
bus, being a third degree knight, was a member of
the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and among other
interests had some ranch holdings in Elk Park. His
first wife and the mother of Mrs. Curtis was Ann
Mooney, who was born at St. Stephen, New Bruns-
wick, in 1842 and died at Butte, Montana, in 1886.
She was reared and educated at Halifax, Nova
Scotia. Her father, Andrew Mooney, was one of
the early architects of Nova Scotia, and designed
and built many bridges and lighthouses along the
coast. Mrs. Curtis was the oldest of her mother's
children. Her brother Charles died in Wyoming at
the age of forty-eight. Josephine lives on West
Granite Street in Butte, the \vife of John St. Clair,
manager of the Northwest Coal Company of Butte ;
Mary is the wife of George Grose, a mining carpen-
ter at Walkerville, Montana; Frederick is an assist-
ant mining superintendent at Walkerville ; Gertrude
is the wife of John Brosnahan, living at 927 Zarelda
Avenue in Butte, Mr. Brosnahan being a hoisting
engineer with the Mountain Consolidated Mining
Company. Mrs. Curtis' father married for his sec-
ond wife Mary Jane McGrath, who was born at
Woodstock, New Brunswick, in 1844 and died at
Butte July 4. 1916.
Helena Elizabeth O'Donnell acquired her early
education in the public schools of Woodstock, and
was fourteen years of age when her father came to
Butte. She graduated from the high school of that
city in 1886. Before graduation she taught two
summer terms of school at Big Hole, Montana. She
is an active member of the Catholic Church.
In 1888, at Butte, Miss O'Donnell became the wife
of Charles Frederick Curtis. He was born at Quincy,
Michigan, in 1868, was educated in Nebraska, at-
tending the University of Nebraska at Lincoln for
two years and specializing in mining- and civil engi-
neering. After his marriage he lived at Walkerville,
Montana, 'where he was a merchant and also engaged
in mining. That was his home though he died at
Butte in 1897.
Mrs. Curtis has one child, Aimee Helena. She
was educated in St. Mary's Academy at Deer Lodge
and is a graduate of the Butte High School. She is
now the wife of Charles L. Bray, a rancher at Sheri-
dan, Montana. Mr. and Mrs. Bray have three chil-
dren: Charles Curtis, born March 27, 191 1; Ken-
neth, born February 28, 1913; and John, born Octo-
ber 16, 1915.
Joseph Piedalue, M. D. Each calling or busi-
ness, if honorable, has its place in human existence,
constituting a part of the plan whereby life's
methods are pursued and man" reaches his ultimate
destiny. Emerson said that "All are needed by
each one." And that is as true in one avenue
of life's activities as another. However, the im-
portance of a business or profession is in a very
large measure determined by its beneficence or
usefulness. So dependent is man upon his fellow
men that the worth of each individual is largely
reckoned by what he has done for humanity. There
is no class to whom greater gratitude is due from
the world at large than to those self-sacrificing,
svmpathetic, noble-minded men whose life work
has been the alleviation of suffering that rests upon
humanity, thus lengthening the span of human
existence. There is no known standard by which
their beneficent influence can be measured; their
helpfulness is as broad as the universe and their
power goes hand in hand with the wonderful laws
of nature that come from the very source of life
itself.
Joseph Piedalue, one of the best known and
most successful physicians and surgeons of Southern
Montana, living at Bozeman, was born near Mon-
treal, in the Province of Quebec, Canada, on January
24, 1859. His father, Isaac Piedalue, was also born
in that province, in 1827, and died in Montreal in
the fall of 1915. He was reared in his native
province and became a farmer. In 1885 he emi-
grated to Nebraska, locating near Imperial, where
he became a farmer and stockraiser. In the course
of time he became a citizen of the United States,
and he was prospered in his business affairs so that
he was able to retire and in igog located at Missoula.
Montana, where he made his home until his return
to Alontreal in 1912, where his death occurred. He
became a democrat after coming to the States and
was a member of the Roman Catholic Church. Dur-
ing his young manhood he served in the Canadian
militia, in which he held an officer's commission.
He married Elodie Roy, who was born in 1S30 in
the Province of Quebec and whose death occurred
there in 1872. To them were born the following
children: Absalon, who is a farmer at Greeley,
Colorado; Arthur, who is a farmer at .Roman,
Montana: Joseph, the immediate subject of this re-
view : Anatole, who is a farmer near Hyde Park.
Vermont ; Lea, who is the wife of Z. Mercau, now
retired and living in Los Angeles, California, but
who was a pioneer rancher in the Missoula Valley,
Montana; Febranie, who is the wife of Delphis
Brassard, a contractor and builder at Chicopee, Mas-
sachusetts ; Hector, who is a farmer and stockraiser
at Champion. Nebraska ; Stephanie, who is the wife
of S. Robert, formerly a builder and contractor,
but now a farmer near Missoula, Montana.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
313
Joseph Piedalue is descended from good old
Breton stock, his progenitors having resided for
generations in Brittany, France, whence they came
to L'Acadie, Nova Scotia. Driven from that land,
they came to the Province of Quebec and gave to
their new home the same name as their former
home.
Joseph Piedalue received a splendid education, for,
after completing his studies in the public schools
of his native province, he attended the L'Assumption
College near Montreal, Canada, where he studied
for eight years, comprising both preparatory and
classical courses, and graduating from the latter in
i88i. He then matriculated in the medical depart-
ment of Victoria University, at Montreal, where
he was graduated in 1885, with the degree of Doctor
of Medicine. Doctor Piedalue immediately entered
upon the active practice of his profession at French-
town, Montana, where he remained until 1891, when
he moved to Columbia Falls, Montana, being the
first physician to locate there. A few years later
he located in Helena, Montana, but a year later
moved to Chestnut, this state, where he served as
mine physician until 1904, when he came to Boze-
man, where his family had been living, and here
he has since been successfully engaged in the gen-
eral practice, meeting with the most pronounced suc-
cess and winning the confidence and esteem of the
people generally. Doctor Piedalue has been pros-
pered financially and is the owner of a fine ranch
of 160 acres 3V2 miles south of Bozeman, the land
being irrigated. The doctor has served as city
physician, as coroner and as county health officer,
his official service covering a period of nine years.
Politically the doctor is a democrat and his re-
ligious affiliation is with the Roman Catholic Church.
Fraternally he is a member of Bozeman Council
No. 1413, Knights of Columbia; Bozeman Lodge
No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks ;
Bridger Camp No. 62, Woodmen of the World;
Gallatin Castle No. 82, Royal Highlanders; Eureka
Homestead No. 415, Brotherhood of American Yeo-
men. He is also a member of the Gallatin County
Medical Society, the Montana State Medical Society
and the American Medical Association.
In 1885, at L'Acadie, Province of Quebec, Canada,
Doctor Piedalue was married to Laura Robert, the
daughter of Alexander and Sophie (Lefebvre)
Robert, the former of whom is now deceased. The
father was a successful farmer, and his daughter,
Mrs. Piedalue, received a good education, having
studied in convents. To Doctor and Mrs. Piedalue
were born the following children : Mary Alice, who
is the wife of Charles Hancock, a jeweler and drug-
gist at Lewistown, Montana ; Alexander died in
youth ; Laura is a teacher of domestic science in
the high school at Helena, Montana; Irene is en-
gaged in social service work at Spokane, Washing-
ton ; Aimee Mary, who lives at home, is employed
in the Commercial National Bank ; Robert Joseph,
who is a dentist in Bozeman, enlisted in May, 1918,
was sent to Camp Fremont, California, and was
mustered out in February. 1910. with the rank of
corporal, and he is now practicing his profession
of dentistry in Conrad, Montana; Roy enlisted in
the United States Navy in April, 1917, was assigned
to the hospital corps, and died in a hospital at
Philadelphia on January 10, 1919, at the age of
twenty-one years.
Throughout his busy life Doctor Piedalue has
ever been a close student, keeping well abreast of
the times in matters pertaining to his profession, and
to the practice of his art he has brought rare skill
and resource. His life has been a busy and suc-
cessful one and he stands today as one of the leaders
of his profession in this community, secure in the
confidence and esteem of the people with whom he
has been associated.
William S. Bole, M. D. Professional success re-
sults from merit. Frequently in commercial life one
may come into possession of a lucrative business
through inheritance or gift, but in what are known
as the learned professions advancement is gained
only through painstaking and long-continued effort.
Prestige in the healing art is the outcome of strong
mentality, close application, thorough mastery of its
great underlying principles and the ability to apply
theory to practice in the treatment of diseases.
Good intellectual training, thorough professional
knowledge and the possession and utilization of the
qualities and attributes essential to success have
made the subject of this review eminent in his
chosen calling, and he stands today among the
scholarly and enterprising physicians in a com-
munity noted for the high order of its medical
talent.
William S. Bole was born in St. Paul, Minnesota,
on the 17th day of July, 1882. His father, William
M. Bole, who is now editor of the Great Falls
Tribune, at Great Falls, Montana, was born in the
State of Vermont in 1859, and was there reared
and learned the printing trade. He was married in
Boston, Massachusetts, and shortly afterward moved
to St. Paul, Minnesota, where he was employed at
his trade. He then held a position in the postoffice
for a while, and afterward started and ran a weekly
paper there. In 1890 he moved to Great Falls, Mon-
tana, and became connected with the Leader of that
city. In 1894 he and O. F. Warden bought the
Great Falls Tribune, which they published until 1901,
when they sold the property and Mr. Bole came to
Bozeman and edited the Chronicle, which he later
bought. He sold the Chronicle in 1917, but in the
meanwhile, in 1905, he and Mr. Worden had re-
purchased the Great Falls Tribune, of which Mr.
Bole is still the editor. He is a democrat in politics
and in religion is affiliated with the Presbyterian
Church. He is also a member of the Masonic fra-
ternity. Mr. Bole married Elizabeth Dow. who was
born in Vermont in 1864, and the immediate sub-
ject of this review is their only child.
William S. Bole received his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of St. Paul and Great
Falls, attending the high school in the latter city
until the junior year. He then became a student in
the Montana State College, at Bozeman, where he
was graduated in 1906, with the degree of Bachelor
of Science. Having decided to make the practice
of medicine his life work, he then matriculated in
the medical department of Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity, Baltimore, Maryland, where he was grad-
uated in 1910, with the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
He then entered upon the active practice at Great
Falls, but two years later came to Bozeman, where
he has since remained, engaging in a general medical
and surgical practice. His record is simply the ac-
count of a life which has been in the main un-
eventful as far as stirring incidents are concerned,
yet has been distinguished by the most substantial
qualities of character.
Politically Doctor Bole is an earnest supporter of
the democratic party, and takes an intelligent in-
terest in public events. While a resident of Cascade
County he served as county health officer and also
as county physician. He is a member of the Galla-
tin County Medical Society, the Montana State Medi-
cal Society and the American Medical Association.
The doctor is an active supporter of every move-
ment which gives promise of being of material ad-
314
HISTORY OF MONTANA
vantage to the community in any way.
He
stockholder in the Tribune Printing and Supply
Company. .
In 1907, at Bozeman, Doctor Bole was married to
Edith Jackson, daughter of Thomas and Emma
(Gordon) Jackson. They became pioneer settlers
near Harrison, Montana, and both died there. To
Doctor and Mrs. Bole have been born two children,
namely: Emma E., born in November, 191 1, and
Marion E., born in April, 1914. The doctor is es-
sentially a man among men, commanding respect by
innate force as well as by his ability, and he holds
the unequivocal confidence and esteem of the people
among whom he has lived and labored. _
John S. Cable. Among the earnest and enter-
prising men whose depth of character have gained
them a prominent place in the community and the
respect and confidence of their fellow citizens is
John S. Cable, manager of the Thompson Yards
at Clyde Park. A man of decided views and laud-
able ambitions, his influence has ever made for the
advancement of his kind, and today he ranks among
the representative business men of his community.
John S. Cable was born at Wilmot, South Da-
kota, on September 15, 1892, and is a son of D. S.
and Alice (Tripp) Cable. D. S. Cable, who still
resides at Wilmot, was born in 1854, at Syracuse,
New York, where he was reared and educated.
Eventually he followed the tide of migration west-
ward and after stopping for a time at various
points, went to Wilmot. South Dakota, of which
locality he was a pioneer, having been there at
the time of the opening of the Indian reservation
lands to white settlers. He went into the drug
business, in which he has prospered, and is now
retired from active business life. He took an
active part in the public affairs of the newly opened
country, serving as recorder of deeds and as an ab-
stractor. He is a member of the Episcopal Church
and his fraternal relations are with the .Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons and the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows. He married Alice Tripp,
who was born in 1859 at Dundas, Minnesota, and
to them were born three children, namely: Marie,
who is assistant cashier of the Citizens State Bank
at Clyde Park, John S., the immediate subject of
this sketch, and Frank Ewart, who is a farmer
and who still remains with his parents.
John S. Cable was educated in the public schools
of Wilmot, graduating from the high school there
in 1910. In 1911 he took a course in the Mankato
Commercial College, at Mankato, Minnesota. In
the following year he came to Yellowstone Park
and for about three months was employed as a
carpenter's helper. He then came to Clyde Park
and entered the employ of H. M. Allen as manager
of the latter's lumber yard. He has remained iden-
tified with this enterprise to the present time and
has seen the plant grow from a humble begin-
ning to the leading yard in this part of Park Coun-
ty. Several years ago the concern was reorgan-
ized under the title of Thompson Yards, Incor-
porated, and is rated among the strong and re-
liable firms of this section of the state. Mr. Cable
is still the active manager of the yards and has
demonstrated his ability and fitness for responsible
work of this nature. He has a wide and accurate
knowledge of ithe details of the business and, hav-
ing the ability to apply his knowledge, he has proven
the right man in the right place. He has taken
an active part in all movements for the advance-
ment of the community's interests, and is a stock-
holder and a director of the First State Bank of
Clyde Park.
Mr. Cable assumes an independent attitude in
political matters preferring Ki support the men
and measures which meet his approval than to
follow party dictates. His religious membership
is with the Episcopal Church, while his fraternal
relations are with' Clyde Park Lodge No. 64, Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows, of which he is a
past noble grand.
In 1914, at Livingston, Montana, John S. Cable
was married to Lois Haycraft, daughter of George
and Libbie Haycraft, who now reside in Clyde Park,
Mr. Haycraft having retired from active life. Mr.
and Mrs. Cable have one child, Clinton G., born
on May 5, 1916.
Mr. Cable has proven himself a useful member
of the community in which he lives, being not only
the administrative officer of one of the chief in-
dustries, but he has also met a large local need by
holding the agency for some of the leading life,
fire, tornado and hail insurance companies, for
which he has written a vast amount of business
in this section of the county. Genial and unas-
suming in personal manner, he has won and re-
tains a host of warm personal friends, who esteem
liim because of his personal qualities.
Andrew G. Krauss, exchange manager at Boze-
man for the Mountain State Telegraph & Tele-
phone Company, has been an executive official of
this corporation in different cities and states of
the Northwest for a number of years. He is a
business man of wide commercial experience and
training, and is a member of a prominent busi-
ness family of New York State.
He was born at Attica, New York, October 28,
1877. His father, J. A. Krauss, was born in 1853
and died in March, 1917, spending his entire life
at Attica. He was one of the leading business
men and citizens of the community. For many
years he was a boot and shoe manufacturer. In
the early days of the oil industry he made a spe-
cialty of manufacturing oil drillers' boots. One
time he had the largest factory of its kind in the
United States and was one of the two manufac-
turers who specialized in that special grade of
boot. About 1895 he discontinued manufacturing
when unable to obtain a supply of raw material
from France. After discontinuing his manufac-
turing department he continued in the retail shoe
and clothing business until his death. He also had
outside interests, including property in the gold
mining district around Cobalt, Canada, and had
invested some money in a gold mine at Helena,
Montana. He was a democrat but little interested
in partisan politics. Several times he was elected
a councilman at Attica, but always by the republi-
cans. He was a director in the Bank of Attica,
was affiliated with the Presbyterian Church and an
active member of the Masonic Order. J. A. Krauss
married Miss Frederica Alentz who was born at
Attica in 1854 and died there in 1884. Caroline,
the oldest of their children, is the wife of C. F.
Bartles, who is manager of the mercantile business
of the Krauss estate at Attica. Andrew G., is the
second of the family. Helen is the wife of Mr.
Glor, and they live on a large farm near Attica.
Louise is married and her husband is in the re-
tail store of the Krauss estate at Attica. John is
manager of a retail shoe store at Springfield, Massa-
chusetts.
Andrew G. Krauss was educated in the public
schools of Attica, graduating from high school in
1895. In 1898 he graduated from the law depart-
ment of Cornell University at Ithaca. While in
university he was a member of the Delta Chi col-
lege fraternity. After getting his law diploma he
spent one year in the law firm of Fisher, Wende .
HISTORY OF MONTANA
& Coatsworth at Buffalo. Mr. Krauss has found
his knowledge of law valuable to him in a busi-
ness way but has never made any serious eflfort
to take up the profession. In 1900 he came to
Helena, Montana, and spend two years as assistant
manager of the old .\mber mine at York. For
about a year he had charge of the books of the
sheriff's office at Butte. Then followed a visit to
his old home at Attica, and later he obtained a
lease on the old Amber mine at York, Montana,
and personally operated it for si.x months. His
next home was at Portland, Oregon, where for
two years he had charge of a clothing and shoe
store and for a time was with the general mer-
cantile house of Olds, Workman & King. Mr.
Krauss then spent three years at Attica. in charge
of his father's business. Until 1912 he was buyer
of the clothing and furnishing goods department
of a large department store at Caldwell, Idaho.
His connection with the Mountain State Tele-
graph & Telephone Company began in 1912, when
he became a salesman in the district office at Boise.
After a year he was promoted to credit man and
then to district salesman, and eventually became
special representative covering the State of Idaho.
In 1915 he was sent as special representative and
division general manager to Salt Lake City, re-
maining there two years, afterward was with the
same company at Helena and in 191 8 was given
the management of the exchange at Bozeman, in-
cluding the Bozeman, Belgrade,' Manhattan and
Sayleville exchanges. His official headquarters are
in the exchange at 13 North Tracy Avenue in Boze-
man.
Mr. Krauss is a republican voter. He married at
Butte, Montana, in 1901. ]Miss Helen McCarthy.
She was born near St. Paul, Minnesota, and is a
graduate of a Sisters' school at St. Paul. They
have four children : J. A. Russell, born April 2,
1903; Eloise, born in May, 1904; Norman Douglas,
born in January, 1906; and Julian Roach, born in
March, 1909.
Benjamin Franklin White, the last territorial
governor of Montana, is a real pioneer of the North-
west, and enjoys the peculiar esteem and affection
of the people of Dillon and Southwestern Montana,
where he has made his home for forty years. Mr.
White is one of the oldest bankers of Montana, hav-
ing for thirty-five years been the active head of the
First National Bank of Dillon, which he has made
one of the largest and strongest banks in the entire
state.
He was born at Fairhaven, Massachusetts, Decem-
ber 3, 1838, and is a direct descendant of the father
of Peregrine White, the first white child born at
Summit, Massachusetts, after the Pilgrims landed
there in 1620. Governor White's grandfather, Wil-
liam White, was born in Southern Massachusetts,
and is buried at Long Plain, Massachusetts. He
lived in his native state and in Rhode Island, and
founded the first cotton mill at Providence. Benja-
min White, father of Governor White, became inter-
ested in his father's cotton mill in Rhode Island, and
was one of the leaders in the textile industry for
many years. He died in Massachusetts when about
ninety years of age. He married Caroline Stock-
bridge, who died in Massachusetts at the age of
eighty-live. They had two sons: George M., a re-
tired manufacturer at New Bedford, Massachusetts,
and Benjamin Franklin.
Benjamin Franklin White lived in his native com-
munity until he was nineteen years of age, acquiring
■his education in the public schools and is a graduate
of the Pierce Academy at Middleborough, Massa-
chusetts. He began earning money as a boy, and a
sum of thirteen dollars he earned hauling logs for
an uncle he used to purchase a watch. He was not
content to enjoy the prosperity and comfort of a
well ordered home in New England. Urged on by
some of the spirit of his Pilgrim ancestors he went
to sea, sailed to Australia and China, and in 1858
came around the Horn to San Francisco. He was
in California until 1866, engaged in mining and
ranching. From 1866 to 1879 he lived in Oneida
County, Idaho, where he became extensively inter-
ested in the salt business. He also served as county
clerk and recorder of that county.
With the building of the Utah Northern Railroad,
now the Oregon Short Line, into Montana, Mr.
White followed the progress of that road as freight
forwarder, and developed the largest wagon freight
service in the West, using 2,000 wagons for the re-
shipment of goods all over Montana from the ter-
minus of the railroad. When the road reached Dil-
lon in the fall of 1880 Governor White had found
his permanent home and business location. Dillon
was the headquarters of his great freighting business
for many years. He also had a large commissary
establishment, and in 1881 opened a private bank as
an accessory to his freighting and other business. In
1884 the bank was incorporated as the First National
Bank, and to the upbuilding of that institution Mr.
White has given his primary attention ever since.
The First National Bank of Dillon is housed in a
substantial brick building on North Montana Street,
and has a capital of $200,000, surplus and profits of
$200,000, while its deposits in 1919 aggregated
$4,000,000. By its resources and the personnel of its
management it easily takes first rank among the
large banking houses of the Northwest. With Mr.
White as president is associated E. J. Bowman of
Anaconda as vice president, and J. H. Gilbert,
cashier.
For a man immersed in practical business affairs,
Mr. White has an unusually long record of pujjlic
service. He was a member of the Territorial Legis-
lature in 1882 and in 1889 was appointed by Presi-
dent Harrison as territorial governor. He remained
in that office until after the state had been admitted
and until the first governor was installed. He was
again in the Legislature and speaker of the House
of Representatives from 1902 to 1904, and was a
member of the State Senate from 1904 to 1908.
Governor White was commissioner for Montana at
the World's Fair at Chicago in 1893 and at the
Louisiana Exposition at St. Louis in 1904. For a
quarter of a -century almost continuously he served
as mayor of Dillon, 'beginning with the incorporation
of the citv. He has also served on the Beaverhead
County High School Board and the City School
Board, has been president of the Dillon Commercial
Club, and has made every interest of his home city
his own.
Mr. White is a member of the Montana and Amer-
ican Bankers' Association and is president of the
White Investment Company, which he established
as a family corporation to manage a large amount
of property, including dwellings, business and gen-
eral real estate at Dillon. Governor White has one
of the substantial and beautiful private homes of
Dillon, at the corner of Orr and Idaho streets.
In February. 1879, in Oneida County, Idaho, he
married Miss Elizabeth Davis, daughter of Emrys
and Margaret Davis. They are the parents of four
children : Carolyn, born in 1881, a graduate of Mill
College at Oakland. California, and living at home
with her parents ; Emrys, born in 1883, finished his
education in Shattuck Military .Academy at Fari-
bault, Minnesota, and is owner of an orange grove
316
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Santa Ana, California; Ralph, who also attended
Shattuck Academy, had an orange grove at Red-
lands, California, and died there in August, 1918, at
the age of twenty-six; Margaret W., the youngest,
is a graduate of Smith College at Northampton,
Massachusetts.
Charles C. Esgak is sheriff of Gallatin County.
He came to Montana thirty years ago and for many
years was busily engaged in homesteading and
ranching. For the past ten years his energies have
been taken up by public duties and responsibilities.
Mr. Esgar was born in Tioga County, Pennsyl-
vania, December 15, 1868. His grandfather, Samuel
Esgar, was a native of Wales, came to America
with his family about 1844, lived in several states
and died near Chicago, Illinois. Robert Esgar,
father of Sheriff Esgar, was born in Wales in 1842
and was an infant when brought to this country.
He was reared in Pennsylvania, and was married
in Tioga County, that state. At Blossburg, Tioga
County, he served for a number of years as chief
of police. Coming to Montana in 1888, he home-
steaded a quarter section in the Bridger Canyon,
proved up the homestead and handled cattle and
other stock over leased lands and the public domain,
and eventually owned a farm of 420 acres. He
died at Bridger Canyon, near Bozeman, in Janu-
ary, 1898. He was a republican, and though reared
a Methodist became affiliated with the Latter Day
Saints Church. He was a member of the Odd
Fellows and Knights of Pythias. Robert Esgar
married Eliza Hanwell, who was born in Tioga
County, Pennsylvania, in 1844, and is now living
at Bozeman. She was the mother of seven chil-
dren : S. G., a rancher in Gallatin County ; Mary
Louisa, who died in Gallatin County in igoo, the
wife of John Dawes, a retired rancher of that
county; Charles C. ; Sadie, wife of John Raby, a
farmer at Bridger Canyon ; Robert M., a Bozeman
merchant; John D., who lives on a farm in Park
Coifnty; and Frank H., a farmer and merchant at
Kansas City, Missouri.
Charles C. Esgar received his early education
in the public schools of Blossburg, Pennsylvania.
He was twenty years of age when he came to
Montana with his parents in 1888. For three y^rs
he worked as a miner at Chestnut, and then took
up a homestead of 160 acres in Bridger Canyon.
He sold this homestead, and afterward owned and
occupied and sold a number of ranches, and con-
tinued active as a productive factor in Montana
agriculture until 1909.
For three years beginning in 1909 Mr. Esgar
served as deputy sheriff. For five years he was
deputy state game warden, and in 1918 was elected
sheriff of Gallatin County, beginning his two year
term on January 6, 1919. His official residence is
the county jail, and he also owns a dwelling on
West Lamme Street. Politically Mr. Esgar is a
democrat. He is affiliated with Bozeman Lodge
No. 463 of the Elks, and P>'thagoras Lodge No. 2,
Knights of Pythias.
In October, 1895, at Bridger Canyon, Gallatin
County, he married Miss Ida Yadon, daughter of
J. V. and Nancy (Lay) Yadon, residents of Boze-
man. Mrs. Esgar died at Bozeman in January,
1913. She was the mother of two children ; Chloe
May, a graduate of the eighth grade public schools
and attending Lamoni, Iowa, College and now at
home ; and Charles R., a student in the grammar
schools at Bozeman. In January, 1915, at Spokane,
Washington, Sheriff Esgar married Miss Leona E.
Martin. She was born in Iowa.
Philip Griffith Dodson is one of the younger
business men of Bozeman, and is known as a suc-
cessful painter and decorator, having developed
the leading business of its kind in Gallatin County.
He is a native of Bozeman, and his father was one
of the very earliest settlers in that town.
Both his father and grandfather were named
Philip Dodson and both were natives of England.
Grandfather Philip spent his life as a farmer and
proprietor of an old fashioned tavern at Swave-
sey, England, where he died. He married Eliza
Pettit, a native of Stanton, Cambridgeshire, who
died in London. Their children were Richard,
Thomas, Caroline, John, Mary Ann, Sarah Ann,
these two daughters being twins, Philip, Emma,
Lucy, Ed\yard, Clara, Walter P. and Frederick W.
Of the thirteen ten died in England. Those liv-
ing are Philip, Walter P., who is a retired railroad
man in the East Indies, and Frederick W., a loco-
motive engineer in London, England.
Philip Dodson, Jr., was born at Swavesey, Cam-
bridgeshire, England, June 15, 1845, was educated
in the public schools and the Academy of St. Ives,
and in 1862, at the age of seventeen, came to the
United States. He lived at Decatur, Illinois, three
years, working as a porter in a hotel. For one
year he was a brakeman on the Illinois Central
Railroad, and in 1865 went to Leavenworth, Kan-
sas, working in a restaurant for ten months. The
spring of 1866 found him a pioneer at Bozeman,
Montana. He had varied experiences and fol-
lowed different occupations in the territory until
1875, when he went to Washington and took up a
quarter section of land in Garfield County. He
farmed there two years, after which he sold his
pre-emption and for a few months was in the
hotel business at Walla Walla and for two years
conducted a restaurant there. Returning to Helena
in the fall of 1879 he worked in a restaurant and
the next spring went to Deer Lodge, where he
worked in a hotel three months, also in a restau-
rant at Butte, and in September, 1880, returned to
Bozeman, where he clerked in a hotel until 1883.
The following fifteen years he was a Bozeman
merchant, and since then has conducted a business
in fire insurance and still handles a prosperous
agency for some of the best old line insurance
companies. His offices are at 330 West Main Street.
He and his son Philip G. are associated in the
ownership of five dwelling houses at Bozeman and
a large farm and ranch. Philip Dodson resides
at 408 South Central Avenue. For four years he
was city treasurer of Bozeman and two years a
member of the council and for two years public
administrator of Gallatin County. He is a re-
publican, a member of the Episcopal Church, is
past grand of Western Star Lodge No. 4 of the
Odd Fellows, past grand master of the State of
Montana, is a member of Rising Sun Encampment
No. 8, of the Odd Fellows, and past grand patriarch
of the state, and also belongs to Gallatin Canton
No. 7 and to the Rebekahs. He is affiliated with
Bozeman Tent No. 2 of the Knights of the Macca-
bees.
In September. 1883, Philip Dodson married at
Bozeman. Mrs. Elnora (Griffith) Warfield, a daugh-
ter of Samuel and Dicy (Hankins) Griffith, both
now deceased. Her father was a farmer at Van-
dalia, Illinois. Mrs. Dodson died at the Presby-
terian Hospital in Chicago. February 29, 1908.
Philip Dodson and wife had two children, the older,
a son, dying in infancy.
Philip Griffith Dodson was born at Bozeman,
Jariuary 7, 1890, and was graduated from the Gal-
latin County High School in 1908. The next three
years after leaving high school he worked at his
HISTORY OF AIONTANA
317
trade as a painter and decorator at Bozeman. From
191 1 to 1916 he gave all his time to the manage-
ment of his ranch at Sedan. He and his father
own 714 acres there. In 1916 Mr. Dodson resumed
his business as a painter and decorator and has
made his own skill in that line the nucleus of a
business in which he employs several assistants
and has facilities for a complete service, his ofHce
and supply store being at 330 \\'est Alain Street.
In November, 1918, Mr. Dodson responded to
the draft and entered the array camp at American
Lake, subsequently being transferred to Camp
Kearney at San Diego, California, and was in that
camp until discharged in March, igig.
Mr. Dodson is independent in politics, is a mem-
ber of the Episcopal Church, and is affiliated with
Western Star Lodge No. 4 of the Odd Fellows,
Bozeman Lodge No. 463 of the Elks, Bozeman
Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Zoma Chapter No. 12, Royal Arch Masons. He
and his wife reside at the Blackmore Apartments.
In October, 191S, at Bozeman, he married Miss
Cora Onslow. Mrs. Dodson is a graduate of the
Normal School at Chico, California.
WiLLARD Crockett Dawes, D. O. A leading rep-
resentative of osteopathy at Bozeman, Doctor Dawes
is a native Montanan and has been an active worker
in his profession for the past fifteen years.
He was born in Central Park, Gallatin County,
Montana. September 19, 1881. His paternal an-
cestors were colonial settlers in Virginia from
Wales. His father, John A. J. Dawes, was born
at Paris, Virginia, March 2, 1839, and lived there
until he was twenty years of age. He moved to
Audrain County, near Mexico and Centralia, Mis-
souri, and was married in the Beaverdam Baptist
Church of that county. In 1861 he entered the
Confederate army and was all through the war,
much of the time as a soldier in General Price's
army. In 1865 he returned to his farm in Audrain
County, and lived there until he came to Mon-
tana in the spring of 1880. The first year he spent
at Central Park in ' Gallatin County, and during
that time his son. Doctor Dawes, was born. He
ne.xt removed to Fergus County, and as a pioneer
he pre-empted a quarter section and also took up
a timber claim of 160 acres. In the course of tithe
he bought other land and did a successful busi-
ness as a rancher and stock man. He finally owned
900 acres and spent the rest of his life as a rancher
and died while visiting his son. Doctor Dawes, at
Billings on February 15, igo6. He served a num-
ber of years as justice of the peace in Fergus Coun-
ty, was a democrat, a very active member of the
Baptist Church and was affiliated with the Mod-
ern Woodmen of America. John A. J. Dawes mar-
ried Margaret Jane Crockett, who was born in
.Audrain County, Missouri, in 1841. and now lives
with her children. She was a direct descendant
of a brother of David Crockett, the hero of the
Texas revolution. She is the mother of seven
children: Rosella, wife of P. W. Polly, an osteo-
pathic physician at Emmett, Idaho ; Laura, wife
of Dr. J. L. Mullenbrook, an osteopath at Spo-
kane, Washington ; Wellington, who is also a doc-
tor of osteopathy practicing at Great Falls,
Montana; Hugh R. and Frank P., both farmers at
Garneill, Montana ; Willard C. ; and Edith B., wife
of H. J. Betten, a physician and surgeon at Spo-
kane, Washington.
Dr. W. C. Dawes lived on his father's farm in
Fergus County until he was twenty years of age.
He received a rural school education and in prepa-
ration for his profession took the regular course
of the American School of Osteopathy at Kirks-
ville, Missouri, graduating in January, 1904. The
following two years he practiced at Billings, and
since then has been a resident of Bozeman, and
by his personal abilities has made his profession
highly respected and liberally patronized in Galla-
. tin County. Doctor Dawes was president of the
■ Montana Osteopathic Association for 1900-10, and
has served continuously as secretary-treasurer of the
association since 191 1. In 1906-7 he also served as
secretary of the association. His offices and home
are in the Martin Block, 237 West Main Street.
Doctor Dawes is a leading member of the Mon-
tana and the American Osteopathic associations.
He is a democrat in politics. Doctor Dawes takes
a prominent part in the Christian Church at Boze-
man, being an elder and member of the choir in
the church and chorister and teacher in the Sun-
day school. He is affiliated with Eureka Home-
stead No. 215, Brotherhood of American Yeo-
men, and Western Star Lodge No. 4, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows at Bozeman. August 3,
1910, at Murray, Indiana, he married Miss Nelle
Park, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph W. Park.
Her parents are both deceased. Her father was
a blacksmith and veterinarian. Mrs. Dawes is a
graduate of the Normal School in Indiana.
Harvey A. Corbin. The dignity of farming and
the profits accruing from this calling are now re-
ceiving universal recognition, but prior to the period
which is making such unprecedented deiuands upon
those engaged in raising food for the world there
were a number who devoted their abilities to tilling
the soil, and brought up their children to the same
calling. Harvey A. Corbin, of Miles City, owner
of one of the best ranches in the Tongue River Dis-
trict of Custer County, comes of a long line of
agriculturists, whose names are inscribed first as
farmers of Maine and later of New York State.
The grandfather of Harvey A. Corbin, born on a
farm in Maine, left that state for Clinton County,
New York, where he was engaged in farming all
of his life, and there his son, Asa Corbin, father
of Harvey A. Corbin, was born and died, passing
away in 1869, at the age of forty-nine years. Asa
Corbin was married to Elizabeth Finney, who died
at the home of her son Harvey A. Corbin in 1905,
being then aged seventy-five years. Mr. Corbin has
one sister, Mary, who is the wife of James Fiddes,
of San Francisco, California, they being the only
children of Asa Corbin and his wife.
Harvey A. Corbin was born on a farm in Clinton
County, New York, not far from Plattsburg, No-
vember 2, i860, and he was reared at Moore's Junc-
tion of that same state. A very active lad, the
confinement of the schoolroom irked him, and when
he had completed the courses included in a common
school education he severed his connection with edu-
cational institutions and sought a place in the larger
school of experience. Until he left New York his
means of subsistence were found in farm work, and
this early training, which was hard and thorough,
fitted him, as nothing else could have done, for his
future expansion into a ranchman of many acres
and large and varied interests.
Always ambitious, the restless spirit of this ener-
getic young man could not be content with the event-
less routine of a New York State farm, and in 1883
he struck out westward, arriving in Custer County,
Montana, in June of that year. Help was scarce,
and an experienced farm worker did not lack for
employment, although the wages of those days only
ranged from $30 to $40 per month, and the work
was hard and the hours long. With the cheerful
318
HISTORY OF MOx\TANA
optimism of youth Mr. Corbin accepted the hardships
of this period as just so much more experience,
and kept his eyes open for opportunities, finding them
during the subsequent three years, so that he was
able to take a homestead on the Tongue River, ten
miles south of Miles City. On this land he erected
a crude shelter of logs, using dirt for both the floor ,^
and roof, and into it he moved his scanty posses-
sions and had his first home of his own. He had
invested in several horses and used them to break
the soil and put in corn and potatoes, which crops
have always yielded abundantly, and which he still
raises. Making his money earn more for him, Mr.
Corbin was soon able to acquire a few cows and a
calf or two, and from this small beginning has de-
veloped his present immense cattle industry. When
he first went into the stock business, however, the
feeding of cattle and horses was not much of a
problem because the land was then all unfenced and
with the exception of a milch cow or saddle horse
the stock could forage, even during the winter. The
little log shack in time was succeeded by the pres-
ent comfortable ranch house, and barn after barn
was built to house the increasing head of stock. All
these improvements, together with many others, Mr.
Corbin has made and is rewarded by now having
one of the best improved and valuable ranch prop-
erties in Custer County or along the Tongue and
Powder Rivers trail. It was perhaps a dozen years
before Mr. Corbin began buying railroad land on
the long-time payment plan, but when he com-
menced so doing, continued to add to his acreage
in this manner until there are now about goo acres
of deeded land entered upon the tax rolls to his
credit. A portion of his ranch is under the Tongue
River Irrigation Canal, which provides him with
alfalfa meadow, from which an average of 454 tons
of hay are sure to be mowed annually. Experiments
have taught Mr. Corbin that for his purposes the
Shorthorn cattle and Shire horses are the best, and
he is breeding them upon a large scale. He is one
of the commissioners of the Tongue River Irriga-
tion _ Canal, and has carried on his part in local
politics as a layman, rendering efficient service when
required as a member of the Election Board, or in a
similar capacity. In national matters he votes with
the democratic party.
In July, 1899, Mr. Corbin was united in marriage
with Miss Carrie Card, a daughter of Joseph Card,
an eady settler of Weld County, Colorado, where
Mrs. Corbin was born, but she was reared chiefly
in Deadwood, South Dakota. Her parents had
eleven children, of whom the survivors, in addition
\o nerself are : Mrs. Annie Williams, of Miles City,
Montana ; Millie, who is the wife of John Christten-
son, of St. Paul, Minnesota; Will, who is a resident
of Central City, South Dakota; Joseph, who is a
resident of Upton, Wyoming; and Warren, who is a
resident of Spearfish, South Dakota. Mrs. Corbin is
the next to the youngest of these surviving children,
and was born June 20, 1874. Mr. and Mrs. Corbin
have no children.
Thomas Connolly. It is a generally accepted
fact that some of the most successful men of this
country are those who come here from the Emerald
Isle, and of them Montana has its share. Thomas
Connolly, one of the enterprising ranchmen of Hill
County, owns and operates about three sections of
land at Cottonwood, twenty-five miles northwest of
Havre, and he is proud of the fact that he was born
in County Roscommon, Ireland. His birth occurred
on March 25, 1881, and he has acquired all he now
owns since 1901. His father, Thomas Connolly,
was born in County Roscommon, in 1837, and his
mother, Elizabeth (Quigley) Connolly, is a native
of the same county. Both survive and live in County
Roscommon, where the father lias been a farmer all
of his mature years. He and his wife had eleven
children born to them, of whom three died in in-
fancy, and four sons and four daughters lived to
maturity, Thomas Connolly being the seventh in
order of birth.
Until he was eighteen years of age Thomas
Connolly remained on his father's farm and at-
tended the public schools. On April 23, 1899, he
took passage on a steamer for New York City, his
ticket being a through one to Great Falls, Montana,
where he joined an uncle, John C. Quigley, a sheep-
man, with a ranch fifteen miles west of Choteaii
in Teton County, and there Thomas Connolly re-
mained about a year. In 1901 he and his brother
Patrick formed a partnership and continued together
until the latter's death in 1915. They operated in
sheep until 1912, and then reduced their flocks to
fifty head and branched out into cattle and horse
raising. In 1918 Mr. Connolly sold the greater num-
ber of his cattle and is now specializing on breeding
Percheron horses. About 500 acres of his ranch are
devoted to wheat and other small grain, and he is
very successful in his farming. In 191 1 Mr. Con-
nolly was appointed postmaster of Cottonwood, Hill
County, and in connection with the office conducted a
general store, housing both in a building he erected
for that purpose in 1911. After three years he leased
his business so as to give all of his time to farming
and horse breeding. Mr. Connolly was honored
by Governor Samuel Stewart who appointed him
a member of the Grain Grading Inspection and
Warehouse Commission in April, 1919, and for the
past eight years he has been a member of the School
Board of his district. In politics he is a strong
republican. His fraternal connections are with
Havre Lodge No. 1201, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
On August 13, 1914, Mr. Connolly was united in
marriage with Ethel Weir, born at Grafton, North
Dakota, a daughter of John and Susan (Fennell)
Weir, both of whom were born in Ontario, Canada.
They had three children, but Mrs. Connolly is the
only one now living. Mr. Weir is deceased, but his
widow survives him. Mr. and Mrs. Connolly have
one daughter. The case of Mr. Connolly is a rather
remarkable one in that he has been able to attain
to such prosperity in so short a period and all
through his own exertions. It is not difficult for a
young man to achieve success when he is backed
by large property interests and influential friends,
but it is a different matter for him to reach his goal
only through his personal acumen, far-sightedness
and industry.
William B. Calhoun. A man of naturally sound
judgment and shrewd perception, characteristic of
the Scotch race of which William B. Calhoun, drug-
gist of Clyde Park, is a descendant, he has so or-
dered his career as to be eminently eligible to
representation in a work of this kind. He has
risen through his strictly moral habits, his atten-
tion to business and his desire to deal fairly, prompt-
ly and honestly with his fellow men, and today
his name stands high in all business circles with
which he has come into relationship.
William Baron Calhoun was born at Sparta,
Wisconsin, on the 25th day of January, 1870, and
is a son of William A. and Emogene (Holmes)
Calhoun. The Calhoun family of which he is a
lineal descendant immigrated to this country from
Scotland, where the name was spelled Kalhoun.
They located in Massachusetts during the days of
^^^J~^^r^ l^^^t4r^^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the colonies, and there the subject's paternal grand-
father, William Baron Calhoun, was born, lived
and died, his last home being at Springfield. Wil-
liam A. Calhoun was born at Springfield and his
death occurred at Wilmar, Minnesota, in 1878.
He was reared in Springfield and sometime after
his marriage he moved to Sparta, Wisconsin. A
short time later he located in Wilmar, Minnesota,
where he became the proprietor of a hotel and
where he spent the rernainder of his days. He
was a republican in politics and at one time served
as sheriff of Kandiyohi County, Minnesota. He
was a faithful member of the Episcopal Church.
He was a veteran of the Civil war, having enlisted
in a Massachusetts regiment of volunteer infantry,
with which he served through the war. At Spottsyl-
vania Courthouse he was severely wounded, a bul-
let plowing through his left arm from elbow to
wrist. He married Emogene Holmes, who was
born at Bradford, Pennsylvania, and whose death
occurred at Sparta, Wisconsin, in 1898. They be-
came the parents of three children, namely : Mary
Margaret, who remains unmarried, is principal of
a ward school at Billings, Montana; W'illiam B.;
and Bertha Belle, unmarried, has charge of the
silks and dress goods department of Yegen Brothers
store at Billings.
William B. Calhoun received his general educa-
tion in the public schools of Sparta, Wisconsin,
graduating from the high school there in the spring
of 1890. He then took a course in pharmacy in
the University of Wisconsin, at Madison, after
which he was employed for eight months in a drug
store .at Antigo, Wisconsin. In 1892 Mr. Calhoun
went to Billings, Montana, and was employed in
a drug store there until the outbreak of the Span-
ish-American war in 1898. In May of that year
he enlisted in the volunteer cavalry, known as the
Montana Rough Riders. The command was sent
to Camp George A. Thomas at Chickamauga Park,
where Mr. Calhoun served as chief steward in
the regimental hospital. He was mustered out of
the service in September, 1898, and at once re-
turned to Billings, spending the next year in a drug
store. During the following four years he served
as deputy assessor of Yellowstone County, under
Assessor A. P. Smith, and at the expiration of his
official term he went to Bridger, Montana, where
he entered the employ of the Glidden Mercantile
Company, with whom he remained six years. The
following year he spent at Salt Lake City, and
in 191 1 he cAme to Clyde Park and bought the
drug store owned by F. A. Scheuber. This is the
pioneer drug store at Clyde Park and has always
enjoyed its full share of public patronage in that
line. Mr. Calhoun is a registered pharmacist in
both Montana and Minnesota and is an expert pres-
cription druggist. By a course of right dealing he
has gained not only a large clientele, but also a
host of friends, who esteem him for his personal
qualities of character.
Politically Mr. Calhoun is a republican. Fra-
ternally he is a member of Livingston Lodge No.
32, Ancient Free ,and Accepted Masons; Clyde
Park Lodge No. 64. Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, of which he is a past hoble grand, and
Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
In 1908. at Livingston. Mr. Calhoun was mar-
ried to Cathryn Stroup, who was born at Mount
Clements, Michigan, and they are the parents of
one child. Harriet Emogene, ijorn January 12, 1915.
Fred F. Willson is a widely known Montana
architect. In architecture "many are called but
few are chosen," in other words, few have the
Tol. 11—21
training, the artistic sense, the skill and technique
to make them worthy of the word by which they
describe their vocation. The practical work of
Mr. Willson as an architect may be found in many
cities of Montana and in some of the leading state
institutions.
He is the only son of the late Gen. Lester S. Will-
son, who died at Bozeman, January 26, 1919. Gen-
eral Willson was born at Canton, St. Lawrence
County, New York, June 16, 1839, son of Ambrose
and Julia A. (Hill) Willson and of old English
ancestry. He was educated in the public schools
and academy at Canton, and left the store of an
uncle to enter Company A of the Sixtieth New
Vork Infantry in August, 1861. He was made ser-
geant in September, second lieutenant in October,
1862, soon afterward was promoted to first lieu-
tenant and adjutant, and declined a commission as
captain. However, in August, 1864, he was made
a captain, in October of the same year lieutenant
colonel, and in May, 1865, was promoted to colonel,
though he never served as such. His rank as brevet
colonel and brevet brigadier general was made to
date from March 13, 1865. He was given those
honors on the recommendation of Generals Hooker
and Slocum, "for gallant and meritorious service
under General Sherman at Atlanta." He saw some
of the hardest service of the war, being in the
Virginia campaigns of 1861-62, at Antietam, Chan-
cellorsville, where he was severely wounded, and
his wound kept him out of the Gettysburg cam-
paign. From the fall of 1863 he was under General
Hooker in the campaigns marked by the great bat-
tles of Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge.
It was through his personal influence that his regi-
ment veteranized and re-enlisted in November. 1863.
It is said that the Sixtieth New York was the sec-
ond regiment of the Union army to take this step.
He and his command were in all the battles of
Sherman's campaign from Chattanooga to Atlanta,
and thence on the historic march to the sea and up
through the Carolinas. The Sixtieth New York
was one of the first two regiments to enter the City
of Atlanta and the Sixtieth was declared by com-
petent authority to be the best regiment in the
Union army. General Willson enjoyed the confi-
dence and personal association with such great
military figures as Sherman, Hooker, Slocum, Gary,
Greene.
After the war he was appointed assistant quar-
termaster general of the State of New York, with
the rank of colonel. This office had the adjust-
ment of many business matters with the railroads
pertaining to the transportation of troops, sup-
plies and the settlement of accounts between the
state and federal government. General Wilson re-
tired from that responsibility in March, 1867. and
from that date until his death his name and ca-
reer were identified with Montana, where he was
prominent in mining, merchandising, banking and
where from 1883 to :886 he served as quartermas-
ter general of the territory with the rank of briga-
dier general. Even with this casual review of his
career it is evident that he was one of the out-
standing figures in the territorial and early state
history of Montana. He did much to build up and
maintain the influence and prestige of the republi-
can party in Montana, and was a member of the
Territorial Legislature in 1868-69. He was a char-
ter member of the William English Post of the
Grand Army, had filled most of its offices and was
at one time department commander of Montana
and was a member of New York Commandery of
the Loyal Legion. He was also a Mason, being
affiliated with the lodge at Bozeman.
March 2, 1869, General Willson married at Al-
320
HISTORY OF MONTANA
bany, New York, Miss Emma D. Weeks, a native
of Vermont. She is still living at Bozeman. They
were the parents of three children, Fred F. being
the only survivor.
Fred F. Willson was born at Bozeman, Novem-
ber II, 1877. He attended public schools at his
native town, spent four years in the Bozeman
Academy, and completed his junior year in the
Montana State College of Agriculture and Mechanic
Arts. He completed his college work in Columbia
University at New York City, graduating Bachelor
of Science in Architecture with the class of 1902.
While at Columbia he was a member of the Delta
Upsilon fraternity. He had set his mind upon archi-
tecture as his calling when a youth, and has never
deviated from a stanch and loyal devotion to the
art and profession. After leaving university he
returned to Helena and spent two years with C.
S. Haire, a prominent architect there. His two
years of practical work at Helena were then sup-
plemented by two years abroad. His headquarters
were in Paris, where he was a student with a gradu-
ate of the Ecole de Beaux Arts, but at the same
time carried on extensive travels and observation
through England. France. Germany, Holland, Bel-
gium, Italy and Spain. While his work as an archi-
tect has been noted for originality of design, that
originality has always been tempered by the broad
and thorough knowledge he has of architecture
as exemplified in the best creations of all the cen-
turies and in the greatest centers of art in the civ-
ilized world. On returning to America in 1906 he
remained for some time in New York City follow-
ing his profession. He has since established an
associate relationship with a prominent firm of
New York architects comprised of Theodore C.
Visscher and James Burley. Mr. Willson returned
to Bozeman in April, 1906, and for the following
four years had charge of Link and Haire's office
at Butte. Since then he has practiced his profes-
sion with offices in Bozeman. He has a suite of
offices and a complete organization in the Com-
mercial National Bank Building. Mr. Willson is
responsible for the architectural development of the
Orphans' Home Building at Twin Bridges; the
Chemical Building on the campus of the state col-
lege, and designed the Commercial National Bank
Building at Bozeman and the Emerson School. The
Emerson School at Bozeman is a building which
has attracted the attention and admiration of edu-
cational bodies all over the United States. He has
recently begun work on the engineering building
for the Montana State College, and has designed
and built schools, apartment houses and business
structures at Dillon, Anaconda, Columbus, Man-
hattan and in many other towns and cities of the
state. Mr. Willson owns one of the most beauti-
ful homes of Bozeman, at 509 Tracy Avenue. He
designed and built this residence in 1914. Since
his father's death he and his mother have been*
administrators of the estate. He individually owns
640 acres in the Powder River country, and is
president of the Bozeman Investment Company and
a director and stockholder of the Willson Company,
a business which was established by his father more
than half a century ago.
Mr. Willson is a present member of the city
council of Bozeman. Politically he is a republi-
can. He is a member of the Historical Library
Board of Helena, a member of the State Archi-
tectural Society, which he served two terms as
president and is now a director, is affiliated with
the Presbyterian Church, with Bozeman Lodge No.
18, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Bozeman
Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks, Silver Bow Club of Butte and the Cham-
ber of Commerce at Bozeman. He is also a mem-
ber of the Columbia University Alumni Association
and the New York Commandery of the Loyal
Legion.
October 15, 1913, near Bozeman, he married Miss
Helen Fisher,, daughter of E. H. and Clara (Mc-
Cabe) Fisher, residents of Bozeman, her father
being president of the Owenshouse Company. Mrs.
Willson is a graduate of the Gallatin County High
School and the Montana State College. They have
one son, Lester S., II, born March 3, 1916.
H. F. Brink. Upon the roll of representative
citizens and prominent and influential business
men of Wilsall consistently appears the name of
H. F. Brink, the able president of the First Na-
tional Bank. He is one of those sturdy spirits
who has contributed largely to the material wel-
fare of the locality in which he resides. During
his residence in this locality he has won his way
into the afi^ections of the people, for he possesses
those sterling qualities of character which com-
mend themselves to persons of intelligence and
the highest morality.
The Brink family is of sturdy old Holland stock,
whence the subject's progenitors came to New York
State in colonial days and thereafter took a lead-
ing part in the stirring events of those historic
times. His paternal grandfather, Henry W. Brink,
was born in New York State in 1804. He became
one of the pioneer settlers of Illinois, becoming
a farmer and also owning a hotel at Woodstock,
where his death occurred in 1892. He married
Hannah French, who was born in New York State
in 1812 and who died at Woodstock in 1896. Among
their children was the subject's father, ^I. D. Brink,
who was born in New York State in 1832. At the
age of eleven years he accompanied the family
on their migration to Illinois and was reared in
McHenry County until twenty years of age. In 1852,
lured by the wonderful stories of the great Eldo-
rado of the West, he went to California and spent
three years in prospecting, in which he was fairly
successful. He then returned to McHenry County,
but shortly thereafter moved to Northeastern Iowa,
and to Osage County, that state, in 1865. He was a
successful brick manufacturer practicall}' all his
life. In 1872 he located in Nashua, Iowa, where
he operated a brickyard and farmed until his re-
tirement from active business pursuits, about twenty
years prior to his death, which occurred at Inde-
pendence, Iowa, on October 21, 1917. His real
estate is now owned by the subject's brother, C. G.
Brink, who cared for his father during the last
twenty years of his life. M. D. Brink was a re-
publican in politics and a man of strong charac-
ter, who exerted a beneficent influence on all with
whom he came in contact. He married Helen Au-
rand, who was born in New York State in 1837
and who now resides at Park Rapids, Minnesota.
They became the parents of the following children :
Lee A., who is a minister of the Congregational
Church at Maize, Kansas ; Minnie, who is the wife
of Frank Campbell, a farmer at Park Rapids,
Minnesota ; H. F., whose name forms the caption
to this review ; 'C. G., who is operating the home-
stead farm at Nashua, Iowa ; Loutie M., the wife
of Oscar Armagost, a contractor and builder at
Topeka, Kansas; Nellie, the wife of Milo Butler,
a farmer at Windham, Ohio.
H. F. Brink was born at Osage. Iowa, on May
16, 1868. He was educated in the schools of Chicka-
saw County and remained at home until seven-
teen years of age. He then learned the trade of
a flour miller at Nashua, to which he applied him-
self until twenty-three years of age, when he en-
HISTORY OF M0N'];ANA
321
gaged in farming for about a year. He then bought
a homestead at Park Rapids, Minnesota, to which
he de\'Oted his attention for six years, or until
1898, when he came to Norris, Montana, and for
four months was employed as a clerk in a store.
During the following two years he was engaged
in the livery business, but sold that business and
for eleven years was engaged in the lumber and
coal business. Disposing of that business, he then
went to Columbus, Montana, and bought .a farm
on the Stillwater River, which he operated about •
V/i years. In 1912 he came to Wilsall and estab-
lished the pioneer hardware and implement busi-
ness here, which he has continued ever since, this
now being the leading business of the kind in this
section of the country. He has been financially
successful in his business operations and owns, be-
sides his store building, a splendid modern resi-
dence, a drug store and real estate in Wilsall. He
is also president of the First National Bank of
Wilsall, one of the strong and influential financial
institutions of this county, and much of the suc-
cess of which is due to the sound judgment and
wise policy of its president.
Politically Mr. Brink has been aligned with the
republican party and has served his community as
justice of the peace. His religious affiliation is
with the Methodist Episcopal Church. Fraternally
he is a member of Wilsall Lodge No. 103, Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows, of which he is treas-
urer, and of Jeffers (Montana) Lodge, Modern
Woodmen of .America.
On July 16, 1890, at Verndale, Minnesota, Mr.
Brink was married to Lucy Wilson, the daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Wilson, both of whom
are deceased. The father had been a farmer in
Dane County, Wisconsin. Mr. and Mrs. Brink
are the parents of the following children : Grace,
the wife of Robert W. Lucas, a real estate dealer
and stockman at Wilsall ; Lee R., who is engaged
in business with his father at Wilsall. Mr. Brink
has given consistent support to every measure look-
ing to the advancement of the best interests of his
community, and to a large measure the prosperity
of the town is due to his influence.
R. N. Stryker. The gentleman whose name ini-
tiates this paragraph is deemed eminently worthy
of representation along with the best and most in-
dustrious citizens of the locality in which he re-
sides, owing to the fact that he belongs to the
energetic and enterprising class that has contributed
to the later-day success of the favored section of
the great treasure state honored by his citizenship.
He enjoys distinctive prestige in business circles,
his practical intelligence, mature judgment and
sound business sense winning for him the confi-
dence and good will of all with whom he has come
in contact.
Like several others of the best known citizens of
Southern Montana, Mr. Stryker is descended from
Holland stock, his progenitors having come to
America in the days of Peter Stuyvesant and lo-
cating in New Jersey. The subject's paternal grand-
father, William Stryker, was born in 1813 in New
Jersey, but in an early day removed to Illinois,
where he was numbered among the pioneer farm-
ers. His death occurred at Jerseyville, Illinois, in
1883. He married Phoebe Davis, a native of New
Jersey and who also died at Jerseyville, Illinois.
J. V. Stryker. father of the subject of this sketch,
was born in 1851 at Whitehall, Illinois, and died
at Pawnee City, Nebraska, in 1009. He was reared
at Whitehall, but subsequently removed to Spring-
field, that state, where he became a breeder and
trainer of trotting horses, in which vocation he
attained a national reputation, some of the speediest
horses on American race tracks having come from
his stables.- In 1897 he moved to Pawnee City,
Nebraska, where he retired from business and spent
his last days. He was favorably known as a man
of fine attainments in other lines than his special
calling and enjoyed the acquaintance of many of the
leading men of the country. He was a democrat
in politics and was appointed ambassador to Eng-
land, but declined the appointment. He was a mem-
ber of the Presbyterian Church. He married Gretta
Nevius, who was born in 1859, ni Galesburg. Illinois,
and who now resides at Wilsall. Their children are
as follows : Frank, who is in the employ of the
Northwestern Railway at Council Bluffs, Iowa;
R. N., the immediate subject of this sketch; Fred,
who is the owner of a ranch at Wilsall ; Charles,
of Barnhamville, Virginia, enlisted in the United
States army in 1918 and was mustered out in 1910;
James, who is engaged in railroad construction work
at Denver, Colorado ; Barlett, whose home is in
San Francisco, is in the United States aviation serv-
ice
R. N. Stryker was born at Jerseyville. Illinois,
on December 27, 1881, and received his education
in the public schools of Springfield, Illinois, and the
high school at Pawnee City, Nebraska, where he
was graduated in 1903. He then studied engineering
one year in the University of Nebraska, at Lincoln.
In 1904 Mr. Stryker came to Montana and in igo6
filed on a homestead at Meyersburg, now Wilsall.
He still owns that land and altogether has 360
acres, with fine water rights, the whole comprising
one of the best equipped stock ranches in Southern
Montana. The fine residence, modern barns and
convenient outhouses all comprise a plant of which
the owner is justifiably proud. In the spring of
1919 Mr. Stryker moved into Wilsall in order to
take up the duties of assistant cashier of the First
National Bank, which had just been organized and
which already has gained an excellent reputation as
a strong and influential financial institution. The
bank is capitalized at $25,000, with a surplus of
$S,ooo, and the official personnel is as follows ; Presi-
dent, H. F. Brink; vice president, John F. Sinclair;
second vice president, Dr. L. R. Carson ; cashier,
O. E. Sahr; assistant cashier, R. N. Stryker. Mr.
Stryker is a republican in politics.
In igi2, at Clyde Park, Montana, Mr. Stryker was
married to Ethel Fellows, daughter of Martin and
Almeda (Stillwell) Fellows, both of whom are de-
ceased. Mrs. Stryker is a lady of splendid culture,
having attended the State Normal School at St.
Cloud, Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Stryker have two
children, Harriet, born January 24. 1913, and Almeda,
born June i, 1916. Mr. Stryker has been success-
ful in his business enterprises and today no one
here enjoys a larger circle of warm friends and
acquaintances, who esteem him because of his ster-
ling qualities of character and his business ability.
V. F. GuiNzY. In such men as V. F. Guinzy, a
successful business man and rancher of Wilsall,
there is peculiar satisfaction in offering their life
histories — justification for works of this character
— not that their lives have been such as to gain
them particularly wide notoriety or the admiring
plaudits of men, but that they have been true to
the trusts reposed in them and have shown such
attributes of character as entitle them to the regards
of all.
V. F. Guinzy was born in Peoria, Illinois, on Feb-
ruary 21, 1883, and is a son of A. and Jennie (Jor-
dan) Guinzy. The father was born in Italy in
1841, and came to the United States in 1874, settling
at Yates City, Fulton County, Illinois, where he fol-
322
HISTORY OF MONTANA
lowed the vocation o£ a coal miner. In 1880 he
went to St. David, Illinois, where he also mined,
but about ten years later he located in CollinsviUe,
Illinois, and engaged in the dry goods business, to
which he gave his attention until 1907, when he re-
tired and is now living at Wood River, Illinois. He
is a democrat in politics. Before coming to Amer-
ica he was in the military service of his country
and took part in the Abbysinian war under General
Garibaldi. Mr. Guinzy married Jennie Jordan, who
was born in i860 in Yates City, Illinois, and whose
death occurred at St. David, Illinois m 1887. lo
this union were born the following children : Joseph,
who is a coal miner at CollinsviUe, Illinois ; V. F.,
the immediate subject of this review; Edward, who
is also a coal miner at CollinsviUe.
V. F. Guinzy received a good elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of CollinsviUe, Illinois,
and having decided to apply himself to the legal
profession he entered the Missouri College of Law
at St. Louis, where he was graduated in 1902, with
the degree of Bachelor of Laws. In that same year
he was admitted to the bar, with license to prac-
tice in either Missouri or Illinois. He became a
member of the law firm of Grund, Guinzy & Mc- ■
Neely in St. Louis, with which he was associated
for three years. He then went to Lead, in the
Black Hills of South Dakota, where for three years
he was connected with the celebrated Homestake
Mining Company, one of the greatest and most
successful mining companies in the West. Severing
his connection with that company, he returned to
CollinsviUe, Illinois, and engaged in the real estate
business until 191 5, when he came to Wilsall and
entered the employ of the Northern Pacific Railway
Company. In 1916 Mr. Guinzy became manager of
the Farmers Exchange, a co-operative company at
Wilsall, with which he is still associated. He oc-
cupies the responsible positions of secretary, treas-
urer and general manager of the concern and has
so conducted its affairs as to win the approbation
of all concerned in the enterprise. The office and
elevator are situated along the Northern Pacific
Railroad tracks, and through this elevator is shipped
an enormous quantity of grain from the farmers of
Park County. The officers of the company, be-
sides Mr. Guinzy, are George M. Parker, president,
and W. E. Cunning, vice president. The Farmers
Exchange was organized in 1916 and has already
proven a very successful and popular enterprise in
the interests of the farmers of the community.
Much of the popularity and success of the Ex-
change is directly due to the indefatigable efforts
and hustling qualities of the manager, who has
proved himself the "right man in the right place."
Mr. Guinzy has other interests, being a stock-
holder in the CollinsviUe Building and Loan Asso-
ciation and in the United States Building and Loan
Association of Butte, Montana. He owns a com-
fortable and modern residence adjoining Wilsall,
including ten acres of land, which he is successfully
utilizing as a chicken farm. He also has a ranch of
160 acres of irrigated land about one-half mile east
of Wilsall, which he is developing into a splendid
property.
Politically Mr. Guinzy is a democrat and takes
a live interest in the trend of public affairs, though
not a seeker after public office. Fraternarlly he is
a member of East St. Louis Lodge No. 664, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks; Wilsall Lodge
No. 103, Independent Order of Odd Fellows; Col-
linsviUe Lodge, Loyal Order of Moose, and to the
Societa Dogali.
In 1904, at St. Louis, Missouri, Mr. Guinzy mar-
ried Caroline Baima, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
John Baima, of CollinsviUe, Illinois, where Mr.
Baima is a coal miner. To Mr. and Mrs. Guinzy
have been born two children, Cleda, born February
14, 1905, and Olivia, born October 31, 1907.
Plain and unassuming in manner, Mr. Guinzy has
so ordered his life that today he occupies an envi-
able position in the community with which he has
cast his lot and to the general progress of which
he is contributing in a very definite way.
Hugh Allan MacMillan, M. D. A physician
and surgeon whose services have been greatly ap-
preciated in Dillon since he began practice there six
or seven years ago. Doctor MacMillan has never
neglected an opportunity to improve his abilities and
increase his experience. By hard work he paid his
expenses through medical college and after grad-
uating took several special courses both in this coun-
try and abroad.
As his name indicates, he is of Scotch ancestry
and was born in Inverness County, Nova Scotia,
January 25, 1882. His grandfather, Angus Laugh-
lin MacMillan, was a native of Inverness, Scot-
land, born in 1806, married a Scotch girl, Ann Mac-
Donald, and became one of the pioneer settlers
of Lake Ainslie in County Inverness, Nova Scotia.
He lived on a farm there and died in 1884. Many
of his descendants are still found in that typically
Scotch community. His son, Neil MacMillan,
father of Doctor MacMillan, was born in the same
county of Nova Scotia in October, 1838, and spent
all his life there, for many years being a successful
merchant. He died in May, 1913. He was a con-
servative in politics and was a brother of Rev. Hugh
MacMillan of Elmsdale, Nova Scotia, a Presbyte-
rian clergyman and long one of the most prominent
Liberals in Canadian politics. Neil MacMillan was
a member of the city council for twenty-four years
and never knew a defeat in any political campaign.
Many of the MacMillans have become prominent
in professions. Neil MacMillan was probably the
most prominent member and active supporter of the
Presbyterian Church in his community. He was also
an Orangeman, and at one time he was in the Cana-
dian forces which put down a rebellion. The Cana-
dian government did not formally recognize his serv-
ices until in 1914, a year after liis death, when his
widow received a $100 bonus for the military duty
he performed. Neil MacMillan married Miss Chris-
tine MacDougall, who was born at Lake Ainslie in
1843 and is still living there. Her father. Hector
MacDougall, was a native of Scotland and a pioneer
farmer in Inverness County of Nova Scotia. He mar-
ried Ann MacLairi, who was born in Scotland in 1803.
and she died at Lake Ainslie in 1896, at the age of
ninetv-three. Neil MacMillan and wife had the
following children: Annie B., wife of Jack Mac-
Dougall, a plasterer and contractor at Boston, Massa-
chusetts ; Elizabeth, who died at the age of twenty-
one; Mae C, living at Boston, widow of Dan Mac-
Millan, who was a school teacher : Angus L., a car-
penter and builder at Butte, Montana; Jennie M., at
home with her mother; Doctor MacMillan; and four
other children that died in infancy.
Doctor MacMillan attended the public schools of
Lake Ainslie and in 1896 graduated from the Why-
cocomagh Academy. Following that for several
years he was employed in different vocations in Bos-
ton and in T901 came out to Butte. Montana. For
two years he worked for Dr. O. Y. Warren at Warren
Springs, and then returned to Butte and spent a year
and a half in the carpenter shop of the Rarus mine.
While he was earning a living by different occupa-
tions, he had for several years definitely made up
his mind to become a physician and all the money
he could save was set aside to complete his educa-
)\^(A c\ >]/]a.c ^y] lUclu \if
HISTORY OF AIONTANA
tion. For several summers until 1909 he worked
for the Butte Street Railway. He acquired his medi-
cal education during the regular winter sessions of
the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Balti-
more, Maryland, and graduated with his M. D. de-
gree on June 3, igio. While at Baltimore lie was a
member of the Delta Delta Chapter of the Phi Chi
college fraternity. Doctor MacMillan attended the
New York Post Graduate School in 1914-15, and
was awarded a special diploma in surgery. He also
has a special degree in diseases of the chest as a
result of post-graduate work done at the College of
Physicians and Surgeons at Baltimore. In 1919
Doctor MacMillan went abroad and took special
courses in the University of Edinburgh.
He began practice in 1910 at Helena with Dr.
George H. Barber and Doctor Tracy. While there
he was contract physician and surgeon for the Holter
& Hauser Lake Dams Company until that piece of
construction was completed. In 1912 he removed
to Elk Horn, Jefferson County, and in January,
1913, began his career at Dillon, where he enjoys
a large general medical and surgical practice. He
was absent from his practice for about a year during
the late war. January 21, 1918, lie was commissioned
a first lieutenant in the Medical Reserve Corps and
was assigned to special duty as a surgeon at Little
Rock, Arkansas, in General Hospital No. 33. He was
mustered out January II, 1919. He was recommend-
ed for promotion shortly after joining the service,
and received his commission as captain in the Re-
serve Corps shortly after receiving his discharge
from active service. Doctor MacMillan served as
county physician in 1915 and is a member of the
Silver Bow, Montana State and American Medical
associations. His offices are in the Telephone Build-
ing at Dillon.
Doctor MacMillan is a member of the Presbyterian
Church, in which faith he was reared, is affiliated
with the Arcanna Lodge No. no. .\ncient Free and
Accepted Masons, at Baltimore, is a member of Scot-
tish Rite Consistory No. 2 at Butte and Bagdad
Temple of the Mystic Shrine of the same city. He is
also a member of Virginia Citv Lodge No. 390 of
the Elks.
May 5, 1909, at Newark, New Jersey, Doctor Mac-
Millan married Miss Ellen Morgan Bowling, daugh-
ter of E. Gill and Nan (Hawkins) Bowling. They
have one son, Hugh Allan, Jr., born September 28,
1912. Mrs. MacMillan is member of a very promi-
nent family of Maryland. Her father was a Mary-
land business man and a son of Colonel Bowling, one
of the prominent men of the state in his time. His
estate was divided among fourteen children, E. Gill
Bowling being the only son. Mrs. MacMillan's
mother is still living at Cumberland, Maryland. Her
father. Doctor Hawkins, was one of the first gradu-
ates of the University of Maryland, and lived on a
grant of land in Charles County at La Plata which
had been acquired bv the familv direct from the
Crown.
Hugh D. Page. Sound education strengthens
the character and makes possible successful opera-
tion along varied lines and constructive achieve-
ment which will serve a-; an inspiration for activi-
ties of the best sort. Hugh D. Page, now repre-
senting one of the leading nursery houses of the
West at Billings, is an example of the progress
which can be made by a professional man in the
marts of trade. He was born at Glennville, Minne-
sota, October 21, 1879, a son of J. R. Page, and a
grandson of Abraham Page. The Page family
originated in Holland, but representatives of it
came to the American colonies many years ago, and,
locating in Pennsylvania, were instrumental in de-
veloping that province into one of the original thir-
teen states of the Union. Abraham Page was born
at Williamsport, Pennsylvania, and died at LaPorte,
Indiana, at the age of sixty-five years, before the
birth of Hugh D. Page. A farmer, he moved to
Indiana in 1845, seeking better opportunities for
acquiring land at reasonable prices, and was one
of the pioneers of LaPorte. He was married to
Mary Shriveley, born in Pennsylvania, who also
died at LaPorte.
J. R. Page was born at Williamsport, Pennsyl-
vania, and died at Glennville, Minnesota, in De-
cember, 1918. Until he was seven years old the
family lived at Williamsport, but at that time re-
moval was made to Indiana, and there he was
reared and lived until some time after his marriage.
His first business venture was that of operating a
clothing business, and he later became interested
in conducting a large farm. When he was thirty
years of age, in 1868, he moved to Glennville, Min-
nesota, and there managed a large farm until his
death. First a republican, he later espoused the
principles of the prohibition party and voted for its
candidates. For two terms he served as a com-
missioner of Freeborn County, Minnesota. Before
leaving Indiana he had united with the Baptist
Church, but after he went to Minnesota he joined
the United Brethren Church, and was very active
in its work. J. R. Page was married to Matilda
Mimmum, born at Meadowville, Pennsylvania, in
1839, and died at Glennville in May, 1914. Their
children were as follows: Joseph Simon, who is a
farmer of Glennville ; Ada, who married O. S.
Geesey, a stockman of Dupree, South Dakota; J. J.,
who is a clothing merchant of Northwood, Iowa;
True R., who is a photographer of Brown's Valley,
Minnesota ; William A., who is baggageman at the
Union Depot of Billings ; and Hugh D., whose name
heads this review.
Hugh D. Page attended the public schools gf his
native place, and was graduated from its high school.
He then became a student of the Southern Minne-
sota Normal School at Austin, and was graduated
from the commercial and teacher's courses in i8«8.
Entering the Austin Law College of Austin, Minne-
sota, he was graduated therefrom in 1901 with the
degree of Doctor of Law, and for the subsequent
three years he was in the office of Judge S. T. Lit-
tleton of Owatonna, Minnesota. An opening oc-
curring, Mr. Page embarked in a real estate busi-
ness at Owatonna, and continued to operate it' until
1909. Having in the meanwhile become interested
in the work of beautifying property by the proper
planting of trees and shrubs, in 1909 he associated
himself with the Jewell Nursery Company, and in
that line of endeavor found congenial and remunera-
tive work. While with that company he covered
Montana and Wyoming, and in 1913 located at
Billings, where he has since resided. In 1913 he
resigned his position with the Jewell people and
incorporated the Page-Clark Seed and Nursery
Company of Billings and continued its president
until 1917, in that year severing his connections to
become manager for the Montana Farmers Seed
Company, with which he remained for a year. In
the fall of 1918 he incorporated the Page Nursery
Company to handle trees, shrubs and plants, with
offices at No. 12. First _ National Bank Building.
Independent in his political views, Mr. Page has
been a justice of the peace, having served as such
at Glennville. The Baptist Church holds his mem-
bership, and he served it during 1917 as trustee and
clerk. Fraternally he belongs to Owatonna Lodge,
324
HISTORY OF AIONTANA
Brotherhood of American Yeomen, and the Illi-
nois United Commercial Travelers.
In 1903 Mr. Page was united in marriage at
Owatonna, Minnesota, to Miss Jessie M. Gleason,
a daughter of Emerson and Mary (Fate) Gleason.
Mr. Gleason is a stockbuyer, and he and his wife
still reside at Owatonna. Mrs. Page was graduated
from the Austin Business College, and she, too, be-
longs to the Baptist Church. Mr. and Mrs. Page
have the following children : Winfield Emerson, who
was born May 23, 1904; Harlan Kenneth, who was
born December 28, 1907; Maxine Violetta, who was
born May 12, 1912; and Lorraine Virginia, who was
born August I, 1916. Scrupulously upright in his
dealings, Mr. Page has inspired confidence wher-
ever he has been associated with business or pro-
fessional duties, and his judgments of men and af-
fairs are sound and sincere.
John N. Osborne. The business of writing insur-
ance as a vocation is one that has reached enor-
mous proportions. This is not entirely due to the
realization of the people of the growing necessity
for proper protection, but in a large degree because
the masses are being properly educated by men en-
gaged in this line of endeavor of the benefits accru-
ing from insurance. It is not every man who can
hope to achieve success in this field, and it is one
that demands the possession of peculiar gifts and
characteristics, and the man who is desirous of be-
ing successful in the sale of this commodity must
not only understand every angle of the business
thoroughly, but be a competent judge of human na-
ture, possessed in a remarkable degree of that
faculty which enables him to speak logically and
forcibly upon his subject, and be persevering and
indefatigably industrious. Montana has long been
the home of some of the most capable insurance
agents in the West, and one who has been a leader
in his field for several years is John N. Osborne of
Lewistown.
Mr.- Osborne was born on his father's farm in
Vernon County, Missouri, May 12, 1878. a son of
John M. and Lydia (Hornback) Osborne, the former
born in Tennessee. April 9, 1850, and the latter in
Illinois, April 5, 1853. They were married in Vernon
County, Missouri, and became the parents of six
children, five surviving, and John N. being the third
in order of birth. John M. Osborne continued to be
engaged in farming in Vernon County, Missouri,
until 1888, in which year he came to Gallatin County,
Montana, but after remaining some time returned
to Missouri and later desposed of his farm. In 1896
he again came to Montana, this time to locate perma-
nently with his family in Gallatin County, where he
has since been extensively engaged in grain and
hay farming. He is one of the prominent men in
the Baptist Church, and in politics is a democrat.
John N. Osborne secured a public school educa-
tion in Missouri, and remained with his parents until
he reached the age of seventeen years. At that time
he struck out on his own account, coming to Gallatin
County, Montana, where he obtained employment on
a ranch. He next took up the business of sheep
shearing, which he followed for twelve years, and
followed this by a period of working at his trade of
carpenter and subsequent operations in the field
of contracting and building at Moore, where he re-
mained about three years. Still he had not found
his proper vocation, nor did he do so until he started
selling life insurance for the Montana Life Insur-
ance Company. Realizing that this was his forte,
he applied himself whole heartedly to learning its
every detail, and so successful did he become that at
the end of three years he was made general agent
of the concern. In March, 1915, he established his
office in the Montana Building at Lewiston, where he
still remains. Mr. Osborne has been successful in
the securing and placing of some large policies and
in forming a wide circle of friendships. He is a
democrat in his political views, although not a poli-
tician. As a fraternalist he belongs to Lewiston
Lodge No. 37, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
Helena Consistory No. 3, thirty-second degree ; and
Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the
Mystic Shrine ; and Lewiston Lodge No. 456, of the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
On December 25, 1910, Mr. Osborne was married
to Miss Bertha J. Weston, who was born in Kansas,
daughter of William C. and Etha ( Bock) Weston,
the former born in Boston, Massachusetts, and the
latter in Illinois. There were six children in the
family, of whom five are living, and Mrs. Osborne
is the fourth in order of birth. As a young man
Mr. Weston journeyed westward to Kansas, and
after his marriage made his way to White Sulphur
Springs, Montana, where he was for some years en-
gaged in freighting. His home is now in Fergus
County, where he is a prominent cattle man. He is
a republican in his political views. Mr. and Mrs.
Osborne are the parents of three children; Mabel
Clair, Bessie Mildred and John Weston.
William O. Hutchinson. The representative and
honored citizen of Wilsall whose name forms the
caption to this review has been distinctively the archi-
tect of his own fortunes, has been true and loyal in
all the relations of life and stands as a type of that
sterling manhood which ever commands respect and
honor. He is a man who would have won his way
in any locality where fate might have placed him,
for he has sound judgment, coupled with great en-
ergy and business tact, together with upright prin-
cigles, all of which make for success wherever and
whenever they are rightfully and persistently ap-
plied. By reason of these principles he has won
and retained a host of friends in whatever com-
munity he is known.
William O. Hutchinson traces his family line
back to sterling old English ancestry, his progenitors
having come to this country in colonial days. His
father, E. W. Hutchinson, was born in 1833 in
Pittsylvania County, Virginia, but was reared to
manhood about fifty miles north of St. Louis, Mis-
souri. Upon reaching mature years he took up
farming as a vocation, which he followed until 1853.
when, lured by the stories of fortunes to be found
in the gold diggings of the coast, he went to Cali-
fornia, where he prospected for three years. He
then returned by way of the Isthmus of Panama^
across the Gulf of Mexico and up the Mississippi
River, settling near Wright City, Warren County,
Missouri, where he engaged in farming. In the fall
of 1866 he removed to a farm in l\Iacon County,
Missouri, where he remained until a few years
before his death, when he located in Jacksonville,
Missouri, where his death occurred in 1910.
Politically E. W. Hutchinson was an ardent demo-
crat and took a prominent part in public affairs in
the several communities where he lived. While a
resident of Macon County. Missouri, he served one
term as county judge and one term as presiding
judge, and at the time of his death he was serv-
ing as mayor of Jacksonville. Religiously he vvas
an earnest member of the Christian church, to which
he gave active and consistent support. He was a
member of the Masonic fraternity and was chaplain
of his lodge at the time of his death.
E. W. Hutchinson married Sarah Elizabeth Cole-
man, who was born in 1828 in Trimble County,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Kentucky, and who died at Jacksonville, Missouri,
in 1912. To them were born five children, namely :
Atta, who died at the age of twenty-one years ;
William O., the immediate subject of this sketch;
Jesse, who died in infancy; Charles B., who is a
practicing osteopathic physician at Duluth, Minne-
sota ; and Edgar P., a farmer and real estate broker
at Moberly, Missouri.
William O. Hutchinson received his elementary
education in the rural schools of Macon County,
Missouri, after which he was for two years a stu-
dent in the State Normal School at Kirksville, Mis-
souri. Leaving that institution in 1882, he taught
two terms of school in Missouri and then came to
Helena, Montana, and spent one season as a farmer.
He then engaged in teaching school at Prickly
Pear Valley, where East Helena now stands, at
the time of the construction of the smelter theme,
and was thus employed there seven years, until
1892, the greater part of the time as principal. He
also taught in another district in the Prickly Pear
Valley and in Beaver Creek Valley. During this
period Mr. Hutchinson not only made a splendid
record as an educator, but impressed his character
upon the people to such an extent that he was
appointed postmaster of East Helena under Presi-
dent Grover Cleveland, serving five years in that
position. He also bought a drug store in East
Helena, which he conducted until IQOO, when he
sold it. Mr. Hutchinson was elected county com-
missioner of Lewis and Clark County, serving five
years, and then became associated with Louis Pen-
well in the sheep business, the firm being known as
the Riverside Land and Livestock Company. The
company was formed in 1903 and Mr. Hutchinson
was managing director of the business until 1907,
when he was put in full charge as general fore-
man, serving as such until the company sold its
interests in 1909. In 1910 Mr. Hutchinson became
connected with the Montana Life Insurance Com-
pany as inspector of farm loans, in which capacity
he traveled all over Montana. In 1912 he severed
his connection with that company and, joining in-
terests with S. S. Working bought the leading mer-
cantile concern at Wilsall. They incorporated the
Wilsall Mercantile Company, with the following
officers : President, William O. Hutchinson ; vice
president, V. L. Sherwin ; secretary-treasurer and
general manager, S. S. Working. The store is lo-
cated at the corner of Elliott and Clark streets,
and one evidence of the phenomenal growth of
their business is the fact that they were compelled
to build a splendid new business block, 50 by 100
feet, with basement of the same size, fully cemented.
They have their own steam and electric light plants
and in every way the building is adapted to the pur-
pose to which it is devoted. It is a department
store and every department is kept well stocked
with up-to-date styles and full lines of such goods
as meet the requirements of the local trade. The
store is known far and wide, trade being drawn
from a radius of twenty-five miles.
Mr. Hutchinson is also interested in a number of
other enterprises, among which are the Farmers
State Bank of Wilsall, of which he is a director;
the Montana Life Insurance Company; the Conrad
Trust and Savings Bank, of Helena; and is presi-
dent of the Wilsall Townsite Company, which owns
all the unsold platted lots of the townsite of Wilsall.
He also owns a farm of 280 acres in Broadwater
County, Montana.
Politically Mr. Hutchinson is a democrat and has
for years taken an active interest in party affairs.
In 1898 he was elected a representative to the
Legislature from Lewis and Clark County, serving
in the sixth legislative session. He served on the
mercantile committee, the committee on credentials
and elections and other important committees of
that body. He is a member of the Christian Church
and his fraternal relations are with Silver State
Lodge No. 46, Independent Order of Odd Fellows,
which was organized in 1892 and of which he was
a charter member. He was also formerly a member
of the Knights of Pythias, the Woodmen of the
World and the Ancient Order of United Workmen.
Mr. Hutchinson has been twice married, first on
August 10. 1887, at East Helena, to Cora E. Burns,
the daughter of Capt. A. F. and Annie Burns, both
of whom are now deceased. Captain Burns was one
of the pioneer ranchers of Prickly Pear Valley.
To Mr. and Mrs. Hutchinson were born the follow-
ing children; Jesse D., who is general agent at
Topeka, Kansas, for the Goodrich Rubber Com-
pany, graduated from the Helena High School and
then was a student in the University of Michigan,
at Ann Arbor, for two years. For seven years he
was in the claim department of the Santa Fe Rail-
way. Annie E. is the wife of A. R. Sanders, of
White Sulphur Springs, Montana, a district forest
ranger in the Castle Mountains. She graduated
from the high school at Helena, attended Knox
College two years at Galesburg, Illinois, taught
school for one year, and then attended the Montana
State University at Missoula, where she graduated
in 1914. Mrs. Cora Hutchinson died in October,
1890, at East Helena, and in September, 1892, Mr.
Hutchinson married Allie Updike, a native of Illi-
nois. To this union has been born one child, Alma
Atta, who is now a teacher in the high school of
Wilsall.
As a man of ability, sturdy integrity and use-
fulness, Mr. Hutchinson has merited the considera-
tion of his fellow men, for while engaged in the
prosecution of his own business affairs he has
never been neglectful of his duties to his com-
munity and state, and today he is honored by all
who know him.
S. S. Working. Examples that impress force of
character on all who study them are worthy of
record in the annals of history wherever they are
found. By a few general observations the biogra-
pher hopes to convey in the following paragraphs,
succinctly and yet without fulsome encomium, some
idea of the high standing of S. S. Working, of
Wilsall, as a business man and representative citi-
zen. Those who know him best will readily acqui-
esce in the statement that many elements of a solid
and practical nature are united in his composition
and which during a series of years have brought
him into prominent notice through his section of
the state, his life and achievements earning for
him a conspicuous place among his compeers.
S. S. Working was born at Windom, Minnesota,
on February 13, 1872, and is a son of D. W. and
Elizabeth (Gunderson) Working. The family is
descended from sterling old English stock, the
progenitors having come to this country during
the colonial period, and the subject's paternal
grandfather was a soldier in the War of 1812.
D. W. Working was born in 1827, at Centerville,
Center County, Pennsylvania, and his death oc-
curred at Abilene, Kansas, in 1908. He was reared
in his native town, but after attaining manhood
he removed to Henderson, Minnesota, where he
followed farming as a vocation and where he was
married. Later he moved to Windom. Minnesota,
where the subject of this sketch was born, and
still later went to Logan, Kansas, where he farmed
and also engaged in contracting and building from
326
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1S78 to 1885, In the latter year he became a resi-
dent of Abilene. Kansas, where he followed farm-
ing until his death. He was a man of fine personal
character and enjoyed the esteem of all who knew
him. He was a republican in his political faith
and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
He was a veteran of two wars, having served as
a musician during the Mexican war, and as a
member of Company A, Fourth Regiment of Min-
nesota Volunteer Infantry, during the Civil war.
In the latter great struggle he served for three,
years and was with Grant in many of the notable
battles of the war, including Lookout Mountain,
Missionary Ridge and the Siege of Vicksburg. He
was an orderly for General Grant and later was
with General Sherman on the historic march to
the sea. He was twice injured during his serv-
ice, receiving a bayonet wound in the right leg,
and being injured in tlie spine while on a vessel
on the Mississippi River, but recovered from both
injuries. Mrs. Elizabeth (Gunderson) Working
was born in 1824 in Christiania, Norway, and died
at Logan, Kansas, in 1870. To this worthy couple
were born the following children: J. B., who is
now retired and lives at Palacios, Texas ; Anna
E. is the wife of F. E. Ross, a contractor and
builder at Los Gatos, California; Lincoln is an
attorney at Glasgow, Montana ; D. W. is dean of
the State .Agricultural College at Tucson, .Arizona ;
J. C. operates a ranch at Bakersfield. California;
Ida is the wife of Alexia Podchernikoff, an artist
of San Francisco, California ; S. S., the immediate
subject of this review.
S. S. Working received his elementary education
in the public schools of Logan and Abilene, Kan-
sas, and also attended the Santa Rosa Business
College, at Santa Rosa, California. In 1895 he
came to Montana and clerked in a store at East
Helena until 1901. He then became postmaster
of East Helena and also engaged in the mercan-
tile business there until 1911. He was successful
and in 191 2 he came to Wilsall and bought the
leading mercantile business here. He foresaw a
splendid future for this place and at once pro-
ceeded to put the business on a permanent and
solid basis by incorporating the Wilsall Mercan-
tile Company in 1914. It is a typical department
store and is accounted one of the largest and best
in Southern Montana. The official personnel of
the company is as follows : President, W. O. Hutch-
inson ; vice president, V. L. Sherwin ; secretary-
treasurer; S. S. Working, who is also general
manager of the business. The store is located at
the corner of Clark and Elliott streets and is well
stocked with a well selected stock of goods in every
department. Right prices, courteous treatment and
quick service are elements which have attracted
trade from a radius of twenty-five miles and the
concern is considered one of the most important
commercial enterprises in the locality.
Mr. Working is also financially interested in
several other business propositions, including the
Farmers State Bank of Wilsall, of which he is
president, the Wilsall Townsite Company, of which
he is secretary and treasurer, the Conrad Trust
and Savings Bank of Helena, and owns a ranch of
320 acres about ten miles northeast of Wilsall,
besides a fine modern residence in Wilsall. He is
keenly alive to every movement that promises to
promote the interests of the community in any way
and is an ardent supporter of every worthy cause.
Politically Mr. Working is a stanch republican
and has served on the school boards of East Helena
and Wilsall. Fraternally he is a member of Liv-
ingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons ; Livingston Chapter No. 7, Royal Arch
Masons; St. Bernard Commandery No. 6, Knights
Templar; Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine; Livingston Lodge
No. 246, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks;
and Wilsall Lodge No. 103, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. He is also a member of the Mon-
tana State Bankers .Association and the American
Bankers Association.
In 1901, at East Helena, Mr. Working was mar-
ried to Jean Drury, daughter of J. R. and Sarah
(Cauby) Drury. The father, who during his ac-
tive life was a farmer at Unionville, Missouri, is
now deceased, and his widow resides at Union-
ville. Mrs. Working, after completing her com-
mon school training, was a student in the State
Normal School at Twin Bridges, Montana. To
Mr. and Mrs. Working have been born three chil-
dren, namely : Paul D., born December 22, 1901 ;
Webster B., born January 19, 1903 ; and Margaret,
born July 22, 1908.
Mr. Working holds worthy prestige in business
circles, being regarded as distinctively a man 'of
affairs, and wields a potent influence among those
with whom his lot has been cast, having won defi-
nite success and shown what a man of right prin-
ciples and determination can win by proper eflfort.
William C. Spottswood is vice president, treas-
urer and manager of the Bonner Mercantile Com-
pany, one of the largest and one of the oldest mer-
cantile houses in Western Montana. Mr. Spotts-
wood who has been actively identified with this con-
cern at Deer Lodge for the past thirteen j-ears, has
a veteran's experience in business and for many
years covered the northwestern territory as a travel-
ing salesman for one of the largest dry goods houses
in the West.
Mr. Spottswood was born at Lake City, Minnesota,
May 31, 1859, and comes of a family identified with
Minnesota in territorial times. Trie Spottswoods
are a noted American Colonial family of Scotch de-
scent. One of the first governors of the Virginia
Colony was Governor Spottswood, a native of Scot-
land, who was sent over by the Crown to govern in
Virginia. One of his three sons moved north to
Pennsylvania, and from the Pennsylvania branch is
descended William C. Spottswood of Deer Lodge.
The latter's father was Charles C. Spottswaod who
was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in 183 1. He
grew up at Harrisburg and when he was a boy of
about fourteen the science of telegraphy was first
put into practical use. He learned the art and was
the first telegraph operator for the Pennsylvania
lines when that road was built west from Harris-
burg. For some time he was an operator at Car-
lisle, Pennsylvania. In 1856 he left the East and
gave up railroading to identify himself with the
Northwest frontier at Lake City, Minnesota. He
served as steamboat agent there for the Diamond
Joe Line and also practiced law, having been admit-
ted to the bar at Lewistown, Pennsylvania. He
served as county attorney for Wabasha County,
Minnesota, and was honored with other local offices.
In later years he moved to North Dakota and died at
Minot. that state, in 1914. He was a democrat, and
a very active member of the Episcopal Church.
Charles C. Spottswood married Nancy P. Lilly, who
was born at Lewistown, Pennsylvania, in 1834 and
died at Minneapolis in 1888. Lizzie, the oldest of
their children is a resident of Minneapolis, widow
of Rev. James R. Rogers, who was a Presbyterian
clergyman. Anna M. of Minot, North Dakota, is
the widow of George R. Ransom, who was an attor-
ney practicing for a number of years at Willmar,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
327
Minnesota. Dr. E. W. Spottswood is a graduate
from the medical department of the University of
Minnesota, and is practicing medicine and surgery
at Missoula, Montana.
William C. Spottswood. the third in the family,
was educated in the public schools of Lake City,
graduated from high school in 1878, and then took
the commercial course at the State University at
Minneapolis, graduating in 1880. From that time
forward, a period of forty years, his life has been
one of extensive effort in commercial lines. He was
in the retail hardware business until he sold his store
at Willmar, Minnesota, in 1883. For ten years he
was traveling representative for the wholesale hard-
ware house of Janney, Brooks & Eastman, and then
had charge of the sales department thirteen years.
Mr. Spottswood came to Deer Lodge in January,
1906,' and has since been the active manager of the
Bonner Mercantile Company, succeeding in that
position C. J. Joslyn who tiad been manager for
twenty-one years. The Bonner Mercantile Company
was established in 1865 in early territorial times as
the E. L. Bonner Company. It was incorporated as
the Bonner Mercantile Company in 1906. This is
one of the leading general department stores of
Western Montana, and maintains a splendid estab-
lishment at Main Street corner of Missouri Avenue
in Deer Lodge. Carrie S. Bonner of Missoula is
president of the company, with Mr. Spottswood
vice president, treasurer and manager, and Mrs. L.
B. Spottswood of Missoula, secretary.
Mr. Spottswood is also vice president of the Deer
Lodge Electric Light Company. He is a democratic
voter, a vestryman in the Deer Lodge Episcopal
Church, and is affiliated with Lodge No. 14 of the
Masons, Valley Chapter No. 4 Royal Arch Masons,
Ivanhoe Commandery No. 16, Knights Templar,
Algeria Temple of the Mvstic Shrine at Helena and
Valley Lodge No. 6 Knights of Pythias at Deer
Lodge.
Mr. Spottswood resides at 410 Missouri Avenue.
In 1896 at Minneapolis he married Grace M. Perkins,
daughter of George D. and Mary I. (Moody) Perk-
ins, both now deceased. Her father for many years
was in the real estate and insurance business. He
spent most of his life in the Northwest and as a
young man was a neighbor and acquaintance of the
late Tames J. Hill. Mrs. Spottswood is a graduate
of the Ladies Seminary at Minneapolis. She is
a niece of Senator Paris Gibson of Great Falls,
Montana. Mr. and Mrs. Spottswood have two
children : Donald P., born February 8, 1898. is a
student of electrical engineering at the University
of Minnesota of Minneapolis. Dorothy, born May
2J.. 1003. is a graduate of the Deer Lodge public
schools, and is attending St. Mary's Academy at
Faribault, Minnesota.
Christian and Peter Vfgen. To the City of
Billings during the past thirty vears a tremendous
amount of personal ability, initiative and commer-
cial resource has been supplied by Yegen Brothers.
While thev have sold out or retired from manv
of their former interests, these interests are still
factors in the city's commercial life, and the pres-
ent owners feel a sense of gratitude and debt to the
enternrise of these pioneer business men.
Both brothers were born in Switzerland, sons of
Conrad and Emerita (Prader) Yeeen. Christian
was born November 10. 1857. and Peter August 7,
i860. Christian Yegen was educated for a career as
teacher, his father's profession, but determined to
become a business man instead. In 1870 he located
at Bismarck. North Dakota, joining his brother John
and sister Dorothea. He learned the baking trade
under his brother, and the following year took
a small farm. In 1881 he sent for his brother Peter,
who had been farming in Switzerland. With the
aid of their sister they continued on the farm an-
other year and then invested their capital in a
restaurant at Glendive and subsequently moved to
Terry Station, where they conducted the section
house, and with a fare consisting chiefly of buffalo
meat, sauer kraut, cranberries and bread, supplied
a very' popular and profitable service. By 1882
they had accumulated a capital of $3,000, and this
they then invested in a small bakery at Billings.
The bakery prospered until the railroad moved
on, and with other reverses the partners found
themselves without capital or business and $400
in debt. They started all over again, baking bread
in the morning and peddling the product in the
afternoon. Inside of a year they bought a build-
ing, and soon expanded their enterprise with a'
stock of groceries. Later they moved to a larger
building on the site of the still later splendid estab-
lishment of Yegen Brothers. In 1893 they installed
a stock of hardware, and successive additions were
made to their building equipment and their stock,
including a dry goods department. In 1900 they
erected a cold storage plant. In that year they
also engaged in the banking business, opening the
first savings bank at Billings, and afterward open-
ing savings banks at Anaconda and Gardiner. About
1904 they bought the wholesale grocery business
of Millis & Company. The firm of Yegen Brothers
was incorporated in 1902. The brothers had bought
their sister's interest in 1895. Yegen Brothers also
platted two additions to the City of Billings. While
their mercantile interests are now in other hands
they remain honored and influential factors in the
business, civic and social community of a city which
they have largely helped to make.
Christian Yegen was elected an alderman in
1892. later was a member of the Legislature, was
chosen mayor of Billings in 1896, and in 1904 was
sent to the State Senate. Peter Yegen has for a
number of years served on the Billings Library
Board.
August 27, 1893, Christian Yegen married Miss
Laura B. Clark. They had five children, Laura,
Dora, Mildred, Virginia and Christian. Peter Yegen
married Miss Marguerite Trepp. a native of Switzer-
land, in 1800. They have three children, David,
Peter and Elizabeth.
John H. Harvat. In any group of Montanans
where eligibility rests upon masterful ability to
overcome circumstances and difficulties, great power
in handling men and aff^airs. and the achievement
of big things from small beginnings, the name of
John H. Harvat has a generally acknowledged
place.
His career has been frequently a theme for news-
paper correspondence both in Montana and else-
where. While he probably did not recognize it
at the time, his early life was a part and parcel
of that richly colored experience which modern
readers are prone to regard as the romance of the
great West.
Mr. Harvat was born at Iowa City, October g,
i860. His father, Joseph Harvat, was born in Aus-
tria in 1829. was reared and married in that coun-
try, his wife being Mary Cerny. On coming to
the United States he settled at Iowa City on a
farm and spent the rest of his life there. He died
in 1899. and his wife also passed away in Iowa
City. Of their children Jacob J. was a meat man
and died at Denver, Colorado, at the age of forty-
one: Marv lives at Iowa City, widow of Rudolph
328
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Grissel, who was a merchant; Daniel died in Ger-
many; Jennie lives at San Francisco, widow of
John Vevovda, and is in the harness business;
Joseph J. was in the meat business at Denver, where
he died at the age of thirty-seven; John IL is
the next in age ; Annie is the wife of George Hol-
bert, an attorney at New York City; Emma is
unmarried and lives at Iowa City; Clara died in
Oklahoma ; and George is a traveling salesman with
home in Texas.
John H. Harvat attended public schools at Iowa
City, including high school, and in 1878 completed
a course in the Iowa City Business College. Up
to that time he had never been out of his home
county. Going to Omaha, he found it a difficult
matter to secure employment even at such wages
as fifty cents a day. He worked in a grocery store
for several months, and was then attracted to
Colorado, partly being influenced by stories of the
great wealth acquired in the mineral districts of
that state. He worked in hotels, afterward for
a few months had some experience working in
the mines of Silver Cliff, and finally joined a
brother at Georgetown, Colorado. The experiences
in this stage of his life, while they must be briefly
noted here, forms an important chapter in his life
career. He was frequently discouraged, and prob-
ably at that time Mr. Harvat became convinced
that there was no such thing as "luck" in life for
him and that success depended entirely upon a
steady, consistent effort in a line of practical serv-
ice to humanity. For two years he remained at
Georgetown learning the meat market business.
Then again he tried mining at Leadville, and while
in that district made his first independent effort
as a merchant in meats and groceries. He failed
and was once more adrift without money, but
still with some faith in himself.
It was at this time that he sought opportunity
in Montana. He arrived at Bozeman over the
stage route from Virginia City. He came to Mon-
tana penniless, and for about two months worked
on a ranch for his board, and then secured em-
ployment with a meat market at Bozeman. Mr.
Harvat in August, 1880, left Bozeman and went
to Park City, now Livingston. At that time there
were only three buildings in the town and he is
now the oldest remaining male resident of Liv-
ingston or the original Park City. For a time he
was employed by a firm of contractors furnish-
ing meat to the railway construction crews, and
in 1882, engaged in the meat business with Tom
McDonald as a partner. Then for the first time
in all his previous consecutive experience success
began to reward his efforts, he developed a great
and thriving enterprise and continued it until 1900,
when he sold out to other parties.
Mr. Harvat was a member of the Vigilante
Committee in the early days and he knows a great
deal of pioneer affairs of Montana, and has vivid
memories of many of the old timers now gone to
their reward.
Since igoo Mr. Harvat has been a sheep rancher,
and his operations through twenty years have made
him one of the leading figures in the sheep indus-
try of the Northwest. His first venture in that
business, however, largely partook of failure. He
kept on, acquired rights to range and bought land
of his own, and at this time has ranch properties
near Livingston aggregrating 16.000 acres, and he
keeps flocks of sheep aggregating 12.000 through
the year. He has been one of the biggest ship-
pers of wool to Boston and has also sent hundreds
of carloads of mutton sheep to the Chicago mar-
ket. It is estimated that Mr. Harvat as owner has
individually been interested in as high as 100,000
sheep in a single year. Besides his own ranch
lands he has frequently leased as much more. On
one of his ranches, a mile east of Livingston, he
has built a modern home, and he has his property
equipped with the most modern facilities for sheep
shearing and for handling the sheep business in
every detail. As his sons grew to manhood he
made them responsible co-workers and eventually
organized the Harvat Sheep Company, capitalized at
$500,000.
Through all the ups and downs of his career
since coming to Montana he has been deeply inter-
ested in the welfare of Livingston, has owned
property in that city more than thirty years, and
has done much to improve and expand its advan-
tages. He still owns the business block on Main
Street at the corner of Second Street. He has
served as a member of the Livingston School Board,
is active in the Commercial Club, is a member
of Livingston Lodge No. 246 of Elks, is a Catholic
and a republican.
While he has acknowledged many vicissitudes in
his business career, his domestic life since his mar-
riage has been one of unalloyed happiness. On
April 30, 1889, at Iowa City, he married Miss Eliza-
beth Haberstroh, daughter of Julius and Barbara
Haberstroh, still living in Iowa City. Her father
is a retired carpenter and contractor. The four
children of Mr. and Mrs. Harvat are Marie, Paul
J., Edwin J. and J. H., Jr. All the children received
part of their finishing education in Notre Dame
University. Indiana, the daughter being a gradu-
ate of St. Mary's College there. Marie is the wife
of William Ahearn, a timekeeper for the North-
ern Pacific Railway, living at Livingston. Paul J.
and J. H., Jr., are both associated with their father.
Edwin J. enlisted in the army in 1918 and in July
went overseas with the rank of captain in the expe-
ditionary troops to France.
G.WLE M. Fletcher. A gentleman of pleasing
address and upright character, possessing a natural
aptitude for business pursuits, Gayle M. Fletcher,
agent for various manufacturing concerns, has
made rapid progress along the road to success and
attained a position of note among the leading men
of Billings, his home city. A son of Joseph C.
Fletcher, he was born in Beatrice, Nebraska, August
18. 1878, of Irish and English ancestry. His grand-
father Fletcher was born in Ireland in 1800, and
as a young man immigrated to America, locating
first in Ontario, Canada. When about thirty-five
years old he followed the tide of emigration to
Iowa, and until his death in 1890, resided in Keokuk,
where for many years he had followed the trade
of a stone mason.
Although he was born, in 1844, in the Province
of Ontario, Canada, Joseph C. Fletcher was brought
up and educated in Keokuk, Iowa. In 1863, fired
with true patriotic ardor, he enlisted in the Third
Iowa Cavalry for service in the Civil war. _ Sub-
sequently while in battle at Guntown, Mississippi,
he was captured and confined as a prisoner of
war for a year in Andersonville Prison. While
thus confined he suffered untold hardshios, losing
over eighty pounds of good, honest flesh, his weight
having been 173 pounds at the time of his enlist-
ment, and but 92 pounds when he was exchanged.
Returning to Iowa he married, and shortly after
that happy event established himself in the furni-
ture business at Beatrice. Nebraska, where he still
resides, for the past thirty years having been suc-
cessfully engaged in the real estate business. A
steadfast republican, he has been prominent in civic
HISTORY OF MONTANA
329
and political affairs, and has served town and county
in various official capacities. He belongs to the
Grand Army of the Republic.
Joseph C. Fletcher married Samantha E. Monce,
in Nebraska City, Nebraska. She was born in
Ohio in 1848, and to them five children have been
born, as follows: Fred, a manufacturer in Forest-
ville, Connecticut; Harry, of Minneapolis, Minne-
sota, is a traveling salesman ; Arthur, formerly
a successful merchant of Beatrice, Nebraska, died
in that ctiy at the early age of forty years ; Gayle
M., the special subject of this sketch; and Thomas,
a well-known manufacturer of Los Angeles, Cali-
fornia.
After his graduation in 1897 from the Beatrice,
Nebraska, High School, Gayle M. Fletcher was
employed as a bookkeeper for a year. The ensu-
ing six years he worked in Cambria, Wyoming,
for Kilpatrick Brothers & Collins, who were rail-
road contractors, and had valuable mining inter-
ests in that locality. Going from there to Sheri-
dan, Wyoming, he was there engaged in the real
estate and insurance business for a year Com-
ing to Montana in 1905, Mr. Fletcher was similarly
employed at Billings for a year. Accepting then
his present position as manufacturers' agent, he
has since made a specialty of outfitting banks,
stores, offices, courthouses and other public build-
ings with up-to-date furniture, fi.xtures and equip-
ments of all kinds. His business increases from
year to year, his territory now including all of
Montana and Wyoming. His sales are extesive,
and are not only gratifying to him. but are highly
satisfactory to the firms which he represents and
pleasing to his many customers. His offices are in
the Stapleton Block in Billings.
Mr. Fletcher is a republican in politics, and an
attendant of the Congregational Church, toward
the support of which he contributes generously.
Fraternally he is a member of Billings Lodge No.
113, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; of Algeria
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mys-
tic Shrine, at Helena ; of Cambria Lodge, Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows, at Cambria, Wyo-
ming; of Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks; of the Royal Highland-
ers ; of the Montana branch of the United Com-
mercial Travelers of America; of the Billings Club;
of the Billings Midland Empire Club; and of the
Billings Golf and Country Club. He is also a
stockholder in the American Bank and Trust Com-
pany and in the Security Trust and Savings Bank,
financial institutions of high standing.
Mr. Fletcher married in 1902, at Helena, Montana,
Miss Estella Walker, who was born in Illinois,
and was there educated, having been graduated
from the Jacksonville Female Academy at Jack-
sonville. Illinois. Helen, the only child of Mr. and
Mrs. Fletcher, was born March 30, 1904, and is
now, in 1919, attending the Billings High School.
Ralph A. Sharp. It is claimed that what has
developed the United States from a few colonies
along the Atlantic coast into the greatest nation
in the world has been its pioneer spirit, which has
urged its people onward and enabled them to go
into a wilderness and make of it a place of de-
sirability. Certain it is that many of the truly
American families show in their records that in
almost every generation there have been migrations
of some of their representatives ever westward,
and that following upon them have come civili-
zation and constructive development. The Sharp
family is one of these and dates back in America
to colonial days. At a time when Tennessee was
a battlefield for the struggles between the In-
dians and the whites members of this family came
into the region, and after making the usual sacri-
fices of comfort and, in some instances, life, be-
came substantial settlers of the great common-
wealth. Still pushing onward, the family was
brought into Montana, and one of the represen-
tatives of it in this state is Ralph A. Sharp, cashier
of the Custer State Bank of Custer.
Ralph A. Sharp was born in Gage County, Ne-
braska, January 16, 1883, a son of Cain Sharp, and
grandson of Jonathan Sharp, who was born in
Tennessee in 1824. After the close of the Civil
war Jonathan Sharp came West to Nebraska and
locating at Liberty, there lived until his death,
which took place in 1900. All of his life he was
engaged in farming. Jonathan Sharp was mar-
ried to Margaret Lynch, born in Tennessee, and
died at Liberty, Nebraska. Their children were
as follows: Martha, who married Allen Jimer-
son, a farmer who is now deceased, but his widow
survives him and makes her home at Liberty;
Nicholas, who is a retired farmer and carpenter
of Lincoln, Nebraska; William, who is a farmer
of Liberty ; Lewis, who is a farmer of Liberty ;
George, who is a Baptist minister of McCook,
Nebraska; Cain, who is spoken of below; Susie,
who married Linville Wymore, is deceased, as is
her husband ; Cordelia, who is the widow of Wil-
liam Cofifee, lives at Liberty; Sarah, who married
Houston Ellison, a farmer of Liberty; Ella who
married Charles Reis, a farmer of Liberty; and
Melissa, who is unmarried and resides at Liberty.
Cain Sharp was born in the mountains of Ten-
nessee in 1861, and now resides at Soldier, Kan-
sas. He was reared in Gage County, Nebraska,
and has been a farmer all of his life. A few years
ago he moved to Kansas, and still continues his
farming activities. His political convictions make
him a democrat. Cain Sharp was married to Nancy
McFarland, who was born in Tennessee in 1863,
and they became the parents of the following chil-
dren : Ida, who married O. R. Maxwell, a farmer
of Burlingame, Kansas ; Ralph A., whose name
heads this review; and Ivan, who is a general work-
er of Holton, Kansas.
Ralph A. Sharp attended the common and high
schools of Liberty, Nebraska, being graduated
from the latter in 1899. He then entered the em-
ploy of a railroad as telegrapher, and was in Ne-
braska and Kansas for the Chicago, Burlington &
Quincy Railroad until 1906, In that year he came
to Billings, Montana, as bookkeeper for J. H. Reyn-
olds, at that time constructing 100 miles of road
for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad
from Harlowton, Montana, east, and held that
position for two years, when he moved to Custer.
Montana, to be bookkeeper for Harry F. Scott,
a merchant of Custer, which position he held until
191 5. In the meanwhile Messrs. Scott and Sharp
established the Custer State Bank, which was
opened for business in April, 1910, Mr. Sharp
being made cashier, and the business so ' increased
that since 1915 he has had to devote all of his
time to the bank. The present officers of the bank
are as follows : George Ganssle, one of the lead-
ing merchants of Custer, president; Harry F. Scott,
now of Billings, vice president; and Mr. Sharp,
cashier. The capital stock is $25,000; and surplus
$10,000, and its deposits average $140,000. Under
the wise policies of the present administration the
affairs of this institution are in excellent condi-
tion, and the bank has a stability and standing that
speaks well for it and the community. Mr. Sharp
330
HISTORY OF MONTANA
owns one of the finest residences at Custer. In
politics he is a republican.
In 1908 Mr. Sharp was married to Miss Beda
Kron at Cyrus, Pope County, Minnesota, she be-
ing a native of that county. Mr. and Mrs. Sharp
have the following children: Ralph Kron, who
was born March 29, 191 1 ; Earl, who was born
September 27, 1913 ; and Neil, who was born August
7, 1918. Mr. Sharp has achieved a success that is
very commendable, all the more so because it has
been attained through no spectacular methods, but
along legitimate paths of industry and thrift. Not
only has he won his place in his community to
which his talents entitle him commercially, but he
is justly recognized as one of the worthwhile men
of Custer, and one upon whose soundness of judg-
ment and reliability of character the utmost reliance
may be placed.
John E. M.\.\ley. who recently became a town
dweller at Deer Lodge, where he enjoys a post of
honor and responsibility in public affairs as chairman
of the board of county commissioners has spent the
greater part of his life under the open sky and is
still one of the leading ranchers of Powell County.
■ He has lived in Montana for over thirty years, and
was engaged in mining before he entered the sheep
business.
Mr. Manley was born in the Northwest, in Hous-
ton County. Minnesota, November 28, 1862. His
father was Anthony A. Manley who was born at
Manchester, England, in 1820. When he was seven
years of age in 1827 the family came from England
and settled in Pennsylvania, where the grandparents
spent the rest of their lives. Anthony Manley was
reared and married in Pennsylvania and in 1840
was one of the first to seek a home on the North-
western prairies in the territory of Minnesota. He
homesteaded 160 acres in Houston County and
eventually owned a large farm of 600 acres. He
lived there until his death in 1890 and out of many
years of toil he achieved a substantial degree of
prosperity. He was an honored citizen of his coun-
ty and served as justice of the peace many years.
In politics he was a democrat. Anthony Manley
married Catherine Mulcahey, who was born in Coun-
ty Tipperary, Ireland, in 1824, and died in Houston
County, Minnesota, in 1904. Mary, the oldest of
their children, is the wife of Orris'Layne, a farmer
of Minnesota, living in Fillmore County. John E.
and James A. are twins, the latter an 'attorney at
New Rockford, North Dakota. Catherine died
unmarried at the age of twenty-four. Frank is in
the insurance business at Indianapolis. Emmett went
to the Philippines with the North Dakota Volunteers
in 1898, and after being mustered out of the army
remained in the islands, and now has a large prac-
tice as a lawyer.
John E. Manley was reared on his father's farm
in Minnesota and secured his education in the rural
schools of that state. Two years before coming west
Mr. Manley was married. He arrived at Deer Lodge,
Montana, in March, 1889. in company with his wife
and young daughter. The following ten years he
spent as a miner, and then invested his modest cap-
ital in a ranch in the Nevada Valley. He still owns
that land, since increased to a large ranch on which
he runs sheep and cattle. The active management
of the ranch property now devolves upon his sons.
In 1919 Mr. Manley invested $60,000 in additional
land for his sheep and cattle. He has had his ups
and downs and vicissitudes as a rancher in Mon-
tana. The worst accident to befall him came in
1906 when he was hit with a stacking pole and his
back broken. He was in a hospital a year and on
crutches three years more, but gradually has re-
covered his health and strength so as to be able to
attend to his business affairs. In November, 1918,
he moved to a home in Deer Lodge at 506 Milwaukee
Avenue.
Mr. Manley was elected a county commissioner
of Powell County in 1906, was re-elected in 1908,
and in 1914 was chosen for another si.x year terra.
He was made chairman of the board in 1918, having
held that post of honor twice before. Mr. Manley
is a republican and is a director in the United States
National Bank of Deer Lodge,
In Houston County, Minnesota, in 1887, he mar-
ried Miss Mary Ellen Gaffney. Her parents Mr, and
Mrs. William Gaffney, both now deceased, lived in
Winona County, Minnesota, where her father was a
farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Manley had three children.
Catherine their only daughter, who died of the in-
fluenza in 1919, was a graduate of the high school
of Winona, Minnesota, and the wife of John R.
Quigley, a rancher at Avon, Montana. Emmett, the
older son, finished his education in the Butte Busi-
ness College and w^th his brother Clifford runs the
ranch. Clifford also attended the Butte Business
College.
George L. Killorn. Fealty to facts in the analy-
zation of the character of a citizen of the type of
George L. Killorn of Clyde Park, is all that is
required to make a biographical sketch interesting
to those who have at heart the good name of the
community, because it is the honorable reputa-
tion of the man of affairs, more than any other
consideration, that gives character and stability to
the body politic. Though of modest demeanor,
with no ambition to distinguish himself in public
position or as a leader of men, Mr. Killorn's ca-
reer has been signally honorable and it may be
studied with profit by the youth entering upon his
life work.
George L. Killorn was born at Livingston, Park
County. Montana, on August 15, 1889. and is the
son of John and Ellen (Lewis) Killorn. who are
now living at Wilsall. John Killorn was born in
Ireland in 1866, the son of James Killorn, who
left the Emerald Isle in an early day and became
a pioneer settler and miner at Bozeman, John
Killorn accompanied his parents on their immi-
gration to this country and was reared to man-
hood in Missouri, In 1891 he came to Livingston,
Montana, where he was married, and then for a
few years was a miner at Cokedale. He then
bought and has since resided on a ranch near where
Wilsall now stands, which he has improved and
kept at a high standard, so that it is now num-
bered among the best ranches for its size in this
locality. He owns 240 acres under cultivation and
1,920 acres of pasture land, which he devotes to
the raising of high-grade cattle. He has been finan-
cially successful and at the same time has won the
confidence and esteem of his fellow men. He is
a democrat in his political views and served as
sheriff of Park County for four years. Fraternally
he is a member of Livingston Lodge No. 246,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Mr.
Killorn married Ellen Lewis, who was born in
England, and who bore him the following chil-
dren: George L,. the immediate subject of this
review; Ella, the wife of James Schofield, of Butte;
John, who enlisted in the United States army in
1917, being sent overseas in December of that
year, and was assigned to the Aeria] Corps of the
One Hundred and Eighty-sixth Division and was
in the Argonne drive and other maior engagements,
making a good record and receiving the rank of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
331
top sergeant; Jane is unmarried and is a profes-
sional stenographer at Livingston.
George L. Killorn received his elementary edu-
cation in the public schools of Livingston, attend-
ing also the Park County High School one year.
He vi-as then a student in the Yellowstone Busi-
ness College at Livingston for two years. In 191 1
he came to Clyde Park and became assistant cash-
ier of the Citizens State Bank, holding that posi-
tion two years. He then entered the employ of
Wolcott & Bliler, general merchants, as credit man,
remaining with them for five years. In 1916 Mr.
Killorn bought the leading dry goods store at Clyde
Park and has since then devoted himself closely
to this enterprise. He carries a large and well-
selected stock of goods and enjoys a patronage
from a wide radius of surrounding country. In
1917 Mr. Killorn was appointed postmaster of
Clyde Park, being the present occupant of that
position, and has given the best of satisfaction to .
the patrons of the office. Mr. Killorn is a demo-
crat in his political affiliations. He is a member
of Livingston Lodge No. 246, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, of Livingston, and is popu-
lar in the circles in which he moves.
In igi2, at Livingston, Mr. Killorn was married
to Isadore Maggs, the daughter of James and
Emma (Baumgardner) Maggs. The father is de-
ceased, and his widow now resides at Coshocton,
Ohio. Mrs. Killorn is a lady of wide culture, hav-
ing completed her elementary education in the high
school at Coshocton, after which she attended and
graduated from the Columbus College of Oratory
and Music. She possesses exceptional talents as
an elocutionist and is the holder of five medals won
in state oratorical contests. Mr. and Mrs. Killorn
have a wide circle of warm personal friends, among
whom they are deservedly popular.
R. H. Dean. Though a native of Missouri, R. H.
Dean has lived in Montana over forty years. He
is a prominent lumber dealer at Bozeman, a busi-
ness he has followed for several years. A period
of his life which might be regarded with most
interest was twenty years as a railroad contractor,
during which time he constructed a number of
miles of Montana railway.
Mr. Dean was born in Randolph County, Mis-
souri, December 26, 1866. His father bore the
same name and was a Montana pioneer and his
grandfather, Richard H. Dean, was born in Ire-
land in 1801 and brought his family to America
about 1843. In Wisconsin he was engaged in the
elevator and grain business a number of years
and about 1864 went with other members of the
family to Randolph County, Missouri, and lived
retired until his death in 1881. R. H. Dean, father
of the Bozeman business man, was born in Ire-
land in 1837, and was six years old when brought
to America. He grew up near Columbus, Wiscon-
sin, was married in that state, and was associated
with his father in the grain elevator business. After
removing to Randolph County, Missouri, in 1864,
he became a farmer. As a Montana pioneer he
settled in the Missouri Valley, not far from the
present site of Townsend, in 1877. The quarter
section homestead and the 160 acre timber claim
which he took up and developed on Deep Creek,
five miles south of Townsend he still owns. For
many years he was a successful rancher in that
locality, and is now living retired at Townsend.
He is a republican in politics. R. H. Dean mar-
ried Mary E. Ranney, who was born in New York
State in 1840. They had four children : Jessie,
wife of Henry Seiben, a banker and stockman
at Helena; R. H., Jr.; DoUie, of Helena, widow
of Harry Burgess, a stockman and dairyman; and
Daisy, wife of Herbert Brady, a bookkeeper at
Great Falls, Montana.
R. H. Dean began his education in Missouri and
continued it after he was eleven years of age in
the country schools of Meagher County, in what
is now Broadwater County. For three years he
attended the Helena Business College, graduating
in 1886. Then followed twenty years of work as
a railroad contractor, the duties of that occupa-
tion calling him to all parts of the state. He was
a contractor for the Northern Pacific, and his
principal undertaking was the building of the Mon-
tana Railroad known as the Jaw Bone line, be-
tween Lombard and Castle. After retiring from
railway construction he engaged in the retail lum-
ber business at Manhattan, remaining there until
January, 1919, when he sold his interests and his
home and came to Bozeman. Here he is manager
of the Gallatin Lumber Company, one of the largest
concerns of its kind in Southern Montana. The
company is incorporated for $50,000 and has a large
plant at the corner of Third Avenue and Main
Street. L. W. Truitt is president of the company,
Martin Jacoby vice president, with Mr. Dean gen-
eral manager and secretary and M. F. Getchell,
treasurer.
Mr. Dean in politics is a democrat. He was active
in public affairs at Manhattan, being one of the
first councilmen upon the organization of the city
in 1912 and serving continuously until 1918. For
one term he was also mayor. He is affiliated with
Manhattan Lodge of Masons and at Bozeman is a
member of Western Star Lodge No. 4, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, Bridger Camp No. 2, Wood-
men of the World, and Lodge No. 463 of the Elks.
In 1898, at Bozeman, Mr. Dean married Miss
Sallie Chrisman, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John
Chrisman, both now deceased. Her father for
many years was county treasurer of Gallatin County.
Mrs. Dean died at Bozeman in 1904, leaving one
son, Richard Howell Dean, who was born June
16, 1901, and is now a student in the Montana
State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts.
In 1908, at Manhattan, Mr. Dean married Mrs.
Evelyn (Collins) Carmack,' daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. F. J. Collins, who are residents of Toston,
Montana, her father being a farmer.
Frank H. Garver since 191 1 has been Professor
of History and Economics in the Montana State
Normal College at Dillon. He is one of the lead-
ing historical scholars and authorities in the North-
west, and in Montana and elsewhere has given
much of his time to research and investigation and
is author of many addresses, magazine articles and
contributions to historical journals.
Professor Garver was born at Albion in Mar-
shall County, Iowa. March g, 1875, son of Andrew
A. and Diana (Ballard) Garver. His father was
of English ancestry, the Garvers coming to Penn-
sylvania in colonial times. The Ballards were a
Colonial Virginia family. Andrew A. Garver was
born at Mechanicsville. Pennsylvania, in 1838, was
reared there and at the first call for soldiers to
put down the rebellion in 1861 joined a Pennsyl-
vania regiment of infantry. He was in the three
months' service, but on account of physical disa-
bility was rejected for a second enlistment. In
1863 he moved to Iowa, locating in Marshall Coun-
ty, where he was a farmer for over thirty years.
In 1895 he went into the famous Grand River
Valley of Colorado and engaged in fruit growing
332
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Grand Junction, where he died in 1896. In Iowa
he was a leader in civic affairs and held a num-
ber of township offices, being president of the
school board for many years. He was a republican
and late in life became a convert to the Sweden-
borgian creed. His wife, Diana Ballard, was born
in Henry Countv, Iowa, in 1840 and died at Albion
in that state in' i8Sv They had five children, of
whom two are living Frank H., the subject of this
sketch, and Katherine, wife of C. J. Manning, prin-
cipal of the Beaverhead County High School at
Dillon.
Frank H. Garver grew up on his fathers farm
in Marshall County, Iowa. His advantages in the
country schools were supplemented by attending
the .Albion Seminary from 1890 to 1893, and after
that the Epworth Seminary at Epworth, Iowa,
where he graduated with the class of 1895. He spent
three years and received in 1898 his A. B. de-
gree from Upper Iowa University at Fayette. •
Aiter graduating Mr. Garver took up his pro-
fessional work as teacher of history and politics
at Morningside College, Sioux City, Iowa. He
was head of that department until 191 1. In the
meantime by residence and non-residence work at
the University of Iowa he received his Master of
-Arts degree in 1908 and after another two years
of study was granted his Doctor of Philosophy
degree in 191 1. Doctor Garver then came to the
Montana State Normal College as Professor of
History and Economics.
He spent ten years in the service of the State
Historical Society of Iowa as research assistant
and later as research associate. During that time
he contributed historical articles to the "Annals
of Iowa," the "Iowa Journal of History and Poli-
tics," "The Mississippi Valley Historical Review,"
and "The .American Political Science Review." He
has been a regular attendant at many of the re-
gional and national historical societies, has borne
a part in their discussions, and has been on the
program for formal articles and addresses. During
his residence in Montana Doctor Garver has made
a special study of Montana history and is fre-
quently referred to as an authority on contro-
verted points. Some of his historical articles have
been published in the Butte Miner, the Anaconda
Standard, the Butte Post, and he is also author
of several pamphlets on Montana history. One of
his services has been in assisting to mark and
define important historical sites. He and Prof.
M. L. Wilson, of the State Agricultural College at
Bozeman, in 1917 followed the Custer Trail from
the mouth of the Rosebud to the battlefield, iden-
tified a number of camps and also points on the
battlefield, and placed permanent markers. Doctor
Garver each summer gives a special course on
Montana history at the State Normal College.
He is a member of the State Teachers' Associa-
tion, the State Historical Society of Iowa, the
Mississippi Valley Historical Society, the Ameri-
can Political Science .Association and the Ameri-
can Historical Association. He served one year as
president of the Dillon Chautauqua Association,
was a library trustee while living at Sioux City,
Iowa, and is a member and trustee of the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church at Dillon. Politically he is
an independent voter. Doctor Garver has some
important business interests, being a stockholder
in the Beaverhead State Bank of Dillon, and presi-
dent of the Slade Shoe Company of Des Moines,
Iowa.
August 26, 1900, at Mount Vernon, Iowa, he
married Miss Edna L. Sniffen, daughter of Robert
and Ellen (Phelps) Sniffen. Her mother li- rs at
Sioux City and her father, deceased, was a mer-
chant, farmer and miner in Iowa and New Mexico.
Mrs. Garver is a graduate of the Epworth Semi-
nary in Iowa and received her A. B. degree from
Cornell College at Mount Vernon, Iowa. Doctor
and Mrs. Garver have two children : Raymond,
born October 30, 1901, and Jeannette, born March
13, 1904-
Fr.ank Ch.^rlton Noble. Among other skilled
and experienced men holding important positions
with the Anaconda Copper Mining Company is
Frank Charlton Noble, chief civil engineer, admit-
tedly one of the corporation's most valued em-
ployes. He was born at Boston, Massachusetts,
March 10, 1856, a son of John Noble, and grand-
son of Samuel Noble, who died at Boston before
Frank C. Noble was born. He came to the United
States from his native place of Londonderry, Ire-
land, in 1818, settling at once at Boston, where
he spent the remainder of his life. The maternal
grandfather of Frank C. Noble was James Hick-
man, and he was born in Eastham, Cape Cod, Massa-
chusetts, and lived there and at Duxbury, Massa-
chusetts, until 1849, when he went to California
in search of gold, and died there about 1850. Un-
til leaving Massachusetts he was a carpenter. He
married Eusebia Sawyer, a native of Marlboro,
Massachusetts, and she died in her native state.
John Noble was born at Boston, Massachusetts,
in 1818, and died in that city in 1886, having been
a civil engineer by profession. After the organi-
zation of the republican party he accepted its prin-
ciples and adherred to them until his death, and
was very active in local affairs, serving for years
as a member of the city council of Boston and
on the city school board and the English High
School board, of which he was chairman for a
considerable period. In him the Methodist Epis-
copal Church had a conscientious member and active
worker. Prior to her marriage his wife bore the
maiden name of Eusebia Sawyer Hickman, and
she was born in Marlboro, Massachusetts, in 1820,
her death occurring at Boston, Massachusetts, in
1904. She and her husband had the following
children : Annie J., who is unmarried, lives at
East Boston, Massachusets ; Eliza Gerry, who mar-
ried Fred Putnam, lives at Reading, Massachusetts,
where he is engaged in clerking; Frank C, whose
name heads this review ; Mary E., who died at
Boston, Massachusetts, in 1917, unmarried; and
Edith Warren, who is also unmarried, lives in East
Boston, Massachusetts.
Frank C. Noble attended the public schools of
Boston, and was graduated from the Boston High
School in 1873, and from the Massachusetts In-
stitute of Technology in 1881 as a civil engineer,
he having elected to follow his father's calling.
He immediately came West in 1881 and was a civil
engineer for the Burlington & Missouri River Rail-
road in Nebraska, until 1894. In that year he came
to Montana and was engaged in surveying the lo-
cation from .Anaconda west for the Butte, Ana-
conda and Pacific Railroad's west extension, but six
months later returned to Bo.ston, where he fol-
lowed his profession until 1898. Once more he
came west, this time to accept a position with the
.Anaconda Copper Mining Company as civil engi-
neer, and has remained with it ever since, be-
ing promoted until he is now chief of the civil
engineering department. His offices are in the
general office building of the company's reduction
plant two miles east of Anaconda. Like his father
he early embraced the principles enunciated by the
republican party, and also followed him in his
HISTORY OF MONTANA
333
choice of a church home, being a member of the
Anaconda Methodist Episcopal Church. Mr. Noble
belongs to the Montana Society of Engineers, and
to the Anaconda Club. He is not married and
resides at the Montana Hotel.
Harry A. MacPherson, secretary, treasurer and
manager of the MacPherson Mercantile Company of
Deer Lodge, has been a resident of Montana for
over thirty-five years. His father was one of the
first steamboat captains to pilot a boat up the Yellow-
stone River. The MacPhersons have always been
pioneers. He is descended from Brim MacPherson,
one of four brothers who came from Scotland to
Maryland in Colonial times. Two of these brothers
remained around Baltimore and two others went to
Canada.
Mr. MacPherson's grandfather E. B. MacPherson
was born in Maryland in 1800 and during the '30s
moved to Missouri, locating at Booneville, where
he developed a large plantation, owned many slaves
and was proprietor of the City Hotel of Boone-
ville. When he came west he brought a number of
thoroughbred horses on the boat down the Ohio and
up the Mississippi. After coming west he formed
a friendship with Abraham Lincoln, and though a
slave holder he was very loyal to- the great emanci-
pator and at the time of the Civil war he set all his
negroes free, giving each one a suit of clothes
and $15.
Edward B. MacPherson, father of the Deer Lodge
merchant, was born at Baltimore in 1830 and was a
small child when his parents settled at Booneville,
Missouri, where he was reared. As a young man
he moved to St. Louis and was married in that city
and became a steamboat captain. He not only piloted
boats up and down the Mississippi between St. Louis
and New Orleans, but also followed steamboating on
the upper reaches' of the Missouri River to Fort Ben-
ton, Montana, and along the Yellowstone branch of the
Missouri. After many years of activity he retired
in 1903, and lived at Deer Lodge until his death in
1905. He was a democrat and a member of the
Presbyterian Church. Edward B. MacPherson
married Mary Diller, who was born at Pittsburg,
Pennsylvania, in 1832 and died at St. Louis in 1899.
They had only two children, Harry A. and Mamie.
The daughter died in 1876 when eight years of age.
Harry A. MacPherson was born at St. Louis-,
Missouri, October 25, 1864, and spent his early life
in that city, attending the public schools, for three
years the academic department of Washington Uni-
versity, and two years in the St. Louis High School.
At the age of sixteen he went to work for a whole-
sale boot and shoe house at St. Louis, but in the sum-
mer of 1879 came to Montana, and for four years
was with the firm of Caplice & Smith, general mer-
chants at Philipsburg. He also represented them
in their branch store at New Chicago, and in 1886
established his permanent home at Deer Lodge. Mr.
MacPherson was continuously in the employ of the
E. L. Bonner Mercantile Company, one of the oldest
business organizations in the state, until 1909. Li
that year he established his present business, incor-
porated as the MacPherson Mercantile Company.
He has a complete department store, well equipped
and stocked in every department. The president
of the company is Peter Pauly, Mrs. Peter Pauly is
vice president, while Mr. MacPherson has the active
management and is secretary and treasurer. The
MacPherson store is at the corner of Main and
Missouri Avenue.
Mr. MacPherson also owns a modern home at 414
Fourth Street and has two dwelling houses on Fifth
Street. He served four years as a member of the
city council, is a democrat, and is an active member
and in 1918 was president of the Business Men's
Association. He is a member of the Episcopal
Church, is past chancellor commander of Valley
Lodge No. 6 Knights of Pythias, a member of Royal
Lodge, Loyal Order of Moose at Deer Lodge. In
1897 he married Miss Retta Ward, daughter of H. G.
and Caroline (Turner) Ward, both now deceased. Her
father was a pioneer liveryman at Deer Lodge, and
for some years had charge of S. E. Larabie's race
horses. Mr. and Mrs. MacPherson have one son,
Kenneth, born June 21, 1903, now a student in the
Powell County High School and member of the
Boy Scouts organization.
Charles Hayden Eggleston, associate editor of
the Anaconda Standard, one of the leading jour-
nals of this part of Montana, is recognized as
one of the clever newspaper men of his day. He
was born at Fulton, Oswego County, New York,
February 16, 1858, a son of Charles S. Eggleston
and grandson of Charles G. Eggleston, a native of
New York State, who died near Utica, New York,
before his grandson was born. For some years
he had been a general merchant of that region.
The Eggleston family originated in England, from
whence representatives of it came to New Y'ork
during the colonial period in the history of this
country.
Charles S. Eggleston was born in the vicinity
of Utica, New York, in 1824, and he died at Ful-
ton, New York, in 1893. Reared at his birthplace,
Charles S. Eggleston for a time was a clerk in a
general store but in 1854 became professor of lan-
guages in the Falley Seminary at Fulton, New
York. In i860 he established a book store, and
continued in charge of it until his death. A mem-
ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church, he took
an active part in its support. His political faith
made him a republican, and he was stanch in his
adherence to the principles of that party. Charles
S. Eggleston was married to Helen Paddock, born
at Wolcott, New York, in 1831, and she died at
Fulton, New York in 1867, having borne her hus-
band the following children : Mary, who died at
Fulton, New York, aged thirty years, married W.
H. Bridge, a manufacturer, who Survives her and
lives at Fulton, New York; Frances H. who mar-
ried A. B. Blodgett, superintendent of schools of
Syracuse, New York, now deceased, lives at Wash-
ington, District of Columbia ; Charles Hayden, whose
name heads this review; Clara who died in infancy;
and Theodore, who also died in infancy.
Charles Hayden Eggleston attended the public
schools of Fulton, New York, and the University
of Syracuse, New York, being graduated there-
from in 1878 with the degree of Bachelor of Arts,
and member of the Greek letter college fraternity.
Delta Upsilon. From 1878 to 1882 Mr. Eggleston
was a bookkeeper in a brokerage office at Buffalo,
New York, and then in the latter year entered the
newspaper field as reporter for the Syracuse Stand-
ard, rising to be city editor in 1885, and continu-
ing as such until 1889. In September, 1889, Mr.
Eggleston came to Anaconda as associate editor
of the Anaconda Standard, which he helped in
organizing, the editor being J. H. Durston, now
editor of the Butte Post. The other associate of
Mr. Eggleston in organizing the Standard was
W. W. Wallsworth. The first copy was issued
September 5, 1889, and the policy of the paper has
always been democratic. The financial backer of
the paper was Marcus Daly. The Standard Pub-
lishing Company owns the fine building at the
corner of Main and Third streets. The original
334
HISTORY OF MONTANA
plant was burned on February 4, 1918, and the
present two-story brick structure was immediately
built to replace it. The presses, job room and busi-
ness office are on the ground floor, while the edi-
torial, composing and stereotyping rooms are on the
second. Several additional rooms are rented as
offices. The plant is equipped with all modern
machinery and appliances for the issuance of a
daily paper and carrying on of a large job print-
ing business. The Standard circulates all over the
state and is the afficial paper of Deerlodge County.
Mr. Eggleston is a democrat and is very active in
his party, being elected on its ticket to the Upper
House of the State Legislaturi. of Montana in
1893 and 1907, serving in all eight years. While in
office he served on the corporations other than
municipal committees and other important com-
mittees, and served his constituents faithfully and
well. Both by inheritance and belief he is a Metho-
dist, and serves the church of Anaconda as trus-
tee. Fraternallv he belongs to Anaconda Lodge
No. 239, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
and socially is a member of the Anaconda Rotary
Club, the Anaconda Club and the Anaconda Coun-
try Club. He owns a modern residence at No.
712 Hickory Street.
On December 23, 1884, Mr. Eggleston was mar-
ried at Syracuse, New York, to Miss Jessie Vir-
ginia Coleman, a daughter of C. C. Coleman, who
died in Syracuse, New York, as did his wife, where
he had operated for a number of years as a real
estate broker. Mr. and Mrs. Eggleston have one
son, Charles L., who lives at Berkeley, California,
and is with the Southern Pacific Railroad.
Rodney E. Foster. The active career of Rodney
E. Foster of Dillon covers about twenty years. The
first ten he spent as a railroad fireman and engi-
neer in Michigan. The last ten he has lived in
Montana, and in this great state has found bigger
and broader opportunities for usefulness and suc-
cess. He is one of the leading livestock _ com-
mission men of Montana and is connected officially
with several companies controlling great tracts of
land and handling sheep and other livestock by the
thousands.
Mr. Foster was born at Dundee, Michigan, Janu-
ary 19, 1880. His Foster ancestors were Scotch
and English and were colonial settlers in the State
of Maine. He might properly claim the inheri-
tance of pioneer instinct from his father, C. D.
Foster, who was a western plainsman for many years.
C. D. Foster was born in Maine in 1837, and spent a
number of years of his early life in Nevada and
California. He had the distinction of being the
first man to drive a stage out of Carson City, Ne-
vada. He was all over the plains in the early days.
For five years he was a stage driver in the Sacra-
mento Valley of California and also did placer
mining in the early days of the Pacific Coast. About
1877 he returned East and was satisfied after that
with the quiet environment of the farm at Dundee,
Michigan. He married there and was a farmer
and stock raiser until his death in September,
1918. Politically he was a republican and was a
very regular attendant and active supporter of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. His wife was Miss
Lusetta Hall, who was born in Holland, Ohio, in
1843, and is still living at Dundee, Michigan. Their
children were : F. A., agent for the Boston & .A.1-
bany Railway Company, living at Litchfield. Con-
necticut; C. C. Foster, who died at Chicago in
November, 1918, and for many years was a millin-
ery salesman for Hyland Brothers ; George W., a
resident of Boston and traveling salesman for
Strong & Sons, a boot and shoe house of that city;
C. D., who is in the sheep business and handles
about 3,000 head every year with home at Harri-
son, Montana; Arthur B., who was a clerk and died
at Butte, Montana, in 1912 ; Rodney E. ; and Isa-
belle, wife of Frank Strong, in the elevator and
grain business at Rockwood, Michigan.
Rodney E. Foster received his early education
in the public schools of Dundee, Michigan, gradu-
ating from high school in 1899. Soon afterward
he entered the service of the Grand Trunk Rail-
waj', and was fireman five years and locomotive
engineer five years, his headquarters being at De-
troit. He came to Montana and located at Dillon
in 1909, and has since engaged in the livestock
business. As a livestock commission man his offices
are in the Telephone Building at Dillon. Mr. Fos-
ter is associated with Senator E. O. Selway as as-
sistant general manager of the Selway Sheep Com-
pany. Senator Selway is president, Frank Schultz
is vice president, and George M. Melton is secre-
tary and treasurer. This company has one ranch
of 7,000 acres on Blacktail Creek, and two other
ranches comprising 3,000 acres between Divide and
Melrose. The company's operations are conducted
on a large scale and involve the handling of about
23,000 sheep annually.
Mr. Foster is president of the Montana Livestock
Commission Company and in association with
George M. Melton owns a ranch of 2,400 acres
with water rights at Feely, Montana. Mr. Foster
is a republican voter, a member of the Episcopal
Church, is affiliated with Oroy Plata Lodge No.
390 of the Elks at Virginia City, and is a former
member and past chancellor commander of the
Knights of Pythias. He and his family live in a
modern home at 903 South Washington Street.
He married at Kansas City, Missouri, June 10,
IQ04, Miss Emma G. Churchill, daughter of Charles
and Addie (McDaniels) Churchill. Mrs. Churchill
lives with Mr. and Mrs. Foster. Mr. Churchill,
deceased, was for many years chief mail clerk on
the Missouri Pacific Railway with headquarters at
St. Louis. Mr. and Mrs. Foster have two chil-
dren : Rodney C. and Walter.
Lewis Clark Ford, M. D. The oldest physician
in point of service at Lima, Montana, Dr. Lewis
Clark Ford. Sr., came to this state thirty years ago
and has since been in continuous practice. Dur-
ing this long period he has not only risen to a
high place in his profession, but has been an active,
helpful and constructive factor in the development
of the section, his name and services having been
identified with numerous movements which have
contributed to progress and advancement along va-
rious lines.
Doctor Ford belongs to a family which originated
in England and crossed the Atlantic during the
seventeenth century. He was born at Keokuk,
Iowa, July 4, 1852, a son of Eliakim Reed and
Margaret (Stilwell) Ford. His father was born
December 10, 1822, in the State of New York, and
as a young man removed to Keokuk, Iowa, where
he was married June 23, 1849, to Margaret Stil-
well, born at Keokuk, November 22, 1829, as the
first white child born there, a daughter of Moses
and -Anna Maria (Van Orsdal) Stilwell. She
died at Keokuk, May 18, 1875, having been the
mother of seven children : Eliakim, born May 9,
1850, who died December 2, 185 1 ; Lewis Clark;
Ernest, born .August 18, 1854, who died March 29,
1S55; Frank Bailey, born October 4, 1856, who
when last heard from was a resident of Phoenix.
.Arizona ; Edgar, born February 22, 1859, who died
HISTORY OF MONTANA
August 23, 1864; George Lee, born February 22,
1862, who died August 23, 1864; and Anna Maria,
born October 13, 1867, the wife of Clarence M.
King, of Seattle, Washington. Eliakim R. Ford
married for his second wife November 14, 1878,
Jane Lee, o'f South Peters, St. Charles County,
Missouri, who died at De Soto, that state, in igi2.
Eliakim Reed Ford was a banker, real estate broker
and {jrominent business man and leading citizen.
In 1804 he came to what is now Beaverhead Coun-
ty, Montana, then Owyhee County and a part of
Idaho, to develop a mine, but decided to buy and
operate a stampmill instead, and this venture prov-
ing unsucessful, he lost a fortune and returned to
Keokuk, where he bought into the Iowa Coal Com-
pany, which he conducted at Oskaloosa, with head-
quarters at Keokuk. He was president of that
company until he disposed of his interests in 1866
and went to St. Louis, where he interested him-
self in real estate ventures until 1870, then going
to St. Charles, Missouri, where he had large and
important interests. Eventually he went to Rich-
field, Missouri, where he settled down on a farm,
and tliere his death occurred December 29, 1886.
He was. a republican of the old school, and a mem-
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. At
the outbreak of the Civil war he was acting as
professor of gynecology at the University of Iowa
Medical College, and became the surgeon in charge
of the medical corps of the home guards, with
which he served during the period of the war.
Lewis Clark Ford attended the public schools of
Keokuk and the Peekskill Military Academy, at
Peekskill-on-the-Hudson, and in 1868 was gradu-
ated from the Keokuk High School. Following
this he clerked in a bookstore at Keokuk for two
years, and then went to Cornwall, Missouri, as
agent for the Iron Mountain Railway, and while
there carried on merchandising and acted as super-
intendent of a mine for two years. Returning
to St. Louis, for eighteen months he was engaged
in the coal business, and then went to Keokuk
again. .Accidental happenings often change the
entire course of men's lives, and it was so in the
case of Doctor Ford. At Keokuk he imposed upon
himself the duty of caring for a close friend who
had been injured in an accident, and while per-
forming this service he became impressed with
the value of the medical profession and decided
to enter that science. His preliminary studies were
prosecuted under Dr. J. C. Hughes, Sr., dean of
the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Keokuk,
and in 1876 he was graduated from that institu-
tion wi«Ii the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
Doctor Ford began the practice of medicine in
1876 at Keokuk, Iowa, and then moved to Nauvoo.
Illinois, where he remained for two years, and
then went to Como, Colorado, where he was sur-
geon for the Denver & South Park Railroad for
two years, then going to Monte Vista, that state,
where he remained until 1889. During that pe-
riod he served as coroner of Park County, Colo-
rado, and county physician of Rio Grande County.
On March 29, 1889, he took up his residence and
began practice at Lima, Montana, where he has
since remained in continuous practice, and at this
time is the pioneer physician of the city. From
1909 until 1919 he served as coroner of Beaver-
head County, and during the past thirty years has
held his present position as assistant surgeon for
the Oregon Short Line. His standing in his pro-
fession is of the highest, and he is generally es-
teemed as a man of the highest professional ethics
by his fellow members in the Montana State Medi-
cal Society and the .American Medical Association.
Vol. II— «
For a number of years lie served as justice of the
peace, and for twelve years acted as postmaster
at Lima, during the administrations of Presidents
McKinley, Roosevelt and Taft. He votes the
straight republican ticket.
Doctor Ford is the owner of a modern residence
on Main Street, several other dwellings. Ford's
Hall and the drug store building, and is a stock-
holder in the Lima State Bank. With other pro-
gressive and public-spirited men he has backed
movements which have had for their object the
development and betterment of the section, princi-
pal among which were the reservoir and ditch
schemes. Associated in these projects were Charles
T. Stewart, secretary of state, Edward Ripley, of
Dillon, A. J. Holmes, of Garden City, Kansas, and
James Dresser, of Mason City, Michigan, their
object being the development of the reservoir and
ditch twelve miles east of Lima. These men were
starling out to make their fortunes at that time,
and were not men of large means, with the pos-
sible exception of Mr. Dresser, who was relied
upon to finance the proposition, although he had
to borrow from the Mason City Bank. The reser-
voir was completed, a tunnel dug through the sand
rock at the side of the dam, which was located
in Madison (now Beaverhead) County, and the
reservoir was started in 1891, but a series of mis-
fortunes, including the year of the financial panic
and the caving of the roof of the tunnel in 1894,
caused Doctor Ford and the others to dispose of their
interests, and the cattlemen, who did not wish
homesteaders to occupy the lands of Red Rock
Valley, succeeded with other influences in hav-
ing the dam condemned. Later Joseph Williams,
Judge Lindsay, William Stewart, and Marco Medin
took up the matter but later sold out to a Chicago
financier who in turn sold it to the Beaverhead
Valley Water Users -Association. The reservoir
and dam now supply the entire Red Rock Valley,
as well as some farm lands beyond this region.
Doctor Ford is prominent as a fraternalist, belong-
ing to Evergreen Lodge No. 45, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, of Lima, of which he is past
master; Dillon Chapter No. 8, Royal Arch Ma-
sons; St. Elmo Commandery No. 7, Knights Tem-
plar, of Dillon ; Butte Consistory, thirty-second
degree ; Bagdad Temple, Ancient .Arabic Order
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of Butte, and Elva
Boardman Chapter, Order of the Eastern Star, of
Lima, of which he is past patron. He is also a
member of the Montana State Medical Association
and the -American Medical Association.
On August 16, 1878, Doctor Ford was united in
marriage at Nauvoo, Illinois, with Lucie Miller
Ohler, daughter of Benjamin and Susan (Adams)
Ohler, born at Barbourville, Kentucky, November
17, 1854. To this union there have been born four
children : Lewis Clark, Jr., born July 9, 1879, who
resides on his ranch east of Snowline, Beaverhead
County ; Lucie Miller, born in December, 1880,
who was married June 25, 1907, to Dr. Maurice
Anson Walker, a physician and surgeon of Dillon :
-Adda Susan, born March 22, 1886, who was mar-
ried March 27, 1911, to Raymond Alton Richard-
son, of Lima, a conductor on the Oregon Short
Line Railway; and Lucille, born February 22, 180,=;,
who died in infancy.
Thomas J. McKenzie, M. D. Distinguished not
only as the pioneer physician and surgeon at Ana-
conda, but as a leader also in its civil development
and public affairs. Dr. Thomas J. McKenzie for
thirty years has been one of the needed, practical,
far-sighted men of this city whose earnest efforts
336
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in every direction have been for the general wel-
fare. Doctor McKenzie is a native of Tennessee,
and was born at Lexington, March 27, 1865.
The parents of Doctor McKenzie were Dr. James
F. and Elizabeth (Galbraith) McKenzie. The
father was born in 1S24, in Kentucky, but was
reared and married in Tennessee. He was a gradu-
ate of the medical department of the Kentucky
University at Louisville. After practicing his pro-
fession for thirty-five years at Lexington, Tennes-
see, and in the vicinity, he retired and in 1884 re-
moved to Texas, and his death occurred at Hills-
boro in that state in 1891. During the war be-
tween the states he served in the Confederate army.
In politics he was always a democrat, belonged
to the Masonic fraternity and was a faithful mem-
ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The
mother of Doctor McKenzie survives and lives at
Fort Worth, Texas. Her birth took place in 1839,
in Mississippi. They were the parents of the
following children: John F.. who is a fa mer near
Pittsburg. Texas; Emma, who is the wife of D.
M. Alexander, an attorney at Fort Worth, Texas ;
Thomas J.: Jasper \., who died at Hillsboro, Texas,
when aged twenty-one years ; Dan, who is in Gov-
ernment service at Fort Worth ; Ada, who is the
wife of Frank S. Sullenberger, president of a bank
at Amarillo, Texas : Oda, who lives at Fort Worth :
Ida, who is the wife of Ross Ozier, of Amarillo,
where he has a cattle ranch ; Urna, who is the
wife of A. J. McKinnon, a banker at Tucson,
Arizona ; William C, who is a cattleman near
Amarillo ; Maude, who is the wife of W. C. Corn,
who has extensive cattle interests near Fort Worth ;
and Mertie, who resides at Fort Worth, Texas.
Thomas J. McKenzie was primarily educated in
the public schools of Lexington, Tennessee, and
later of Henderson, Kentucky, and was graduated
from the high school of the latter city in 1879,
then entering the University of West Tennessee,
from which he was graduated in 1884. In 1885
he went to Hillsboro, Texas, where he spent the
year punching cattle. In the meanwhile his pre-
paratory medical reading was not neglected, for
he early chose his father's profession, and in 1886
he entered the University Medical College at Louis-
ville, from which he was graduated in February,
1889, with his degree of ^L D. For about a year
afterward he served as an interne in the Louis-
ville City Hospital, and on many occasions has
attended clinics and taken post graduate courses
in the Polyclinic and Rush Medical schools, Chi-
cago; the Post Graduate School in New York,
and with the Mayo Brothers at Rochester, Minne-
sota. Doctor McKenzie came to Anaconda, March
9, 1889, and has remained here. His professional
standmg is high and he is identified with all the
leading medical organizations of this section, be-
ing a member of the Deer Lodge County Medical
Association and is former president, is an ex-presi-
dent also of the Montana State Medical Associa-
tion, and belongs to and is highly valued in the
American Medical Association. For twenty-two
years he was surgeon for the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, and for the past twenty-six years
has been surgeon for the Butte, Anaconda and
Pacific Railway, this connection beginning before
the railroad came through Anaconda.
Not alone has Doctor McKenzie been permitted
to devote himself to his profession. Recognition
and appreciation of his public spirit, his sense of
justice, his business ability and sterling charac-
ter led to his election as mayor of Anaconda in
1905 on the democratic ticket, and he served in
• 1906 and 1907, during which time many public im-
provements were made, needed reforms suggested
and inoperative laws put in operation, all for the
betterment of the city.
At Anaconda, in 1891, Doctor McKenzie was
united in marriage to Miss Thula Hardenbrook, who
is a daughter of A. and Thula (Walker) Harden-
brook, the latter of whom is deceased. The father
of Mrs. McKenzie is a retired physician now liv-
ing at Missoula, Montana, who came to Anaconda
in pioneer times. Doctor and Mrs. McKenzie have
had five children, namely : Frank W., who was a
corporal in the aviation service in the great war,
was sent overseas and was on his way to Metz
when the armistice was signed, was mustered out
of the National army July I, 1919, and is now at
home ; Allen, who died when aged eight years ;
Anna, who is a graduate of the Anaconda' High
School and completed the junior year at the State
University at Missoula, is a stenographer for the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company at Anaconda ;
Elizabeth, who attends school in the city ; and
Thomas J., Jr., the youngest who is nine years of
age. Mrs. McKenzie is vice regent of the Daugh-
ters of the Revolution for the State of Montana
and her daughters also belong to this patriotic
body. Doctor McKenzie belongs to Acacia Lodge
No. 33, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons and to
the Rotary Club of Anaconda. He maintains his
oflices in the Electric Light Building on Main Street,
and owns his handsome modern residence at No.
406 Elm Street, Anaconda. He takes pride in an
intelligent and worthy ancestry that leads back to
Scotland.
Charles E. Aspling. On of the earliest settlers
at Deer Lodge was the late Thomas Aspling. His
son Charles E. Aspling came to Montana when about
ten years of age, and as he entered the shop of a pio-
neer newspaper soon afterward he could make a
strong claim to being one of the oldest printers and
newspaper men in the state. He has not been in the
newspaper and printing business continuously,
though during the past fifty years he has served a
number of the best known publications in Montana.
Mr. Aspling is proprietor and editor of the Powell
County Post at Deer Lodge.
He was born at Parkville, Missouri, January 24,
1854. His grandfather Peter Aspling brought his
family from Canterbury, England, in 1824, and set-
tled in Southern Missouri around Springfield, where
he spent the rest of his life as a farmer. The late
Thomas Aspling was born at Canterbury, England,
in 1815, and lived a full century. His death occurred
at Deer Lodge in 1915. He was about nine years of
age when he accompanied the family to this country,
and from his father's farm in Southern Missouri
he went to St. Louis, where he grew to manhood.
Not long afterward he settled in the extreme west-
ern Missouri on the Missouri River at Parkville, then
an important and historic town. He married there
and was an Indian trader and also owned a grist and
flour mill. In 1857 he opened a stock of goods a
few miles south of Parkville in what is now Kansas
City, Missouri, and was one of the first merchants
of that now splendid metropolis. Thomas Aspling
had all the qualities of the western pioneer, possess-
ing the ability to adapt himself to the difficult and
frequently dangerous circumstances and with a zest
for adventure that led him to keep well out on the
frontier of western civilization. In 1864 he came
to Montana and was a placer miner at Virginia City,
.'Mder Gulch and in the Last Chance mine near Hel-
ena. Thomas Aspling established his pioneer busi-
ness at Deer Lodge in 1866. At fiirst he ran a
commissary for the miners, and later engaged in the
l^^' a^^ju.^.1^^^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
general merchandise busniess, continuing it upwards
of forty years until he retired in 1905. At the time
of his death he was one of the oldest members of
the Masonic fraternity, having joined that organiza-
tion in St. Louis. He became a charter member of
Deer Lodge Lodge No. 14, Ancient Free and Accept-
ed Masons, and was also a member of Valley Chap-
ter No. 4, Royal Arch Masons. He voted independ-
ently in politics and was a prominent Presbyterian,
helping establish that church in Deer Lodge and serv-
ing it as an elder for many years. Thomas Aspling
married Georgiana Kelley, who was born at Fred-
ericksburg, Virginia, in 1832. She died at Deer
Lodge in 1899. They were the parents of three sons.
T. P., the oldest, was a merchant at Dupuyer in Cho-
teau County, Montana, where he died in 1907.
Charles E. is the second in age. Robert, the youngest,
accidentally shot himself while out hunting at the age
of fourteen.
Charles E. Aspling left his books and studies in the
public schools of Deer Lodge at the age of fifteen.
He had entered the printing office of the Independ-
ent when it was established at Deer Lodge in 1867,
and learned the trade and worked for the Indepen-
dent four years, later helping move it to Helena.
Afterwards he returned to Deer Lodge and for four-
teen years was foreman of the printing office of the
New Northwest. Beginning in 1884 Mr. Aspling was
in business as a merchant at Anaconda four years,
and when the Anaconda Standard was established
he joined that publication and was with it for eight
years. Mr. Aspling left the newspaper office to do
some active work as a miner through Powell and
Granite counties, and is still interested in mining
being president of the Elk Mining Company.
Resuming his residence at Deer Lodge in 1905 he was
wifh the Silver State for three years, and in 1909
established the Powell County Post, of \yhich he
has since been editor and proprietor. This is the
leading paper in Powell County, having a circulation
over that and surrounding counties, and is demo-
cratic in politics. The plant on Missouri Avenue
just off Main Street has every facility in the way of
machinery and equipment for the publication of a
modern newspaper. Mr. Aspling owns the business
and his son James is his active partner in the busi-
ness. His substantial home adjoins his printing
plant.
Mr. Aspling has always been a democratic voter.
He is a member of the Presbyterian Church, and is
a past chancellor commander of Valley Lodge No. 6,
Knights of Pythias, and a past grand master of the
exchequer of the Grand Lodge of Montana. He is a
member of the Deer Lodge Chamber of Commerce.
In 1875 at Deer Lodge he married Miss Mattie
Emma Self, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James Self,
now deceased. Her father followed the trade of
machinist in Nebraska and Missouri. Mr. and Mrs.
Aspling have four children. Their oldest son
Charles M. volunteered in the army in 1917 and
went overseas in 1918 as a corporal in the Fourth En-
gineers. During one of the drives of the summer of
1918 he was severely gassed, and was sent to a field
hospital and afterward invalided home, and had a
long period of recovery at Fort Bayard. New Mex-
ico. He has since returned home and is now dep-
uty county clerk of Powell County. The only daugh-
ter, Mary E., is the wife of Arthur E. Davis, an ab-
stractor at Butte. Thomas B. is a machinist in the
local shops at Deer Lodge of the Chicago, Milwau-
kee & St. Paul Railway. James S., his father's
partner, is a graduate of the Powell County High
School.
Frederick Laist, general manager of the reduc-
tion department of the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company at Anaconda, and one of the most ex-
perienced men of his calling in the country, has
won his present standing through his own merit.
He was born at Cincinnati, Ohio, October 30,
1878, a son of Otto Laist, now a resident of Oak-
land, California. Otto Laist was born in Bavaria,
Germany, in 1836, and when about twenty years
of age came to the United States, settling at Cin-
cinnati, where until 1892 he was engaged in the
manufacture of glycerine, but in that year disposed
of his interests and went to Oakland, California,
to become an employe of the California Powder
Company. He is now retired from active life.
Politically Otto Laist is a republican. The maiden
name of his wife was Anna Hochstetter, and she
was born in Wurtemberg, Germany. Their chil-
dren are as follows : Alexander, who lives at Han-
cock, Michigan, is superintendent of the Quincy
smelter; Theodore F., who is an architect of Chi-
cago ; Otto, who is a physician and surgeon of
San Francisco, California ; Frederick, whose name
heads this review; and Herbert H. R., who is a
manufactures' agent of San Francisco, California.
Frederick Laist attended the public schools of
Cincinnati, Ohio, through the sixth grade, and then
his parents moving to Oakland, California, he
completed the grammar course and took the high
school course in that city, being graduated in the
latter in i8g8, following which he became a stu-
dent at the University of California at Berkeley,
from which he was graduated in 1901, with the
degree of Bachelor of Science. In the fall of
that same year Mr. Laist became a teacher in the
Santa Ana High School of chemistry and physics,
and a year later left California for the University
of Utah, at which he was instructor of chemistry
for a year. For the subsequent year he was iden-
tified with work in the mines and smelters of
Utah, coming to Anaconda in the spring of 1903
and entering the testing department of the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company, and has since re-
mained with this corporation, rising steadily through
the positions of chief chemist, superintendent of
the blast furnace, assistant superintendent, general
superintendent and metallurgical manager to his
present one of general manager of the reduction
department, including the plants at Anaconda and
Great Falls, Montana. He also occupies an advisory
position with reference to the plans for the work
of the company in South America. The Anaconda
Copper Mining Company has large properties un-
der the name of the Andes Copper Mining Com-
pany, of which Mr. Laist is consulting engineer.
The plant and offices of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company are located three miles east of
Anaconda. Under Mr. Laist's supervivsion are
.i,ooo employes at the two plants of Anaconda and
Great Falls. Mr. Laist is an independent repub-
lican. During the great war he took an active
part in filling the quota for this region in the va-
rious Liberty Loan drives, and was president of
the War Chest fund, raising considerably more
than the allotment for his district. Taking an in-
telligent interest in the work of the Rotary Club,
Mr. Laist served it as president in 1918, and was
president of the Anaconda Club in 1917. He also
belongs to the Anaconda Country Club, the Silver
Bow Club of Butte. Montana, the American Insti-
tute of Mining Engineers, the American Chemical
Society, and the Sigma Psi Greek letter fraternity.
The Laist residence at No. 218 West Seventh
Street, Anaconda, is owned by him.
In April, 1908, Mr. Laist was married to Miss
338
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Rosalba Murphy, at Butte, Montana, a daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. J. W. Murphy. Mrs. Murphy is
deceased, but Mr. Murphy survives and lives at
Portland, Oregon. He is now retired, but at one
time was a pioneer mining man of Butte, Montana.
Mrs. Laist was graduated from the Butte High
School. The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Laist
are as follows: James Wallace, born in August,
igio; Dorothy Ann, who was born in August, igi2;
and Virginia, who was born in September, 1914.
Mr. Laist is a constructive optimist, with a prac-
tical vision and an abiding faith in the possibilities
and prosperity of Anaconda, and any measure look-
ing toward its advancement has in him a sponsor.
His work during the period this country was at
war was of a character tht will not be easily for-
gotten, and he is performing equally important
work in the difficult reconstruction days which are
proving the worth of real patriots, even more than
when actual warfare was in progress.
John H. Duffy, who has the distinction of being
the leading attorney of Anaconda, is a man of
acute mind, carefully developed to its full powers,
his natural acumen sharpened by training and ex-
perience, which attributes have enabled him to
augment his resources in handling the important
litigation entrusted to his care, and to gain ver-
dicts for his clients others less learned and adept
would have failed to obtain. He was born at Sac-
ramento, California, March 4, 1859, a son of James
Duffy. The birth of James DufTy took place at
Strokestown, County Roscommon, Ireland in 1821,
and he died at Sacramento, California, in 1893.
Leaving Ireland when but a lad of sixteen years,
he reached New York City just when enlistments
were being asked for the Mexican war, and he
offered his services to what he intended should be his
adopted country. Although too young for a sol-
dier, he was accepted as a drummer boy, and as
such participated in the ensuing campaign and was
a source of inspiration to his comrades. As a re-
sultant effect of the gold excitement of 1849 James
Duffy went to Sacramento in 1850, and mined on
the American and Feather rivers, and in Nevada
County, California, prospecting for gold and meet-
ing with moderate success. He was a practical
man, and soon saw that there was much money
to be made freighting in a section where there
were no railroads and necessities had to be brought
in from the outside. In this he reaped a harvest
that was deserved, for he was one of the pioneer
freighters and endured many hardships and en-
countered dangers that might have proven fatal
had he not been unsually courageous and resource-
ful.- With the outbreak of the Civil war this intrepid
frontiersman and former drummer boy enlisted
in the Union army in 1861. and served until its
close, and then having helped to secure peace, came
back to Sacramento and was engaged in the con-
struction work of the state capitol building until
it was completed. As an aftermath of his freight-
ing experiences Mr. Duffy then bought a neces-
sary number of horses, wagons and other equip-
ment and established himself in an express busi-
ness that he conducted until his death, having made
himself useful all his life, and proving a valuable
asset to the country to which he had come in his
immature boyhood. He was a democrat. Both
by inheritance and conviction he was a member
of the Roman Catholic Church. His wife bore
the maiden name of Catherine Smith, and she was
born at West Meath. Ireland, in 1823. and died
at Los Angeles, California, in 1916. Of the six
children born to James Duffy and his wife, John
H. Duffy is the only one who outlived childhood.
After attending the public schools of Sacramento,
John H, Duffy took a business and collegiate course
under President E. C. Atkinson at the Sacramento
Business College, from which he was graduated in
June, 1876, and in August of that year began the
study of law in the office of J. N. Young. After
a year he went in the office of J. C. Goods, a lead-
ing attorney of Sacramento, and when Mr. Goods
died seventeen months later Mr. Duffy entered the
office of J. W. Armstrong, who was later superior
judge of Sacramento County, and remained in that
office for two years. For the subsequent year he
was with C. T. Jones, and then returned to the
office of J. N. Young, where he remained until
March 3. 1882. On March 12th of that year he
came to Montana and located at Butte, was ad-
mitted to 'the bar in August, and thereafter was
engaged in a general law practice at Butte until
June, 1895, when he came to Anaconda, and has
been located here ever since. His practice is not
confined to any local area, but extends all over the
state. Mr. Duffy's offices are in Nos. g, 10 and
12 Durston Block, and there he has what is per-
haps the most complete working library in Alon-
tana. Mr. Duffy is a Wilsonian democrat, and has
been very active in his party, serving as county
attorney of Deer Lodge County for two consecu-
tive terms, from 1897 to 1901. He is a member of
the Roman Catholic Church. The Anaconda Club
holds his membership, and he also belongs to Ana-
conda Lodge No. 239. Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, with which order he has been con-
nected for twenty years, and for four years he has
been a trustee of the local lodge. His modern resi-
dence at No. 122 West Fifth Street is one of the
very best ones at Anaconda, and is surrounded by
beautifully kept grounds 90 by 100 feet.
In December, 1887. Mr. Duffy was married at
Deer Lodge. Montana, to Miss Martha Welch, a
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Welch of Athens, Michi-
gan, where he was a farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Duffy
have the following children : Catherine Amelia and
Floy Marie. The elder daughter was married to
W. A. Mclntyre, and they have three children,
namely: Duffy Mclntyre. who was born in 1915;
Floy Martha, who was born in 1916; and Mary Belle,
who was born June 9, 19IQ. Mrs. Mclntyre was
graduated from the Anaconda High School and also
from a Miss Clark's School of Washington, Dis-
trict of Columbia. Tlie Mclntyre family residence
is on the corner of Eighth and Hickory streets.
Anaconda, which Mr. Mclntyre owns, and he and
his brother, Alexander Mclntyre, conduct a men's
furnishing store on East Park Street. The younger
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Duffy is a graduate of
the Anaconda High School, and is now residing
with her parents.
D. A. Galt is secretary and treasurer of the
Beaverhead Motors Company. Incorporated, at Dil-
lon. Mr. Gait, a newcomer in Montana, is an ag-
gressive young business man. and has had a varied
and successful experience as an engineer and in
other lines of industry.
He was born at Sterling. Illinois, May 6, l8ixi.
His ancestors came from England and were early
settlers in Pennsylvania. His father, LeRoy Gait,
was born at Sterling. Illinois, in 1850, and spent
his active business life there as a manufacturer
of farm implements and as a banker. He retired
from business in 1918 and now lives at Winter
Park, Florida. He is a republican, an elder in the
Presbyterian Church, and rendered many valuable
HISTORY OF MONTANA
339
services to his home communily in Illinois. He
married Miss Annie Carter, who was born in
Worcester, Massachusetts, in 185J and died at Ster-
ling, Illinois, in 1896. They had four children, D.
A. Gait being the youngest. The oldest is Thomas
A., in the sales department of the Adams-Westlake
Company, a prominent and nationally known house
manufacturing brass and other castings. Margaret
is the wife of J. E. Gilroy, director of physical
education in the public schools of Gary, Indiana.
Helen is employed in the Daly Bank & Trust Com-
pany of Anaconda, Montana. LeRoy Gait married
for his second wife Mary Harvey, a native of
Sterling, Illinois, and they have one son, Robert,
now a student in the University of Florida.
D. A. Gait graduated from the Sterling High
School in 1909, and finished his sophomore year
in the University of Illinois at Champaign. He
specialized in science and engineering courses. In
191 1 he went to the extreme southern point of the
United States, Brownsville, Te.xas, and was em-
ployed as civil engineer on the canal there and also
did some farming. In 1914 he went to Freeport,
Illinois, and at Bridgeport was engaged in the
vegetable and greenhouse business until May, 1918.
At that date he identified himself with Montana
and was for about nine months city engineer of
Anaconda. He came to Dillon in March, 1919, and
acquired an interest in the Beaverhead Motors
Company, Incorporated. The business was incor-
porated March 10, igiy. Roy Murray, of Butte,
is president, Fred Woodside, of Dillon, is vice
president, and D. A. Gait has the responsibilities
of secretary and treasurer. The company are the
accredited agents over a large section of Montana
who are handling the Ford cars and Ford tractors.
The plant and offices are on Idaho Street.
Mr. Gait is a republican voter and a member of
the Presbyterian Church. In 1913, at Sterling, Illi-
nois, he married Miss Helen Briggs, a daugher of
F. D. and Edith (McDermott) Briggs, residents of
Sterling. Her father is a traveling representa-
tive of the Rock Falls Manufacturing Company.
Mr. and Mrs. Gait have one son, William Briggs,
born January 22, 1917.
Joseph Eaton Monroe. The service by which his
name is most widely known in Montana was Profes-
sor Monroe's connection for over twenty years with
the Montana Normal College at Dillon, where he
was head of the physics and chemistry department,
and later president of the institution. He still takes
a great interest in educational affairs, being presi-
dent for 1919 of the Montana State Teachers Asso-
ciation. However he gave up his work at the Mon-
tana Normal College early in that year and is now
engaged in banking and is also mayor of Dillon.
Mr. Monroe was born at Xenia, Ohio, Novem-
ber 26, 1864. His grandfather was Robert Munro,
as he spelled the name, a land owner at Dornoch,
Scotland, where he spent his life. Robert was a son
of James Munro. Hugh Monroe, father of J. E.
Monroe, was born at Dornoch in 1807, was well
educated, and as a youth spent some time in the
British army. He came to the United States in
1840, and for five years was a contractor on the old
Wabash and Erie Canal, his residence during that
time being at Toledo. He then moved to the south-
western section of Ohio, was married at Xenia, and
spent the greater part of his life as a farmer. He
died at Mound Valley, Kansas, in 1882. He began
voting in this country as a whig and later was
a stanch republican. He was a devout United
Presbyterian. Hugh Monroe married Jemima
Steele, who was born at Urbana, Ohio, in 1823 and
died at Muncie, Indiana, in 1892. There were ten
children : Elizabeth C, of Mound Valley, Kansas,
where her husband, James Beggs, was a pioneer
farmer and stockman and died in April, 1919; Rob-
ert W., who died at Muncie, Indiana, in 1916; Sarah
J., a resident of Muncie, Indiana, widow of John
A. Keener, who was an attorney; Marv E., who
died at Muncie in 1914, wife of Dr. G. R. Green,
a physician and surgeon at Muncie; Agnes, wife
of Robert H. Traver, a retired stockman at
Poughkeepsie, New York ; John Riley, who died
at Mound Valley, Kansas, in 1909, whose business
was as a druggist; Jennie F., who died unmarried at
Muncie in 1906; James A., a contractor and builder
at Tulsa, Oklahoma ; Anna R., twin sister of James,
wife of J. O. Wilson, a banker at Mound Valley,
Kansas.
Joseph Eaton Monroe was the youngest of the
family. He received most of his education in the
public schools of Muncie, Indiana, graduating from
high school there in the class of 1879. He soon
afterward went to Mound Valley, Kansas, and pre-
pared for a career of teaching in the Fort Scott
Normal College at Fort Scott, Kansas. He was
graduated with the class of 1886, and during the
next three years was principal of a normal school
at Great Bend, Kansas. In 1889 he went abroad,
back to the land of his ancestors, and spent sev-
eral years in post-graduate work specializing in
physics and chemistry in the University of Scot-
land at Glasgow. After this intensive training
Professor Monroe returned to Fort Scott, Kansas
and was professor of physics and chemistry in
the Normal College in that city until 1897.
He came to Dillon in 1897 to take the Chair of
Physics and Chemistry in the Montana Normal Col-
lege. In 1906 he was given the additional duties
of vice president, and in 1912 became president,
and for seven years gave his talents and energies
to the administrative duties of his office. He re-
signed March 22, 1919. He is now associated with
the State Bank of Dillon.
Mr. Monroe was elected mayor of Dillon on
April 7, 1919. During his residence at Dillon he
has interested himself in all the larger questions of
local welfare and the first months spent in his
present office have witnessed a very thorough and
business like administration of municipal affairs.
He is a member of the Presbyterian Church and is
a prominent Mason, being past master of Dillon
Lodge No. 23. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
past high priest of Dillon Chapter No. 8, Royal
Arch Masons, past commander of St. Elmo Com-
mandery No. 7, Knights Templar, and in 1914 was
potentate of Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine
at Butte. Mr. Monroe owns a modern home at
506 Atlantic Street and another dwelling house
at 430 Atlantic Street. He married at Wellsville,
Missouri, in 1895, Miss Elizabeth Eidson, daugh-
ter of Matthew B. and Mary J. (Waters) Eid-
son. Her mother is a resident of St. Louis. Her
father, who spent his active life as a contractor
and architect, died at Fort Scott, Kansas, in 1910.
Charles Henry Williams. While Montana in
former years had many immense domains owned by
individuals or syndicates devoted to the grazing of
livestock, the developments of recent years have left
few of these large holdings. One of the big un-
divided ranches at the present time is that owned
by the firm of Williams & Pauly. This firm has an
immense sheep ranch not far from Deer Lodge.
Senator Williams of this firm is a Montana pioneer
and has been in the livestock industry for many years
and he is one of the best known stock men in the
340
HISTORY OF MONTANA
state. His four terms as State Senator have also
made him widely known as a tigure in public life.
Mr. Williams was born in Appanoose County,
Iowa, September 28, 1856. In the paternal line he is
of Welsh ancestry, his forefathers having settled in
Vermont in Colonial times. His grandfather was
born in Bennington County, Vermont, about l8og
and moved West and became a pioneer in the Ohio
Western Reserve, acquiring a farm not far from
the Village of Cleveland and now almost a part of
that city. He lived there until he died in 1890. He
married a Miss Muzzy of Vermont of French an-
cestry. Z. E. Williams, father of Senator Williams,
was born in Bennington County, Vermont, in 1825
and was a child when his parents moved to the vi-
cinity of Cleveland, Ohio, where he grew up on his
father's farm. That farm is still intact, being owned
by Senator Williams and other heirs and is a highly
valuable property. Z. E. Williams was married at
Cleveland and for many years was a railroad con-
tractor. In 1848 he moved to Sheboygan County,
Wisconsin, was a pioneer farmer in that locality,
and in 1853 went to Appanoose County, Iowa, where
he cleared up and developed one of the best farms in
that then wilderness section remote from any rail-
road. He was a hard working Iowa farmer for
many years, but in 1908 retired and moved to Deer
Lodge, Montana, where he died in 1913. Politically
he was a democrat. Z. E. Williams married Asen-
eth E. Jackson who was born at Troy, New York,
in 1828 and died at Deer Lodge, Montana, in 1903.
Her father, William Jackson, was a Michigan farmer
and was a cousin of President Andrew Jackson.
The children of Z. E. Williams and wife were:
Delilah, who died in Appanoose County, Iowa, in
1878, unmarried ; Charles Henry ; Adda M., who died
at Anaconda, Montana, at the age of thirty years,
wife of Arthur Truscott who is now a mine operator
near Princeton, Montana; W. J. Williams associated
with his brother Charles on the ranch ; Emma who
died unmarried in 1878.
Charles Henry Williams attended rural schools
in his native Iowa county, and spent two years in the
State Normal School at Kirksville, Missouri. For
a period of si.x years he farmed in the summer
in Appanoose County and taught school in the winter.
In 18S2 Mr. Williams hitched up a pair of mules
and with a wagon drove the entire distance from
Eastern Iowa to Montana. He was seventy-nine days
making the journey. One of his first acts after
coming to the territory was homesteading 160 acres
six miles north of Deer Lodge. That homestead is
included in his present magnificent ranch, and has
been a part of his holdings for over thirty-five years.
At the present time Senator Williams and his partner
Peter Pauly own 30,000 acres of patented land and
they lease 10,000 acres more. They handle about
20,000 sheep annually and the pride of their ranch
is a herd of 300 pure bred Shorthorn cattle. The
ranch leaves nothing to be desired in the way of
modern facilities and improvements. One of the
features is the beautiful country home of Senator
Williams, a house of fourteen rooms lighted by elec-
tricity with hot and cold running water, and all the
:onveniences of a modern home. On his farm he
also has one of the largest and best equipped barns
in the state, with many other buildings for the
housing of stock and feed. Convenient to the ranch
is a Milwaukee railway station, affording excellent
shipping facilities. Senator Williams is also presi-
dent of the Cochrell Implement Company.
He has long been a prominent figure in republi-
can politics. He was elected a member of the State
Senate for the thirteenth session, and has been re-
jected and has served in the fourteenth, fifteenth and
sixteenth sessions. For several terms he has been a
member of the judiciary committee and in the six-
teenth session was on that committee and has been
a hard working member of other committees and
also on the floor of the Senate. In the sixteenth
session Mr. Williams was chairman of the joint
committee for investigating the State Department.
Out of the work of this committee came the creation
of the present efficiency commission for reorganizing
the various state departments and getting the busi-
ness of the state administration reduced to a basis
of efficiency, so that the citizens may know the work
and expenditures to be credited to each department.
Senator Williams is an active member of the Cham-
ber of Commerce at Deer Lodge.
In 1880 in Appanoose County, Iowa, he married
Miss Allie Davis, daughter of Thomas C. and Eme-
line Davis, the latter now deceased. Her father is
a retired farmer at Alpha, Kentucky. Senator and
Mrs. Williams had a family of five children: Lee the
oldest is a graduate in electrical and civil engineer-
ing at Cornell University, New York, is practicing
his profession and is also interested in the Cochrell
Implement Company at Deer Lodge. Bessie is a
graduate of the Montana State Agricultural College
at Bozeman, attended the Lake Forest Seminary in
Illinois, and is the wife of Frank Tavenner, formerly
of Lewiston, Montana, now a resident of Ellens-
burg, Washington, and an electrical engineer em-
ployed in the construction department of the Mil-
waukee Railway and also having been identified with
the work of electrification of various sections of that
road. The third child. Earl, died at the age of thir-
teen. Ray, who attended the State Agricultural Col-
lege at Bozeman and for two years the Polytechnic
Institute of California is on his father's ranch. Wal-
ter is a student in the public schools of Deer Lodge.
Peter Pauly. From sheep herder to membership
in a firm that controls one of the largest holdings
and runs some of the largest flocks in Southwestern
Montana, Mr. Pauly has had an enviable business
record as a Montana resident for more than thirty
years.
Mr. Pauly is of French nativity and ancestry and
was born at Sarrance, France, December 25, 1871.
His father Bernard was born in 1835 and died in
1909, and spent all his life at Sarrance, where he was
a farmer and cattle raiser. He was active in public
affairs, serving as mayor of his home town, was a
French soldier and a member of the Catholic
Church. He married Charlotte Pefaur who was
born in 1844 at Oloron and still lives on the home
farm. Their children were Mary, wife of Pierre
Guicharneau, a farmer and livestock dealer at
Asasp ; John L., who lives on the paternal farm
at Sarrance ; Annie, wife of John P. Lacu, a farmer
at Lucg de Beam ; Vincent, a farmer at Harlem,
Montana ; Catherine, who died in France unmarried
at the age of forty-eight; Peter; Louise, wife of
Francis Agoure, a professor at Pau ; Joseph, whose
home is in California ; and Josephine, who is mar-
ried to a farmer and lives in France.
Peter Pauly was educated in the schools of his
home locality, and in the fall of 1889 came to the
United States and settled in the Milk River Valley
near Chinook, Montana. For three years and nine
months he herded sheep. But in 1893 he started
in the sheep business for himself with a little band
of 1,000 head. He moved into the Deer Lodge
Valley and eventually associated himself with Sen.
C. H. Williams. With increasing experience Mr.
Pauly became a recognized expert in the sheep
breeding industry. His favorite sheep was the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
341
American Rambouillet and, firmly believing that
this breed was the best, he set about building up his
flock. Almost twenty years ago, after looking over
many of the leading flocks of Michigan and Ohio,
he brought home, as a foundation flock, a carload
of registered Rambouillet breeding ewes selected
from the herds of eight of the leading flockmasters
of the East. With other importations and with
careful breeding this modest enterprise has grown
to a large and well known business. The firm of
Williams and Pauly now owns one of the choicest
Rambouillet flocks in the state, and their ranch is
particularly well adapted for sheep raising. Their
headquarters are located about six miles west of
Deer Lodge.
Mr. Pauly is also president of the McPherson
Mercantile Company at Deer Lodge, and owns con-
siderable real estate in that city including his
modern home at 6i6 Fourth Street. He is a fourth
degree Knight of Columbus, having affiliation with
Deer Lodge Council No. 1810, and is also a mem-
ber of Anaconda Lodge No. 239 of the Elks. He
is a Catholic and in politics an independent voter.
On February 10, 1900, in California, Mr. Pauly mar-
ried Miss Mary Jane Pucheu. Her parents are both
deceased, her father Francis Pucheu having been a
farmer at Asasp, France, where Mrs. Pauly was
born. Mr. and Mrs. Pauly have four children :
Sylvan J., who was born July 9, 1901, and is a
graduate of the Mount St. Charles High School
at Helena; Elize M., born March 31, 1904; Elsie
C, born August 18, 1907 ; and Harry C, born March
I, 1910.
Elmer Bosshard. One of the men' of signal
enterprise and great promise in his community is
Elmer Bosshard, whose business until recently was
chiefly dealing in and shipping livestock. He is
now engaged in banking in Nashua.
Mr. Bosshard, who has resided in Montana for
fifteen years, was born in LaCrosse County, Wiscon-
sin, July 20, 1885, son of Adolph and grandson of
John Bosshard. John Bosshard was a native of
Switzerland, immigrated to the United States in
1851, the same year he entered a- homestead in
Southwestern Wisconsin, and spent the rest of his
life in LaCrosse County. He is buried at Bangor.
He was twice married. By his first wife there are
two surviving children, Adolph and Elizabeth. By
the second marriage the only survivor is Otto Boss-
hard, a prominent lawyer at LaCrosse.
Adolph Bosshard was born in LaCrosse County in
1853 and has spent his life as a farmer and stock
grower in that locality. He is now living retired
at Bangor. He has been a director of the Farmers
State Bank of Bangor, is a democrat in politics and
holds membership in several fraternal insurance or-
ders. He married Tolena Fremstad, a native of
Monroe County, Wisconsin, and of Norwegian par-
entage. Her mother lived to the advanced age of
ninety-one, passing away in December, 1919. Mrs.
Adolph Bosshard died in 1895, the mother of the
following children: Amelia, wife of Wilfred Le-
mieux, of Fairview, Montana ; Walter, of Van Hook,
North Dakota ; and Elmer. Adolph Bosshard's sec-
ond wife was Annie Schroeder, a native of Germany
and of Low German stock. They have three chil-
dren : Lucy, John and Helen.
Elmer Bosshard grew up in a country district of
Southwestern Wisconsin, graduated from the Bangor
High School in 1904, and completed his education
and prepared for the serious business of life by one
vear spent in the University of Wisconsin. In Sep-
tember, 1905, he arrived at Mondak, and for a time
was associated with a brother-in-law in a general
store. In the spring of 1906 they moved to Fair-
view and continued their business for six months
longer. Elmer Bosshard selling out his interests in
the fall, spent the winter in the West, exploring
Washington and Idaho, and in the spring of 1907
returned to Montana and acquired an outfit to en-
gage in freighting up the Yellowstone Valley to
Sidney. He combined freighting with practical
farming until 1914. During 1915 and 1916 he was
handling horses as a buyer and shipper to the Miles
City market. Mr. Bosshard has never exercised
his right of a homestead, though his wife employed
that privilege, entered a claim and proved it up.
Her homestead is about six miles below Fairview.
Besides farming Mr. Bosshard has become a dealer
and speculator in lands and has helped develop some
valuable tracts and prepare the soil for the produc-
tion of crops. At Fairview he built a home and
developed a small tract across State Street, within
the limits of North Dakota.
In 1917 Mr. Bosshard and A. M. Gardner formed
a partnership for the buying and shipping of live-
stock from Fairview. In 1918 he acquired his part-
ner's interest and continued the business on his own
responsibility. His enterprise furnished a convenient
market for a large amount of cattle and hogs which
have been moved out of the region toward Eastern
markets in recent years. On June 3, 1920, Mr.
Bosshard purchased a large block of the stock of
the First National Bank of Nashua, was elected its
cashier and transferred his residence to this point.
Mr. Bosshard has done well in his business career,
and still has a prospect of many useful years before
him. He cast his first presidential ballot for Mr.
Taft in 1908 and in 1916, like thousands of other
republicans, supported Mr. Wilson.
At Williston, North Dakota, February 17, 1910,
he married Miss Sweetie Dakota Moore. She was
born at Hillsboro, North Dakota, October 6, 1887, a
daughter of John and Lucy (Honstain) Moore.
Her father was a native of Wisconsin, while the
Honstains were a Pennsylvania family. The Moores
are farmers and were early identified with the Yel-
lowstone Valley near Fairview. The children in
the Moore family are : Arthur, of Fairview ; Pearl,
of Baker, Montana; Edward, of Fairview; Mrs.
Bosshard; and Lilburn, of Enid, Montana. Two
children have been born to the marriage of Mr. and
Mrs. Bosshard, Adolph and Hazel.
James F. Blair. Among the alert, progressive
and thoroughly substantial business men who have
come to the forefront during recent years by reason
of their connection with the automobile industry,
one who has been recruited from the ranks of Mon-
tana ranchmen is James F. Blair, proprietor of the
leading general garage of Southwestern Montana,
situated at Dillon. As a ranchman Mr. Blair had
established a reputation for ability and industry that
gained him high standing in the Horse Prairie coun-
try of Beaverhead County, and since locating at
Dillon he has added to this reputation and substan-
tiated it by the manner in which he has entered
his new field of activity.
James F. Blair is a native Montanan, born at
Bannack, September 12, 1878, a son of William G.
and Emma (Frester) Blair. His father, born in
1844, in Tennessee, was reared in Kentucky, and
when but little more than a lad enlisted for service
during the war between the states, in which he
served four years, and during which he reeeived
a gunshot wound in the knee that lamed him for
life. In 1867 he became a pioneer into Beaverhead
Count\% Montana, where he first worked on a ranch
at Red Rock, and following his marriage in that
county resided at Bannack, where, during the early
342
HISTORY OF MONTANA
days he drove stage from Bannack to Virginia City
and carried the mail for several years. Subsequent-
ly he took up ranching and became one of the
successful ranchers and cattlemen of his locality,
and was so occupied until his retirement in 1913 to
California, where he now makes his home at Los
Angeles. Mr. Blair is a democrat in politics. He
married Emma Frester, who was born in 1851, at
Battle Creek, Michigan, and they became the par-
ents of three children: Nellie, the wife of J. H.
Shesher, a rancher of Horse Prairie, Beaverhead
County; Frank P., a rancher of Grant, this state;
and James F.
After attending the public schools of the rural
community of Beaverhead County, James F. Blair
took a course in the Ogden (Utah) Business Col-
lege, from which he was graduated in 1898, and at
that time began ranching on Horse Prairie, where
he became the owner of great herds of cattle and
3,000 acres of land. Disposing of his ranches and
stock in May, 1917, he came to Dillon, and in the
summer of 1918 built the leading general garage
of Southwestern Montana, situated on the corner of
South Idaho and Sebree streets, with a floor space
of 75x115 feet. A general garage business is done,
and Mr. Blair and his partner, W. E. Lloyd, handle
Stearns-Knight and Velie cars, and all kinds of au-
tomobile accessories. In addition a machine shop
is maintained which is one of the best equipped in
Montana, fully capable of making repairs on all
kinds of cars. In addition to the garage Mr. Blair
is the owner of a modern residence at No. 703
South Pacific Street, and has various business in-
terests, including stock in the Farm Loans Corpora-
tion of Helena, and mining interests in Alaska.
His business standing is of the best, and his associ-
ates know him as a man of practical ideas, excel-
lent judgment and unswerving integrity, in whom
they may place the utmost confidence. He is a dem-
ocrat in politics, but not a politician, and his fra-
ternal connection is with the Bannack Lodge No. 16,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
In March, 1904, at Dillon, Mr. Blair was united
in marriage with Miss Edith G. Parkinson, daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. Tim Parkinson, the former a
Utah farmer, now deceased, and the latter a resi-
dent of Wellsville, that state. Mr. and Mrs. Blair
are the parents of four children : June, born June
26, 1905; Nellie, born September 12, 1906; Gymie,
born March 23, 1909; and Tim, born January 22,
1911.
Walter E. Lloyd. The activities of Walter E.
Lloyd during a somewhat diversified career have
included participation in freighting, cow-punching
and ranching, and, at present, in conducting at Dil-
lon what is generally accounted the leading and
best-equipped garage in Southwestern Montana.
From the time he was twelve years of age Mr.
Lloyd has been self-supporting, and his rise to a
position of business eminence at Dillon has come
through his tireless industry and the able and in-
telligent manner in which he has made use of his
talents and opportunities.
Mr. Lloyd was born in Deer Lodge County, Mon-
tana, July 3, 1872, a son of Charles W. and Evaline
Lloyd, the latter a native of Iowa. His father was
born in 1834, in the State of New York, and was a
lad when he came west, accompanying an ox-train
across the plains to the gold fields of California.
In 1867 he became a pioneer of Deer Lodge County,
Montana, where he engaged in mining, and died at
Granite Mountain, in what is now Granite Goiinty,
in 1883. He was a republican in politics. Mrs.
Lloyd died in the same community in 1880, They
were the parents of two children: Walter E. ; and
Charles, who is engaged in mining in Beaverhead
County, Montana.
Walter E. Lloyd attended the rural schools of
Deer Lodge County, but the early death of his
father made it necessary that he become self-sup-
porting when he was but twelve years of age, at
which time he secured work on a ranch. During
the pioneer days he followed whatever occupation
presented itself, and until he was twenty-three
years of age his work was largely that of a cow-
boy. Later he freighted from Red Rock to Ban-
nack, and eventually engaged in ranching near the
latter place, twenty-five miles from Dillon. His
operations there were decidedly successful, being
prosecuted with vigor and good judgment, and he
becSme the owner of 5,000 acres of land and a large
cattle raiser. In 1916 he disposed of his ranch
and stock and moved to Dillon, where he assisted
liis partner, James F. Blair, to establish their pres-
ent garage, situated at the corner of Idaho and Se-
bree streets, which is the leading and best-equipped
general garage in Southwestern Montana. The
firm of Lloyd & Blair handles Stearns-Knight and
Velie cars and all kinds of accessories, and also con-
ducts a machine shop, fully equipped for the repair
of all kinds of automobiles, and the business enjoys
an excellent patronage. Mr. Lloyd is a business-
man of marked capacity and high principles and
commands the respect of business men and the gen-
eral public. He, is an independent voter who pre-
fers to use his own judgment in his choice of can-
didates, and as a fraternalist belongs to Jackson
(Montana.) Tribe, Improved Order Red Men.
In 1898 Mr. Lloyd was married at Bannack.
Montana, to Miss Elizabeth Parkinson, a native of
Utah.
CHARLrs Clifford Thornton is member of a
prominent Minnesota family of bankers and busi-
ness men and a few years ago came to Dillon, Mon-
tana, and established the Securities State Bank,
now one of the solid and prosperous financial insti-
tutions of Southwestern Montana.
Dr. Thornton, whose active experience has given
him a wide knowledge of the northwestern country,
was born at Benson, Minnesota, January 23, 1884.
His father was the late Frank M. Thornton, who
was born in Belfast, Ireland, in 1840. He was five
years of age when his mother brought him to New
York City and later she took up a homestead on
Lake Harriet, in what is now the City of Minne-
apolis. Frank M. Thornton therefore grew up on
the Minnesota frontier, and lived on his mother's
homestead until the outbreak of the Civil war. In
1861 he became captain of a regiment of infantry
of Ohio troops, and was all through the war, a gal-
lant and hard fighting soldier. He came out with
the rank of major. About 1869 he cast in his lot
with the new community of Benson, Minnesota.
For half a century that town has had the greater
part of its civic and business enterprise centered in
the Thornton family. Frank M. Thornton was
interested in the hardware, elevator and grain busi-
ness, established the old Bank of Benson, serving
as its cashier and later as its president, holding that
office at the time of his death in 1905. He lent his
influence and means in every way to the substantial
upbuilding of Benson, showing himself a man of
progress when the community needed a forward
push and also conservative as a safeguard to undue
speculation and over-hasty development. He was a
good business man and on many occasions proved
his sincere philanthropy. He was a republican in
politics and he and his family were the chief influ-
>
#s
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ences in upbuilding and maintaining an Episcopal
church in Benson. He was also an active member
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and a
regular attendant at lodge meetings and filled all
the chairs in the order. He built a fine home at
Benson, owned much other town property and also
several ranches in Swift County and had a beau-
tiful summer home at Glenwood, owning 200 acres
extending about a mile along the front of Minne-
waska Lake. This beautiful and attractive property
is still owned by his estate. Frank M. Thornton
married Elizabeth Clague, who was born on the
Isle of Man in 1845 and died at Benson, Minnesota,
in 1913. The Dillon banker was the sixth of a
family of eight children. Frank C. Thornton, the
oldest, is president of the First National Bank of
Benson. Frances Eleanor is the wife of Frank
Stone, president of the Swift County Bank of Ben-
son. Eric L. is vice president of the Metropolitan
Bank of St. Paul, is a lawyer by profession, and
was formerly secretary to Governor Burnquist of
Minnesota. Elizabeth is the wife of George Champ-
lin, an attornej' living at Lake Crystal, Minnesota.
Edwin B. is an electrical engineer practicing his
profession at Toledo, Ohio. Mabel married C. G.
Ferguson, advertising manager for the Baker Im-
porting Company and a resident of Minneapolis.
Harry, the youngest of the family, is employed in
the First National Bank at Benson.
Charles Cliflford Thornton was graduated from
the Benson High School in 1903. The e-xperience
of the past sixteen years has brought him in touch
with many prominent business interests. He first
learned the banking business as an employe of the
First National Bank of Benson, and on his own
merit was promoted to the duties of assistant cash-
ier. In 1908 he left Minnesota and for several
years was a resident of Vancouver, British Colum-
bia, where he was associated with S. W. Thacker
in the investment and real estate business. In 1915
he returned to his home town and for six months
had some active participation in the First National
Bank. He is still a director of that institution and
one of its principal stockholders. Mr. Thornton
came to Dillon. Montana, in the fall of 1916 and
organized the Security State Bank, of which he
has since been president. This bank has a capital
of $50,000, surplus and profits of $.5,000, average
deposits of $200,000. The bank is housed in the
Hotel Andrus Building. The vice president is Nels
Nelson, a well known retired stockman and capi-
talist of Dillon, and the cashier is Marshall Field.
Mr. Thornton is also interested in the organiza-
tion of a national bank at Lima, which will be known
as the Security National Bank of Lima. The char-
ter was received October 29, 1919, and the capital
stock is $25,000. This is the sixth banking
institution in the county. C. C. Thornton, presi-
dent of the Security State Bank at this place, is
president; Frank Merril of Lima is the vice pres-
ident and the board of directors will be composed
of those two gentlemen with A. F. Waldorf of
Dillon, and Emery Keller and C. S. Truax of Lima.
The other stockholders are Nels Nelson, Marshall
Field, John Peterson, J. T. McKnight, J. T. Thiel,
L. E. Brainard, Leo Truax, Miss Maggie Halligan,
Mrs. C. B. Van Housen, Smith McKnight, William
Gleed,< Ed Gleed, M. P. Christensen, Sherman
Vance, E. W. Geary, Victor Mathews, Dr. L. C.
Ford, John A. West. Will Wall and Ed Kenison.
The bank will be located next to the Merril
store and a fine new brick and stone building will
be erected in the near future for the housing of
the new institution. It will be well equipped and
handsomely furnished.
Mr. Thornton owns considerable real estate in
Benson, Minnesota, and Vancouver, B. C, and is
interested in a ranch in Beaverhead County, Mon-
tana. He is a member of the Montana and Amer-
ican Bankers Associatisn, is a republican voter,
affiliated with the Episcopal Church, and is a mem-
ber of Vancouver Lodge of Masons and Benson
Lodge Knights of Pythias.
In 1912, at Morris, Minnesota, he married Miss
.\dele Bailey, daughter of W. J. and Sarah (Wolf)
Bailey. Her father is a contractor and builder,
and her parents still live at Morris, Minnesota,
Mrs. Thornton is a graduate in domestic science
from the Thomas Training School at Detroit, Mich-
igan, and for a year before her marriage lived at
Herman, Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Thornton have
one son, Howard, born March 30, 1913.
Frank Conley. During the closing years of the
territorial period and for thirty years of Montana's
statehood. Frank Conley has been the warden of the
penitentiary at Deer Lodge. It is doubtful if any
official in similar institutions in the country have
served a longer period than Frank Conley. On any
subject connected with prison management he speaks
with the voice of authority born of an unusually
long and interesting experience.
Mr. Conley is not only a veteran state official, but
has long been helpfully identified with the Town of
Deer Lodge, has served as its mayor over a score
of years, and has never neglected an opportunity to
upbuild and increase the prestige of his home city.
Mr. Conley was born at Havre de Grace. Maryland,
February 28. 1864. His father. James P. Conley.
was born in Ireland in 1821. As a young man he was
guilty of infringing some of the poaching laws of
Ireland and left that country for that reason and
came to America. He married at Baltimore and
followed the business of drover for a number of
years with home at Havre de Grace. He died in
March, 1865. His wife was Mary McCan, who was
born in Ireland in 1823 and died at Carroll, Iowa,
in 1880. Frank Conley was the youngest of their
seven children. Jack the oldest has been a success-
ful business man and is now living on the income
of his property at Seattle, Washington. James is
a worker in the shipyards at Seattle. Mary lives at
Carroll, Iowa, widow of Ed Daly, who was a black-
smith there. Kate has her home at Danbury. Iowa,
widow of John Gleason, a farmer. Eliza is the wife
of George Kennebeck, a lumber dealer at Carroll.
Iowa. Martin died at the age of fifteen.
Frank Conley was only an infant when his father
died. He attended his first school at Bryn Mawr.
Pennsylvania, and afterwards went with his mother
to Carroll, Iowa. All his education was acquired be-
fore he was fourteen years of age. As a means of
helping support his mother he worked in a grocery
store five years, giving his wages to the family.
Mr. Conley came to Montana in 1880 and from
Miles City went with a surveying party to the Yel-
lowstone National Park, spending eighteen months
in that work. For four years he was deputy sheriff
of Custer County with home at Miles City. Mr.
Conley came to Deer Lodge in 1886, and was first
employed as a guard in the territorial penitentiary.
The penitentiary was then a Federal institution, and
in 1889 it became an institution of the state govern-
ment. At that time Mr. Conley and Tom McTague
made a contract with the state to manage the prison
and act as wardens. The contract system continued
until 1908. at which time a change in the system of
management was effected, with direct responsibili-
ty to the state administration. Governor Norris
continued Mr. Conley in the management in the ca-
3U
HISTORY OF MONTANA
pacity of warden and he has been reappointed to
those duties by every successive governor.
Mr. Conley has served as mayor of Deer Lodge
twentv-four years. In that time the city has grown
from 800 to 5,000 population, and Mr. Conley has
exerted his influence in behalf of every advancement
and improvement made in a quarter of a century.
Recently he has been busy arranging a vote on a
$100,000 bond issue for a new courthouse and a
$30,000 bond issue for a new city hall. Mr. Conley
is also chairman of the State Highway Commission,
having been elected chairman by his fellow commis-
sioners in May, 1919.
In politics he is a republican. He is affiliated with
Deer Lodge Lodge No. 14, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, with Valley Chapter No. 4, Royal
Arch Masons, Montana Commandery of the Knights
Templar, and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine
at Helena. He is president of the Deer Lodge Ho-
tel Corporation and is owner of a fine modern resi-
dence on Main Street. In 1902 at Missoula he mar-
ried Miss Hilda Higgins. Her father was Captain
Higgins, founder of Missoula. They have two chil-
dren: Hilda, born March 12, 1904; and Helen, born
April 19, 1907-
Clarexce W. Hudson, a banker of long and suc-
cessful experience, was the prime leader in establish-
ing the Beaverhead State Bank at Dillon. This bank
opened for business in May, 1917. has had a rapid
growth and development and is now one of the
strong financial institutions of Southwestern Mon-
tana. It has a capital stock of $50,000, surplus of
$10,000, and its deposits in the summer of 1919
aggregated $200,000. It has been under the able
management of Mr. Hudson since the start. G. T.
Paul is president, and there are three vice presidents,
Frank Landon, T. J. Mullany and Clarence W. Hud-
son. Mr. Hudson is also cashier and active manager.
Mr. Hudson was born at Nashville, Tennessee,
March 2, 1878, and his father, John M. Hudson,
was born at Gallatin, Tennessee, in 1838. John M.
Hudson spent his life in Gallatin and Nashville, was
married in the latter city, and for many years was
foreman in the press room of the Methodist Pub-
lishing House at Nashville. He was a sincere
Methodist himself, was a democrat in politics and
was a Royal Arch and Knight Templar Mason. ' He
died at Nashville in 1903. His wife was Nannie
Woodford, who was born at Hartford, Connecticut,
in 1850 and is now living at Omaha, Nebraska.
Clarence W. Hudson was the younger of two sons.
His brother Arthur was in the transportation busi-
ness in South .-America and died at Babahoya, Ecua-
dor, in 1901.
Clarence W. Hudson received his early education
in the public schools of Nashville and completed his
sophomore year in the Woolwine College of TuUa-
homa, Tennessee, in 1896. For one year he was a
bookkeeper in the employ of the Methodist Pub-
lishing House. He made his first acquaintance with
the northwestern country in 1897, when he was sent
to Dietz, Wyoming, as manager of the commissary
maintained by his uncle. C. N. Dietz, of Omaha.
He looked after the interests of his uncle in Wyo-
ming for five years. In 1902 he engaged in the
wholesale and retail mercantile business at Sheri-
dan, Wyoming, but four years later sold out and
returned to Kentucky. For three years he was
cashier of the Eagle Bank at Owensboro. He was
then instrumental in organizing the United States
National Bank at Owensboro. This was the result
of a consolidation of the three Owensboro banks,
with combined capitalization of $125,000. and the
new bank doubled that capitalization. It is now
the largest bank in Owensboro, operating on a cap-
ital of $250,000. Mr. Hudson remained at Owens-
boro as cashier of this bank for five years.
He returned to the Northwest in 1914 and for two
years was cashier of the Stockmen's National Bank
at Fort Benton. He left Fort Benton to interest
local capital at Dillon in the organization of the
Beaverhead State Bank.
Mr. Hudson is a republican in politics, is a dea-
con in the Baptist Church at Dillon, is affiliated
with Dillon Lodge No. 23, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Dillon Chapter No. 8, Royal
Arch Masons, St. Elmo Commandery No. 7, Knights
Templar, and is a member of Rizpah Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Madisonville, Kentucky.
He and his family reside at 717 South Pacific
Street in Dillon. He married at Owensboro, Ken-
tucky, July 2, 1901, Bessie Nave, a daughter of
John H. and America (Norris) Nave. Her mother
is deceased. Her father was for many years a
tobacconist at Owensboro and is now living retired
with his daughter, Mrs. Hudson. Mrs. Hudson is
a graduate of the high school of Louisville, Ken-
tucky, and also of the Miss Annie Nold College of
that city. Mr. and Mrs. Hudson have one child,
Delia, born July 27, 1906.
Herbert Floyd Best. One of the ablest dental
surgeons in Southwestern Montana is Dr. H. F.
Best, who for the past thirteen years has been en-
gaged in a busy practice at Dillon. Doctor Best is
member of an old and prominent family of Dillon,
being a son of O. M. Best. His father's career as
a merchant and business man and as head of the
Western Wholesale Grocery Company is told in a
separate article.
Dr. Herbert Floyd Best was born while his parents
lived at Climax, Michigan^ February 21, 1883. He
was about two years old when the family came to
Montana and located at Dillon, where he grew up
and received his education in the public schools.
He attended the Beaverhead County High School at
Dillon, spent two years in the Montana Normal
College, and took his professional degree in the
Northwestern University of Chicago, where he
graduated in 1906. While in university he was a
member of the Psi Sigma Phi Dental Greek Letter
fraternity. In 1917 Dr. Best took post-graduate
work in dentistry at the University of Pennsylva-
nia, and received a certificate in Dental Surgery.
He began practice at Butte in 1906, but in 1908
returned to his home town of Dillon and has all
the modern equipment of a dental surgeon in his
offices at 2 East Bannack Street.
Doctor Best is a stockholder in the Security State
Bank of Dillon. He owns a modern home at 526
South Washington Street. Politically he is a repub-
lican, is a member of the Montana State Dental
Society, is a Methodist and is affiliated with Dillon
Lodge No. 23, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Dillon Chapter No. 28, Royal Arch Masons, St. Elmo
Commandery No. 7, Knights Templar, Bagdad Tem-
ple of the Mystic Shrine at Butte, and Dillon Camp,
Modern Woodmen of America.
At Dysart, Iowa, in 1910, Dr. Best married Miss
Margaret Pearson, a daughter of E. and Helen
(Fuller) Pearson. Her mother lives at Long Beach,
California. Her father, who died at Dysart, Iowa,
in 1910, was a successful farmer and also owned a
canning factory. Dr. and Mrs. Best have one
daughter, Helen Ida, born November 3, 1914, and
one son, Winfield Judson, born November 6, 1919.
EsEK R.\Y MosHER. acting president of Montana
Normal College at Dillon, has held the chair of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
345
Mathematics in that institution for the past twelve
years. Mr. Mosher is a man of thorough scholar-
ship, comes of a family of scholars, and has been
engaged in educational work since the age of
twenty-one, when he graduated from the University
of Minnesota.
Mr. Mosher was born at Dexter, Michigan, April
15, 1882. Some of his paternal ancestors came to
America and settled in Massachusetts as early as
1621. His father was Roswell Curtis Mosher, who
was born in New York State October 6, 1854. He
spent his early life in Michigan, was married at
Kalamazoo in that state, and lived for two years
at De-xter. He spent his active life as a clerg\-man
of the Baptist Church. He was a graduate of Kala-
mazoo College, a Baptist institution, with the A. B.
degree, later attended the old Chicago University,
where he received his Master of Arts degree, and
took his theological course in Morgan Park The-
ological Seminary at Chicago. On leaving Mich-
igan he moved to Southern Minnesota and was pas-
tor of churches at Herman, Owatonna, Albert Lea
in that state, and at Hudson, Wisconsin. On ac-
count of failing health he moved to Missoula, Mon-
tana, in 1906, and died there shortly afterward, on
the 6th of May of that year. He was a republican
in politics. Rev. Mr. Mosher married Margaret
Emily Kane, who was born in Pennsylvania Febru-
ary 14, 1857. She is now living at Greeley, Colo-
rado. Esek Ray was the second of four children.
Curtis Lee, the oldest, is assistant Federal Reserve
Agent in the Federal Reserve Bank at Minneapolis.
Robert Marcius is in the automobile business at
Casper, Wyoming. Maurice Emeny during the war
and afterward served as chief electrician on the
United States steamship New York.
Mr. E. R. Mosher acquired his public school edu-
cation at Owatonna, Minnesota. He graduated from
Pillsbury Academy in 1898, and afterward took
the regular academic course at the University of
Minnesota, receiving his A. B. degree in 1903. Dur-
ing 1903-06 he was commandant and professor of
Mathematics at the State Normal and Industrial
School in Ellendale, North Dakota. The year
1906-07 he spent at Cleveland, where he was Super-
visor of Instruction in the Evening School System
of that city and was also carrying studies in the
Western Reserve University, from which he has
his Master of Arts degree granted him in 1907.
In 1907 Mr. Mosher came to Dillon as Professor
of Mathematics in the Montana State Normal Col-
lege. From 1912 to 1919 he had the additional
administrative responsibilities of vice president of
the college, and in the spring of 1919, upon the
resignation of Mr. Monroe, was appointed acting
president of the college.
He has identified himself with the community of
Dillon as a home owner, his residence being at 935
South Pacific Street. Mr. Mosher is a member of
the National Education Association and the Amer-
ican Mathematical Society, is a republican voter
and is affiliated with the Episcopal Church.
August 23, 1911. at Lewistown, Montana, he mar-
ried Eleanor Marie Schmidt, daughter of Emi! and
Anna (Klein) Schmidt. Her parents are residents
of Winnett, Montana, where her father was one
of the early ranchers. Mrs. Mosher is a graduate
of the Helena High School and of the Montana
State Normal College at Dillon. She is president
of District No. 2 of the Montana Federation of
Women's Clubs. They have two children : Paul
Ray, born November 17, 1916, and Marion Eleanor,
born August 21, 1918.
JuDSON P. Best is one of the leading young busi-
ness men of Dillon, and is founder of the Best
Candy Company, Incorporated, manufacturers of
standard product sold and distributed throughout
Montana, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming and
Idaho.
Mr. Best is a son of O. M. Best, the veteran
business man and merchant of Dillon, president of
the Western Wholesale Grocery Company. The
story of his father's career in Montana is told on
other pages. Judson P. Best was born at Dillon
August 26, 1891. He graduated from the Beaver-
head County High School in 1910, and entered the
University of Michigan to complete his education.
He finished his junior year there in 1913. and then
returned west. For eight months he was in the
real estate business at Port .'\ngeles, Washington,
and from there returned to Dillon and entered the
Western Wholesale Grocery Company under his
father. He had an increasing part in that business
until April, 1919, and is secretary and treasurer of
the company. In January, 1919, he established the
Best Candy Company and was the sole proprietor
of the business until January i, 1920, when the busi-
ness was incorporated with Mr. Best as president,
Roy S. Stephenson as vice president, and Roy M.
Carruthers, secretary-treasurer. . In less than a year
this local industry has developed facilities and re-
sources and a trade demand for all the goods it
can supply over Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Utah,
Washington and Wyoming. The plant located at
120 North Montana Street employs forty hands.
Mr. Best is a republican in politics. He is affili-
ated with Dillon Lodge ' No. 23, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, Dillon Chapter No. 8, Royal Arch
Masons, and Dillon Lodge No. 3, Independent Order
of Odd Fellows. He and his family live in a mod-
ern home at 619 South Washington Street. On
March 17, 1915, at Boulder, Colorado, Mr. Best
married Miss Cecilia Hill, a daughter of W. W. and
Christie Hill. Her parents reside at Kenosha, Wis-
consin. Her father is interested in the Hill Steam-
boat Company, and owns the Hillsdale Stock Farm,
widely known for its pure bred cattle. Mrs. Best
finished her education in the Stout Institute at
Menominee, Wisconsin. To their marriage were
borii two children, Judson P., Jr., on August 7,
1916, and O. M., Jr., born August 18, 1919.
Mrs. Mabel (Lindstadt) Campbell. The life his-
tory of the estimable and popular superintendent of
schools of Missoula County, Montana, Mrs. Mabel
(Lindstadt) Campbell, most happily illustrates what
may be attained by faithful and continued eflrort
in carrying out noble purposes. It is a story of a
life whose success is measured by its usefulness — •
a life that has made the world better and brighter.
Her career has been dignified and womanly, her
manner unaffected and her actions, springing from
a heart charged with love and altruistic sentiment
for humanity, have been a blessing to all who have
come within range of her influence.
Mrs. Mabel (Lindstadt) Campbell is a native
daughter of the great Treasure state, having been
born at Philipsburg, Montana, and she is the daugh-
ter of August W. and Minnie (Miller) Lindstadt.
In the paternal line of descent Mrs. Campbell is
descended from John Lindstadt, who was born in
Stettin, Germany, came to the United States, was
married to Caroline Bitte, and died in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, in 1890. Among their children was Au-
gust W., father of Mrs. Campbell. He was born
in 1855 at Stettin, Germany, and his death occurred
at Mis'soula, Montana, in 1912. At the age of fifteen
years he had run away from home and came to the
United States. He at once went to work, and so
industrious and economical was he that in three years
he had saved enough money to bring over his
346
HISTORY OF MONTANA
parents and two brothers, all ot whom settled m
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, He, however went to Mari-
posa County, California, where he oUowed his trade,
that of a butcher. Subsequently he came to Mon-
tana, locating in Deer Lodge Valley m 1884 and
ther^ he was married. In 1886 he moved to Butte,
where he was employed at his trade for a year,
and then located in Philipsburg, where and m
Granite he spent the ensuing eighteen years. He
then came to Missoula and was connected with the
John K. Daily Company up to the time ot his deatn,
which occurred in 1912- Mr. Lindstadt was a demo-
crat in political faith, and was a member ot the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
^s above stated, while residing at Deer Lodge
\'alley Mr. Lindstadt was married to Mmnie Miller,
who was born in New York City in 1868 and who
now makes her home with her daughter, the sub-
ject of this review. Her father, Christopher Miller,
was born in Germany in 18^5 and died at Deer
Lodge Valley in 1874, the year in which he came to
Montana. He had married Margaret Gerken, who
was born near Hamburg, Germany, in 1841, and who
died at Deer Lodge Valley, Montana, in 191 1. In
1874. after their marriage, they had coine to Mon-
tana by way of Salt Lake City, to which city they
had traveled by rail, whence they traveled to Deer
Lodge Valley by emigrant wagons.
Mabel Lindstadt attended the public schools of
Philipsburg, Montana, through the seventh grade.
In 1906 the family moved to Missoula, where she
completed her public school training, graduating
from the high school here in 1910. She was then
a student in the Minnesota State Normal School
at Duluth, ^Minnesota, where she was graduated in
November, 1912. During the following year she
was engaged as a school teacher in a rural district
in St. Louis County, Minnesota, where all of her
pupils were foreigners, none of them being able
to speak English. This was certainly a severe initia-
. tion for a young girl into the educational field, but
nothing daunted, she stuck to her school and com-
pleted her year to the entire satisfaction of the
school board. She then returned to Missoula, and
during the following year she was employed to
teach a rural school in Missoula County. From 1914
lo 1917 she was engaged in teaching in the public
schools of Missoula. In November. 1916, she was
elected to the office of county superintendent of
schools, and in January, 1917, she entered upon the
discharge of the duties of that office. So entirely
satisfactory was her conduct of the office that in
1918 she was elected, without opposition, to suc-
ceed herself and is still the incumbent of that office.
The office of county superintendent of schools is a
most important one and Mrs. Campbell has made
a most favorable impression throughout the county
because of her businesslike method of conducting
the office. She has supervision over fifty schools,
ninety-seven teachers and over two thousand pupils.
."Ks a teacher she had met with merited success, and
in her present capacity as superintendent her record
presents a series of successes and advancements
such as few attain. She has pursued her chosen
calling with all the interest of an enthusiast, is
thoroughly in harmony with the spirit of the work
and has a proper conception of the dignity of the
profession to which her life and energies are so
unselfishly devoted.
Politically Mrs. Campbell is a democrat, while
fraternally she is a member of Electa Chapter No. 7,
Order of the Eastern Star, and the local lodge of
the Daughters of Rebekah. She is also a member
of the ^lontana State Teachers' .Association and the
National Teachers' Association.
On December 23. 1918, she became the wife of
Nigel H. Campbell, who was born in Missouri, where
he was reared and where he followed farming pur-
suits until his removal to Missoula, Montana, in
1916. Here he has been in the employ of the North-
ern Pacific Railroad Company. He is a gentleman
of splendid personal qualities of character and is
well liked by a large circle of acquaintances in the
city of his adoption.
A. L. Stone. A large group of important busi-
ness interests in Southwestern Montana have as
one of their chief directing spirits Mr. A. L. Stone
of Dillon. He is a Montana pioneer. Not one of
the very first settlers, but has been identified with
Montana since the late territorial period, altogether
nearly thirty-five years. He has been busily engaged
in practical work since boyhood, and yet has found
time to cultivate those interests represented outside
the realm of practical business. His father was a
thorough scholar and Mr. Stone's own children have
had every incentive and advantage of a liberalizing
education.
Mr. Stone is a native of Kansas, born in Shawnee
County, not far from the City of Topeka, October
16, i860. His father, Lewis Anson Stone, was born
at Royalton, New York, in 1825 and in 1837, at the
age of twelve years, accompanied his parents to a
pioneer home in Eaton County, Michigan. He re-
ceived most of his education in Michigan, was a
student in an academy at Olivet, and received his
Master's degree from' Oberlin College, Ohio. For
twenty-five _j-ears he was engaged in educationa'J
work and was a pioneer of Kansas. Three years
after the birth of his son A. Louis, he moved
to Whiteside County. Illinois, and several years later
returned to Kansas and settled on a farm in Leav-
enworth County, where he died in 1904, at the age
of seventy-nine. He married Miss Martha A.
Hotchkiss in 1857, daughter of Freeman Hotchkiss,
a farmer, contractor and builder. She was well
educated and for a number of years assisted her
husband in his school and college work. She died
in Leavenworth County in 1872. A. Louis Stone
had one sister, Eva Louise, who died in February,
1919. Her husband, J. M. Oilman, still lives on the
old Stone homestead farm near Leavenworth, Kan-
sas. Mr. Oilman has long been prominent in repub-
lican politics in Kansas and for several terms was
a member of the State Legislature.
A. L. Stone from the age of about six years grew
up on his father's farm in Leavenworth County.
He attended school there and also had much help
from his father and mother in his studies. He
earned his first money when ten years old running
a rake in the field and gathering up scatterings.
He was a regular hand on the farm and after get-
ting his education was a teacher in Leavenworth
County six years. At the same time he became
interested in merchandising. Not enjoying the best
of health in Kansas, he sold his interests and came
to Montana in 188.^. For a time he was clerk with
McMillan & Cluett at Butte and in 1888 moved to
Dillon, where he has made his home and has been
an increasing factor in business affairs for over
thirty years. Within a year after he went to work
for the Dillon Implement Company he became sec-
retary and treasurer of the company. He witlidrew
from this firm in 1899 and on the first of August
established the State Bank of Dillon, being its
cashier and manager until September 24. 1912. at
which time he was chosen president. Under his
management this bank has become one of the strong-
est in the state. It has capital of $100,000, surplus
and profits of an equal amount, while its deposits
HISTORY OF ^lONTANA
347
aggregate $1,250,000. Mr. Stone is president, Mar-
tin Barrett is vice president, and W. A. Graeter is
cashier.
Mr. Stone was chairman of the E.xecutive Com-
mittee in 1909-10 and vice president for 1910-13 of
the Montana Bankers Association. His address
upon the "Resources of Montana" before the Bank-
ers' Convention in August, 1919, was a notable re-
view and 5,000 copies were published by the asso-
ciation for distribution.
A busy man, he has nevertheless found time to
promote the welfare of his home locality, particu-
larly in the matter of schools. From 1889 to 1892 he
was superintendent of schools of Beaverhead
Elks, the Beaverhead Club, and is a democrat m
County. He is now a member of the State Board
of Education. He has also been a member of the
City Coimcil of Dillon. He is affiliated with the
politics. His family are members of the Episcopal
Church.
At San Francisco April 8, 1896. Mr. Stone mar-
ried Miss .^Ib'na Smith, daughter of Eden Smith
of Illinois. The Stone family liave a handsome
modern home at 318 South Idaho Street but since
1917 Mr. Stone has maintained a home in Los
.\ngeles in order that his children might en-
joy the best of educational and other advantages
in that city. He and his wife have five children :
Irma, the oldest, born April 18, 1897, was sent
abroad when eleven years of age and spent a year
in Berlin. She is a graduate of Radcliffe College,
the woman's department of Harvard University,
receiving her Master of .Arts degree there. She
was a resident student in Old Mexico during 1909-10,
and is well versed in modern languages. During
1918 she was teacher of Spanish atid French in the
high school of LaPorte, Indiana. Robert Malcolm,
the second child, was born May 23. igni, and during
I9i8-I9'was a member of tlie Reserve Officers Train-
ing Camp in the University of California at Berke-
ley, and in the fall of 1919 entered upon his sopho-
more year in that university. Martha, born October
8, igo2, is a graduate of the Los .Angeles High
School and entered the University of California in
1919. Donald was born .August 22. 1904, and is in
his, second year of the Los .Angeles High School,
while Henry Lee was born May 30, 1906, and has
completed the eighth grade of the Los .Angeles
grammar schools.
-Augustus F. Graeter. While there are scores
of Montanans called pioneers because they came to
tliis country before the territory was erected into a
state, it is a very diminished number which makes
up the group of those Montanans whose lives and
fortunes were cast with this isolated section of the
Northwest during the early '60s. One of these,
honored not only by length of residence, but by
the quality of his public spirit, the great range of
his business enterprise, and the kindness and
strength of his character, is -Augustus F. Graeter
of Dillon, who became a resident of Montana in
1862.
He was born at Allentown, Pennsylvania, July 29,
1834. His father, Augustus Graeter, was born at
Geppingen, near Stuttgart, Germany, March 16,
1803, and was highly educated, attending colleges
and universities at Leipsic and Stuttgart. He came
to America in 1828 and spent many years as a printer
and publisher, publishing both books and newspa-
pers in the German language. He was in that busi-
ness at Allentown, Pennsylvania, and in 1836 moved
to Warren, Ohio, where in addition to other work
he was a farmer and hotel proprietor. Politically
he was a whig and finally a republican. He died at
Warren March 8, 1863, at the age of si.xty. He mar-
ried Sarah Hoffman, who was born near -Allentown,
Pennsylvania, and died at Warren, Ohio, at the age
of eighty-four. Of their eight children -Augustus
F. was the second. -Adolphus, the oldest, was a
finished and talented musician, for a number of
vears conducted a music store and died at Warren,
Ohio; Sarah died at Warren; Olivia lives at Butte,
Montana, widow of Mr. Hopkins, a pioneer Mon-
tanan, and a miner by occupation; Isabella is the
wife of Frank Ritzel, publisher of the Warren
Chronicle in Ohio; Walter was a Union soldier with
an Ohio regiment and died while in the arrny ; Fred-
erika Bailey lives at Warren, Ohio, is a widow, her
husband having been a printer; Alfred died at Dil-
lon, Montana, in 1914 and was prominently known
in this section of the state, having served as recorder
and sheriff of his county and later was in the mining
business at -Argenta.
Augustus F. Graeter was an infant when his
parents moved to Ohio, and he received his early
advantages in the country schools of Warren, Ohio.
He lived on his father's farm and also in the town
of Warren until he was fifteen years of age. He
spent one year in a store at Meadville, Pennsyl-
vania, again worked on the farm in Ohio one sea-
son, and from there went to Wisconsin where he
essayed the role of a book agent, but w^ith only a
fair degree of success, his honesty not permitting
him to exaggerate the merits of his stock in trade.
He returned to the more substantial if more labori-
-ous work of cutting cordwood and selling it to
boats on the Fox River. Then for another brief
period he was back on his father's Ohio farm ind
clerk in a dry goods store at Warren.
Mr. Graeter has been identified with a number of
pioneer communities west oi the Missouri Vallev-
In 1856 he went out to Nebraska, then a place of
great historic interest on account of the Kansas-
Nebraska controversy in Congress. He was asso-
ciated with a relative by marriage in a general store
at Florence, and when the business was removed to
Omaha lie clerked there for a time. In the fall of
1857 he and a friend, taking a span of oxen, started
overland for Pike's Peak. -A long journey brought
them to the banks of Cherry Creek, where now is
the City of Denver. Mr. Graeter took up a claim
of 160 acres now identified in the modern city of
Denver by Blake and Larimer Streets. In order
to hold his claim he complied with the legal re-
quirements of that time, placing four logs as a foun-
dation for a cabin. The net results of his pros-
pecting for gold up Cherry Creek were very meager
During the winter about forty men joined him and
his companions on Cherry Creek, and he, like the
others, built a log cabin for shelter. Mr. Graeter's
partner was -A. J. Smith, and during the winter
of 1857-58 they returned to Omaha for supplies.
The early spring of 1858 found them at Black
Hawk, near the present site of Missouri City. Mr.
Graeter mined gold there for two years, and dur-
ing that time put up two log cabins. He returned
to Omaha in 1859-60, and the next spring went back
to his mining properties. In the spring of l852 he
was camped for several days along Snake River.
His partners and associates at that time were .A. J.
Smith and Major Brooke. They suffered all the
hardships and danger of a country infested with
hostile Indians, remote from central markets, where
every day presented a battle with circumstances and
the forces of the wilderness. Finally the party ar-
rived at Fort Lemhi. Idaho, and that was as far as
they got toward their destination, the great placer
gold camp of Florence. Mr. Graeter and five others
decided to winter at Bitter Root and crossed the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
divide into Cottonwood Grove. Here the party were
surrounded by Blackfoot Indians, who mistaking the
white men for Snake Indians with whom they were
at war. stole their stock but on the mistake being
discovered the stock was returned. Later the white
men retraced their steps to Fort Lemhi, where Mr.
Graeter again joined Smith and Major Brooke.
They next set out for winter quarters at Fort Cald-
well, but hearing of gold at Bannack diverted their
course to that region. Bannack was the principal
center of Mr. Graeter's operations and experiences
as a Montana gold miner, and he operated there off
and on for a quarter of a century. Success came
to him in fair measure. Charles Dahler and Hirsh-
field were his backers in his mining enterprise. At
one time he borrowed $50,000 to build a ditch, com-
pleted the project and received returns sufficient tc
repay his loan and give him something. He was also
successful in a dredging proposition at Bannack.
For a number of years he made a good living while
engaged in ranching on Horse Prairie.
Since 1899 Mr. Graeter's home has been at Dillon,
where he has been actively identified with merchan-
dising, banking, ranching and real estate. He bought
a ranch in the Canyon. In 1899 he was one of the
six men who established the State Bank at Dillon,
and is still a stockholder and director in that insti-
tution. His name has been prominently associated
with the grocery business, and he is still a half
owner and president of the Graeter Grocery Com-
pany and is a director in the Western Wholesale
Grocery Company. He is president of the Graeter
Park and Realty Company of Dillon, president of
the Dillon Realty Improvement Company, and is
owner of two business buildings on Bannack Street
and other local property. For a number of years
he lived in a fine home in South Idaho Street,
which he gave to his daughter Sarah. He gave to
his present wife at the time of their marriage the
fine residence in which they reside at 109 South
Washington Street.
Mr. Graeter is a democrat in politics, and in early
days was very much interested in politics as a means
of helping his friends to office. His only public
position was county commissioner and a member
of the City Council. He is prominent in Masonry,
being affiliated with Dillon Lodge No. 23, .Ancient
Free and .\ccepted Masons, Dillon Chapter No. 8,
Royal .^rch Masons, St. Elmo Commandery No. 7,
Knights Templars, and Bagdad Temple of the
Mystic Shrine- at Butte.
On July 29, t86o, at Florence, Nebraska. Mr.
Graeter married Miss Emily M. Drury. She died at
Bannack, Montana, in 1878, the mother of two chil-
dren, Luther and Blanche. Luther is a miner at
Eureka, California. Blanche died in 1917, at Eureka.
California, wife of Charles Falk, who is a manu-
facturer of redwood lumber. In 1880, at Bannack,
Montana. Mr. Graeter married Mary J. Taylor. She
was his faithful wife and companion for twenty-
eight years, and won many lasting friends in the
pioneer communities where she and Mr. Graeter
lived. She was an active member of the Baptist
Church. She died October 6, 1908, in Dillon. She
was born in New Brunswick September 26, 1849.
By his second marriage Mr. Graeter has two chil-
dren: Arthur, cashier of the State Bank of Dillon;
and Sarah, wife of E. L. Poindexter, who is pub-
lisher of the Dillon Examiner and former post-
master. In October. 1916, at Dillon, Mr. Graeter
married Mrs. May Padley, widow of C. H. Padley,
who was at one time engaged in the retail meat
business at Dillon.
W.ALTER Henry Stephan, M. D. Immediately
after graduating from Rush Medical College of Chi-
cago Doctor Stephan came to Montana, and as in-
terne, as railway company physician and in general
practice has been one of the busy professional men
of the state for the past five years. Doctor Stephan
is a member of the medical fraternity at Dillon.
He was born at Sutton, Nebraska. January 8, 1888,
but spent most of his life before coming to Montana
in Illinois. His grandfather. Frederick Stephan, was
born near Bingen-on-the-Rhine in Hesse-Darmstadt,
German}', and as a young man came to America and
settled on a farm at Sublette, near Mendota, Illinois.
Late in life he removed to Nebraska and died at
Sutton, that state, in 1892. John F. Stephan, father
of Doctor Stephan, was born in Illinois in 1855 and
after his marriage moved to Sutton, Nebraska, where
he farmed for a number of years. In 1895 he re-
turned to Illinois. He was a skilled mechanic and
for some time as engine tester traveled all over
Illinois representing the Bruner Gasoline Engine
Works at Peru, Illinois. In 1903 he removed to
Sterling in that state and was pattern maker for the
International Harvester Company. He died at
Sterling in 1918. He cast his ballot as a republican,
was an active Methodist and was affiliated with the
Modern Woodmen of .-Xmerica. John F. Stephan
married Margaret Nauman, who was born at Red
Oak, Illinois, in i860, and now makes her home with
her son Doctor Stephan. There were three children
Lillian A., the oldest, is a resident of Highland Park,
Illinois, and stewardess of the Moraine Hotel near
Fort Sheridan. Ethel E., the youngest is the wife
of Fred \yagner, a farmer and stock man at Ash-
ton, Illinois.
Doctor Stephan was seven years of age when his
father returned to Illinois and acquired his educa-
tion in the public schools of Peru and graduated
from the Sterling High School in 1907. Following
this he spent two years in the Northwestern College
at Naperville, Illinois, and then entered the Univer-
sity of Chicago, where he received his Bachelor of
Science degree in 1912 and did his preparatory work
in medicine. In 1914 he graduated M. D. from Rush
Medical College, the affiliated medical institution of
the University of Chicago. He is a member of .the
Phi Beta Pi medical fraternity. During 1914-15
Doctor Stephan was an interne in Murray Hospital
at Butte. Montana, did a general practice at Pony
for two years, and was then surgeon of the Mil-
waukee Railway Hospital at Three Forks until Jan-
uary, 1919, when he removed to Dillon and engaged
in general practice. His offices are at 21 South
Idaho Street. Doctor Stephan served as health offi-
cer for Madison County and is one of the two
health officers of Beaverhead County. He is also
surgeon for the Oregon Short Line Railway and
surgeon for the county poor. He is a stockholder
in the Dillon Oil Company. Doctor Stephan is a
republican and a member of the Episcopal Church,
belongs to the County, State and American Medi-
cal associations and is affiliated with Beaverhead
Lodge, Ancient Free and .Accepted Masons, and
also with Virginia City Lodge, Benevolent Protec-
tive Order of Elks.
In 1913, at Butte, he married Miss Bh'the Martin,
daughter of Martin and Nellie fCooper) Martin,
residents of Anaconda. Her father is an official
in the .Anaconda Smelter and is ex-secretarv of the
State Fair .Association of Montana. Doctor and
Mrs. Stephan have two sons : Walter, born June 10,
1916; and Robert, born September i, 1917.
Parker W. Hastings since coming to Montana
in 1909 has given all his time and business talents
O0,0^bu.
O.JO«.-A^*
HISTORY OF MONTANA
349
to the Security Bridge Company, a corporation
has has done an extensive business all over the
state. Mr. Hastings is secretary and treasurer.
Parker Wallace Hastings vv^as born at Hope,
Maine, August 2, 1887. His ancestors were colonial
settlers in Massachusetts, coming from England,
and later moved to Maine, where several genera-
tions of the family have spent their lives. His
grandfather was Samuel Hastings, a native of
Maine, a farmer who died at Union in that state
about 1S67. Herbert L. Hastings, father of the
Billings business man, was born at Union, Maine,
in 1845, and has spent all his life in that locality.
He is a cabinetmaker by trade, but is now retired.
He is a republican and Universalist. He is a
member of the Masonic fraternity. Herbert L.
Hastings married Abigail Hewit, who was born
at Hope, Maine, in 1849. and died there in 1903.
She was the mother of four children, Parker W.
being the youngest. Ralph L., the oldest, is a clerk
at Granville, Vermont. Alice M., living at Port-
land, Maine, has been twice married, her first hus-
band being Elias Thompson, a farmer, and her
second husband, Chester Quimby. Phyllis is a
stenographer, her permanent position being with
the Security Bridge Company, but during the war
she was employed in the American headquarters
of the Red Cross at Washington.
Parker W. Hastings was educated in the pub-
lic schools at Waltham, Massachusetts, graduating
from the high school there in 1906. Two years
later, in 1908, having come West, he found a posi-
tion on the payroll of the Security Bridge Company
as timekeeper. In 1909 he was sent to the Billings
branch, taking charge of the books, and in 1913
became treasurer, and today is secretary and treas-
urer of the company. The plant and offices of this
well known corporation are at 502 North Twenty-
second Street.
Mr. Hastings is secretary of the Carbon County
Agricultural Company, and is deeply interested in
all matters concerning the welfare and advance-
ment of Montana. He is a republican. His home
is at loio North Thirty-second Street. Mr. Hast-
ings married Miss Naomi Irons at Toms River,
New Jersey, in igio. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs.
Franklin Irons, live at Toms River, her father
being a wheelwright by trade. Mr. and Mrs. Hast-
ings have one daughter, Ruth Esther, born October
27, 191 1-
Frederick Thorne Sterling came to Montana in
1883 aiid entered the employ of the Eddy-Hammond
Company' at Missoula. This company was, in 1884,
incorporated under the firm name of The Missoula
Mercantile Company. He remained with them for
a period of over thirty-five years, or until December,
1918, at which time, in connection with some friends,
he purchased the controlling interest in the Western
Montana National Bank, becoming president of that
institution December 24, 1918.
The Western Montana National Bank was or-
ganized in 1888, the principal stockholders being G.
A. Wolf, J. H. T. Ryman and Ferdinand Kennett,
and was the second bank organized in western
Montana.
Frederick Thorne Sterling was born in Frederic-
ton, New Brunswick, Canada, January 19, 1863, his
ancestors coming from England and Scotland, the
Sterlings settling at Martha's Vineyard before the
Revolutionary war. When the colonies began their
struggle for independence they organized a company
and fought with the British army, afterward remov-
ing to Canada.
John Allan Sterling, father of Frederick Thorne
Sterling, was born in Fredericton, New Brunswick,
Canada, in 1838, and for a number of years engaged
in the lumber business in New Brunswick, later mov-
ing to Boston, Massachusetts. In 1906 he came to
Missoula, where he died in 1914. John Allan
Sterling married Margaret Thorne who was born
in Fredericton, New Brunswick,' Canada, in 1843
and died at Missoula, Montana, in 1915. Her father
and mother came to Canada from Scotland. Fred-
erick was the oldest of their four children, the
others being Agnes, wife of William H. Reid. of
Augusta, Maine; Addison M., president of the A.
M. Sterling Company of Ronan, Montana, and Mar-
garet, who died at the age of twenty-one.
Mr. Sterling was married at Missoula in 1889
to Miss Lucina Laura Worden, daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. Frank Lyman Worden. Mrs. Sterling
was born in Missoula September 2-], 1867, and is
a member of both the Pioneers and the Sons and
Daughters of Montana Pioneers. Her father, with
Captain C. P. Higgins, located and founded the
town of Missoula. They built the first store in
Montana, at Hellgate, four miles west of Missoula,
later removing this store to the present site of Mis-
soula and building the first flour mill in Montana,
with the exception of a small one built by the Jesuit
Fathers at Stevensville.
Mr. and Mrs. Sterling have four children, Dorothy,
John Worden, Frederick Thorne, Jr., and Barbara.
Mr. Sterling and family reside at 1310 Gerald Ave-
nue, Missoula, Montana.
Mrs. Una B. Herrick. The history of a county
or state, as well as that of a nation, is chiefly the
chronicle of the lives and deeds of those who have
conferred honor and dignity upon society. The
world judges the characer of a community by those
of its representative citizens and yields its tributes
of admiration and respect to those whose works
and actions constitute the record of a state's pros-
perity and pride. So do we judge an institution
by those who represent it, and by this token Mon-
tana State College, at Bozeman, is fortunate, for
among those who represent this institution none
occupies a more enviable place in the esteem of
the community than Mrs. Una B. Herrick, dean
of women.
Mrs. Una (Brasfield) Herrick was born in Madi-
son County, Kentucky. In New York City Una
Brasfield became the wife of Dr. Clinton G. Her-
rick, a successful and well known physician and
surgeon, a native of Burlington, Vermont.
Mrs. Herrick's father. James M. Brasfield, was
born in 1800 in Madison County, Kentucky, and
his death occurred there in 1894, at the advanced
age of ninety-four years. He spent his life in
Madison County, where he owned slaves and oper-
ated a plantation. He made a specialty of breeding
saddle horses and as such acquired a wide reputa-
tion throughout Kentucky. He was a democrat
in politics and was a leader of his party in his
community. He was an active member of the
Presbyterian Church, in which he was an elder
for the long period of seventy-five years. He was
also a member of the Masonic fraternity.
James M. Brasfield married Narcissa C. Haynes,
a cousin of Bob and Alfred Taylor, brothers, who
were at the same time candidates for election as
governor of Tennessee, one as a republican and the
other a democrat. She was born in 1822 in Mur-
freesboro, Tennessee, and died in April, 1916. .
Mrs. Herrick's paternal grandfather, James Lewis
Brasfield, was born, reared and died in Madison
County, Kentucky. He was a prominent man,
being the owner of a plantation and slaves. He
350
HISTORY OF MONTANA
married Mary Mobereley. also a native of Madison
County, where her death occurred. The paternal
line of the Brasfield family is traced back to Eng-
land, whence the family came to America during
the davs of the colonies and settled in Kentucky.
Membe'rs of the family took an active part in the
struggle of the colonists to gain their independence,
and thus Mrs. Herrick is qualified for member-
ship in the society of Daughters of the American
Revolution, as she is also through her maternal
ancestors.
James McLell.\n H.\miltox, president of the
Montana State College of Agriculture and Me-
chanic Arts at Bozeman, is a veteran teacher and
educator, and has recently rounded out thirty years
of participation in the school affairs of Montana.
For fifteen vears he has been directing head of an
institution, through which hundreds of young men
and women are prepared for lives of usefulness
in industry and business.
Mr. Hamilton was born on a farm in Craw-
ford County, Illinois, near Annapolis, October i,
1861, a son of James and Mary (Burner) Hamil-
ton. ' His grandfather, Thomas Hamilton was born
near Belfast, Ireland, of Scotch-Irish ancestry, and
was a Presb>-terian in faith. He came to America
and was a coal miner in Western Pennsylvania,
and died at Beaver Falls in Beaver County, that
state. He married a Miss Williams, a native of
Belfast. James Hamilton, father of James M.
Hamilton, was born near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,
March 25, 1808. He was reared in Pittsburgh, rnar-
ried in Ohio, where he lived on a farm in Lick-
ing Countv near Newark, and in 1851 went to
Crawford Countv, Illinois, and took up a tract of
Government land. He became one of the well to
QO farmers of that locality and lived on his farm
unli; his death, November 4, 1875. He was a Doug-
las democrat until 1864 and after that a republi-
can. Though reared a Presbyterian, he was for
many years active in the Methodist Church. His
wife, Mary Burner, was born near Newark. Ohio,
September 29, 1821, and died on the home farm
at Annapolis, Illinois, in i88q. They had a large
familv of children, briefly noted as follows: Mary,
who died in Oklahoma in IQ16, was the wife of the
late Samuel Ransbarger. a farmer; David, a farmer
who died near Annapolis, Illinois, in 1918; Sarah,
who died in 1917 in Oklahoma, wife of Robert
Fowler, an Oklahoma farmer; Clara, wife of Ches-
ter Ransbarger. who is superintendent of construc-
tion for the Illinois Central Railway and lives at
Watson, Illinois; Cornelia, wife of Henry W.
Beacham, a bank president at Farnhamville, Iowa :
Almira, who died in Oklahoma in 1907, wife of
Nathan Beacham, a farmer in that state ; Jane,
who died in 1894, near Watson, Illinois, wife of
John Mikeworth, a farmer in that locality: Ellis,
who lives on the home farm near Annapolis ; James
McLellan. who i?. the ninth and next to the young-
est of the children ; and William who died in 1901
on his farm near .Annapolis.
James McLellan Hamilton spent his boyhood
in the rural atmosphere of Illinois, attended rural
schools, also the schools of Robinson, Illinois, and
took his college work in Union Christian College,
a noted institution on the banks of the Wabash
River in Western Indiana at the Town of Merom.
He received his Bachelor of Science degree there
in 1887 and his Master of Science degree in 1890.
Mr. Hamilton was a student in Harvard Univer-
sity in 1898. Since he left the Union Christian
College his absorbing work in life has been teach-
ing. For two years he was superintendent of
schools at Sumner, Illinois, and in 1889 came to
Montana and from 1889 to 1901 was superintendent
of the city schools of Missoula. He was Profes-
sor of History and Economics in the University
of Montana from 1901 to 1904 and in the latter
year took up his present duties as president of
the Montana State College of Agriculture and Me-
chanic Arts at Bozeman. He was a member of
the Montana State Board of Education from 1893
to 1901. He is a member of the National Educa-
tion Association, the American Association of Agri-
cultural Colleges, the American Academy of Political
and Social Science. During 1912 Mr. Hamilton
made a tour of Europe and gave special attention
to agricultural conditions.
He is an independent republican in politics, a
member of the Unitarian Church, past master of
Bozeman Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, a member of Zona Chapter No. 12,
Royal Arch Masons, Bozeman Commandery of
Krights Templar, is past grand of Covenant Lodge
No. 6, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, at Mis-
soula, and a member of Bozeman Lodge No. 463
of the Elks. He also belongs to the Sigma Chi
college fraternity.
Mr. Hamilton resides at 712 South Central
Avenue. On June 6, 1888, he married Miss Emma
Shideler, of Merom, Indiana, daughter of Henry
and Mary (Stanley) Shideler. Her parents are
both deceased, her father having been a merchant
at Merom. Mrs. Hamilton died August 12, 1909,
at Portland, Oregon. Her only child, Mary, died
in infancy. On August 21, 1918, at Bozeman, Mr.
Hamilton married ^Iiss Florence Ballinger, daugh-
ter of Merrill and Jane (Hardcastle) Ballinger.
Her father, now deceased, was a farmer in Yellow-
stone Valley between Livingston and Gardiner, and
was a Montana pioneer, having come overland in
a prairie schooner from Illinois and Missouri to
Montana. Mrs. Ballinger lives with Mr. and Mrs.
Hamilton. Mrs. Hamilton has also been a promi-
nent figure in educational affairs. She finished her
education in the Montana State College at Boze-
man, and was a member of the department of home
economics there for several years.
S. R. Krom is cashier of the Northwestern Na-
tional Bank of Livingston, and has been identified
with that institution since it was organized in 191 7.
Mr. Krom, who has had an extensive commer-
cial and banking experience, was born at Accord,
New -York, July 3, 1887, and has lived in Mon-
tana more than twenty years of his life. His
ancestors came from Holland and settled in New
York State. Solomon Krom, father of the Liv-
ingston banker, was born in New York in 1846,
and spent all his life there as a farmer. He died
at Accord in Ulster County in January, 1888, when
his youngest son and child, S. R. Krom, was about
six months old. He was a republican, and a mem-
ber of the Dutch Reformed Church. He was also
a veteran of the Civil war, having been with the
One Hundred and Second New York Infantry for
three years. Solomon Krom married Mary E. Hast-
ings. She was born in New York State in 1846
and in 1898 brought her family to Montana and
settled on a ranch at Billings, where she still re-
sides. She is a member of an old New York and
New England family, the Hastings being of Eng-
lish origin. She is a first cousin of the great Ameri-
can statesman and lawyer Elihu Root of New
York. Her father, S. P. M. Hastings, was a na-
tive of New York State and died at EUenville in
New York in 1888 and was a minister of the Dutch
Reformed Church, preaching for many years in
HISTORY OF xMONTANA
Ulster County. Mrs. Solomon Krom's two old-
est children, Roy Hastings and Bessie, died in
infancy at the old home in New York. The third,
J. Merwin, died at Billings at the age of twenty-
one, Frank is manager of the home ranch at Bill-
ings and Mary J. is the wife of A. J. Turco, a
stockman and farmer at Big Timber, Montana.
S. R. Krom was eleven years old when brought
to Montana. He attended public school in his
birthplace, and completed the junior year of the
Billings High School course. He also finislied
the preparatory course in the State Agricultural
College at Bozeman. On leaving college in 1907
he was for eight years connected with the Bill-
ings postoffice, beginning as a clerk and was finally
superintendent of the money order and postal sav-
ings division. During 1915-17 Mr. Krom was dili-
gently engaged in preparing himself for a bank-
ing career, working in banks in Chicago, Minneapo-
lis and Billings. He then entered the Northwestern
National Bank of Livingston as assistant cashier,
and in January, 1919, succeeded Mr. H. B. Miller
as cashier. He is also secretary of the affiliated
institution of the Northwestern National, a mutual
building and loan association.
Mr. Krom is a young and energetic and public
spirited citizen, and interested in all local move-
ments. He is a member of the Railway Club of
Livingston, the Commercial Club and Chamber of
Commerce, and is affiliated with Livingston Lodge
No. 32. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Liv-
ingston Consistory of the Scottish Rite, Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena, and Liv-
ingston Lodge No. 246 of the Elks. Politically he
is a republican. Mr. Krom and family reside at
the Ebert Apartments on Callender Street. He
married at Billings in 1913 Blanche J. Spicer, a
daughter of Joseph B. and Nellie (Randolph) Spi-
cer. Her parents are both deceased, her father
having been a farmer in Illinois. Mrs. Krom fin-
ished her education in a seminary in Tennessee.
Louis D. Blodgett. Unless a man possesses real
business ability he will not continue to be honored
by his associates and placed in positions entailing
heavy responsibilities and requiring certain specified
attainments. Thus it is that such continued ex-
pressions of confidence indicate stability of char-
acter and business experience, and the people of
Three Forks, Montana, have every reason to rely
upon the good judgment of Louis D. Blodgett,
vice president of the Adams Realty Company, vice
president of the American National Bank, and a
ranchman of large interests. He was born at
W'aukegan, -Illinois, April 4, 1876, a son of A, Z.
Blodgett. His paternal grandfather was born at
Amherst, Massachusetts, but came to Illinois at an
early day, becoming a pioneer of the region now
known as Downer's Grove in Du Page County,
where he died before his grandson, Louis D. Blod-
gett, was born. He' was a farmer and blacksmith,
and made one of the first mold board plows ever
used in Illinois. The Blodgett family is a very
old one in this country, representatives of it hav-
ing come to Maine from England during the colonial
period, and going from there to other colonies.
A. Z. Blodgett was born in a covered wagon at
Fort Dearborn in 183.S. his parents having taken
refuge there from the Indians, and he died at Wau-
kegan. Illinois, in 1916, having spent his entire life
in Illinois. Prior to the war between the states
he was land commissioner and agent for the North-
western Railroad. With the declaration of war,
he felt that his duty lay in the army, and he en-
listed in 1P61 in Company D, Ninety-sixth Illinois
Tol. 11—23
Volunteer Infantry, serving all through the war with
Generals Grant and Sherman, and was wounded at
the Battle of Chickamauga. Returning home after
his honorable discharge, he resumed his duties and
continued to discharge them until his retirement
at the age of sixty-five years on a pension. A
strong republican, he was the successful candidate
of his party for mayor of Waukegan upon several
occasions. The Presbyterian Church had in him
a consistent member. Well known as a Mason,
he rose in that order to the Thirty-second degree,
and he was also a member of the Grand Army of
the Republic. A. Z. Blodgett was married to Mary
E. Porter, born at Belleville, Ontario, Canada, in
1835, who died at Waukegan, Illinois, in 1899.
Their children were as follows : Henry, who re-
sides at Gooding, Idaho, was made registrar of the
land office created under the Carry Land Act ;
Cyrus, who is in the freight department of the
Northwestern Railroad at Waukegan, Illinois; John,
who is manager of the Underwood Typewriter Com-
pany at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ; Frank, who is
chief train dispatcher for the Northwestern Rail-
road at Mason City, Iowa ; and Louis D., whose
name heads this review.
Louis D. Blodgett attended the public schools
of Waukegan, and was graduated from its high
school in 1892. Following the completion of his
education, Mr. Blodgett was in the employ of the
Northern Trust Company of Chicago for two years,
and then went on the road handling cigars for the
Fred F. Greenleaf Cigar Company, covering North
Dakota and South Dakota, and operating from
Sioux Falls. In 1899 he left the road and for six
months was with the Power Mercantile Company
at Lewistown, leaving that concern to engage with
the Lewistown Commercial Company, owners of
a general store. After some years, Mr. Blodgett
became manager of the Spring Creek Coal Com-
pany, and still later became interested in ranch-
ing. In 1913 he assumed charge of the Lewistown
Chamber of Commerce, although he retained his
ranch, and still owns 1,000 acres of land in Fergus
County, Montana, and 160 acres in Saskatchewan,
Canada. In 1917 Mr. Blodgett located permanently
at Three Forks, assuming then the duties pertain-
ing to the vice presidency of the Adams Realty
Company, which is one of the largest real estate
concerns operating with their own properties in
Montana. This company owns 16,000 acres of land
in the vicinity of Three Forks, and carries on
farming on an extensive scale. In addition to this
large tract the company also owns property all
through Eastern Montana, along the Chicago, Mil-
waukee & St. Paul Railroad, and also handles farm
loans. The company headquarters are at Three
Forks, and Mr. Blodgett's associates are: J. Q.
.■\dams, president; J. A. Sififert, secretary; and
C. B. McCulloh, treasurer. The company is in-
corporated and has a capital stock of $500,000. The
offices are located in a suite of rooms at No. 12!
Main Street. Mr. Blodgett is also president of the
Judith Ranch Company, vice president of the Ameri-
can National Bank and was elected first president of
the Glacier and Geysers Association. Like his
father, strong in his adherence to the principles of
the republican party, Mr. Blodgett takes an in-
telligent interest in public events. He is an Epis-
copalian. Fraternally he belongs to Three Forks
Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and
Three Forks Chapter. No. 20. Royal Arch Masons.
The Chamber of Commerce of Three Forks has in
him a forceful member. In addition to his ranch
holdings he owns a modern residence at No. 120
Birch Street, Three Forks.
352
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In 1909 Mr. Blodgett was maried at Buffalo,
North Dakota, to Miss Adalaide M. Thompson,
a daughter of David and Mary Thompson, both
a pioneer in the grain and elevator business at
of whom" are now deceased. Mr. Thompson was
Hastings, Minnesota. Mrs. Blodgett was gradu-
ated from the University of Minnesota at Minne-
apolis with the degree of Bachelor of Science.
There are no children of this marriage. Mr. Blod-
gett's rather remarkable advance in his business
affairs is but the legitimate outcome of intelligent
and persistent effort, and the adherence to the
principles of uprightness instilled in him by his
parents during the formative period of his life.
William H. Brennan. Few of the old timers
have had more varied and useful experiences in
Montana than William H. Brennan, of Missoula. He
has been in the great west nearly fifty years. Mon-
tana has been his home the greater part of this
period. He has been a prospector, gold and silver
miner, has taken out several fortunes from the lodes
of Montana, has been a contractor in the construc-
tion and equipment of railroads and industrial plants,
and even now, though well able to retire and enjoy
leisure, is giving his daily supervision to a pros-
perous mercantile business at Missoula.
Mr. Brennan was born in the province of Ontario,
Canada, November 29, 1856. His father, James
Brennan, was born in County Carlow, Ireland, in
1813, and at the age of eighteen came to Canada and
spent the rest of his life as an Ontario farmer. He
died in 1905, at the advanced age of ninety-two. He
was a conservative in politics, but had no desire for
office, though he once served as reeve in Howland
Township. He was an active member of the Catholic
Church. His wife was Clarissa Keys, who was born
at Prescott, Ontario, in 1824, and died in that prov-
ince in 1900. Thomas, the oldest of their children,
was a Western Union telegraph operator, received
a sunstroke while at work in Arizona, and then
went back to Canada and died two years later, in
1887 ; Margaret, whose home is at Owen Sound, on
Georgian Bay, Canada, is the widow of William
Malone, who was a farmer; William H. is the third
in age ; Eliza is the wife of John Vasey, a black-
smith at Newark, California ; John is a lumberman
in California; Edward is in the bakery business at
Missoula ; Mrs. Ellen Fogarty is the wife of a plas-
terer and contractor in Ontario; Marcella is the
wife of Thomas Coffey, a mine operator at Oak-
land, California ; James is a farmer in the Bitter
Root Valley of Montana ; and Nathaniel lives at
Winnipeg, Canada.
William H. Brennan attended the separate schools
of Ontario and lived at home until he was fourteen
years of age. Two years later, in 1872, he went
"to California, .\ year and seven months he worked
as a ranch hand, then entered the service of Gov-
ernor Latham at Menlo Park, California, operating
the governor's gas works for the manufacture of
gas, and also pumped water for the lawns a year
and seven months. This experience enabled him
to take a position in the San Francisco Gas Works
for seven months. He drove a horse car --ine
months and was a street railway conductor for nine
months in San Francisco, following which he was
superintendent of the horse car lines of that city
for two years. He did his first mining in Bodie,
California, working in the mines there for eight
months, then spent four months installing machinery
at the Silver King Mine. After a brief stay at San
Francisco Mr. Brennan came to Silver Bow, Mon-
tana, in 1879. He prospected over a large district
for the next several years and in 1882 went with
the Gloucester Mill, near Helena, and under the boss
process was engaged in amalgamating silver and
gold for fifteen months. After a vacation of three
months spent at Helena Mr. Brennan took a con-
tract for the Helena Mine to sink a shaft two hun-
dred feet and run a fourteen hundred foot level.
This contract required a year, eight months and one
day for its performance. While engaged in this
work Mr. Brennan kept his horse picketed four
miles from Helena. A party of Indians coming
along scared the horse, so that it jerked out its
picket. On examining this picket Mr. Brennan dis-
covered evidences of gold and silver in the dirt that
clung to the stake^ and he immediately made a claim
there and began taking out ore. Three carloads
were shipped to the Wicks Smelter and it assayed
seventy-two ounces of silver per ton and $18 in gold.
This claim accidentally thus discovered gave Mr.
Brennan a start as a money capitalist.
In 1887 Mr. Brennan began contracting, furnish-
ing all the bridge timber to be used by the Montana
Central Railway between Butte and Helena and also
the timber for the section houses and snow fences.
During two years he furnished more than four mil-
lion feet of lumber to that road. He entered the
field of lumber manufacture by the purchase of two
sawmills, one at Philipsburg and one at Ellison. He
also invested $8,000 in railroad grading and
construction outfit. He sold a third sawmill
to Harry McLaughlin. His first sawmill at Clancy
Gulch was the first saw milling machinery shipped
into Montana. His business as a lumber producer
continued with prosperity from 1887 to 1891. In
the meantime he also used his railroad outfit for
building the Pipestone road. Mr. Brennan came
into the Bitter Root Valley with Marcus Daly, and
for more than a year had a contract to furnish the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company 1,500,000 feet
of timber per month. The mill he operated for
this contract he later sold to the Bitter Root De-
velopment Company.
Mr. Brennan has the distinction of having erected
the first house in the present thriving town of Ham-
ilton, Montana. That was in 1892, and he was en-
gaged in an extensive business as a stonemason con-
tractor, with Hamilton as his headquarters, until
1891. One work he did at that time was the con-
struction of the dam across the Bitter Root at the
mouth of Sleeping Child. Mr. Brennan, with a
partner, Joseph Farrell, erected a mill at Pony, Mon-
tana, in 1901, also established a lumber yard there,
conducting both plants for two seasons. About that
time he was seized with the mining fever, and did
some prospecting and spent a year as shift boss in
the Garnet mine and was then promoted to fore-
man. After eight months the mine shut down and
was never opened again. In the course of his pros-
pecting Mr. Brennan went up into the Boss Tweed
district of Madison County, discovered a body of
gold ore, and getting a lease on the property for
three months with his partner, Ed Smith, he took
out $25,000 worth of gold, the dirt assaying at $80
a ton.
.'\mong the many varied experiences of Mr. Bren-
nan he has been a successful rancher. After the
mining venture just noted he bought a ranch two
miles from Harrison, Montana, his associate being
his brother-in-law, Joseph Farrell. They paid $19
an acre for 920 acres, and when they sold the prop-
erty in 1918 the purchase price was $70 an acre. In
1918 Mr. Brennan moved to Missoula and bought
the O. K. Trading Company's property, consisting
of a general store and residence at the corner of
South Fifth and Arthur streets. This is the busi-
ness to which he now gives his time and attention.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
353
Mr. Brennan is an independent democrat. While
living at Hamilton he served as town marshal. He
is a member of the Catholic Church and is a thirty
degree Knight of Columbus, being affiliated with
Missoula Council No. 1021, and is also a member of
Pony Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
In 1889, at Helena, Mr. Brennan married Miss
Rosie Ferrell, daughter of Brown and Elizabeth
(Denning) Ferrell. Her parents live at Pony, Mon-
tana, her father being a retired farmer. Brown
Ferrell is a real Montana pioneer, having located
at Virginia City as early as 1863. For many years
he was a pioneer prospector and placer miner, and
later went on a ranch. Mrs. Brennan has the dis-
tinction of being one of the oldest native daughters
of Virginia City, where she was born March 22,
1866, Clarissa, the oldest of Mr. and Mrs. Brennan's
children, is the wife of Fred Carman, a rancher near
Harrison; James is with the Interstate Lumber Com-
pany at Whitehall, Montana ; Francis, who is now
assisting his father in the store, spent fourteen
months overseas with the 248th Aerial Squadron, be-
ing trained as a mechanic in England for eight
months and for six months was in France, and he
has a record in the air of sixty-eight hours ; John,
who also assists his father in business, enlisted, but
the armistice was signed before he was able to get
into active service; William is a student in the Loyola
High School at Missoula; while Rose and Mary
Alice, the youngest, are pupils of the Sisters Aca-
demy.
Irving U. Danley. It is quite possible that no
other resident of Montana can. lay claim to the cer-
tain distinction that belongs to Irving U. Danley, a
representative business man and prominent citizen of
Manhattan. Montana, that of having a great-grand-
father's name perpetuated by inscription on the
monument that commemorates the battle of Bunker
Hill in the Revolutionary war. Later members of
the family have added military glory, Mr. Danley's
grandfather, Col. James Danley, being an officer
in the War of 1812, and his father, the late S. K.
Danley, was a wounded veteran of the Civil war.
Irving U. Danley was born at Chicago, Illinois,
August 24, 1865. His parents were S. K. and Ada-
line (Randall) Danley, the latter of whom was born
in Oneida County, New York, in 1827 and died at
Marseilles, Illinois, in 1900. S.. K. Danley was born
in 1 81 7 in an ox cart on Kentucky soil while his
parents were enroute from Virginia to Missouri and
his death occurred at Marseilles, Illinois, in 1905.
He was reared in Missouri, learned to be a horse-
shoer, moved to Wisconsin and was married at Mil-
waukee, and some time afterward moved to Chi-
cago, where he lived five years and worked at the
carpenter trade. Early in the Civil war he etilisted
and became a member of Company A, Eighty-eighth'
Illinois Volunteer Infantry, and served through the
war, participating in many battles and campaigns.
He was at Shiloh and was with Sherman on the
march to the sea, and later was wounded in an en-
gagement on the bank of the Hiawatha River.
In 1866 Mr. Danley moved to Marseilles, Illinois,
where he lived during the rest of his life, during his
active years w.orking as a carpenter and builder.
In politics he was a republican, and he was active
in the Grand Army of the Republic. For many
years he was a deacon in the Congregational Church.
His children were the following: Stella, who died
at Marseilles, Illinois, was the widow of William
Parker ; Irving U., and Nettie, who died in infancy.
Irving U. Danley was graduated from the high
school at Marseilles in 1881. He early developed
interest in mechanics and his first work was done on
tlie Rock Island Railway as a fireman, later being
promoted to a locomotive engineer, and as such he
worked in Illinois and Iowa. Later as a stationary
engineer he was employed in the City of Philadel-
phia. His work and pleasure have made him an ex-
tensive traveler, and in pursuit of one or the other
he has visited every state in the Union, together with
Canada, Central America and Mexico. In 1884 he
came to Montana and worked as a stationary en-
gineer at Butte and also at Helena, and afterward
at Grand Mere, Canada. In 1900 he came to Man-
hattan, Montana, and undertook the job of putting in
the machinery and starting the paper mills here,
which required three years to complete. Following
the successful closing of that contract he went in
with the Sanborn Company, general merchants, and
remained four years. In 1910 he opened a garage,
which he has developed into the largest enterprise
of its kind at Manhattan, and the business done is
probably of more volume than any other garage
business in the county. It is situated on Railroad
Avenue, with floor space of 50 by 100 feet, well
equipped for the handling of automobiles and ex-
hibition of Franklin cars, of which he is a selling
agent. This is a business that interests Mr. Danley
and he is doing exceedingly well. He carries a full
line of automobile accessories.
At Bozeman, Montana, in 1908, Mr. Danley was
united in marriage to Miss Myrtle Haskins, a lady
of education and social accomplishments and a
graduate of the Montana State College. She is a
daughter of C. H. and Kate (Bell) Haskins, the
latter of whom resides at Bozeman. The father of
Mrs. Danley died at Bozeman, being a retired ranch-
man and pioneer. Mr. Danley has always been con-
sistent in his adherence to the principles of the re-
publican party. He has long been identified with
Masonry. He was the first master of Manhattan
Lodge No. 59, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
and belongs to Zona Chapter No. 12, Royal Arch
Masons; St. John's Commandery No. 12, Knights
Templar; Livingston Consistory No. i, Thirty-sec-
ond degree; and is also a member of Algeria Tem-
ple, Mystic Shrine, at Helena. He was the first
patron of Sweetbrier Chapter No. 49, Order of the
Eastern Star. He is an active member of the Com-
mercial Club and is interested in every business
•project that promises to be of substantial benefit to
the city.
E. L. Heidel, cashier of the Belgrade State Bank,
of Belgrade, Montana, is a worthy representative of
the younger financial element of his county. To a
very considerable extent it is this element in any
community, especially outside of the great cities,
which infuses spirit and zest into the activities of the
place. It is this element whose entrance upon the
arena of active life dates back only comparatively
a few years which monopolizes a large part of the
vigor, zeal and pushing energy which keeps the
nerves of the financial world ramifying through all
the towns of the country strung to the full tension
of strenuous endeavor.
Mr. Heidel was born at Valley City, North Da-
kota, November 13, 1891, a son of C. E. Heidel.
His grandfather, August Heidel, was born in 1836,
in Germany, and was twelve years of age when he
came to the United States with his father, being
reared in Missouri, where he was also married. He
was subsequently a pioneer settler in the vicinity of
St. Paul, Minnesota, where he was engaged in farm-
ing until his death in 1912. C. E. Heidel was born
in Missouri, in 1861, and was reared there and in
North Dakota, being for some years a general mer-
chant at Valley City. In 1893 he removed to Mm-
354
HISTORY OF MONTANA
neapolis, where he was city agent for the Sleepy-Eye
Milling Company, and left that concern to become
a traveling representative for the North Dakota
Implement Company, covering North and South
Dakota and Minnesota for ten years. Mr. Heidel
then became the organizer of the Black Rock Min-
ing Company, going to Butte, Montana, in 1903, but
after three years sold out to the Butte-Superior
Mining Company, which later turned out to be one
of the richest mines in the state, and, having re-
ceived a good remuneration for his share, he practi-
cally retired from business and settled at Helena,
Montana, where his death occurred in 1914. He was
a member of Butte Lodge, Benevolent Protective
Order of Elks, and while residing in North Dakota
was a lieutenant in the National Guards of that
state. He was married at Valley City, North Da-
kota, to Miss Hattie Weiser, who was born in 1864,
at Shakopee, Minnesota, and died at Pomona, Cali-
fornia, in 1902. They were the parents of three chil-
dren : C. S., a graduate of the Minnesota School of
Mines, University of Minnesota, and now a resident
of Helena, Montana, where he is state hydrographer
and assistant to A. VV. Mahon, state engineer; A. W.,
a graduate of the University of Minnesota College
of Law, degree LL. B., formerly assistant to Attor-
ney General C. S. Ford, and at one time assistant to
the United States district attorney, now a resident
of Broadus, Powder River County, Montana, where
he assisted in the organization of the, Powder River
County Bank, of which he is cashier, although he
will later resume his law practice; and E. L., of this
notice. .
E. L. Heidel attended the public schools of Min-
neapolis, Minnesota; California; North Dakota, and
Sioux City, Iowa, and in 1909 was graduated from
the Central High School, Minneapolis. At that time
he entered the Security National Bank of that city,
starting his banking experience at the bottom in the
humble capacity of bank messenger and being pro-
moted through the various stages until he reached
the post of assistant credit manager. In the mean-
while he was devoting himself to the study of law
in the night school of the University of Minnesota,
and while he has never engaged in active practice his
experience and knowledge in this connection have
been of incalculable value to him in his financial
work. In 1913 Mr. Heidel became identified with
the Commercial National Bank of Bozeman as tel-
ler, and after one year went to Great Falls, Mon-
tana, where he became connected with the Great
Falls National Bank in the capacity of assistant
cashier. In September, 1917, he transferred his serv-
ices to Belgrade, where he became cashier of the
Belgrade State Bank, a position which he occupies
at this time. This bank was established in 1902 as
a stjte bank, and is accounted one of the most sub-
stantial and successful in this part of the state. Its
officials are : president, Louis Accola. of Bozeman ;
vice president, George J. Heck, of Belgrade ; and
cashier, E. L. Heidel. The capital of this institution
is $50,000, its surplus and profits amounting to
$60,000, while its deposits amount to $500,000. The
banking house is situated on Northern Pacific Ave-
nue, at the corner of Broadway. Mr. Heidel is an
exceptionally enterprising young man and is uni-
versally recognized as thoroughly competent in all
matters of finance. He is the owner of a ranch in
the Judith Basin of Montana, near Stanford, and of
a modern residence at the corner of Broadway and
Madison Avenue. He is a democrat, but has taken
no active part in political matters, and his religious
connection is with the Methodist Episcopal Church,
while as a fraternalist he holds membership in Bel-
grade Lodge No. 68, ."Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons ; Great Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevolent
Protective Order of Elks, and the Alpha Tau
Omega, Greek letter college fraternity. He is like-
wise a member of the Belgrade Commercial Club
and has a number of social and civic connections.
In 1910, at Minneapolis, Mr. Heidel married Miss
Frances Brown, a native of Louisiana, and they have
two children: Charles, born July 12, 1914; and Eva
Lee, born June 7, 1917.
Helmer Hagelie. The beautiful little City of Man-
hattan, Montana, has developed and prospered
largely because of the sterling character of its citi-
zens. They have been clearsighted enough to wel-
come to their midst able and enterprising business
men, and the result has been progress along every
line. Particularly has this been true in the mercan-
tile trade, for in the Manhattan Mercantile Com-
pany the city has an organization that compares
favorably with any in the state. Credit for a large
part of this commercial importance is due Helmer
Hagelie, a member of the corporation and who has
been the company's able, indefatigable and judicious
manager for the past six years.
Helmer Hagelie was born at Ossian in Winne-
shiek County, Iowa, February i, 1882. He is a son
of Chris and Martha (Osheim) Hagelie, and a
grandson of Halvor Hagelie. The grandfather was
born in Norway, in i8og, and came to the United
States and settled as a farmer in Iowa prior to the
Civil war, in which he served as a soldier in an
Iowa regiment. In 1892 he retired to Buxton, North
Dakota, and died there. The father of Helmer
Hagelie was born at Ossian, Iowa, January 12, 1858,
and remained there engaged in agricultural pursuits
until 1892, when he went to Buxton, North Dakota,
where he has farm interests. The mother was born
at Ossian in 1863 and also survives. They are mem-
bers of the Lutheran Church at Buxton. Of their
children, Helmer was the first born, the others being
as follows: Clara, who is the wife of Ole Foss, a
farmer living near Buxton ; Gilbert, who is a farmer
near there ; Cora, who married and lives near Bux-
ton ; Bennie, who is a farmer near Buxton ; Liva,
who resides with her parents, is a teacher in the
public schools of Buxton; Martha, who is also a
teacher there ; Albert, who is a student at Bux-
ton ; Agnes, who was graduated from the Buxton
High school in 19 19, and Reuben, who is a student
in the high school at Bu.xton. The son Bennie__en-
tered the army in September, 1917, and was in over-
seas service in the Fourth Division and saw active
service until the armistice was signed. He received
his discharge in August, 1919. He was wounded
twice during this time. The parents, deeming edu-
cation an important asset, have given their children
every advantage in this line in their power.
Helmer Hagelie entered Hauges Seminary at Red-
wing, Minnesota, where he remained a student until
1897, leaving in his senior year. He then accepted
a clerical position in the store of Oscar Sorlie at
Buxton, and during the three years he continued
there applied himself closely to learning business
details, and by 1900, when he became connected with
a store at Thompson, Iowa, was a competent clerk.
Two years later he went into John Paulson's general
store at Hillsboro, North Dakota, one year later
leaving in order to go into business for himself,
and for the next three years was the senior partner
in the firm of Hagelie & Murphy at Reynolds, North
Dakota. In 1908 he came to Montana and for two
and a half years was manager of the dry goods
department for the Heisberg Mercantile Company at
Conrad, then went to Helena as a department man-
ager for T. C. Power, and for two years was with
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the Bogy Mercantile Company at Chinook. Montana."
As a result of these various changes Mr. Hagelie
had become thoroughly acquainted not only with the
trade but with different trade territories and their
needs and demands, and when he came to the Man-
hattan Mercantile Company, in the spring of 1913,
he was a man of matured judgment in regard to the
mercantile business and well qualified for the re-
sponsible position of manager of this large business.
It is tte leading establishment of its kind in Gallatin
County, and with its numerous special departments
carries a complete stock of seasonable gools that
under present careful managerial inspection repre-
sents the best in the market. The store is an im-
posing building with 100 by 80 feet floor space and is
situated on Railroad Avenue. Mr. Hagelie has ad-
ditional business interests, being treasurer and a di-
rector of the Trident Store Company, of Trident,
Montana, and his two ranches, comprising 480 acres
near Chinook. Montana, demand some attention.
He also owns a handsome modern residence on
Broadway, Manchester.
At Reynolds, Morth Dakota, in 1904, Mr. Hagelie
was united in marriage to Miss Marie Bridston, who
is a daughter of H. O. and Dorothy Bridston, the
former of whom is a substantial farmer. Mrs.
Hagelie completed her liberal education in the
Maysville Normal School at Maysville, North Da-
kota, and before marriage was a teaclier for some
time. Mr. and Mrs. Hagelie have two children,
namely : Verna, who was born December 6, 1906 ;
and Raymond, who was born October 21, 1910.
.Although his life has been one of business care
and responsibility. Mr. Hagelie has never deemed
politics or public service other than citizenship
duties, and has honestly endeavored to be useful in
such relations to his community. On April, 1919, he
was elected a member of the City Council of Man-
hattan, on the democratic ticket, his fellow citizens
thereby showing their approval of his thorough way
of doing business and bringing about substantial re-
sults. He is serving also as secretary of the Com-
mercial Club. Mr. and Mrs. Hagelie are members
of the Lutheran Church.
Fred M. Bytjne. In the less extensive and popu-
lous cities of the West the postmaster is very likely
to be brought into contact with a greater number of
the inhabitants and at more frequent intervals than
almost any other member of the community. Few
are the individual residents of either sex who do not
become familiar with his presence and deportment
and cognizant of his habits and characteristics, and
there are likewise few, on the other hand, whom he
has not learned to know. With such an intimate
relationship existing between the man conducting
the postoffice and the townspeople depending upon
it. fortunate is the incumbent of that office when
all the residents of the place have for him only
words of commendation. Such is the favored posi-
tion of Postmaster Fred M. Byrne, who located at
Belgrade in 1910 as agent for the Chicago, Milwau-
kee & St. Paul Railway, and who a few years later
was appointed postmaster, a position which he had
held with marked fidelity and efficiency to the pres-
ent time.
Mr. Byrne is a member of a family which settled
in colonial days in Virginia, where his grandfather
was born and where he died. Himself a native of
West Columbia. West Virginia, he was born Janu-
ary 12, 187.1, a son of Thomas Marshall and Hannah
(Boyce) (Kay) Byrne. His father was born in
1823, in Braxton County. West Virginia, where he
was reared and first married and where he was
originally in the oil business, although he later took
up merchandising. During the late '50s he moved to
West Columbia, West Virginia, where he continued
to occupy himself as a merchant until his death in
March, 1897. He was a democrat, but took only a
good citizens part in public affairs. His second wife
was Hannah (Boyce) Kay, who was born in 1840
in England, and still survives her husband as a resi-
dent of Wheaton, Minnesota, and they were the
parents of six children : George, formerly a black-
smith of Olivia, Minnesota, who died in 1898 at
the age of twenty-six years ; Fred M. ; Betty, the
wife of E. A. Johnson, in the machinery and hard-
ware business at Huntington, West Virginia ; Ralph
E., station agent for the Chicago, St. Paul & Mil-
waukee Railway at Bowman, North Dakota ; Frank
P., twin of Ralph E., ex-postmaster and present dep-
uty sheriff of Three Forks, Montana; and Minnie,
the wife of E. G. Hammond, a gr-ain buyer of
Wheaton, Minnesota.
Fred M. Byrne was educated in the public schools
of West Columbia and Charleston, West Virginia,
and at seventeen years of age left school to take up
the study of telegraphy, although for two years
he also applied himself to truck gardening. Upon
mastering his chosen vocation he began working
for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway in
Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota, and in
the fall of 1910 was sent to Belgrade, Montana, as
agent for his company. For three years he faithfully
discharged the duties of his position, and in 1914
was appointed by President Wilson as postmaster,
and has since acted in this capacity. His continuous
conduct of the office up to this time has met with the
hearty commendation of the people, and in addition
to being a conscientious worker in an endeavor to
elevate the service, is the possessor of those quali-
ties of candor, sincerity, faithfulness and affability
which give the best class of public officials a high
standing in the estimation of those whose interests
are entrusted to their care.
Mr. Byrne is a stanch democrat and unwavering
in his support of the principles and candidates of the
party which he joined at the time of the attainment
of his majority. He belongs to Belgrade Lodge No.
68, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Belgrade
Camp, Modern Woodmen of America, in both of
which he has numerous friends, and is also a mem-
ber of the Belgrade Commercial Club. His career
has been successful from a materialistic viewpoint,
and in addition to being a stockholder in the Farm-
ers Bank of Belgrade he is the owner of a modern,
attractive and well furnished home, where his many
friends are always sure of a cordial welcome, located
on Quaw Boulevard.
In 1903, at Olivia, Minnesota, Mr. Byrne was
united in marriage with Miss Lillian Pfeiffer,
daughter of John and Mary Pfeiffer, former farm-
ing people of Minnesota who are both deceased.
Mrs. Byrne, who is a graduate of the Winona (Min-
nesota) Normal School, was a schoolteacher before
her marriage, and is a lady of many graces and ac-
complishments. They are the parents of two chil-
dren : Margaret, born February 10, 1905, a freshman
in the Belgrade High School ; and Marshall, born
April 24, 1907, who is attending the graded public
school at Belgrade.
Tortus Lundevall is: a banker of long experience
and training, and since 1917 has been actively iden-
tified with the banking, financial and other business
interests of the city of Scobey. He was associated
with other Minnesota business men and' bankers who
organized the Citizens State Bank at Scobey about
nine vears ago.
Mr! Lundevall was born at Kviteseid, Norway,
356
HISTORY OF MONTANA
October 29, 1871, son of Olaf and Aasne (Groven)
Lundevall, who spent all their lives in the Norwegian
country. Of their five children the four sons are
still living, Torjus being the only one in America.
He grew up in Norway and was very well educated
both in literary matters and for business. He at-
tended a teachers' seminary, the Government Latin
School and the Government Business College in
Norway. For one term he taught in a country
community, and was bookkeeper in a wholesale dry
goods house at Christiania until he immigrated to
the United States. From Christiania he sailed on
the ship Angelo to Hull, crossed Britain by rail to
Liverpool, and came to New York on the Gallia.
His destination was Crookston, Minnesota, where a
^riend of his father lived. He reached there with-
ers in cash, and sent that back home as soon as he
found work. The first summer he taught in a Nor-
wegian parochial school, following which he com-
pleted a course in a business college at Minneapolis,
and for one year was employed as a stenographer at
Montevideo, Minnesota. Mr. Lundevall acquired a
very thorough knowledge of banking in the State
Bank of Milan, Minnesota, an institution with which
he was connected for eight years, beginning as book-
keeper and terminating his service as cashier. For
twelve years he was associated with the State Bank
of Greenbush, Minnesota, successively as cashier and
vice president, and was actively identified with its
management for twelve years. It was from Green-
bush that Mr. Lundevall came to Scobey in 1917.
He had become interested in the establishment of
the Citizens State Bank as early as 191 1, when he
became a stockholder in the private bank of T. An-
derson, Oie & Company, who subsequently chartered
the Citizens State Bank. However, his active asso-
ciation with the bank and its related enterprises be-
gan only in 1917. He is now vice president of the
bank, president of the Citizens Loan Company and
secretary of the Citizens Realty Company, all of
which have come into existence as auxiliaries of the
mother institution.
Mr. Lundevall had been in America only a short
time when he applied for his first citizenship papers
and completed his naturalization in about five years.
His father's old friend told hirn that whatever he
did politically, "do not be a democrat." He cast his
first presidential vote for Major McKinley and has
supported the principles of his party since. His only
public official service has been as a member of
Village Councils and Boards of Education. He took
the lodge degrees of Masonry at Appleton, Minne-
sota, and is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen
of America. During the war, like other patriotic
citizens of Scobey, he actively contributed to the
purchase of bonds and worked in behalf of the
Red Cross. Mr. Lundevall since coming to Scobey
has built a modern eight-roorn house on Timmons
Street.
_ At .Mbert Lea, Minnesota, June 22, 1898, he mar-
ried Miss Evenna Groven, who was born in Minne-
sota, March 16, 1872, only child of Evan and Annie
(Harelson) Groven, natives of Norway. Mrs.
Lundevall attended the Lutheran Academy at Al-
bert Lea, and prior to her marriage was employed
as a clerk in a business at Northwood, North Da-
kota. Mr. and Mrs. Lundevall have two children,
Valborg Astoria, a student in St. Olaf College at
Northfield, Minnesota, and Dagmar, attending the
public schools of Scobey.
WiLLi,\M Jewett Kress, M. D. The entire absence
of competition cannot account for the professional
success and personal prestige of Dr. William Jewett
Kress, of Belgrade, for while he is the onlv physi-
cian of this thriving and enterprising little city his
achievements have been such as to mark him as a
man of the highest ability and professional capacity,
and his services have been such during his compara-
tively short residence here as to strengthen the repu-
tation which he won both professionally and per-
sonally in long years of practice in other parts of
the country.
Doctor Kress was born in Vancou\er, Washing-
ton, September 6, 1873, and belongs, to a family
which originally came from Germany during Colo-
nial days and settled in Pennsylvania. His father.
General John A. Kress, who resides in retirement at
No. 5030 Vernon Avenue, St. Louis, Missouri, was
born in 1841, at Cory, Pennsylvania, and had a long
and brilliant military career. Graduated from West
Point Military Academy, he entered the United
States Army as a first lieutenant, and served all
through the war betw'een the states, during which
he rose to the rank of captain. Later he saw much
fighting during the border Indian warfare days, and
later took an active part in the Spanish-American
war, being retired at the age of sixty-four years
with a splendid record and the rank of brigadier
general. He is a republican in politics, a Mason, and
a member of the Episcopal Church. General Kress
married Lydia Homet, who was born in 1854 in the
state of New York and died at St. Louis, Missouri,
in 1885, and they became the parents of seven chil-
dren : Frederick, a graduate of Annapolis Naval
.•\cademy, class of 1886, who was an officer in the
United States Navy and died at Benicia, California,
when but twenty-three years of age ; Marion, who
died at the age of twenty years as the wife of
tlie late Frederick Richardson, who was a ranch
owner near Los Angeles, California; Helen, who
died at St. Louis, aged twenty-nine years, as the
wife of the late Fred Gurley. a railroad man; Dr.
William Jewett, of this review ; Frances, of St.
Louis, widow of Lieutenant John Morrison, United
States .\merica, who met a soldier's death during the
Philippine campaign ; Clarence C, a physician anl
surgeon, and past assistant surgeon of the United
States Navy, now stationed on the United States
Steamship Minnesota ; and John A., Jr., who died at
the age of twenty-one years at San Antonio, Texas,
where he was a ranch owner.
William Jewett Kress received his early education
in the public schools of St. Louis, Missouri, where
he was graduated from high school in 1890, follow-
ing which he entered Washington University and
was graduated with the class of 1894, receiving
his degree of Doctor of Medicine. Subsequently he
took post-graduate work at the New York Poly-
clinic and at Bellevue Hospital in 1895, and in 1896
began the practice of his calling at Butte, Montana.
where until 1898 he was in partnership with Dr.
George H. Wells, with whom he conducted a private
hospital. In 1898 he went to St. Louis, where he
continued in practice until 1915, and in that year
returned to Montana as a mine physician at Sand
Coulee. In 1918, Doctor Kress embarked in prac-
tice at Belgrade, where he is the only physician,
and where he carries on a general medical and sur-
gical practice with offices in the Belgrade Building.
He has a pleasing and confidence-inspiring per-
sonality, and his professional and general equip-
ment has led him far toward the realization of a
broad and exceptionally useful life. In the ranks
of his calling he has advanced to a high place in the
esteem of his fellow practitioners, and he is a valued
member of the Gallatin County Medical Society, the
Montana State Medical Society and the American
Medical Association. In the capacity of city health
officer he applies his conscientious energies to pre-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
serving the health and sanitation of the city of his
adoption, and for a time he also acted in the capac-
ity of health officer of Gallatin County. In his poli-
tical adherence he maintains an independent stand,
voting for man rather than party, and in all civic
movements can be found allying his influence with
the forces making for progress and advancement.
His fraternal connection is with Belgrade Lodge No.
82, Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Doctor
Kress owns his own modern home at the corner of
Broadway Street and Central Avenue.
In igcS, at Poughkeepsie, New York, Doctor Kress
was united in marriage with Miss Blanche Ella
Ta_\lor, daughter of Lyman P. Taylor, a native of
Illinois and railroad man who died at Omaha. He
married Mary Ellen Van Wormer, a native of
Rome, New York, who resides with Doctor and
Mrs. Kress, and through whom Mrs. Kress is a
direct descendant of Anika Jans, who came to
America at the time of Peter Stuyvesant.
John H. Congdon. E.xtensive mercantile and min-
ing interests serve to make John H. Congdon, a
foremost business man of Manhattan, one of the
men of independent fortune of Gallatin county.
Montana, and that his portion in the financial
world has been largely due to his own energy and
enterprise is all the more creditable.
John H. Congdon was born at Dover, New Jer-
sey. November 6, 1866, and is a son of William
and Mary (Shears) Congdon, the latter of wnom
resides with her son at Manhattan. William Cong-
don was born in England, in January, 1840, and died
at Manhattan. Montana, April 17, 1919. He came
to the United States in 1862, went to Michigan and
at first worked in the copper mines, but later be-
came a contractor in ore mining and lived at Mount
Hope, New Jersey. In 1872 he came west again and
until 1874 was concerned in silver and gold mining
at several points in Nevada, then went to Grass
Valley, California, and became a gold miner. He
remained on the Pacific coast until 1877, then re-
turned for a year to New Jersey, but in 1878 came
to Colorado, where he leased both gold and silver
mines. In 1880 he became interested at Leadville,
in gold and silver mining, and for a number of
years afterward was connected with the Small Hopes
Consolidated Mining Company there. In 1891
he gave himself another year of rest in his New
Jersey home, but 1892 found him at Butte, Montana,
interested in copper mining with the Amalgamated
Company, and he remained there as foreman and
also in an official capacity until 1912, when he came
to Manhattan. Here he built a handsome residence,
which his son John H. now owns, and here his last
years were spent in great comfort. He was a re-
publican in the political field and for many years
was a member of the Masonic fraternity. His ac-
quaintance was wide in mining circles and his judg-
ment was considered worth while, for he had thor-
ough experience, often in virgin fields. Of his chil-
dren, John H. is the eldest, the others being: Anna,
who is the wife of Newton Ely, a retired merchant
tailor living at Dover, New Jersey; A. C, who is a
resident of Butte. Montana, is a member of the
mercantile firm of Evans & Congdon, also is at the
head of the Economy Grocery Company, and is an
extensive rancher in the Upper Madison District,
Montana ; and Lucy, who resides with her mother
and brother at Manhattan and looks after their home
comfort.
John H. Congdon attended the public schools and
after his high school course spent eighteen months
in Coleman's Business College at Newark, New
Jersey, but prior to this had spent two years at
Leadville, Colorado, attending school during the
winters and working as a shipping clerk for his
father during the summers. After completing his
education he went to New York and worked there
in a grocery house until 1892, when he came to
Butte and was employed in a store in that city
until 1899. He then embarked in business for him-
self by establishing a general merchandise enter-
prise which he conducted under the style of the
J. H. Congdon Company until 1908, when he sold
to Evans & Congdon, his brother, A. C. Congdon,
being the junior member of the firm. In the same
year he became interested in prospecting and min-
ing in German Gulch at Twin Mountains, where
at present he owns extensive interests. In 1909
Mr. Congdon came to Manhattan with the San-
born Company, merchants, and continued finan-
cially interested in this company until 1915, ia which
year he bought his present store, in association
with his brother A. C, as sole owners, and the
business is conducted as the Congdon Company. It
is a large establishment situated on Railroad Ave-
nue, and is one of the important business houses of
the place. Mr. Congdon is a stockholder and a di-
rector in the Home State Bank, and he is secretary
and treasurer of the Garfield Mining Company, a
large development proposition, and both copper and
gold have been located by a tunnel of 1,690 feet.
Mr. Congdon owns, as mentioned above, the family
home at Manhattan and has a large amount of other
city property. He is a member of the Chamber
of Commerce, is a republican in political attitude,
and belongs to Lodge No. 80, Odd Fellows, at Man-
hattan. Personally Mr. Congdon impresses one most
favorably, his face indicating strength and business
purpose, and his manner friendliness and sincerity.
Myron Stanley C.^rpenter. Of the journalists
of Montana whose experiences in newspaper lite
have covered a period of more than a quarter of
a century, few have found in their chosen careers
greater contentment or more material success than
that which has come to Myron Stanley Carpenter,
owner and publisher of the Belgrade Journal. Like
numerous others of the guild, he began his con-
nection with the business at the case, and his long
identification with the editing and preparing of
publications has covered a wide range of expe-
riences and an extensive stretch of territory. At
Belgrade, where both he and his paper are perma-
nently located, he has become one of his commu-
nity's most prominent and influential citizens and
a molder of public thought both through the col-
umns of his journal and in his capacity as a public
official.
Mr. Carpenter was born at Ripon, Wisconsm,
.\pril 16. 1872, a son of Seth Bell Carpenter, and
a member of a family which traces its ancestry
back in this country to the landing of the May-
flower passengers. Seth Bell Carpenter was born
in Vermont, in 1836, and was a young man when
he took up his residence and engaged in the meat
business at Ripon, Wisconsin. In June, 1872, he
removed with his family to Green Lake, Wiscon-
sin, where he embarked in the same line of busi-
ness, and where he spent the rest of his life, with
the exception of two years passed in Kansas and
four vears in the north central part of Wisconsin
He died at Green Lake in 1898. in the faith of
the Congregational Church, of which he had been
a lifelong member and generous supporter. Po-
litically a republican, he was one of his party s
influential men in his community, and served as
roadmaster at Green Lake for a number of years.
Fraternally he was affiliated with the Masons. Mr.
358
[IISTORY OF MONTANA
Carpenter married Nancy Matilda Stanley, who
was born in 1834, also in Vermont, and died at
Green Lake, Wisconsin, in 1902. and they were
the parents of the following children: Viola A.,
who died unmarried at Green Lake, at the age of
fortv-five years; Loretta, who married first Ed-
win Long, a farmer and merchant at Green Lake,
and after his death married Lorenzo D. Patter-
son, and resides on a farm near Green Lake, where
Mr. Patterson is the owner of a large and valuable
property and one of the wealthy men of his com-
munity; Clara C. is the widow of \\'alter Cole, who
was a merchant at Green Lake, and she lost her
son, Harvey, in the great drive in the Argonne
Forest, France, October 7, igi8; Elva, the wife of
H. P. Smith, identified with a banking house at
Superior, Wisconsin ; Freeman, a rancher and meat
merchant at Maxville, Kansas; Myron Stanley;
and Wilson R., who died at the age of sixteen years.
Myron Stanley Carpenter wa^; educated in the
public schools of Green Lake, Wisconsin, and at
the age of fourteen years began work for his
father in the meat business. This line, however,
did not prove congenial, and when he attained his
majority he turned his attention to the printer's
trade, which he followed at Hortonville, Wiscon-
sin, until 189-I. In the fall of that year he returned
to Green Lake and founded the Green Lake County
Reporter, a modest publication at the start which
he built up into sizeable proportions, retaining it
until 1907. when he accepted an attractive offer
and disposed of his interests. He next purchased
an interest in the Princeton Republic, at Prince-
ton, Wisconsin, but sold it after 2' i months and
returned to Green Lake, where he established a
job printing office, in conjunction with the con-
duct of which he published an advertising sheet
known as the Live Wire. Mr. Carpenter contin-
ued to be thus employed until September, 1909,
when he came to Montana and formed a connec-
tion with the Belgrade Journal. This lasted until
October, 1910, when he established the Three Forks
News and edited it until 191 1, when he sold his
stock. He was foreman of the mechanical depart-
ment of the Bozeman Chronicle during the cam-
paign of 1912. In the meantime Mr. Carpenter
had homesteaded 160 acres of land situated fifteen
miles north of Three Forks, a property which he
still owns, and lived on his ranch until Septem-
ber, 1913, when the call of the craft again became
too strong to resist and he became editor of the
Three Forks News. He purchased the controlling
interest in the Belgrade Journal, March 15, 1915.
and at this time he and his wife are sole owners
of this weekly publication, which is printed every
Thursday. The Journal was established in 1900,
and is independent in its political stand. It has an
excellent circulation throughout Gallatin and the
surrounding counties and devotes its columns to
clean and authentic news and interesting features,
with timely and well-written editorials and spe-
cial articles. The plant and offices a'e situated on
Northern Pacific Avenue, and a well-eauipped iob
oflSce is maintained at which reliable and attractive
work is done.
Mr. Carpenter is a stanch democrat and his long
activities in the ranks of his party culminated in
1018 when he became the democratic nominee for
the Legislature. The campaign was one of the
hardest-fought in the history of the countv, Mr.
Carpenter being defeated by five votes by M. W.
Penwell, the choice of the republican party. Mr.
Carpenter is serving his community capably in the
capacities of justice of the peace and police magis-
trate. He is a valued and active member of the
Belgrade Commercial Club, of which he was presi-
dent for two years and secretary for a like pe-
riod, and also is popular with his fellow-members
in Belgrade Lodge No. 82, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, and Three Forks Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America. With his family he belongs
to the Presbyterian Church, in which he is an elder.
On December 16, 1896, Mr. Carpenter was mar-
ried at Green Lake, Wisconsin, to Miss Andilusia
Randall, a daughter of Hubert and Maria (Merri-
thew) Randall, the latter of whom resides
on her homestead ranch in Montana. Mr. Randall,
who was a veteran of the Civil war and a lifelong
agriculturist in Wisconsin, died at Marshfield, that
state. Two children have been born to Mr. and
Mrs. Carpenter, namely : Randall Seth, who at-
tended the State Normal School at Superior, Wis-
consin, entered the Students' Army Training Corps
while there, and became a bugler and a corporal, and
is now residing at Belgrade, where he is assisting
his father with his business duties and also in the
conduct of his ranch ; and Miss Erma Arvis, who is
a sophomore at the Belgrade High School.
WiLLi.\M E. Parkins. In the various activities
which make up the life of the thriving and en-
terprising City of • Belgrade, William E. Parkins
has been a factor of prominence. His business
connections include the assistant secretaryship of
the Gallatin Valley Milling Company and a direc-
torship in the Farmers Bank of Belgrade, as a
public servant he is capably discharging the duties
of council member, and in religious and social
circles he is known as a man of constructive teii-
dencies and one with the best interests of his
community at heart.
Mr. Parkins was born in Madison County. Mon-
tana. March 13, 1878, a son of W. J. Parkins. His
father was a native of Godmanchester. England,
born in 1840. and reared and educated in his na-
tive place. He came to the United States during
the late ';os and was married at Littleton. Colorado.
In 1864 he came to Montana, locating in the Ruby
Valley of Madison County, where he became a pio-
neer rancher, homesteader and stockman, and de-
spite the fact that he died at the early age of forty-
two years, in 1882. was one of the reasonablv
successful men of his locality. He was a republi-
can in politics and a member of the Episcopal
Church. Mr. Parkins married Marcia Montgomery,
who was born at Waddington. New York, and
still survives, making her home with her son at
Belgrade, and three children were born to the
union ; Hattie M., who died at Craig, Montana,
in iQi.^, as the wife of E. T. Trerise, now a re-
tired farmer of Helena, Montana; 'William E. ;
and a daughter who died in infancy. Following
the death of her husband Mrs. Parkins took her
children back to Littleton, Colorado, and then to
Denver, spending four years in these two places,
later spent a year each in Madison County, Mon-
tana, and Denver, Colorado, and then went to Boise,
Idaho, for one vear. She had formerly been mar-
ried to Dr. J. H. Miller, who was born in 1830,
in Maryland, and was a physician bv profession.
He came to Helena. Montana, in i88q, where he
practiced medicine for one year, and then located
at Belgrade, spending ten years, subsequently prac-
ticing at Twin Bridges, Virginia City, Norris and
finally Littleton. Colorado, where he died in 1912.
He and his wife had no children, and after his
death she moved to Belgrade to live with her son,
William E.
William E. Parkins attended the schools of Lit-
tleton, and Denver, Colorado ; Virginia City. Mon-
"iUmr^U^-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tana ; Boise City, Idaho ; and Helena, Belgrade and
Bozeman, Montana, and at the last-named place
finished the freshman year in the Montana State
College. Leaving that institution in 1898, he se-
cured employment as a stenographer and office
assistant at Bozeman, and later acted in a like ca-
pacity at Butte. In the fall of 1903 he came to
Belgrade as bookkeeper for the Gallatin Valley
Milling Company, and since that time has been
steadily promoted until he now occupies the posi-
tion of assistant secretary with this concern and
has risen to a recognized place among the capable
business men of his city. The mills and offices of
this company are situated along the tracks of the
Chicago. Milwaukee & St. Paul and Northern Pa-
cific Railway's tracks, and the mills have a capacity
of 250 barrels of flour daily. Mr. Parkins has
been a factor in securing increased business for
his concern and in making it one of the substan-
tial houses of its kind in the county. He has va-
rious connections and is a director in the Farmers
Bank of Belgrade, and his associates have every
reason to place faith and confidence in his ability.
Politically a republican, Mr. Parkins has interested
himself in a practical way in civic affairs, and is
at present a member of the council and one of the
working and constructive members of that body.
His religious connection is with the Episcopal
Church, which he is serving as treasurer, and
fraternally he is past master of Belgrade Lodge
No. 68, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. He
also belongs to the Commercial Club.
Mr. Parkins was married in IQ14, at Bozeman,
Montana, to Miss Emma Rehsteiner, daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. John Rehsteiner, both of whom are
deceased. Mrs. Parkins, who is a native of Tell
City, Indiana, was a professional nurs" prior to
her marriage, and is a lady of many graces and
accomplishments. Two children have been born to
Mr. and Mrs. Parkins : William E., Jr., born March
I, 1916; and Katherine, born May 10, 1917.
Major William W. Alderson. While :iot chron-
ologically the first. Major William W. Alderson was
among the very first not only in point of time but
in influence and achievement among the pioneers of
Bozeman, and has long been regarded as one of the
city's real founders and builders.
He was born at Arkendale, North Riding, York-
shire, England, February 28, 1831, and died at Boze-
man, October 15, 1906, at the age of seventy-five,
having been a resident of Bozeman more than forty
years. When he was seventeen years of age he
came with his parents to the United States. The
Alderson family settled in western Illinois, near the
city of Galena. On May 30. i8S4. at Shullsburg,
Wisconsin, Mr. Alderson married Frances W.
Weatherby. For a few years he was engaged in
business at Shullsburg, but in 1858 moved to Minne-
sota Territory, and was one of the first to engage
in the milling business in Winona County. In the
fall of i860 he returned to Illinois, living for a time
at Council Hill, where he had charge of the milling
business of his brother, Simon Alderson, and also
did some farming.
In the spring of 1864. Mr. Alderson and his
younger brother, John Alderson, came across the
plains to the Northwest, to the then great Idaho
Territory, part of which is now Montana. Perhaps
a dozen earlier settlers had preceded them into the
Gallatin Valley. The Aldersons arrived at the pres-
ent site of Bozeman on July 14, 1864. They soon
settled on a claim a mile south of the present Main
Street of Bozeman. John remained with his brother
a few years, but Major .'\lderson lived there ten
years and in the meantime, while engaged in farm-
ing and dairying, he helped to establish the town
of Bozeman, and proposed the name for the town,
which was adopted August 9, 1864, in honor of the
famous guide, John M. Bozeman, who piloted many
emigrant trains through the mountain pass approach-
ing this city.
Mr. Alderson and his brother started the building
of a log house larger than their first cabin in 1865,
William J. Beall, one of the founders of the city,
assisting in the work. The house was completed in
1866. when Mr. Alderson was joined by his family,
consisting of his wife and four children, who ar-
rived from Wisconsin, having made the trip up the
Missouri River from St. Louis to Fort Benton. Part
of the original Alderson claim is now a choice resi-
dence section of the city of Bozeman, and the old
log house that was the Alderson home for several
years is still standing, one of the picturesque land-
marks of the Gallatin Valley.
Mr. Alderson and his brother were among the
first to raise wheat in the Gallatin Valley in 1865,
and since that time farming has been a profitable
industry. In order to secure seed they drove to
Cache Valley. Utah, and by the time they com-
pleted the trip the wheat and oats cost them 20
cents per pound. Their first plow, purchased in
Virginia City, cost $150, and the teeth of their har-
row, made from an old wagon tire, cost 40 cents per
pound. Mr. Alderson brought the first Wood's Har-
vester to Montana in 1865.
Mr. Alderson was not only active in the early
agricultural advancement of the community, but he
was also a leader in religious and educational work.
He had been ordained as a local preacher before
coming west, and he conducted the first religious
services in Gallatin Valley, at the farm home of
Oscar E. Penwell and his brother. Merritt W. Pen-
well, in July, 1865, on the ranch where M. W. Pen-
well and his family now reside, about twelve miles
northwest of Bozeman. He organized the first Sim-
day school in Bozeman in 1866, and raised the funds
to build the first church in this part of Montana, the
Methodist Episcopal Church built in 1866 and 1867.
He performed the marriage ceremony for many pio-
neer couples, and was called from the fields on his
farm to perform the burial services for pioneers and
their children.
The records of the school district still in existence
show that Mr. Alderson was a member of the
school board of the district in which Bozeman is lo-
cated in 1868, and he served for twelve years on
the board. He hauled lumber to build the first
school house in the district, a building now used
as a residence. He was also instrumental in se-
curing the first brick school house -in the district.
For four years he was a member of the City Coun-
cil, and was interested in many public movements.
In 1873 Mr. .-Mderson was appointed United States
Indian agent at the Milk River Agency, and for
three years he successfully held in check and man-
aged the Sioux and Assiniboines. inducing many of
these Indians to engage in farming. It was during
his service as Indian agent that he acquired the title
of Major. He resigned in 1876 in order to return to
Bozeman to be with his family.
."Xs a member of the Fifteenth Territorial As-
sembly in 1886 and 1887, Major Alderson served
with notable ability and indefatigable energy through
the regular and special sessions. He was also a
representative from Gallatin County in the Fourth
Legislative Assembly of the state of Montana, and
'as chairman of the committee on buildings and
grounds, and also as a member of the committee on
appropriations, he had much to do with securing
HISTORY OF MONTANA
for Montana the splendid educational institutions
of which it now boasts.
Major Alderson helped to organize the Society
of Montana Pioneers, and also the Pioneers Society
of Gallatin County. He served efficiently as presi-
dent of both organizations. He took a prominent
part in the organization of the republican party in
Gallatin County under conditions that were the re-
verse of encouraging.
It was perhaps in his long and active career as
a newspaper man that Major Alderson was best
known throughout the state and in other states. It
was more with a view to increasing his usefulness
than as a financial venture that he entered the jour-
nalistic field in 1877 by purchasing the Avant Courier,
a weekly paper that had been established in 1871
as the successor of the Montana Pick and Plow,
Bozeman's first paper. For nearly thirty years he
continued to wield an important influence in the
state through his fearless editorial utterances.
The Avant Courier was for several years the only
paper published between Bismarck and Helena, and
its files are considered valuable historical records.
The Avant Courier and Gallatin County Republi-
can were merged July I, 1905. and in the consolida-
tion Major Alderson was elected managing editor,
a position he filled most ably until a short time be-
fore his death, dictating editorials after he became
too weak physically to write, his mind being active
until near the end. The columns of his paper were
always open to the people of the community, and
Major Alderson took special pride in chronicling
events marking progress or that were calculated to
add to the fame of the favored region in the up-
building of which he played an important part. His
pen was always ready to advance the interests of
the community and the state in which he lived.
The Montana Press Association was another or-
ganization that Major Alderson helped to organize,
and during its prosperous years he was one of its
most earnest workers. He served as first vice presi-
dent and as second president of the organization.
In his address as president of the association he
spoke to the news gatherers as follows : "How-
ever humble your lot or unpretentious your station
in the field of journalism, never lose sight of the
fact that you are, or should be, a gentleman, the peer
of all j'our patrons, and a reliable news gatherer in
the community. Whether the circulation of your
paper reaches 300, 500 or 1,000, you have a larger
if not a more appreciative and intelligent audience
than any preacher or platform orator within the
range of your editorial thunder, and that your weekly
productions will be critically scanned and deliberately
estimated in the scales of calm and deliberate pub-
lic opinion."
The newspapers of the state did not hesitate to
speak in appreciation of Major Alderson's work
while he was living, and at the time of his death
there were many editorial tributes, among them be-
ing a number of references to him as the "dean of
Montana journalism," while the editor of the Butte
Miner said, among other things : "To a great ex-
tent, what Charles A. Dana was to the newspaper
world of the United States. Major Alderson was
to the profession in Montana."
The Alderson family moved from the ranch home
in 1874 to a commodious residence half a mile nearer
the city, the home on Central Avenue, now one of
the prettiest streets in Jhe city, being the scene of
many happy gatherings and community social af-
fairs. Here Mr. and Mrs. Alderson celebrated their
golden wedding anniversary in 1904, and all their
living children except one and some grandchildren
were home to celebrate the occasion. At this home
both Major Alderson and his wife died.
Mrs. Alderson was born in Durham County, Eng-
land, May 5, 1834, and died at Bozeman, December
19, 1910. Of the nine children born to Major and
Mrs. Alderson, Matthew W., the oldest, is editor
of the Northwestern Stockman and Farmer at
Helena. Edward C, a farmer and guide, died in
Bozeman in 1917. The third is Mrs. E. L. Houston,
of Bozeman. Mary F., who died in Chicago in
1903, was first married to Milton Russell, and later
became the wife of Dr. Charles Dietz, of Chicago.
Anna G. is the wife of James S. Hammond, a mer- ■
chant at Billings. Margaret H,, with her husband,
Stephen A. Ulmer, lives on the Alderson ranch,
where Charles R. Alderson, the next member of
the family, is manager and one of the owners. Wil-
liam B. died at the age of sixteen, and George Frank-
lin, the youngest, is linotype operator for the Boze-
man Chronicle. There are eleven grandchildren liv-
ing and four great-grandchildren.
Mrs. Elizabeth Lina (Alderson) Houston has
many of the literary gifts of her honored father,
and has long been prominent as a teacher and news-
paper writer. She was born near Winona, Min-
nesota, and was brought to the Gallatin Valley in
early childhood. She was educated at Bozeman, be-
ing a member of the first class graduated from the
Bozeman High School. She attended through the
sophomore year Northwestern University at Evans-
ton, Illinois, leaving school in 1883, and the fol-
lowing year, at Bozeman, became the wife of Mr.
Stafford Houston.
The late Mr, Houston was born in Carroll County,
Missouri, and died at Fillmore, California. He was
a graduate of a business college in his native county
and was in the insurance business in St. Louis, while
following his marriage he lived at Bozeman and
conducted a stationery business. He served as
deputy sheriff of Gallatin County, was a democrat
in politics and a member of the Episcopal Church.
Mr. and Mrs. Houston had one daughter, Edith, who
was the wife of Howard M. Richardson, formerly
manager for the Copeland Lumber Company at Man-
hattan, Montana. Mrs. Richardson died February
16, 1920, from influenza-pneumonia, and five days
later her husband died from the same cause. They
left a son, John Robert, who is being reared by the
grandmother, Mrs. Houston, and a daughter, Eliza-
beth, born the day before her mother's death, who
is being reared by Mrs. Houston's sister, Mrs. S. A.
Ulmer, and her husband.
After the death of her husband Mrs. Houston
went to Chicago and for eleven years was engaged
alternately in work as bookkeeper and teacher. She
returned to Bozeman in 1902 and has also taught
school in this city, though for the greater part
of the time she has been engaged in newspaper
work. At present she is news writer for_ the Boze-
man Chronicle, and reports for the large dailies. Mrs.
Houston has collected an enormous amount of data,
preparatory to the compilation of a history of the
Gallatin Valley. She has prepared many interesting
sketches of local pioneers, and for the past ten
years has been secretary of the Pioneers Society
of Gallatin County. She is Montana director of
the General Federation of Women's Clubs, and for
two years was president of the State Federation.
She has served as a member of the County Edu-
cational Examining Board for nine years and is a
member of the Board of Trustees of the Gallatin
County High School. Mrs. Houston is a member
of the Episcopal Church. Her home is in the Black-
more Apartments.
HISTORY OF AIOXTANA
361
John Dimon, M. D., physician and surgeon of
Three Forks, is one of the capable and highly
trained members of his profession in Gallatin Coun-
ty. He was born in Clay County, Kansas, Janu-
ary 4, 1884, a son of N. H. Dimon, and grandson
of Nathan Hedges Dimon, born at Sag Harbor,
Long Island, New York, in 1814, and died in Clay
County, Kansas, in igog. During his active life he
was a seaman, going on whaling voyages from
Sag Harbor, but when he retired he went to Kan-
sas. During the Civil war he served his country
as a patriot. His wife before marriage was a Miss
Ludlow, of New York State. Record is found of
the Dimon family in the colonial history of New
York, its representatives having come to this coun-
try from England about 1640.
N. H. Dimon was born at Sag Harbor, in 1847,
and there grew to manhood. In 1862, although
his father was in the service, he enlisted for the
remainder of the Civil war in a New Y'ork in-
fantry regiment, and was wounded at Cold Har-
bor, and after he recovered sufficiently to leave
the hospital he was honorably discharged. He
then took a three years' preparatory course at
Colgate University, following it with a four year
theological training, and was ordained a minister
of the Baptist faith. About 1873 he moved to Clay
Center, Kansas, and entered the educational field,
alternating school teaching with farming, and meet-
ing with gratifying success. He still resides at
Clay Center. Always a republican, he has confined
his political activities to exercising his right of
suffrage. For many years he has been an honored
member of the Odd Fellows. After coming to
Clay Center he was married to Priscilla Jane Row-
land, born in Pennsylvania in 1847. Mrs. Dimon
died at Clay Center in 191 5, she and her husband
having had two children, namely: Doctor Dimon;
and Charles A., who is principal of schools of Holi-
rood, Kansas.
After attending the rural schools of Clay Coun-
ty, John Dimon was graduated from the Clay
County High School of Clay Center in 1907, and
for the subsequent two years was engaged in teach-
ing school in Clay County. For a year he was a
student of Washburn College at Topeka, Kansas,
and then matriculated in the Kansas Medical Col-
lege at Topeka. from which he was graduated with
the degree of Doctor of Medicine. During the
ne.xt year he was interne at the Santa Fe Hos-
pital at Topeka, leaving that city for Rock Springs,
Wyoming. In six months Doctor Dimon went to
Nepper, Washington, and was there engaged in
practice for eighteen months. Once more he made
a change, selecting Elk River, Idaho, for the scene
of his labors during the succeeding three years.
In the meanwhile his country had entered the
great war, and Doctor Dimon, like so many of
the members of the medical profession, felt the
urgent need of men of his calling in the service,
so enlisted in June, 1918. as a first lieutenant in
the medical corps and was sent to Fort Reilly, and
thence to Travis, Texas, where he was placed in
the Eighteenth Sanitary Train. Eighteenth Division.
He was also in the base hospital at Camp Travis,
and was mustered out December 19. 1918. with
the commission of captain in the Medical Reserve
Corps. In January, 1919. Doctor Dimon came to
Three Forks, establishing his offices in the Ruby
Building, and is engaged in a general medical and
surgical practice. Doctor Dimon belongs to the
local, state and national medical associations. He
belongs to Elk River Lodge, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. Politically he is a republican.
On September 20, 1913, Doctor Dimon was mar-
ried to Miss Hadassa E. Denham, at Kansas City,
Missouri, a daughter of L. M. Denham, now de-
ceased, who was a veterinary surgeon and profes-
sional trainer of horses in Kansas, Oklahoma. Mis-
souri and Arkansas. Mrs. Denham survives her
husband and makes her home at Topeka, Kansas.
Doctor and Mrs. Dimon have no children. The
experience Doctor Dimon gained during his rrtili-
tary service is a valuable one, and aside from the
realization that he did his duty as he saw it and
was not found lacking when his country called upon
him for assistance in discharging its obligations,
he feels that his practice is benefitted by his asso-
ciation with others of his profession, and the op-
portunity he had to handle so many and varied
cases. In no calling have such radical changes
been effected as that of the healing profession,
and a long step forward was taken when the great-
est physicians and surgeons met on the common
ground of preserving the health and preventing the
fatal results from death and disease during the ti-
tanic conflict just terminated.
Cleveland Martin Young. Reliability and effi-
ciency, combined with practical knowledge, work
for success in any line, and especially is this true
when they are possessed by an alert young business
man such as Cleveland Martin Young, druggist
of Three Forks. Already he has made his the
leading drug store of Gallatin County, and has
otherwise made himself known as one of the typi-
cal men of Montana who may be depended upon
to accomplish whatever they set out to do. Mr.
Young was born at Bowling Green, Missouri, Au-
gust 23, 1885, a son of William E. Young. The
Young family is of Scotch descent and was founded
in this country during its colonial epoch, grafting
on the original excellent national characteristics
of Scotland others equally desirable as the mem-
bers became identified with their new home. Wil-
liam E. Young was born at St. Louis, Missouri,
in i860, and now resides at Three Forks, having
had an active career as merchant in Missouri and
stockman in Montana, to which he came in 1893,
first being at Livingston, but later coming to Three
Forks, where he was the pioneer merchant, but
continued his stockraising until his retirement. He
still owns a ranch of 160 acres of irrigated land,
eleven miles west of Three Forks. His residence
is in the old town of Three Forks, and he owns
the house and grounds. He is a democrat. Both
as a Mason and member of the Methodist Episco-
pal Church he lives up to high ideals, and is held
in the highest respect by all who know him. His
wife, Laura (Copenhaven) Young, was born at
Louisville, Missouri, in 1865, and their children are
as follows: Myrtle, who died at the age of twenty-
one years ; Cleveland Martin, who was the second
in order of birth ; Thomas J., who is a brakeman
for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad,
lives at Three Forks; Russie, who married Harry
Gillingham, an insurance agent, lives at Three
Forks ; and Eva, who married Harry Gustine, of
the county clerk's office, lives at Bozeman, Mon-
tana.
Cleveland Martin Young grew up in Gallatin
County and attended its schools, his graduation
from "the Three Forks High School being in 1903.
For the subsequent ten years Mr. Yoimg was en-
gaged in stockraising, but in 1913 became a mem-
ber of the drug house known as the Three Forks
Drug Company, in partnership with C. A. Berg.
The store is located in the postoffice building on
362
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Main Street, and is well equipped and fitted. A
full line of drugs and sundries is carried and a
very large patronage is enjoyed, that is increas-
ing annually. In addition to his drug interests
Mr. Young' owns his modern residence on Fifth
.'Kvenue. Like his father he is a democrat, but
has never sought to come before the public as a
candidate for office. In the Methodist Episcopal
Church he finds expression of his religious faith.
Mr. Young belongs to Three Forks Lodge No.
73, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Three
Forks Chapter, Royal Arch Masons.
In 1915 Mr. Young was married at Three Forks
to Miss" Jessalvn Wilkins. a daughter of A. H.
Wilkins, trainmaster for the Chicago, Milwaukee
& St. Paul Railroad. He and his wife are resi-
dents of Lewistown, Montana. Mrs. Young is a
graduate of the State University at Missoula, Mon-
tana, and a cultured lady of varied interests. The
son of Mr. and Mrs. Young, Floyd Albert, was
born May 4, 1916.
Fr.\nk p. Byrne as a young man learned teleg-
raphy. As a telegraph operator he naturally en-
tered the service of a railroad company and had
many assignments to the combination duties of
telegrapher and station agent. As a rule a railroad
telegrapher makes frequent changes of residence,
and Mr. Byrne in the course of his service has been
identified with many communities along the va-
rious lines of the Milwaukee system in the North-
west. In course of time he reached Three Forks,
Montana, where for the past ten years he has been
regarded as a permanent resident, having left the
service of the railroad and has entered vigorously
into local affairs.
Mr. Byrne, who is present deputy sheriff, with
Mrs. Byrne occupying the position of postmaster,
was born at West Columbia in Mason County, West
Virginia, May 17. 1877. Several generations of the
family lived in Virginia. His parents were Thomas
Marshall and Hannah (Boyce> Byrne. His father
was born in what is now West Virginia in 182,^.
was a pioneer oil man and later a merchant and
continued in business at West Columbia until his
death in March. 1807. Hannah (Boyce) Kay was
his second wife. She was born in England in 1830
and is still living, a resident of Wheaton. Minnesota.
Of their six children three have been railroad men,
Fred M.. Ralph E. and Frank P., the two latter are
twins, the former a station agent for the Chicago.
Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway in North Dakota.
Frank P. Byrne acquired his early education in
the public schools of his native town. He left
home at the age of fourteen and for four vears
worked as a market gardener at Charleston, West
Virginia. Coming west, he learned telegraphy at
Brownton, Minnesota, and was first employed as an
operator bv the Soo Railway at Marine Falls, Min-
nesota, and subsequently at Heafford Junction, Wis-
consin, and Faithhorn Junction, Michigan. In
i8qo he joined the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul
Railway, first as an operator at Cologne and later
as agent at various points along the Hastings and
Dakota Division. He was promoted and served as
train dispatcher at .Aberdeen. South Dakota, on
the James River Division, during 1906-07. He was
then sent to Mcintosh. South Dakota, on the Trans-
Missouri Division of the Pacific Coast extension
of that now trans-continental railway, and was
station agent there linfil 1008. Mr. Byrne has al-
ways had an inclination for politics and public
affairs, and he was elected and served two years
as auditor of Corson County, South Dakota. He
resigned that office and came to Three Forks. Mon-
tana, in April, 1910. Three Forks was then very
young, but a promising town. Mr. Byrne was lo-
cal agent for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul
lYz years. He gave up railroading to engage in
the mercantile business with the Caldwell Com-
pany until 1914. He then returned to the Milwau-
kee Railway as chief timekeeper on the Rocky
Mountain Division. In 1916 he was appointed post-
master of Three Forks, and held that office until
December I, 1918, when he resigned in favor of
Mrs. Byrne, his wife who is the present postmas-
ter. Since then he has given his chief attention
to his duties as deputy sheriff.
Mr. Byrne has always been affiliated with the
democratic party in politics. He is affiliated with
the Episcopal Church and is a member of Boze-
man Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Or-
der of Elks, and Pytha/oras Lodge No. 2, Knights
of Pythias.
September 19. 1906, at Brookings, South Da-
kota, he married Miss F.meline Witzel, daughter
of Henry A. and Emelia (Wichmann) Witzel,
the latter now deceased. Her father is a contrac-
tor and builder at Watertown, South Dakota. Mr.
and Mrs. Byrne have two children: Emeline Eliza-
beth, born March 31, 1908, and Ralph Emerson,
born August 15, 1913.
P. M. Abbott. Varied and interesting has been
the record of P. M. Abbott of Three Forks, who
now occupies the position in the community to
which his talents entitle him, as president of the
First National Bank of this city, in which his
tact, sound judgment and broader sense of re-
sponsibility have full play. He was born in Wood
County, Ohio, October 2, 1869, a son of P. S. Ab-
bott, also a native of Ohio, where he was born
in 1834, and he died in Wood County that state,
in 1877, having been a resident of that common-
wealth all of his life. By profession he was an
attorney, but in 1862, during the war between the
states, he enlisted in the Union army as a member
of the First Ohio Heavy Artillery, and was wounded
so severely that his injuries were the cause of his
demise. After his return from his military serv-
ice he resumed his practice and was elected prose-
cuting attorney of Wood County on the republican
ticket. P. S. Abbott was married to Mary E.
Fisher, born in Ohio in 1833, who died in Wood
County, Ohio, in 1887. Her ancestors were Quakers,
and came to the American colonies with William
Penn, settling near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
One of her family, Daniel Pegg, was a soldier of
the .■\merican Revolution, enlisted for service from
Elizabethtown, New Jersey, was in a skirmish on
Staten Island, and was pensioned on June 12, 1833.
He later settled in Miami County, Ohio, being at
that time, 1834, eighty-two years of age. The Ab-
botts came to this country from England during the
colonial period, and served in the American Revo-
lution. Lyman J. Abbott belongs to this branch
of the family, and is a second cousin of P. M.
Abbott. P. S. Abbott and his wife had the fol-
lowing children : Margaret, who married F. M.
Gilbert, a manufacturer of centrifugal pumps, lives
at Chicago ; Madge, who is unmarried, lives at Los
Angeles, California; Maude, who married a Mr.
Cornell, an oil operator, is a widow and lives at
Los Angeles ; and P. M., whose name heads this
review.
P. M. Abbott was graduated from the Bowling
Green High School in 1886, following which he
learned telegraphy and worked at his calling for
various railroads in Ohio and other states. It was
as a telegrapher for the L^nion Pacific Railroad
f
HISTORY OF MONTANA
363
that he came to Montana, his duties keeping him
for a time in Beaverhead County, but in 1892, be-
cause of his capability, he was transferred to the
Montana Division of the Northern Pacific Railway,
in Gallatin County, where he remained until 1905,
when he engaged in ranching near the present
Town of Three Forks, and is still the owner of a
fine ranch of 1,080 acres of land, located four miles
east of Three Forks. This land is all irrigated,
and he has been an extensive stock raiser for
years. Mr. Abbott also has extensive land hold-
ings in Broadwater and Jefferson counties. In
1909 the First National Bank of Three Forks was
established, and in 1912 Mr. Abbott was made its
president, and has continued to hold that office
ever since, his stability and conservative policies
giving it added financial strength. His associates
in the bank are as follows ; A. E. Barnes, vice
president ; and Sam J. Crouch, cashier. The bank
has a capital stock of $25,000 ; a surplus of $8,000,
and deposits of $300,000. The handsome two-story,
pressed brick building on Main Street, with offices
on the second floor, occupied by the bank is its
property, and is admittedly one of the most sub-
stantial ones in this region. Mr. Abbott is a demo-
crat and his strength with his party is evidenced
by the fact that he was elected to the Upper House
of the State Assembly in 1912 from Gallatin
County and served the term of four years, dur-
ing that period being connected with some very
constructive legislation and belonging to some of
the important committees. His record in the Senate
is one which proves his ability and public spirit,
and will be of value to him if he cares to go before
the public again for office. He was the author of
the present state highway law, and general road
law under which Montana is now making^ its ex-
tensive road construction. Three Forks Lodge No.
88, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, holds his
membership and has the advantages of his en-
thusiastic attendance. Mr. Abbott also belongs to
the Sons of Veterans and the Chamber of Com-
merce of Three Forks. In addition to his other
interests he owns mining property.
In 1902 Mr. Abbott was married at Helena, Mon-
tana, to Miss Katie Miller, a daughter of James
F. and Mary Miller, both of whom are now de-
ceased. Mr. Miller was a stockman and rancher
of the region about Three Forks. Mr. and Mrs.
Abbott have no children. In every position he has
occupied Mr. Abbott has been recognized as a use-
ful and competent man, and is now an inspiration
for activities of the best sort among his associates.
Charles Lockhart. Enterprising and energetic,
and prompt to take advantage of every offered
opportunity for increasing his business and iii-
dustrial interests, Charles Lockhart stands promi-
nent among the leading contractors and builders
of Billings, and is well known among the success-
ful agriculturists of Yellowstone County, being
owner of a fine ranch at Worden. where his family
now reside. He was born March 8, 1879. at Red
Oak, Iowa, where his father, the late Jefferson
Lockhart, was then engaged in farming.
The descendant of a Scotch-Irish pioneer of
Ohio, Jefferson Lockhart was born in that state
in 1832, and there grew to man's estate. Familiar
with agricultural pursuits from his youth up, he
migrated to Iowa when quite young, and for a
number of years thereafter was employed in gen-
eral farming at Red Oak. In 1882 he removed to
^'ymore. Gage County, Nebraska, where he con-
tinued in his independent occupation for awhile.
When the Oklahoma strip was opened up for set-
tlers he took up a homestead claim, upon which
he lived for a year or more. Going then to Kan-
sas City, Missouri, he embarked in business as
a real estate agent, and as a contractor and builder,
and there spent his remaining years, dying, how-
ever, in Arkansas, where he was visiting friends,
his death occurring in April, 1916. He was inde-
pendent in politics, voting for the best men and
measures, and while a resident of Nebraska served
as road overseer. He was a faithful member of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, being devoted to
its interests, and fraternally belonged to the Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows. In his early life
he took an active part in several skirmishes with
the Indians, fighting heroically.
Jefferson Lockhart married , in Iowa, Emma
Hines, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1848, and
died in Kansas City, Missouri, in October, 1902.
Children were born of their marriage as follows :
William, a contractor and builder at San Pedro,
California ; Ephraim, engaged in farming at Coun-
cil Bluffs, Iowa; Charles, the subject of this sketch;
Thomas, of San Pedro, California, is head clerk
on the wharves ; and Cora, wife of a Mr. Kelley,
an electrician at Toledo, Ohio.
Brought up and educated at Wymore, Nebraska,
Charles Lockhart remained on the home farm until
eighteen years of age. Going then to Old Mexico,
he was there employed as a bridge carpenter for
two years, after which he lived for five years in
Western, Kansas, being engaged in farming and
carpentering. Coming to Montana in 1912, Mr.
Lockhart located in Billings, but almost directly
went to Worden and took up a homestead claim
of forty acres of irrigated land on which his family
still resides, and of which he has »'- - supervi-
sion. For the past two years, since 1917 Mr. Lock-
hart has resumed his work as a contractor and
builder in Billings, having his headquarters at 213
Avenue F, in the dwelling house which he owns,
although he makes his home on his ranch. As a
contractor Mr. Lockhart has erected many fine resi-
dences in Billings, having had a fair share of the
city's patronage in that line of industry. Politically
he is independent, voting without regard to party
prejudices. Fraternally he is a member of the In-
dependent Order of Odd Fellows and of the Mod-
ern Woodmen of America.
Mr. Lockhart married, in Hollenberg, Kansas,
in 1902, Miss Emma Wilson, a daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. Peter Wilson. Mrs. Wilson died in Hollen-
berg, on the home farm, which Mr. Wilson still
occupies and manages. Mr. and Mrs. Lockhart have
four children, namely: Mildred, born March 12,
1905 ; Bethel, born .Vugust 17, 1907 ; Pauline, born
November 10, 1909; and Adeline, born May 13, 1918.
. Clarence D. Howe came to Montana while with
the Government reclamation service. He was one
of the men who supervised some of the extensive
projects in the Billings district for the irrigation
and reclamation of large bodies of farming land.
Upon resigning from the service Mr. Howe took
up his home at Worden, where he is a well known
banker and rancher.
Mr. Howe was born in Richardson County, Ne-
braska. July II. 1880. A record of his paternal
ancestors goes back many years in this country,
while in England the family have a consecutive
history from the time of William the Coiiqueror.
His grandfather, John L. Howe, was born in New-
York State in 1816, lived for many years at Platts-
burg, moved out to Chicago and finally retired
to San Diego, California, where he died in 1901.
His wife was Cynthia Delano, who was born on
364
HISTORY OF MONTANA
an island in Lake Champlain, New \ork-. Ira M.
Howe, father of the Worden banker, was born at
Plattsburg, New York, in 1848, grew up there,
was married at Lancaster, Wisconsin, became a
pioneer stock raiser in Richardson County, Ne-
braska, and in 1893 retired from business and
moved to San Diego, California, where he is still
living. He is a republican, a member of the Con-
gregational Church and the Ancient Order of United
Workmen. Ira Howe married Ella Durand, who
was born in Westfield, New York, in 1848.
Clarence D. Howe, only living son of his parents,
grew up on his father's farm in Richardson County,
Nebraska, attended the rural schools there, and
continued his education in California. He attended
a preparatory school at Pomona and also did work
in Pomona College. He left college in his senior
year, in 1903, and soon after entered the United
States reclamation service. He was employed on a
project at Yuma, -'\rizona. until the spring of 1904,
was at Wadsworth, Nevada, until 1905, and in that
year
to Montana and was stationed at Hunt-
ley, having charge of the construction vyork on the
main canal, which was completed in 1907. He then
remained as assistant project manager until 1909,
and from that year until 1912 was manager of
the Huntley project. In 1912 his headquarters were
moved to Helena. Montana, where he was in the
supervising engineer's office with the title of inspec-
tor of maintenance and operation for the northern
division.
In the meantime Mr. Howe had not been blind
to the many opportunities for an energetic man in
Montana, and on leaving the Government service
he organized the Farmers State Bank of Worden.
He held the post of cashier until January i, 1918,
since which date he has been vice president and
manager. Roy J. Covert, of Billings, is president,
and William Shenck is cashier. This bank, capital-
ized at $20,000.00, with surplus of $4,000.00, is housed
in a modern brick building erected in 1913 on
Third Street. Mr. Hoyye has accumulated some
valuable ranch property in Yellowstone County, his
total holdings aggregating 1,500 acres.
Mr. Howe also takes much interest in republican
politics, and served as committeeman of Yellow-
stone County. He is affiliated with Billings Lodge
No. 394 of the Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks, is a member of the Billings Midland Em-
pire Club, the Billings Club and Billings Country
Club. In June, 1910. at Billings, he married Miss
Helen Rowley, daughter of Henry W. and Har-
riet (Meeker) Rowley, resident of Billings. Her
father is a successful business man and financier.
Mr. and Mrs. Howe have two daughters, Helen,
born February 5, 1913, and Jane, born January 24,
191Q.
Ben F. Dr.^ke, of Billings, has been a busy man
since he came to Montana, has been in the mining
districts, a teacher and ranch hand, traveling sales-
man, manufacturer, and is now apparently settled
down to his permanent business as a produce broker,
at the head of one of the leading establishments
of its kind in the state.
Mr. Drake was born in Moniteau County, Miss-
souri. February 23, 1883. He represents one of the
oldest families to settle in the western wilderness
after the Revolutionary war. The Drakes originally
came from England. His great-grandfather, James
Drake, was a Kentucky pioneer who volunteered for
service with General Jackson in the War of 1812
and was one of the .Americans killed at the battle
of New Orleans on January 8, 1815. Mr. Drake's
grandfather, Asa Drake, was born in Tennessee in
.\pril, 1815, after his father's death. He went as a
pioneer to Southern Missouri in 1836, homesteaded
a farm in Moniteau County, and lived there and
reared a family of fourteen children by his mar-
riage to Sally Smith, a native of Kentucky. He died
in Moniteau County in 1882. ,
P. S. Drake, father of Ben, was born in Morgan
County, Missouri, in 1844, grew up and married in
his native county and farmed there and in Moni-
teau County for many years. Later he moved to
Montana and located on his ranch at Pony, where
he died in 191 1. He was a democrat and a very
ardent Baptist in religion. His wife was Vianna
Parsons, who was born in Iowa in 1851. She is
the mother of eight children: Lillian, wife of
Arthur H. Woods, a rancher in Carbon County.
Montana ; John W., a rancher at Pony, this state ;
Frances, who died at Bear Creek, Montana, where
her husband, John Mikesell, formerly a merchant
still lives : Mattie, wife of Walter Marye, superm-
tendent of the city pumping plant at Worland, Wy-
oming : Grace, who for the past nineteen years has
been with Armour & Company as head stenographer
in the offices at Denver; Ben P.; Marsh, in govern-
ment service in France; and Flora, living at Pony,
widow of Grover Akins, a former rancher there who
died in 1919.
Ben F. Drake attended the rural schools of Mor-
gan County, Missouri, and in 1900, at the age of
seventeen, came to Montana. For the next two.
years he worked around the mines and for the
Electric Power Company on the Madison River in
Madison County, helping survey the Lake site. In
1902 he went back to Missouri, attended public
schools and spent six months in William Jewell
College at Liberty. He left college in 1903 and came
to Carbon County, Alontana, spending the two fol-
lowing winters teaching and the corresponding sum-
mers on ranches. In 1905 he located at Billings and
for five years was a broom manufacturer. The next
five years he traveled as a coal salesman, covering
the states of Washington, Montana and North Da-
kota. His present business was established in 1915.
He handles butter, eggs and other farm produce
wholesale, and is one of the leading bean handlers
in the northwest, employing thirty-eight people for
the sorting of beans. He shipped a large part of
the local bean output to markets at Boston, New
York, Chicago, New Orleans and Portland. His
plant and warehouses are at 3009 Montana Avenue.
Mr. Drake owns a modern home at 310 Terry Ave-
nue. He is independent in politics, a member of
the Baptist Church and is afliliated with Billings
Lodge No. IS, Knights of Pythias. In 1912, at Bil-
lings, he married !Miss Katy Paulson, a daughter of
N. K. and Marie (Paulson) Paulson, who reside
at Billings. Her father is a retired farmer.
Tom S.^ndell. During the last half dozen years
the farmers of the Shield River communities in
Park County have almost invariably marketed their
grain through Tom Sandell at Clyde Park. Mr.
Sandell learned the grain business from the ground
up, and for a number of years has been manager of
the chief elevator at Clyde Park. He is now local
representative of the Bozeman Milling Company.
Mr. Sandell was born in Telemarken, Norway,
December 2, 1883. His people have lived in that
part of Norway for many generations. His great-
grandfather was a soldier in the Norwegian army
in the war of 1814 against Sweden. Grandfather
Olaf Sandell was born in 1804 and died in 1893. and
spent all his life as a farmer near Telemarken,
He also saw some active service as a soldier. Evan
Sandell, father of the Clyde Park business man.
^^^MWYV^iA^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
365
was born in Telemarken in 1864 and died there in
iSgg. He served a time in the Norwegian army
and otherwise followed the occupation of- miner. He
was a member of the Norwegian Lutheran Church.
His wife was Aslaug Feten, who was born at Tele-
marken in 1853. She followed her children to the
United States after her husband's death and died
at Clinton, Wisconsin, in 1911. The oldest son, Olaf,
was a carpenter by trade, and while employed at
Beloit, Wisconsin, received injuries when a wall fell
on him and died as a result of the accident in 1917.
Emma, the second child and only daughter, is the
wife of James O. Lee, a farmer near Beloit.
Tom Sandell, the youngest of the family, was edu-
cated in the public schools of his native Norwegian
community and was about fifteen years old when in
1898 he came to the United States. For two years
he lived at Sharon, Wisconsin, with his uncle Martin
Anderson, an early farmer there, whose father had
come from Sogn, Norway. In 1900 Mr. Sandell re-
moved to Capron, Wisconsin, and during the two
years there he attended high school and perfected
his knowledge of the English language. Returning
to Clinton he worked on a farm three years and then
for four years farmed south of Beloit in Boone
County, Illinois.
The record of his experience in Montana begins
in 1910, when he came to Wibaux. For one season
he was employed by T. M. Eberson in constructing
grain elevators. About that time he determined to
learn the grain business, and worked for one season
as a helper. As a young man of promise and abil-
ity the Occident Elevator Company sent him in 1912
to Clyde Park as manager of their local interests.
He represented the Occident Company until 1914,
then for one year was manager for P. A. Schneck-
loth's elevator and since then has been manager at
Clyde Park for the Bozeman Milling Company.
This company is an incorporated firm with head-
quarters at Bozeman and operates elevators in dif-
ferent towns of Southern M-^ntana. The elevator
at Clyde Park is a large one and is located on the
Northern Pacific Railway tracks, having a capacity
of 40,000 bushels. The general manager of the com-
pany is Charles Vandenhook.
Mr. Sandell is a republican in politics. He is vice-
grand of Clyde Park Lodge No. 64, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows. As a fixture in the citizen-
ship of Clyde Park he owns a modern home on
Main Street and Fourth Avenue. He married at
Livingston, Montana, in 1914, Miss Esther Bliler.
Her parents, Ves and Clara (Coe) Bliler, live at
Bozeman, where her father is assistant in a hard-
ware and implement store. Mrs. Sandell is a gradu-
ate of the public schools of Wilsall, Montana. To
their marriage were born three children, Tom, Jr.,
born December 4, 1915, Alice Irene, and Margaret
Christine, twins, born October 7, 1917.
J.4C0B Thorkelson, M. D. Foremost among the
medical practitioners of Anaconda stands Dr. Jacob
Thorkelson, who has been established in this city,
with a suite of offices in the Daly Bank Building,
since July, 1918. A specialist in surgery, his medi-
cal knowledge and surgical skill are universally ac-
knowledged, and professionally and otherwise Dr.
Thorkelson is held in high esteem. Doctor Thorkel-
son was born and grew to the age of sixteen years in
Norway. His parents were Thorkel and Maren
(Peterson) Jacobson, both of whom were born and
died near Bergen. There were two sons born to
them. Jacob and Peter, the latter of whom died in
the old home near Bergen.
In considering a man's life career, early environ-
ment must be noticed, and it may not be unrea-
sonable to assume that the wide and varied ex-
periences of one whose fortune it was for a number
of years to view life from the deck of a sailing ves-
sel, from cabin boy to captain, in a hundred alien
ports, had its influence and, further, possibly
awakened the sleeping talent that, cultivated, has
made Doctor Thorkelson so truly useful in the prac-
tice of the noblest of professions.
Following his graduation from the Bergen High
School, the youth Thorkelson, then sixteen years
old, shipped as a cabin boy on a vessel sailing from
a Norway seaport. Promotion followed, and the
time came when he commanded American ships out
from Philadelphia. During the years that he fol-
lowed the sea he visited almost every country ac-
cessible to vessels, South America, Africa, China,
Japan and India, and the ports of Europe and the
United States. In 1892 he came to this country with
the intention of becoming an American citizen and
was naturalized in 1901.
It was in 1907 that Doctor Thorkelson began the
serious study of medical science, and with the class
of 191 1 he was graduated from the College of
Physicians and Surgeons, Baltimore, Maryland, with
his degree of M. D. During 1912 he served in his
alma mater as associate professor of anatomy, and
during 1913 held the chair of professor of anatomy
in that institution. He then came to Montana and
engaged in practice at Dillon, and from there in
July, 1918, came to Anaconda. He is surgeon of the
Montana State Hospital at Warm Springs, and
formerly was county physician of Beaverhead
County. He is a member of the Deer Lodge County,
Montana State and the American Medical associa-
tions, the Association of Anatomists and the Medi-
cal Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland, and belongs to
the Anaconda and the Anaconda Country clubs. He
is also quite prominent in fraternal life, belonging
to Laurel Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
at Laurel, Delaware; Bagdad Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at Butte,
Montana; Hope Chapter No. 17, Royal Arch Masons,
and St. Elmo Commandery No. 7, Knights Templar,
of Laurel, Delaware ; Laurel Lodge, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows ; Oray Plate Lodge No. 390,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, Virginia
City, Montana ; and Dillon Tribe, Improved Order of
Red Men, of Dillon, Montana.
James E. Meredith. While his active relations
with the business and civic affairs of Montana are
comparatively recent, James E. Meredith is a vet-
eran of the lumber business, and brought to his
work as manager of the Midland Lumber and Hard-
ware Company of Pompey's Pillar a fund of ex-
perience and learning gained largely in the North-
western states.
Mr. Meredith was born at .Atlantic, Iowa, August
7, 1872. His people came originally from Wales
and settled in this country in colonial times. His
grandfather was a real pioneer. His name was
Joseph. He was born in 1781, and when the middle
west was a wilderness he went into the Illinois
country and made his living by hunting and trap-
ping. He followed the same business later in Iowa
and after the discovery of gold in California went
over the plains, to the Pacific Coast in 1849. He
finally returned to Illinois and died at Peoria in
1884, more than a hundred years old. John L.
Meredith, father of James E., was born in Peoria,
Illinois, in 1836, grew up and married there and
was one of the early settlers on a farm near Atlan-
tic, Iowa. In 1884 he moved to Groton, South
Dakota, continued farming, but from 1913 lived re-
tired at Hot Springs, South Dakota, where he died
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in the spring of 191 5- He was a very staunch re-
publican in his political affiliations and a member of
the Methodist Church. John L. Meredith married
Keturah Doty, who was born in Illinois, 1837, and
died in Groton, South Dakota, in 1905. They were
the parents of three children: Addie, living at Gro-
ton, South Dakota, widow of James Carmine, who
died in 1918, leaving a large farm ; Jessie, living at
Eureka, California, widow of Albert Sells, who was
a farmer at Groton, South Dakota; and James E.
James E. Meredith attended rural schools at
Brown County, South Dakota, and lived on his
father's farm until the age of eighteen, when for
two years he farmed independently, operated a well
drilling machine in Brown County for four years,
took up the homestead claim of a quarter section
near Minot in that state and proved up on it, and
lived there until 1902. He left the farm to go into
the lumber business, working and learning all de-
tails of the industry in a yard conducted by the
Rogers Lumber Company at Donnybrook, North
Dakota. He was there for two years, and then for
seven years was manager of a yard at Fagus, North
Dakota, for the Rogers Brothers, Incorporated. In
1910 he became manager for the Atlas Lumber Com-
pany at Timberlake, South Dakota, remaining there
four years, following which he was manager for the
Schultz Lumber Company at Beach, North Dakota,
until 1918. In June, 1918, Mr. Meredith came to
Pompey's Pillar. Montana, and has since been man-
ager of the Midland Lumber Company. The head
offices of this concern are at Miles City.
Mr. Meredith is a republican, and retains his Odd
Fellow membership in Timberlake Lodge. He mar-
ried at Groton, South Dakota, in 1893, Miss Flora
Kranhold, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C. W. Kran-
hold, the latter now deceased. Her father is a re-
tired farmer at Groton. Mrs. Meredith, who is a
graduate of the Groton High School, has two sons,
both of whom were soldiers. Earl J., born Feb-
ruary, 1895, was with a hospital unit with the army
in France, while Chester O., born May 11, 1897,
was with the Army of Occupation in Germany.
Samuel M. Nye. Examples that impress force of
character on all who study them are worthy of
record. By a few general observations may be con-
veyed some idea of the characteristics and worthy
career of Samuel M. Nye. for many years a well-
known mechanic at Livingston, but who is now liv-
ing in honorable retirement in his pleasant home
there, having through his industry and wise fru-
gality accumulated a competency. He has pursued
the even tenor of his way in a quiet and unosten-
tatious manner, which never courts publicity, always
doing the right as he understands it and attending
strictly to his own affairs. The elements of a solid
and practical nature which unite in his composition
are not a matter of wonderment when we learn that
he comes of sterling English ancestry, of the same
blood that has entered so largely into the building
of that great cosmopolitan character, the American
of today.
Samuel M. Nye was born in Lewiston, New York,
on October 22, 1852. His father, William Nye, was
born in England in 1818 and his death occurred in
Hamilton, Ontario. Canada, in 1879. He was reared
and married in England and came to the United
States in 1851. locating at Lewiston, New York,
where he entered the employ of a mercantile firm.
In 1858 he moved to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada,
and entered the employ of the Great Western Rail-
way, with which he remained until his death. He
was a member of the Episcopal Church, to which he
gave active support. He married Sarah Elizabeth
Tucker, who was born in England in 1818 and who
died in Hamilton, Canada, in 1890. They became
the parents- of seven children, as follows : William
W., who was a carpenter, died at Saskatchewan,
Canada ; George James was the proprietor of a
flour mill at Fenelon Falls, Ontario, Canada, where
his death occurred ; Francis Charles was a machin-
ist, but died at Buffalo, New York ; Louisa Jane,
who resides at Jamestown, New York, is the widow
of William Ross, who was superintendent of a ma-
chine shop in that city ; Samuel M. is the imme-
diate subject of this sketch; Sarah Elizabeth, of
Hamilton, Canada, is the widow of John Patterson,
formerly a master tailor in that city; Arthur Jesse,
deceased, was superintendent of a steel bridge and
machine factory at Toronto, Canada.
Samuel M. Nye attended the public schools of
Hamilton, Canada, comp'leting his studies in tht
grammar school, which he left at the age of fifteen
years. He then learned the trade of a boiler-
maker with the Great Western Railroad, with which
he remained until finishing his apprenticeship. He
was then employed in Michigan by the Pere Mar-
quette Railway, in Missouri by the Iron Mountain
Railway and in Minnesota with the Northern Pacific
Railway. He had a splendid record with the latter
road, beginning in Brainard, Minnesota, in 1882 and
continuing uninterruptedly until 1918, when he re-
signed. In November, 1884, he was transferred by
the company to Livingston, where he became fore-
man of the boiler shops, which position he held up
to the time of his retirement.
In political matters Mr. Nye gives his support to
the republican party. He was one of the first) coun-
cilmen for the city of Livingston and served several
terms in that capacity. His fraternal record is -i
most interesting one. He is a member of Living-
ston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, "of which he is a past master and of which
he has been secretary since 1893 ; Livingston Chapter
No. 7, Royal Arch Masons ; St. Bernard Com-
mandery No. 6, Knights Templar ; Eastern Montana
Consistory, Scottish Rite Masons, in which he has
been exalted to the thirty-third and last degree,
and of which body he has been secretary since 1899;
Algeria Temple of the Ancient .\rabic Order Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine at Helena ; Orient Chapter
No. 6, Order of the Eastern Star, of which he is
a past worthy patron, and he is also a past grand
patron of the Order of the Eastern Star for the
State of Montana, and he is a member of Moun-
tain View Hive No. i. Knights of the Maccabees.
He was one of the founders of the Railway Club,
of' which he was an active member for many
years. He is a trustee of the Masonic Association
of Livingston, which handles all affairs connected
with the Masonic Temple. The latter is a commodi-
ous and well arranged building, comprising two
stories and basement. It contains two large and
well arranged lodge rooms, which are used by the
Masons and other fraternal orders. The offices of
the Chamber of Commerce are also in this building,
as are other offices. Mr. Nye has rendered effective
and highly appreciated service to the various bodies
to which he belongs and in which he is held in the
highest esteem.
In 1875, in Hamilton, Canada, Mr. Nye married
Sarah E. Shipton, who was born in 1856 in Wool-
wich, Kent, England, and whose death occurred in
1918 in Livingston. To Mr. and Mrs. Nye have been
born the following children : Samuel M., Jr., who
died in 1913, at Glendive, Montana, was foreman
of the boiler shop of the Northern Pacific Railwav
at that place; William A. is a printer at The Dalles,
Oregon ; Walter M. is the owner of a 420-acre ranch
HISTORY OF MONTANA
near Willsall, Montana ; Frank G. is a merchant in
Livingston; Charles E. is a boiler-maker by trade;
John A., who resides in Livingston, is foreman of
air inspection for the Northern Pacific Railway;
Louis is vice president of the State Bank of Liv-
ingston, one of the leading banks of this section
of Montana, and much of the success of which is
directly due to the indefatigable efforts and sound
business judgment of Mr. Nye; Edith M. is the wife
of Glenn R. Brown, a brakeman on the Northern
Pacific Railroad. She completed her education in
tlie Park County High School.
Frank B. Hair. Bringing to his calling good
business methods, excellent judgment and keen per-
ceptive faculties, Frank B. Bair, of Billings, is meet-
ing with highly satisfactory results in his labors as
vice president and general manager of the Montana
Live Stock and Loan Company, having been a con-
spicuous factor in building up and extending the
business operations of the organization and in mak-
ing its influence felt in the leading agricultural and
financial circles of Southeastern ^Montana. Born in
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, June 29, 1881, he
is still in manhood's prime.
His father. Elias Bair, was born in Pennsylvania,
in 1843. and was reared to agricultural pursuits.
After his marriage he bought land in Lancaster
County, and by dint of perserving toil improved
a productive farm, on which he resided many years.
In 1899, having accumulated a fair share of this
world's goods, he removed to Philadelphia, where he
lived retired until his death in 1912. In politics he
was identified with the republican party, and in
religion he affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal
Church. He married Elizabeth Raymond, who was
born in Pennsylvania in 1846, and is now a resident
of Philadelphia. Of the fourteen children born of
their union, two died in infancy, the others being
as follows : John D., who is extensively engaged in
the live stock business in Lancaster County, Penn-
sylvania ; Annie C. residing in Philadelphia, is the
widow of R. L. Shirk, a former employe of the
Pennsylvania Railroad Company: William Henry,
who was for a time engaged in business at Phila-
delphia, died in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania,
when but twenty-six years of age ; Jacob R., of
Philadelphia, is a conductor on the Baltimore and
Ohio Railroad ; Samuel G., foreman for a contract-
ing company, resides in New Jersey ; Clement R.,
of St. Paul, Minnesota, is cashier for Swift &
Company : Mary E., wife of Park Foulke, a brick
contractor at Coatesville, Pennsylvania; Harvey E.,
of Philadelphia, holds a responsible position as fore-
man on the large Woods estate ; Frank B., of whom
we write : Sarah, wiie of Walter Cosner, of Phila-
delphia, an automobile dealer; Rachel, wife of R. L.
Pearson, a salesman in Philadelphia ; and Rebecca,
who died at the early age of fifteen years.
.Acquiring his early education in his native state,
Frank B. Bair attended the rural schools of Lan-
caster Cotuity, completing his studies in Philadelphia.
Beginning life for himself at the age of fifteen
years, he was variously employed . for awhile, for
three years serving as conductor on a trolley car
in Philadelphia. Continuing in that city, he was
subsequently engaged in mercantile pursuits for four
years, buying and selling goods on the instalment
plan. That line of industry being scarce suited
to one of his energetic temperament and enterpris.e,
Mr. Bair went to the wide-awake city of Chicago
in 1909, and for four years thereafter was employed
in the Stock Yards, where, with the Clay, Robinson
& Company firm, he became thoroughly acquainted
with the details of the live stock business. In 1913,
continuing with the same company, he was live stock
salesman in St. Paul, Minnesota," for three years,
gaining a practical experience that has since been
of inestimable value to him. Locating in Billings
in 1916, Mr. Blair has since been actively associated
with the Montana Live Stock and Loan Company as
vice president and general manager of its affairs, a
position that he is filling in a most competent man-
ner, the organization under his skillful supervision
being in a highly flourishing condition. Mr. Bair
is also secretary, treasurer and general manager of
the Billings Stock Yards Company, which is carry-
ing on a thriving business. Mr. Bair is one of the
busiest men in Billings, his offices being located in
the Exchange Building at the stock yards, one mile
east of the city.
Although affiliated with the republican ranks, Mr.
Bair takes no active part in the management of pub-
lic affairs, his private interests demanding his en-
tire attention. Socially he is a member of the Bil-
lings Midland Empire Club, and fraternally he be-
longs to Philadelphia Lodge, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Order of Masons, and to Saint Paul Camp,
Woodmen of the World. Religiously he affiliates
with the Methodist Episcopal Church. He owns a
fine residence at No. 1029 North Thirtieth Street,
where he and his wife take great pleasure in en-
tertaining their many friends.
Mr. Bair married, in 1904, at Mount Carmel, Penn-
sylvania, Miss Edna M. Philips, a graduate of the
Mount Carmel High School. Her parents, Ed. and
Ida (Maurer) Philips, are residents of Mount Car-
mel, where Mr. Philips is a blacksmith in the mines.
Mr. and Mrs. Bair have three children, namely:
Edna Elizabeth, born in August, 1905 ; Frank E.,
born in September, 1915 ; and Katherine, born in
January, 1918.
Livingston Publishing Company. One of the
most influential newspapers in Montana is the Liv-
ingston Enterprise, owned and published by the
Livingston Publishing Company. The Enterprise
was established as a weekly in 1910. In 1914 a con-
solidation was effected between the Enterprise and
the Post, the Enterprise being continued as a daily
issue with the Post as a weekly. Since 1916 the
Enterprise has been a morning paper, previously
having been issued in the afternoon. The Living-
ston Publishing Company has one of the best
equipped plants for newspaper work in the state.
The Enterprise is regarded as a democratic paper
and has a circulation all over Park and surround-
ing counties.
The company is incorporated, Robert S. Phillips
being the president and J. Thomas Melton, the vi(;e
president. Mr. Phillips is editor and general man-
ager, and J. Thomas Melton is the business manager.
J. Thomas Melton, business manager of the
Enterprise, is a printer and newspaper man of al-
most lifelong experience. He was born at Texar-
kana, Arkansas, September 20, 1875, and was only
twelve years old when he went to work in a print-
ing office. His ancestors originally lived in Eng-
land, where the family were noted as cloth manu-
facturers and their home was known as Melton-
Mowbray. Then name of the family was also
transferred to a special make of cloth, a broad-
cloth with a rough finish being known as "Melton
cloth."
Several generations ago one branch of the Mel-
ton family came to America and settled in South
Carolina. D. W. Melton, father of J. Thomas,
was born in South Carolina in 1838. He lived
there during his early years, and afterward moved
HISTORY OF MONTANA
to Missouri, where he was a farmer and was in
a similar occupation in Louisiana and Arkansas.
In 1870 he went to Texarkana, before a town was
established there and before there was a railroad
and before there was a bridge over the river.
After remaining there several years he returned
to Iron Mountain, Missouri, for twenty years and
then went back to Texarkana and finally moved
into Texas and died at Kildare, that state, in 1903.
He had served in the Confederate army with a
Missouri regiment, being assigned to ambulance
duty. He was a democrat in politics. D. W. Mel-
ton married .\manda Strickland, Who was born in
North Carolina in 1840 and died at Texarkana in
1895. Louis, the oldest of their children, is in the
lum'ber business at Kildare, Texas; Eliza is the
wife of Henrv \\\ Cook, a carpenter and con-
tractor at Texarkana: William M. is a contractor
and builder at Tulsa. Oklahoma; Martha is the
wife of A. N. McDaniel. a rancher, mill man, tim-
ber dealer and generally prominent in the business
affairs of Redwater, Texas; Harriet is the wife of
H. W. Cox. a ailroad employe living at Texarkana ;
while J. Thomas is the sixth and youngest of the
family.
J. Thomas Melton attended public school in his
native town, and in 1887 went to work in a print-
ing office. He spent twelve years learning and
working at his trade in Te.xarkana. In 1897 he
started out as a journeyman, and the course of his
wanderings took him through Texas, Louisiana,
Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, Missouri,
Iowa, Nebraska Wyoming, South Dakota. Cali-
fornia. Oregon. W'ashington and Idaho. He first
visited Montana in 1906. spending a brief time work-
ing for the Billings Times under Col. C. M. Mor-
ris. After that he resumed his journey toward the
coast. On his way back he became foreman of
the Times at Wallace, Idaho, for a year. For six
years Mr. Melton was at Chandler. Oklahoma, as
manager of the Chandler News, and while there
he married. In 19OQ he established a job printing
office at Hamilton. Montana, and after three years
sold out. He then spent a year as manager of the
Granite County News at Drummond and on ac-
count of his wife's health moved to Portland, Ore-
gon, in 1913. Later in the same year he returned
to Montana, and was with the Henley Printing
Company at Missoula until 1913. He then resumed
his residence at Hamilton, spending one year with
the Ravalli County Republican. Mr. Melton came
to Livingston in 1916 and at first was in the job-
bing department of the Enterprise, was made fore-
man of that department, then superintendent, ad-
\tertising manager, and since September I, 1918, has
been business manager of the company. "
Mr. Melton is a republican in politics. 'He is an
active member and president of the board of trus-
tees of the Christian Science Church at Living-
ston and is affiliated with Hamilton Camp of the
Modern Woodmen of America.
He married Mrs. Effie G. (Gilstrap) Frazier at
Chandler, Oklahoma, in 1909. Her father. Austin
Gilstrap. was a Kansas farmer. She was born at
Colfax, Illinois, and died at Missoula, Montana, in
September, 1913. In July. 1916, Mr. Melton mar-
ried Miss Maude Furnham at Livingston, daugh-
ter of David and Matilda (White) Furnham. Her
parents live at Sparta, Wisconsin, her father being
a Wisconsin farmer.
Judge James F. O'Connor. While Judge O'Con-
nor has been a resident of Livingston only fifteen
years, few citizens have more interests by which
they may be readily identified with the enterprise
and life of the community. He is a former judge
of the District Court, a successful lawyer, presi-
dent of the Northwestern National Bank, a rancher,
and was also president of the Livingston Publish-
ing Company, publishers of the Livingston Enter-
prise.
Judge O'Connor was born at California Junc-
tion, Iowa, May 7, 1878. His father, Patrick O'Con-
nor, was born in County Clare, Ireland, in 1827,
and at this writing is ninety-two years of age.
Evidently he had as much enterprise and vigor of
performance as he had years of life. He was reared
and married in his native Irish county and came
to the United States in 1852. He did his first work
as a railroad man in Wisconsin. Subsequently he
became a pioneer in California Junction, Iowa, and
has spent the greater part of his life as a farmer.
He has developed several handsome farms which
he still owns in. the vicinity of California Junction,
and is now living at Missouri Valley, Iowa. He
has always been democratic in politics and is a
member of the Catholic Church. He married Brid-
get O'Brien, who was born in County Clare in
1836. The record of their children is a very un-
usual one. There were ten in all, and the first
eight were daughters. Every one of these daugh-
ters married a railroad man. The only two sons
chose the profession of law. Judge O'Connor is
the youngest of the family. His brother was
Maurice O'Connor, who died in 1917, at the age
of forty-two, at Fort Dodge, Iowa. He was asso-
ciated in practice with the present Senator Kenyon
of Iowa. A brief record of the daughters of the
family is as follows : Mar}', wife of James H.
Clark, of Lincoln, Nebraska; Ellen, wife of Mar-
tin Burke, of Missouri Valley, Iowa; Anna, wife of
William Mahoney, of Casper, Wyoming; Agnes,
who married Michael O'Connor (not related) and
lives at Missouri Valley; Elizabeth, wife of W. M.
Kelley, of Spokane, Washington; Susan, wife of
Charles Shinkle, of St. Louis, Missouri ; Johanna,
wife of John Dougherty, of Topeka, Kansas ; and
Emma, wife of J. P. Finucane, of Houston, Texas.
All of them it will be noted reside in railroad cen-
ters.
James F. O'Connor received his primary educa-
tion in the rural schools of Harrison County, Iowa,
spent three years in the Woodbine Normal School
in that state, and took his law course in the Uni-
versity of Nebraska at Lincoln. He was gradu-
ated LL. B. in 1904 and the following year came
to Montana and began practice at Livingston, where
he has been connected with much of the important
civil and criminal litigation. His offices are in the
postoffice building.
Much of his time, however, has been taken up
by public duties and business responsibilities not
directly connected with his profession. For a num-
ber of years he was president of the Livingston
School Board. Governor Norris appointed him
judge of the Sixth Judicial District and he filled
the unexpired term for 1912-13. At his appoint-
ment he was the youngest district judge in the
state. In 1916 he was elected a member of the
Legislature and during the session of 1917 was
speaker of the House. During 1918 for six months
he was special counsel to the Federal Trade Com-
mission at Washington, District of Columbia, that
being his patriotic service during the war. Judge
O'Connor is an influential democrat in the state,
is affiliated with Livingston Lodge No. 246, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks, was a member
of the State Bar Association and is a Catholic in
religion.
Besides his official relations as president and
©rifi^}
HISTORY OF MONTANA
369
director of the Northwestern National Bank, presi-
dent, director and stockholder in the Livingston
Enterprise, he owns a cattle ranch of 640 acres
on Shields River in Park County and has a half
interest in a 5,000 acre sheep ranch in Ravalli Coun-
ty. His home is at 227 South Y-ellowstone Street.
Judge O'Connor married Miss Kate Adams at
Council Bluffs, Iowa, in 1S98. Her parents, Mr.
and Mrs, Harry Adams, are both deceased, her
father having been a farmer. To their marriage
were born two children : Miles James, now a fresh-
man in Mt. St. Charles College at Helena, and
Geneva, a member of the junior class of the Park
County High School.
Albert K. Smith, of Rapelje, is one of the many
young men who are swinging the larger respon-
sibilities of business and industry in Montana today.
Mr. Smith had his business training in the City
of Minneapolis, and since coming to Montana has
been identified with ranching on a large scale and
also with merchandising, and is manager of the
oldest mercantile business at Rapelje.
He was born at Minneapolis, October 30, 1887.
His grandfather, John William Smith, was a na-
tive of Scotland, and on coming to America lo-
cated at Boston, where he became a nevyspaper
publisher. He died there more than thirty years
ago. Wallace B. Smith, father of Albert K., was
born in Boston in 1861. grew up at Rockland,
Maine, and as a young man went to Minneapolis.
He had a long and active career at railroading,
spending thirty-three years as superintendent for
the Chicago & Northwestern lines. Though still
a resident of Minneapolis, he has acquired and
developed extensive interests in Montana. In 191 1
he went into the district north of Gibson in Sweet-
gra^s County and homesteaded a ranch, bought
more land, and now has 579 acres, constituting a
grain and stock ranch. He has always been a re-
publican in politics. Wallace B. Smith married
Sarah McBain, who was born in Scotland in 1867
but was reared in Minnesota. They have two chil-
dren, Grace I. and Albert K., the former a- mem-
ber of the home circle at Minneapolis.
Albert K. Smith graduated from the Minneapolis
High School in IQ07. He attended the University
of Minnesota Law Department and received his
law degree from that institution in 1909. While
in university he was a member of the Zeta Psi
Greek letter fraternity. For ten years he has been
closely identified with commercial lines. After
leaving the university he was a j-ailroad man at
Minneapolis and for lyi years was city salesman
there for Armour & Company. In 1911 he began
ranching on his father's land near Gibson, Montana,
and he has since acquired 320 acres of his own
in that vicinity. He gives his supervision to his
ranching, and in 1916 he removed to the site of
the present Town of Rapelje, before the railroad
was built. He is interested in the Lake Basin Trad-
ing Company and is manager of its general store at
Rapelje.
He has become a permanent resident of the
town, owns a modern home, is secretary of the
Rapelje Cemetery Association, is on the board of
trustees of the Congregational Church, is a demo-
crat, and is affiliated with Big Timber Lodge of
Masons.
At Minneapolis in 1910 he married Miss Mar-
guerite Carr, daughter of W. H. and Martha
(Blake) Carr. Her mother is still living at Minne-
apolis. Her father was a wholesale meat mer-
chant and died at Minneapolis. Mrs. Smith is a
graduate of the Mankato Normal at Mankato, Min-
nesota, and finished her education in the University
of Minnesota. To their marriage have been born
two children: McBain, born October 10, 1914, and
Wallace Bertram, born June 28, 1916.
Oly M. Best came into the business life of the
community of Dillon thirty-five years ago. He has
been no laggard in business, has been a factor in
upbuilding several of the larger companies repre-
sented in the city, and is founder and president and
manager of the Western Wholesale Grocery Com-
pany and also an extensive sheep raiser.
Mr. Best was born in Kalamazoo County, Michi-
gan, February 17, 1857. His paternal ancestors came
from Holland and settled in Pennsylvania in colonial
days. His father, Amos Best, was born in Schoharie
County, New York, in 1833, and spent the greater
part of his active life as a farmer in Kalamazoo
County, Michigan, where he married. He lived re-
tired at Vicksburg, Michigan, for several years and
died there in 1913. He was a prominent member
of his community, enjoyed the honor of several local
offices, was a republican and a member of the Ma-
sonic fraternity. His first wife was Mary .A. Kim-
ball, who died at Vicksburg, Michigan, in 1857.
Amos Best married for his second wife Lyvah
Morse, who was born in 1844 and died at Vicks-
burg, Michigan, in 1916. She was the mother of
three children ; Raymond, a farmer at Fromberg,
Montana ; C. D., a former merchant and now city
clerk at Port Angeles, Washington ; and Ella, whose
first husband was Henry Peet, and she is now the
wife of Bird Williams, a shipyards worker at Seattle.
Mr. O. M. Best grew up on his father's farm,
attended country schools in Kalamazoo County,
Michigan, and at the age of sixteen was ready to
make his own living. While employed as a grain
buyer by a firm at Vicksburg, Michigan, he spent
all his leisure time in learning the art of telegraphy.
As a telegraph operator and agent he was connected
with the Chicago & Grand Trunk Railway in Michi-
gan and Indiana for ten years. It was as a rail-
way man that Mr. Best came to Montana. Beginning
in 1885, for two years he represented the Union
Pacific Railway at Dillon as station agent. On
leaving the railroad he was employed as book-
keeper for L. C. Fyhrie & Company, merchants.
When this firm sold its business in 1889 to the Bur-
fiend Brothers & Company Mr. Best remained with
the organization, and when the business was reor-
ganized as the ^Nlontana Mercantile Company, Incor-
porated, in 1890, he acquired an interest in the firm
and was active in its affairs for a quarter of a
century, until 1915. He still has some financial
holdings in this well known Dillon concern.
In 1915 Mr. Best organized the Western Whole-
sale Grocery Company, He is president and man-
ager of the corporation, J. P. Best is secretary and
treasurer, and A. L. Stone is vice president. While
the business has been in existence only five years,
it is the largest concern of its kind in that part
of the state and supplies the bulk of the retail trade
in Dillon, Madison and Beaverhead counties, the
Big Hole Basin and Centennial Valley of Montana
and also Lemhi County and portions of Clark and
Fremont counties in Idaho. The company has two
warehouses on Montana Street. The main office
and warehouse is a two-story building with base-
ment, 100 feet square with 30,000 square feet of
floor space. The company has twelve employes.
Mr. Best is half owner and also secretary and
treasurer of the Swartz Sheep Company, one of
the leading firms handling sheep in the Madison
Valley near Ennis. Mr, Best has at different times
held offices in his home citv -"vl county, and has
370
HISTORY OF MONTANA
always taken a diligent participation in local af-
fairs. He is the present county commissioner of
Beaverhead County, and in the early days served
two terms in the same office. For several terms
he was a member of the Dillon City Council and has
been a member of the school board. He was on
the Beaverhead County High School Board when
the school was organized and was chairman of the
building committee when the schoolhouse was built.
Mr. Best is a member of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, and is affiliated with Dillon Lodge No. 23,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ; Dillon Camp,
Woodmen of the World, and the Royal Highlanders.
He and his family live in a modern home at 235
South Idaho Street. He married at Climax, Michi-
gan, in 1880, before coming to Montana, Miss Ida
E. Pierce, a daughter of Horace and Julia (Pratt)
Pierce. Her mother is still living at Climax, where
her father, a farmer, died. Mr. and Mrs. Best have
two children, Floyd, a dentist at Dillon ; and Jud-
son, owner of a candy factory at Dillon.
J.\MEs E. Spurling has given fully forty years of
his active life to railroading. For more than thirty
years he has been in the service of the Northern
Pacific Railway, is well known all over that sys-
tem and is one of the prominent officials in Mon-
tana, being division freight and passenger agent at
Billings.
Mr. Spurling is a native of Iowa, born at La
Grange. November 16, 1862. His paternal ances-
tors came from Scotland and were colonial settlers
in Virginia. His grandfather, William Spurling,
was a native of Virginia, spent most of his life in
that state as a farmer, and on retiring moved to
Melrose, Iowa, where he died.
James E. Spurling was born after his father,
James H. Spurling, gave his life to his country as
a soldier of the Civil war. James H. Spurling was
born in Virginia in 1826, was reared in that state,
moved to Indiana, where he married, and shortly
after his marriage settled at La Grange, Iowa,
where he operated a sawmill. Though of southern
ancestry he was strongly identified with the Union
cause during the Civil war, and early in that trou-
ble, in 1861, enlisted in the Sixth Iowa Infantry.
He was with his regiment in a number of engage-
ments, including the Battle of Fort Donelson, and
on the great battlefield of Shiloh, April 6, 1862, he
laid down his life. He was a republican in politics
and a member of the Methodist Church. James
H. Spurling married Ann Bevins, who was born
at Jonesville, Indiana, in 1820, and died at Brook-
ings, South Dakota, in December 1918, when nearly
ninety years of age. She was the mother of two
sons Edwin and James E. Edwin is a retired farm-
er at Brookings, South Dakota.
James E. Spurling attended public school at Mel-
rose, Iowa, but early realized the responsibilities
of life, and leaving school at the age of fifteen
went to work as a messenger in the Melrose depot
of the Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railway.
He was there a year, learned telegraphy, and as a
telegraph operator was employed at different points
through Iowa by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy
until 1880. From Iowa he went to Minnesota and
became a telegraph operator and station agent in
the service of the Great Northern Railway. In 1881
he left railroading temporarily, and for six months
was with the Langdon Shepherd Construction Com-
pany in Canada. For the year following he was with
the L^fah Northern Railway in Idaho, and from
that time until 1886 was in the employ of the Chi-
cago and Northwestern Railway in Dakota terri-
tory.
Mr. Spurling joined the Northern Pacific Rail-
way in 1886. His first duties were in Dakota ter-
ritory and his first experience in Montana was in
1891, when he was made agent at 'Butte. He re-
mained there three years, and then returned to
Jamestown, North Dakota, as agent until 1905. In
that year he was made traveling freight agent, cov-
ering a large territory east of the Missouri River.
In 1907 he was appointed to his present important
duties as division freight and passenger agent at
Billings, his offices being at 2812 Montana Avenue.
In the meantime Mr. Spurling has acquired con-
siderable business and property interests, being a
director in the First National Bank of Molt, and
secretary of the Montana Live Stock Company of
Billings. He owns a modern home at 703 North
Thirty-second Street. Mr. Spurling is a republican,
is affiliated with the Rotary Club of Billings, the
local organization of Hoo Hoos, and is a member
of Jamestown Lodge No. 6. Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, and Jamestown Chapter No. 6, Royal
Arch Masons, in North Dakota.
In 1884, at Ironton. W'isconsin, he married Miss
Tessie Mulholland, a daughter of Patrick and Mary
(Trueman) Mulholland. Her parents are both de-
ceased. Her father for a number of years was
foreman in an iron foundry in Ironton, Wisconsin.
Mr. and Mrs. Spurling have four children. Edwin
C. is local agent for the Northern Pacific Railway
at Terry, Montana, and is a graduate of the James-
town High School. Martha is the wife of Joseph
L. Markham, advertising manager for the Billings
Gazette. Tessie married Thomas M. Murn, a lawyer
at Terry, Montana. Margaret, the youngest of the
family, is still at home.
Herbert P. Imislund is a prominent Lewiston
business man, the president of the Montana And
Eastern Corporation, a large investment concern,
handling the funds of outside capitalists invested in
this state. The offices of the corporation are in
the Imislund Building, at the heart of Lewistown's
financial district.
Mr. Imislund is an old time Montana citizen,
having been here for thirty years or more. He
was born in Trempealeau county, Wisconsin, July
2y. 1864. His parents, Peter H. and Annie (Ander-
son) Imislund, were both natives of Norway. His
father came to this country when a young lad. and
the family were pioneers in Trempealeau county.
He cleared up a tract of government land in that
section of Wisconsin, and lived there until his
death at the age of forty-eight. He was a republican
voter. His widow survived until IQ16, and was
eighty years of age at the time of her death.
Herbert P. Imislund. second of four children,
spent his boyhood days on his father's Wisconsin
farm, attending school only during the winter ses-
sions. Leaving home in 1889, he came direct to
Billings, Montana, traveling by railroad and thence
going by stage to Maiden, where for three or four
years he worked as a farm hand with the N Bar
Ranch and others. He then became a clerk in the
general store of James Charters at Grass Range,
and after about three years bou.eht the business and
continued it under his own name for some eleven
or twelve years. Mr. Imislund while at Grass Range
was also interested with B. F. Moulton in a large
ranch raising sheep and cattle. After selling his
store at Grass Range in 1906 Mr. Imislund came
to Lewistown and has since given all his time to
his business as an investment banker.
He is a republican and is affiliated with Lewis-
town Lodge No. 37. Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. Hiram Chapter No. 15. Royal .\rch Masons.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks.
On June 12, 1901, he married Margaret Charters.
She was born near Portage, Wisconsin. They have
one daughter, Lillian Judith.
George Arnott, Jr. Well equipped for his chosen
profession not only by his native talent and ability,
but by his acquired knowledge of legal lore, George
Arnott, Jr., of the well-known firm of Snell &
Arnott, is numbered among the successful lawyers
of Billings, where he has established a fine practice.
A native of Illinois, he was born August 9, 1885,
in Paxton, where his father, George Arnott, Sr.,
resided for upwards of thirty years. Of French
Huguenot stock on the paternal side, the family
from which he is descended fled with thousands of
other Huguenots from France to Scotland in 1685.
Later one of Mr. Arnott's ancestors became cele-
brated as a physician, and in that capacity was
serving Napoleon Bonaparte when he was banished
to the Island of St. Helena. The immigrant an-
cestor of the Arnott family crossed the Atlantic
shortly after the close of the Revolutionary war.
James Arnott, the grandfather of the subject of
this sketch, was born in Orange County, New York,
in 1810, and during his earlier life was there em-
ployed as a tiller of the soil. In 1869, following the
tide of migration westward, he located in Ford
County, Illinois, becoming a pioneer of Paxton,
where he bought land and engaged in farming dur-
ing the remainder of his life, dying there in 1895.
His wife, whose maiden name was Agnes Coulter,
was a life-long resident of New York state, her last
years having been spent on the home farm in Orange
County.
George Arnott, Sr., was born in Greenwich, New
York, May I, 1849, and was there brought up and
educated. Going with his father to Illinois in 1869,
he subsequently bought land in Paxton, and was
there successfully engaged in agricultural pursuits
for thirty-three years. Removing then with his
family to Missouri, he purchased land in Tarkio,
and there lived retired from active pursuits until
1910, a period of eight years. In 1910 he came to
Montana, where he has large landed interests^ own-
ing a ranch of 1,000 acres at Judith Basin and S,ooo
acres at Big Hole Basin, in Beaverhead County. He
is a resident of Billings, where he has a modernly
built home. He is a republican in politics, and an
influential member of the Congregational Church.
He married Susie Gray, who was born in Penn-
sylvania in 1852, and to them seven children have
been born, as follows: James, a ranchman, died
in Belden, Nebraska, aged twenty-seven years ;
Le Roy, who manages the large ranch at Big Hole
Basin; Jessie, wife of George E. Snell, of the firm
of Snell & Arnott, at Billings; Mary, who married
Frank Sande, proprietor of a laundry at Ther-
mopolis, Wyoming, died in Billings, Montana,
March 17, 1916; George, Jr.; Ed, a ranchman at
Windham, Montana; Annabelle, now, in 1919, a
sophomore at the University of California, in
Berkeley.
Receiving his preliminary education in the public
schools of Paxton, Illinois, George Arnott, Jr., con-
tinued his studies in the preparatory department of
Tarkio College, in Tarkio, Missouri, remaining in
that institution three years. Going from there to
.'\nn Arbor, he entered the University of Michigan,
and was there graduated with the degree of Bachelor
of Laws in 1908. In July, 1908, Mr. Arnott settled
in Billings, and having become junior member of
the law firm of Snell & .Arnott has since been ac-
tively and prosperously employed in legal work.
with offices at Nos. 310-12-14 Securities Building,
and a pleasant home at No. 302 Clark Avenue. By
means of thrift and good judgment he has acquired
title to valuable land, owning a ranch of 400 acres
in the Yellowstone Valley, and a half interest in
a ranch of 430 acres in Fergus County. He is like-
wise a stockholder in the Billings Gas Company,
of which he is the treasurer.
Mr. Arnott married, in 1913, at Billings, Miss
Irena Swearingen, who was graduated from the Na-
tional Cathedral School, Washington, District of
Columbia. Her parents, J. R. and Florence (.Car-
dell) Swearingen, are residents of Billings, Mr.
Swearingen being president of the Montana Sash
and Door Company. Mr. and Mrs. Arnott have
one child, Florence, born March 6, 1916. Socially
Mr. Arnott is a member of the Billings Club and
of the Billings Golf and Country Club. Fraternally
he belongs to Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free
and Accepted Order of Masons, and to the Billings
Lodge of Perfection. He is also an active member
of the Yellowstone County Bar Association and of
the Montana State Bar Association.
T. S. HoGAN. Endowed with excellent business
and executive ability, T. S. Hogan, who now owns
and occupies one of the most highly improved
ranches of Yellowstone County, it being situated
six miles south of Huntley, has achieved distinction
as a man of aflfairs, having attained prominence not
only as an attorney and a statesman but as a suc-
cessful and progressive agriculturist. A native of
Wisconsin, he was born at Chippewa Falls December
23. 1869, and was there reared and educated.
John Hogan, his father, was born in Tipperary,
Ireland, in 183 1. Immigrating to the United States
in early manhood, he located first in Cleveland, Ohio,
where he followed his trade of a stone mason for
a time. Ambitious to better his fortunes and, to
become permanently settled in life, he followed the
pioneer's trail to Wisconsin in 1859, ^nd having there
obtained title to a tract of land was subsequently en-
gaged in agricultural pursuits until his death, which
occurred there in 1905. He was a faithful adherent
of the democratic party, and a member of the Roman
Catholic Church. He married, in Cleveland, Ohio,
Bridget A'Hern, who was born in Waterford, Ire-
land, and is now a resident of Aberdeen, Wash-
ington. Seven children were born of their union,
as follows : Mary, wife of James P. Sheehey, a
cotton grower in San Antonio, Texas ; P. R., who
is engaged in the lumber business at Aberdeen,
Washington ; M. E., a lumber dealer in Troy, Mon-
tana ; J. C, a well-known attorney of Aberdeen,
Washington ; William, who resides at Spokane,
Washington, where he has extensive mining in-
terests ; Amelia, wife of D. J. Manning, a prosperous
farmer of Hysham, Montana; and T. S., the special
subject of this brief personal notice.
Acquiring his elementary education at Chippewa
Falls, Wisconsin, T.^ S. Hogan was graduated from
the high school with the class of 1886, and for
three years thereafter taught school in his native
county. Migrating westward in 1889, he spent a
year in Aberdeen, Washington, being variously em-
ployed while there. In 1890 he became a resident
of Montana, and for a year did genera! work in
the mines at Butte. In 1891 Mr. Hogan began work
in the silver belt, at Anaconda, Montana, and subse-
quently was for three years employed in refining
gold and silver for the Anaconda Company.
Taking an active part in public aflfairs, Mr. Hogan
was elected secretary of state in 1896, and served
most faithfully in that capacity for four years, his
residence during that time having been in Helena.
372
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In 1901 he returned to Butte, and, having been ad-
mitted to the Montana Bar in 1900, while secretary
of state, he began the practice of law, which he had
read to advantage in early manhood, and continued
in practice there for four years. Removing to
Billings, Yellowstone Countj', in 1905, he there con-
tinued the practice of his profession seven years,
building up an extensive and lucrative patronage.
In the meantime Mr. Hogan purchased 4,000 acres
of land lying six miles south of Huntley, and has
since devoted his time and attention to its improve-
ment, having one of the finest and most valuable
grain and stock ranches in the county.
An independent democrat in politics, radical in
his views, and honest in the expression of his
opinions, Mr. Hogan is influential in matters con-
cerning the public, and for four years served as
state senator, from 1914 until 1918. While thus
occupied he was a member of several comrnittees
of importance, including among others the judiciary,
capital and labor, agriculture and insurance. He
also introduced the Workmen's Compensation Law,
which has been incorporated on the statute books
of Montana. Ever loyal to his constituents, he
looked after their interests while in the senate with
rare fidelity, using the same good judgment in the
management of public affairs that he did in his
private dealings.
At Chippewa Falls, Wisconsiri, in 1893, Mr. Hogan
was united in marriage with Miss Kathryn Donovan,
a daughter of John and Mary (Manning) Donovan,
pioneer settlers of Chippewa Falls, where both spent
their last years, dying on the farm they redeemed
from its original wilderness. Six children have
blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Hogan, namely:
Emmett V., born April 24, 1897, was graduated from
the Billings High School, after which he continued
his studies at the State University in Bozeman, and
now has charge of all the stock on the home ranch ;
Marj' T., born in 1900, is a graduate of the Billings
High School ; Fred T., born in 1902, assists his
father on the ranch; Ruth, born in 1904; Maurine,
born in 1906; and Helen, born in 1909.
John E. Clifford, who came to Montana in 1886,
has at many times been in close touch with the larger
affairs of the state in its commerce and industry,
and has been an interesting witness and participant
in important phases of state history. Mr. Clifford
has been a leading figure in state politics for a
number of years, and is at present serving his sec-
ond term as state parole commissioner.
Mr. Clifford was born at Weston in Platte County,
Missouri, April 13, 1862. His father, Jeremiah Clif-
ford, was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1835,
and came to the United States in 1856. He im-
mediately went to what was then the western
frontier of Western Missouri, and for a number of
years was a railroad man. He died at Atchison,
Kansas, July 29, 1891. He was a democrat and
Catholic and member of the Catholic Knights of
America. He married Johanna Foley at Jefferson
City, Missouri, in 1857. She was born in County
Kerry, Ireland, in 1839, and died at Kansas City,
Missouri, March 26, loio. The oldest of their
children, D. J. Clifford, died at Jefferson City, Mis-
souri, in 1908, where he was serving as deputy state
dairy inspector. W. J. Clifford died at Kansas City,
Missouri, March 4, 1918, having been connected with
a wholesale house in that city. John E. Clifford is
the third in the family. M, E. Clifford is with
Smith, McCord & Company, a dry goods house in
Kansas City. Mary was married in Atchison, Kan-
sas, to Michael Sullivan, and they now live in Jack-
sonville, Florida. Kate and Leona are both unmar-
ried and living at Kansas City, the latter being
head bookkeeper for Peck's wholesale dry goods
house, the largest firm of its kind in Kansas City.
John E. Clifford was educated in the grammar
and high schools of Platte City, Missouri, and in
1882 graduated from St. Mary's College in Pottawa-
tomie County, Kansas. From 1882 to 1886 he filled
several clerical positions in the Missouri Pacific
Railway offices at Atchison, Kansas, working up to
the grade of chief clerk.
He left the Middle West in 1886 and arrived at
Missoula, Montana, July 13, 1886. Until September
I, 1887, he worked as shipping clerk for the Missou-
la Mercantile Company. He accepted a proposition
from T. J. DeMers to take charge of a large stock
of goods into the Indian country at the head of
navigation in the Flathead district, then Missoula
County, now Flathead County. He housed his mer-
chandise in a large tent. In 18S8 Mr. Clift'ord laid
out and platted the Town of De Mersville, Montana,
a community now extinct, but which in its time was
the scene of much history-making in that part of
the state. Air. Clifford was in that district when the
trouble arose between the Government and the Flat-
head Indians and had many experiences out on the
border. In 1891 he was elected mayor of De Mers-
ville, being the first and only mayor of that short-
lived town. In 1892 the City of Kalispell was start-
ed, and soon drew all the population away from De
Mersville. In the meantime, in 1888, Mr. Clifford
had been appointed postmaster at his store under
President Cleveland, and the postoffice was named
Clifford in his honor. He filled that office two years.
He was then deputy United States marshal, and in
that capacity had an official relation with some of
the Indian troubles in his district.
In 1894 Mr. Clifford accompanied the United
States Commission to Alaska to determine the
boundary lines between that territory and Can-
ada. Returning to Montana in 1895, he spent several
years in Missoula and Butte, and in 1901 came to
Anaconda, where he was employed in the smelters
of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company until
1908. For lyi years, three terms of six months
each, he was recording secretary for the Anaconda
Mill and Smeltermen's Union. Mr. Clifford was
appointed deputy game warden in 1909 by Governor
Norris, holding that office four years. The oflice
of state parole commissioner was created by the
Legislature in 1913, and Governor Stewart chose
Mr. Clifford as the man best qualified to initiate the
duties of that office. After four years in 1917, he
was reappointed for a second terra.
Mr. Clifford has long been prominent in demo-
cratic politics. For six years he was state commit-
teeman of Deer Lodge County, for sixteen years
has been a member of the Deer Lodge central com-
mittee, and was secretary of the county central com-
mittee two years. He has been a trustee of the
Hearst Free Public Library at Anaconda for the
past twelve years. He holds one of the oldest union
cards in Anaconda, and is still a member of the
Anaconda Mill and Smeltermen's Union.
Mr. Clifford is a Catholic, affiliated with Mount
Haggin Court No. 629, Catholic Order of Foresters,
with Anaconda Camp No. 154, Woodmen of the
World, with the Knights and Ladies of Security,
with Anaconda Aerie No. 18. Fraternal Order of
Eagles, and with Anaconda Lodge No. 557, Loyal
Order of Moose.
Mr. Clifford and family reside at 411 Pine Street.
On December 24, 1887, at Frenchtown, Montana,
he married Miss Delia De Mers, daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. T. J. De Mers, now deceased. Her father
was a famous Montanan. a pioneer trader in general
HISTORY OF MONTANA
merchandise, and became widely known all over the
Northwest. Mrs. Clifford died in Oregon in 1901,
the mother of one son. This son, Jerry J., was born
at Clifford or De Mersville, Montana, October 14
1890, and graduated from the Catholic High School
at St. Joseph, Missouri. In 1917 he volunteered in
the army, was trained as an aviator, arrived in Lon-
don April 2, igi8, and was in France during the
great events of the summer of 1918 and afterwards
was with the Army of Occupation. He returned to
this country, landing at New York City, July 13,
1919. On June 22, 1904, at Anaconda, Mr. Clifford
married Mrs. Nellie M. (Whiston) Ahearn, daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. Patrick Whiston, who still live
at Anaconda. Her father was an early settler at
Anaconda and for thirty years has been connected
with the A. C. M. Company. Mr. and Mrs. Clif-
ford have two children: Theresa, born July 31, 1905.
and James Pv, born April 29, 1908. By her first
husband Mrs. Clifford has two children: Margaret,
born .April 17, 1899, and Mollie, born September 22,
1900. Margaret is a graduate of the Catholic High
School at Anaconda with the class of 1916, and is now
bookkeeper and stenographer for Duncan R. Mc-
Rae's department store at Anaconda. Mollie, who
graduated also in 1916, from St. Peter's Catholic
High School at Anaconda, is said to be one of the
most efficient and rapid stenographers in Montana.
She is stenographer and bookkeeper for the Copper
City Commercial Company in their general offices.
D.wiD Reise Hopkins, yardmaster for the North-
ern Pacific Railroal at Laurel, and one of the ranch
owners of Carbon County, is one of the substantial
men of Yellowstone County. He was born at
Logan, Utah, January 4, 1871, a son of W. T.
Hopkins, born in Wales in 1843, and died at Logan,
Utah, in 1914. His father was killed in an accident
in a coal mine in Wales, and following that sad
event his widow, in 1851, came to the United States
and located in North Ogden, LItah, where her son,
W. T. Hopkins, was reared. Her father, Robert
Roberts, a native of Wales, accompanied his daugh-
ter to the United States and died at Farmington,
Utah, before David Reise Hopkins, his grandson,
was born. By occupation he was a quarryman, and
he was one of the pioneers of Utah.
W. T. Hopkins passed through many exciting
experiences during the epoch which saw the develop-
ment of Utah. He and his people connected them-
selves with the Mormons and, as did the others of
that sturdy and industrious band, worked hard to
overcome the obstacles raised by nature and the
Indians to prevent any permanent settlement there
by the whites. That they did succeed and brought
prosperity and wealth to a trackless region are
matters of history. During his youth W. T. Hop-
kins assisted his stepfather in farming, and grew
up strong and courageous and was made a member
of the band of minute men organized to protect the
Mormons from attacks from the hostile Indians.
He drove a bull team three round trips from Salt
Lake City to Omaha Landing, now South Omaha,
Nebraska, as a freighter, taking his life in his hands
on each trip. Loving adventure for its own sake,
he took up railroad construction work and followed
it until 1894, when, acquiring a ranch, he spent the
remainder of his life in operating it. He was a
strong supporter of the republican party. In him
the ^Mormon Church had a conscientious member.
Fraternally he belonged to the Knights of Pythias.
He married Ann Roberts at Logan, Utah, born in
Wales in 1843, and she survives him, making her
home at Logan. Their children were as follows :
Sarah Catherine, who married Moses Thatcher, a
coal and ice dealer of Logan, Utah ; David R., who
was the second in order of birth; W. T., Jr., who
died at the age of sixteen years.
Until he was sixteen years old David R. Hopkins
attended the public schools of Logan, and then
began to be self-supporting. In 1886 he came to
Montana and for four years was on a ranch at
what is now Lima, but was then known as Spring
Hill. Leaving the ranch, he became a .brakeman on
the Utah Northern Railroad, with which he con-
tinued until 1894, being principally employed at and
near Lima, but in that year left for the Montana
Union Railroad as yardman at Butte, Montana. In
1905 he was transferred to Billings, Montana, with
the Northern Pacific Railroad, which had absorbed
the Montana Union Railroad, as yardmaster, and
remained there until 1918, when he was placed in
charge of the company's yards at Laurel, which
are very extensive, covering four square miles.
Under his immediate supervision are seventy-five
men and the other interests connected with the con-
duct of the company's interests at this point. Mr.
Hopkins also owns a fine ranch of 320 acres in
Carbon County, Montana.
In 1894 Mr. Hopkins was married at Lima, Mon-
tana, to Miss Lillian Baker, born at Mapleton,
Kansas. Mr. and Mrs. Hopkins became the parents
of the following children: Alfred, who died in
infancy; W. B., who was born December 19, 1897,
is serving in the United States Navy, overseas ;
Sarah who was born March 14, 1902, is at home
attending the Laurel High School; Blodwyn, who
was born March 24, 1904; and David R., Jr., who
was born December 29, 1906. Mr. Hopkins is noted
for his energy, sincerity and his reliability, it being
a matter of common knowledge that he lives up to
his promises and that when he undertakes to get a
thing done it is accomplished satisfactorily and
expeditiously.
C. P. H.AMRiCK. The opportunities for advance-
ment in Montana are almost limitless provided they
are grasped when presented by hands that have
been trained to be useful, and directed by practical
brains. The records of any industry, particularly in
the West, show that the men who have risen to
positions of trust and responsibility are those who
have made their own way in life, unaided by col-
legiate training or outside influence. Such a man
is C. P. Hamrick, assistant manager of the Bear
Creek Coal Company of Bear Creek. Montana, a
man of practical ideas and well versed in the
methods of honorable industry. He was born at
Denver, Colorado, August 29, 1878, a son of J. M.
Hamrick, now a resident of Calhoun, Colorado, but
by birth a native of Virginia, as he came into the
world in Culpeper County, that state, in 1849, his
ancestors having come to that section in colonial
days from Scotland and Ireland. J. M. Hamrick
was reared in his native state, but was married in
Tennessee to Emma Gold Spindle, born in Virginia
in 1853, and soon thereafter he came west to Denver,
Colorado, where for a number of years he con-
ducted a general merchandise business. In 1905 he
went to Calhoun, Colorado, where he owns a large
ranch, at that time being one of the pioneers of the
section. A strong democrat, he has held various
local offices in the several communities in which he
has lived, and has always taken a prominent part
in civic affairs. He has two children, C. P., whose
name heads this review; and J. M., Jr., who is a
successful business man of Denver, Colorado.
C. P. Hamrick was reared in his native city, and
attended its schools until he was sixteen years of
age. At that time he felt the urge toward a business
374
HISTORY OF MONTANA
career, and left school to engage with the C. S.
Morey Mercantile Company, with which he remained
for twelve years, working from his initial position
as office boy to be one of the company's traveling
salesmen, his territory being the State of Colorado.
The business of this company was the handling of
groceries at wholesale. In 1909 Mr. Hamrick came
to Montana, and after a short period spent at Butte,
entered the employ of the Great Western Sugar
Company at Billings. Later he was connected with
Yeager Brothers, Incorporated, as general office
man, remaining with that concern until March I,
1914, when he was made bookkeeper for the Bear
Creek Coal Company, being promoted to the position
of assistant manager, the manager being Chris
Yeager of Billings. The plant and offices are one
mile west of the town of Bear Creek, and Mr
Hamrick has 200 men under his supervision. The
mine produces semi-bituminous coal and has a ca-
pacity of 1,800 tons per day.
In 1908 Mr. Hamrick was married at Denver,
Colorado, to Miss Beda Lingren, born at Stockholm,
Sweden, but reared in Illinois and given a high
school education. Mr. and Mrs. Hamrick have no
children. His political sentiments make him an
independent democrat. Fraternally he belongs to
Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, of Red Lodge, Montana. Mr.
Hamrick's success in life is his own product, and
he holds the confidence of his employers and the
respect of his men, being recognized by his asso-
ciates as one upon whom responsibilities may be
safely laid, for he will never shirk them or fail to
accord impartial justice to both sides.
Joseph E. Pickens since coming to Montana in
1907 has played a varied and useful part in the af-
fairs of Huntley, where he is a merchant, post-
master and rancher.
He is descended from ancestors who left England
in colonial times and settled in America. His grand-
father was born in 1801 and was one of the pioneer
farmers around Newcastle, Indiana, where he died
in 1889. William Pickens, father of the Huntley
merchant, was born in Indiana in 1840, grew up
there, married in Iowa, and for several years lived
at Muscatine in that state and from there went to
the Nebraska frontier and home^eaded 160 acres at
Powell. In 1862 he was one of the gold seekers to
come to Virginia City, Montana, and had some
varied experiences and adventures before he went
back to Muscatine, Iowa. He is now living retired
at Huntley. Politically he is a democrat. William
Pickens married Celinda Thornton, who was born
at Muscatine, Iowa, in 1847 and died at Salt Lake
City, Utah, in 1905. They had five children, Joseph
being the youngest. Lopiz W., the oldest, is a mail
clerk at Huntley; Rena is unmarried and lives with
her brother Joseph ; Walter R. is a farmer at
Roundup, Montana, and Arthur O. is associated
with his brother Joseph in business.
Joseph E. Pickens was born at Powell, Nebraska,
May 14, 1884, and acquired his early education in
the public schools of his native town and the high
school at Fairbury, Nebraska. For two years he
was a student in the University of Utah at Salt Lake
City, but left college in 1905. The next two years
he spent as an assayer in the mining district of
DeLamar, Nevada, and did some mining on his own
account for four months. He came to Huntley in
1907 and established a stock of genera! merchandise
and out of that undertaking has developed the
leading business of its kind in this part of Yellow-
stone County. He now has a flourishing trade
drawn from all the country thirty miles around
Huntley. It is a department store with floor space
fifty by sixty feet. In connection with the store he
handles the postoffice. He was appointed post-
master in 1909 under the Taft administration and
has had two reappointments under President Wilson,
the last coming in April, 1919.
Besides these interests Mr. Pickens owns a ranch
of 280 acres three miles south of Huntley and has
eighty acres of valuable irrigated land a mile north-
east of the same town. He also owns his store
building. Mr. Pickens is a democrat in politics, and
is unmarried.
John Carney is a veteran in the service of the
Northern Pacific Railway, helped build that road
into Montana, and is still active as a stationary
engineer at Huntley. He is one of the oldest resi-
dents of Huntley and by many years of hard work
has achieved a competency.
Mr. Carney was born at Canterbury, Windham
County, Connecticut, April 3, 1859. His father,
Daniel Carney, was born in County Tipperary, Ire-
land, in 1814, grew up there and learned the trade
of marble cutter, and in 1848 established his home at
Canterbury, Connecticut. He lived the rest of his
life as a farmer and died in October, 1888. He was
a democrat and a Catholic, and during the Civil
war was a Union soldier throughout the period of
hostilities with the Eighteenth Connecticut Infantry.
Daniel Carney married Johannah Brean, who was
born in County Kerry. Ireland, in 1829. She died
at Canterbury, Connecticut, in June, 1867, John being
the oldest of her five children. Mary, the second
in age, died at the age of forty-nine at Norwich, .
Connecticut, where her husband, John Savage, a
teamster, is still living. ' Timothy died at Elizabeth,
Colorado, at the age of twenty. Daniel owns a large
farm and is a prosperous resident of Earlville, Illi-
nois. Johannah, the youngest, died at the age of
eighteen.
John Carney lived on his father's Connecticut farm
until he was seventeen years of age. In the mean-
time he had attended the common schools of Can-
terbur}-, and on leaving home he learned the
butcher's trade at Jewett City in his native state.
He was there two years, went to Mendota, Illinois,
in 1876 and worked' on a farm and in i88i came to
Montana as part of the construction forces building
the Northern Pacific Railway to Glendive. At
Glendive he helped build the roundhouse and the
railroad yards, and while there was made locomo-
tive engineer. He was in command of the throttle
until 1888. He was run over by a car in the Glen-
dive Yards and lost his right foot. Incapacitated
for train service, he was assigned to duty as engi- '
neer in the shops from 1890 to 1895. and in the
latter year was transferred to Huntley, where he
has charge of the railroad pumping house and has
been steadily and faithfully on that job for over
twenty years.
In the meantime he has become owner of a modern
home at Huntley, and owns a valuable irrigated
farm of forty acres east of the town. He has been
active in local affairs, serving for the past eight
years as justice of the peace, and for seven years
was chairman of the School Board. Mr. Carney
is a republican, a member of the Catholic Church,
and is affiliated with Billings Star Lodge No. 41,
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
March 7, 1017, at Norwich, Connecticut, he mar-
ried Miss Mary E. Archer, daughter of John and
Mary (Collier) Archer. Her father was a gun-
smith and both her parents died at Norwich.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
375
Harry E. Andrus gave to the business men and
citizens generally in Montana an instance of unusual
enterprise, foresight and public spirit when in 1916
he built the splendid Hotel Andrus at Dillon. The
people of that community had for a number of
years been deploring the fact that it was without ap-
propriate hotel facilities, and it was known that the
lack of such accommodations was imposing a severe
handicap upon its normal commercial development
and prosperity. However, there had appeared no
individual or group of citizens ready to solve the
problem and invest the money required until Mr.
Andrus, who for many years had been a successful
rancher in Montana, sold his ranch and with the
proceeds determined to give Dillon not only a first
class hotel, but a monument of real progressiveness
and public spirit.
When the hotel was completed the investment
totaled $165,000. Mr. Andrus is not only the builder
but has continued as its manager, and has seen to
it that the service and accommodations are fully up
to the high standard set by the building itself. Hotel
Andrus is now regarded as one of the four leading
hotels of Montana, and no one thing has done more
to give Dillon a place among the thriving cities of
the state than this institution.
Mr. Andrus, who has spent much of his life in the
West, was born at Lafayette, Indiana, August 30,
1867. His father, Horace Andrus, was a native of
Illinois, and for a number of years was a farmer
near Lafayette. The mother was Mary Slaughter,
a native of Kentucky, now living at Boulder, Colo-
rado, where her husband died in 1904. They were
the parents of eight children: James, a rancher in
Colorado; Clara, who died in 1914, leaving seven
children by her husband, James C. G. Smith, who
is now clerk and recorder at Fredonia, Kansas, and
in the real estate business there ; Frank, a rancher
at Ladore, Idaho; Harry E. ; Lula, wife of C. K.
Blanton, a rancher at Boulder, Colorado, and the
mother of two children ; Mary, wife of Sawyer
Clark, a real estate and insurance man at Boulder ;
Bert, a rancher at Boulder; and Barbara, wife of
John Piatt, a physician at Lead, South Dakota. The
parents of these children were active Presbyterians
and the father was a republican.
Harry E. Andrus acquired his education in the
public schools of Kansas and Colorado and had some
farming experience in both those states. He was a
young man twenty-two years of age, had a wife and
one child, when behind a span of mules he rode into
the State of Montana in 1899. In Montana he put
his previous experience to good use, locating in the
Sheep Creek Basin and buying a ranch. In the
course of a few years he had 1,200 acres devoted
to cultivation and as pasture ground for his sheep,
and eventually through leasing of land other than
that he controlled his ranch domain was 8 by 12
miles square. At times his flocks enumerated as
high as 7,000 sheep, and he had one of the best herds
of Hereford cattle in the county. He also raised
a number of high grade horses. For a quarter of
a century all his energies were devoted to ranching,
and in 1916 he sold out and devoted the fruits of his
long labors to the conspicuous improvement at Dil-
lon above noted.
Mr. .^ndrus, who is a man deservedly popular
throughout Beaverhead County, is a democrat in poli-
tics and a member of the Knights of Pythias and
the Woodmen of the World. In 1890 he married
Margaret Rosenbaum of Boulder, Colorado, daugh-
ter of Antone Rosenbaum of that city. They are the
parents of three children, Fern, born in 1897, living
at home; Wilma, born in 1898, wife of J. T. Colfer,
of Seattle; and Harry, born in 1901, now attending
school at Pacific Beach, California.
George A. Westover is one of the leading mem-
bers of the Stillwater County Bar, has been in prac-
tice at Columbus for ten years, and is mayor of that
city.
He was born at Albion in Boone County, Nebraska,
June 9, 1884. The Westover family are English
and were colonial settlers in Pennsylvania. His
grandfather, Amatlia Westover, was born in Iowa
in 1834, when Iowa was a territory. He lived much
of his life along the frontier, and was a pioneer
farmer of Eastern Nebraska. He died at Lincoln
in that state in 1899. His wife, Ann Westover, was
born in Pennsylvania in 1837, and died at Lincoln,
Nebraska, in 1902. J. A. Westover, father of the
Columbus lawyer, was born in Iowa in 1861, but
was reared in Eastern Nebraska, and from Lincoln
during the early eighties moved to Boone County,
where he engaged in the real estate business for a
number of years. He returned to Lincoln in 1898,
continued as a real estate operator, and since 1915
has lived retired at Billings, Montana. He is a
republican. At Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1882, he mar-
ried Mina C. Fusha. She was born in 1862 at
Vergennes, Vermont. Of their six children George
A. is the oldest. Edward J. is associated with his
next younger brother, Robert L., in the Yellowstone
Trail Garage at Billings, Montana. Leo D., the
fourth of the family, is a mechanic living at Omaha,
Nebraska, while Joe F. makes his home at East-
port, New York, and is mechanical tester for the
Curtiss Aeroplane Company. The youngest of the
family is Florence F., wife of Merle E. Smith, an
insurance man at Billings.
George A. Westover attended public school in
Lincoln, Nebraska, graduating from high school in
1906. He finished his course in the Law Department
of the University of Nebraska at Lincoln in 1909,
and during the following year practiced in Ne-
braska's capital city. He came to Columbus in 1910,
and has since been busy with a general civil and
criminal practice. His offices are in the Columbus
State Bank Building. Mr. Westover is a membet
of the Yellowstone Valley Bar Association, is a
republican and is affiliated with Yellowstone Lodge
No. 85, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Billings
Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
At Lincoln, Nebraska, January i, 1914, he married
Miss Nettie E. Wood. Her mother, Mrs. Emeline
Wood, lives at Harvard, Nebraska. They have three
children: Roland W., born September 30, 1914;
June Irene, born June 27, 1916; and Norris Edward,
born January 27, 1918.
Austin Swandal. To a great extent the pros-
perity of the agricultural sections of our great
country is due to the honest industry, the sturdy
perseverance and the wise economy which so promi-
nently characterizes the foreign element that has
entered largely into our population. By comparison
with their "old country" surroundings these people
have readily recognized the fact that in .'\merica
lie the greatest opportunities for the man of ambi-
tion and energy. And because of this many have
broken the ties of home and native land and have
entered earnestly upon the task of gaining in the
new world a home and competence. Among this
class may be mentioned Austin Swandal, who by his
indefatigable labor and honest effort has not only
acquired a well-merited material prosperity, but has
HISTORY' OF MONTANA
also richly earned the high esteem of all with whom
he has been associated.
Austin Swandal was born at Stevanger, Norway,
on the 28th of October, 1889, and is the son of
Austin and Marie (Hereim) Swandal. The latter
was born at Stevanger, Norway, in 1869, and died
there in 1907. Austin Swandal, Sr., was born at
Stevanger in 1862, and was reared to agricultural
pursuits. He came to the United States in 1898
and settled at Lennep, Montana, where he was num-
bered among the pioneer ranchmen. He was suc-
cessful, but in 1904 he returned to Norway, where
he still resides. He had served as a soldier in the
Norwegian armv. He is a member of the Lutheran
Church. To h'im and his wife were born seven
children, namely: Austin, the immediate subject of
this sketch ; Nels, who resides on a ranch twelve
miles north of Wilsall ; John, also a rancher, about
eleven miles north of Wilsall ; Ed, who is in part-
nership with his brother John; Ole remains with
his father in Norway and is a farmer; Matt and
Christ are also with "their father.
Austin Swandal, the son, received a good prac-
tical education in the public schools of Stevanger,
Norway, where he remained until 1905, when he
came to the United States, locating at Lennep,
Montana, where he homesteaded l6a acres, and
also a timber claim of the same size. In 1913 he
sold this land and moved onto his present ranch,
which is situated about ten miles northeast of Wil-
sall. Mr. Swandal owns 2,720 acres of land and
also leases 3,000 acres. He is extensively engaged
in the raising of cattle and sheep, in which he has
met with eminent success, being counted one of the
best ranchmen in this section of the state. He
"runs'" about 3,000 sheep and 500 cattle annually and
has exercised rare discrimination and sound judg-
ment in everything he has undertaken. He has a
partner, C. K. Liquin, under the firm name of Liquin
& Swandal. Mr. Swandal being the secretary and
treasurer of the company.
Politically Mr. Swandal is an ardent supporter of
the republican party, and his fraternal relations are
with Wilsall Lodge No. 103, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows.
In 1914 Austin Swandal was married to Ella M.
Aspelund, the daughter of Ole Nelson Aspelund
and Gusta Amalia Wittre, of Christiania, Nor-
way, where the father, who was formerly owner
of a ship and captain on his own ship, is now retired.
To Mr. and Mrs. Swandal has been born one child,
Gladys Marie, born January 2, 1917.
Ole C. Wogan is postmaster and a merchant at
Roberts, has spent most of his active career in com-
mercial affairs, though he came to Montana and
went through the experience of developing a home-
stead.
He was born in Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota,
September 10, 1880. His father, Frederick Wogan,
was born at Throndjem, Norway, in 1846, grew up
in his native country, served in the Norwegian army,
and after his marriage came to the United States
in the spring of 1880 and was an early settler in
Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota. He has done well
as a farmer and is still living at Dawson in that
county. He is an active member of the Lutheran
Church. The maiden name of his wife was Oline
Stigen, who was born in the southern part of Nor-
way in 1851. She died at Dawson, Minnesota, in
1913. Their children were: Marit, a lumber dealer
at Milan, Minnesota ; Ole C. ; Anna, who lives with
her father; Olaf M., who is employed by his
brother Ole at Roberts ; Oscar, a barber at Dawson,
Minnesota; Selmer, who during the war was in
the Aviation Corps and in training at San Antonio,
Texas; and Maria, wife of Launtz Borgendale, a
farmer near Dawson, Minnesota.
Ole C. Wogan attended public school at Dawson,
graduating from high school and afterwards taking
a course m a business college at Austin, Minnesota.
For two years he was employed in a drug store at
Austin, for another two years was assistant cashier
of a bank at Gary, South Dakota, and was employed
in the postoffice and as clerk in a store at Mobridge,
South Dakota, two years.
Mr. Wogan came to Montana and took up a home-
stead at Columbus in 1910. He proved up and lived
on his farm four years, afterwards selling it. In
the meantime he moved to Roberts in 1915 and
bought out one of the principal general stores of
Carbon County, and now owns both the store and
building and has a trade of generous proportions
drawn from all the country fifteen miles around
Roberts. He also has a ranch of 160 acres near
Gibson, Montana, owns a store building and a half
interest in the stock at Boyd, Montana, and has one
of the good homes in Roberts. He was appointed
to the office of postmaster at Roberts in 1917.
Mr. Wogan is a democrat and is affiliated with
the Lutheran Church. He married at Gibson, Mon-
tana, in 191S, Miss Dora Forsyth, daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. B. O. Forsyth, both now deceased. Her
father was a Montana pioneer, coming to the terri-
tory in 1873, and was a well known rancher. Mr.
and Mrs. Wogan have one daughter, Phyllis, born
March 2, 1916.
William Harry Bunney. A man who has al-
ways been able to take advantage of opportunities
when offered him, William Harry Bunney, general
manager of the M. W. & S. Railroad, with head-
quarters at Belfrey, Montana, has risen steadily in
the railroad business, and his successive promotions
have been accorded him because he has deserved
them, and not through the exertion of outside in-
fluence in his behalf. Mr. Bunney is a native of
Cleveland, Ohio, where he was born January 6,
1880. His father, F. E. Bunney, who is now living
at Puyallup, Washington, was born in England in
1852, in the Village of Penge, and was there reared,
leaving England for the United States after attain-
ing his majority. Marrying after coming to this
country, he settled at Cleveland, Ohio, but left that
city in 1882 to go west as far as Denver, Colorado.
In 1884 he moved to Butte, Montana, being made
station agent for what is now the Northern Pacific
Railroad. From 1886 to 1888 he was in a mining
business at Anaconda, Montana, but left that point
in 1888 for Missoula, where he spent a year in rail-
roading. He then was at Tacoma, Washington, for
a time, leaving that city for Puyallup, Washington,
where he has since 1910 been agent for the Northern
Pacific Railroad. With the exception of the two
years he spent in mining, Mr. Bunney has been
engaged in railroad work practically all his life,
and is still actively engaged in it. He is a re-
publican. For many years he has been a consistent
member of the Presbyterian Church. In fraternal
matters he maintains membership in the Masonic
order and the Ancient Order of United Workmen.
In 1878 F. E. Bunney was married to Lenora
Roberts, born in Kentucky in 1850, and their chil-
dren were as follows : William Harry, whose name
heads this review; and Ethel, who married J. W.
McCune, traffic man on the coast for shipping
interests, resides at Tacoma, Washington.
William Harry Bunney attended the public schools
of Montana and the tacoma High School, from
which he was graduated in 1898. Following that
HISTORY OF MONTANA
377
Mr. Bunney took a commercial course at the Ta-
coma Business College, and then entered the employ
of the Northern Pacific Railroad, beginning at the
bottom and working up from the job of engine
wiper until he was made stenographer in the office.
In 1903 he went to St. Paul, Minne.sota, as stenog-
rapher in the offices of the Northern Pacific Rail-
road. Later he was made assistant to the chief
clerk to the general manager of this road, and held
that position until 1908. In that year he was made
chief clerk to the superintendent of the road at
Missoula, remaining as such until 1912. He was
then made chief clerk to the superintendent at Liv-
ingston, Montana, holding that position until 1918,
when he was made general manager of the M. W. &
S. Railroad at Belfrey, Montana. This road was
built in 1907 and runs from the Bear Creek coal
field to Bridger, connecting with the Northern
Pacific Railroad at that point. Mr. Bunney is_ a
republican, and while living at Livingston was chair-
man of the school board and president of the Rail-
way Club, the leading club of the city. He belongs
to Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, of which he is past master;
Livingston Consistory, of which he is a thirty-
second degree Mason ; and Algeria Temple, .A.ncient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of
Helena, Montana. Mr. Bunney is a director of the
Mutual Building and Loan Association of Living-
ston, and took a very active part in the business and
social life of that city, as he is already doing at
Belfrey.
In 1900 Mr. Bunney was married at Tacoma,
Washington, to Miss Agnes L. Stephenson, born
at Portland, Oregon. Mr. and Mrs. Bunney have
three children: Edward, who was born in May,
1902; Howard Irvine, who was born in December,
1905 ; and Gordon, who was born in May, I9<^.
Mr. Bunney is a man thoroughly experienced in
every detail of his calling, and having worked his
way up understands the possibilities of each posi-
tion, and is able to judge accurately as to the capa-
bilities of each man and to determine if he is
rendering faithful and efficient service. No one
who had not passed through similar experiences
could so ably and justly discharge the onerous
responsibilities of this position and meet promptly
and capably the numerous problems which arise
every day.
William P. Knudsen. The handling of realty
and the writing of fire and life insurance are two
kindred lines of business which have for many years
enlisted the services of some of the most virile men
of the country. No community ever makes much
permanent progress until its real estate is handled
by men possessing a natural ability for such work,
and the nature of their efforts brings them into
contact with their prospects in such a confidential
manner that it is but natural that they learn of their
private affairs and are able to advise wisely as to
the securing of proper protection through insurance
for their lives and property. One of the men who
is fast becoming a potential factor in the realty and
insurance circles of Billings, Montana, is William P.
Knudsen, president of the Knudsen Realty Com-
pany, for he possesses ability of such force as to
bring about successful terminations to the majority
of his operations.
The birth of Mr. Knudsen took place at Merrill,
Wisconsin, September 23, 1888, he being a son of
Louis Knudsen. Louis Knudsen was born in Nor-
way in 1852, and he died at Merrill, Wisconsin, in
1892. When only twenty years of age he left Nor-
way for the United States, and after iiis arrival
in this country he built a saw mill forty miles south
of Merrill, operating it for a time, but later e.x-
panding until he was a builder and contractor and
millwright of considerable importance. He located
in Wisconsin at a time when pioneer conditions
prevailed, and went through the usual experience of
the early settler in any new region. The Lutheran
Church of Merrill had in him a consistent and
earnest member. After coming to Wisconsin Louis
Knudsen was united in marriage with Christina
Hansen, born in Denmark in 1863, who survives
him and lives at Merrill, Wisconsin, .\fter his
death she was married to John Nelson, who is a
lumber grader at Merrill. Louis Knudsen and his
wife had children as follows: Oscar A., who re-
sides at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, is a traveling sales-
man ; Harold M., who is a veterinary surgeon at
Kenosha, Wisconsin ; William P., whose name heads
this review ; and Olaf , who is a pattern maker at
Milwaukee, Wisconsin. By her second marriage
Mrs. Knudsen had two children : James, who is a
first class yeoman of the United States Navy on
the steamer Leviathan, and Roland, who is also
serving in the United States Navy, and is stationed
at the Great Lakes Training Station.
William P. Knudsen was reared at Merrill and
attended its common and high schools, being gradu-
ated from the latter in 1905, following which he
learned the fundar-.entals of business at the Spen-
cerian College at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, putting
them to practical use as a bookkeeper for a tele-
phone company at Milwaukee for a year. He left
that concern to become cashier and traveling sales-
man for the O'Neil Oil and Paint Company of the
same city, with which he remained for six years.
Mr. Knudsen then went to the coast and for four
months was with the Burroughs Adding Machine
Company of Spokane, Washington, and for eight
months was with the Shaw Borden Company, a
stationery house of the same city. In 1913 he came
to Billings, Montana, and for a brief period worked
with the Billings Sugar Company, but later asso-
ciated himself with the F. B. Connelley Company
for a year. For the subsequent two years he was
general office manager and credit man for the
Ryniker Winter Hardware Company, but all of
this time he was looking for a suitable opening
for a business of his own, and in July, 1917, he
opened the Roberts Realty Company, and later on,
in February, 1918, he organized the Knudsen Realty
Company, of which he is president ; P. A. Hammer,
vice president; and Z. B. Knudsen, secretary and
treasurer. This concern handles city property, farm
lands, stock ranches and business propositions and
writes fire, accident, life and health insurance, and
has the state agency for the Mutual Benefit Health
and Accident Company of Omaha, Nebraska. The
offices of the company are 15 North Broadway.
Northern Hotel Block. Mr. Knudsen has expressed
his confidence in Billings and Montana by investing
quite heavily in real estate, owning a comfortable
modern residence at 38 Grand Avenue, Billings ; a
seventy-five acre ranch near Roberts, Montana ; and
a 320-acre ranch near Forsyth, Montana. Mr.
Knudsen has found in Billings his inspiration and
is advancing very rapidly along constructive lines,
each expansion of his business giving him greater
fields for operating. He is well known as a Mason
belonging to Ashlar Lodge No. 29, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons; Billings Chapter No. 6,
Royal Arch Masons; and .'Mdemar Commandery
No. 5, Knights Templar; and he is also a member
of the Knights of Pythias. The Billings Midland
Club and the Billings Real Estate Board, of which
he is the secretary-treasurer, have in Mr. Knud-
sen one of their most enthusiastic members, and one
378
HISTORY OF MONTANA
who may be relied upon to boost Billings and work
for the creation of the "Greater Billings spirit His
political inclinations make him a stalwart republican.
In addition to his other activities Mr Knudsen is
secretary and treasurer of the Belle Mining Com-
pany, another sound corporation of this locality.
In October, 1915, William P. Knudsen was united
in marriage with Miss Zona B Alarshall a daughter
of Attorney T. C. and Sarah (Martin) Marshall,
prominent residents of Greybull, Wyoming. Mr.
and Mrs. Knudsen have no children. Their home is
often the scene of delightful social gatherings, for
both are model hosts, and, holding their friends
in high esteem, like to have them in their immediate
circle. Mr. Knudsen is a man of high ideals with
regard to business obligations, and his sound judg-
ment and singleness of purpose are recognized by
those who have dealings with him.
ToHN C. Making, general freight and passenger
agent at Anaconda for the Butte, Anaconda and
Pacific Railroad, is one of the constructive men of
this region, and owes his advancement in life to
his own efforts. He was born at Harwood, Mis-
souri, October 31, i873. a son of John Maring, and
grandson of John Maring, a native of Germany,
who came to the United States in young manhood
and became a pioneer of Rxhland County, Ohio,
where he was engaged in farming for many years
and there died when eighty years of age. He mar-
ried a lady of New England birth, and she lived to
be eightv-five. The maternal grandfather was a
native of Pennsylvania, as was his wife, and he
died in that state, where he had long been a farmer,
at the age of seventy-six years. His wido\y survived
him for some years, passing away in Michigan when
eighty-seven years old.
■ John .Maring, father of John C. Maring, was born
in Richland County, Ohio, in 1821. and died in
Harwood, Missouri, in December, 1889. A farmer,
he operated a rural property in Richland County
until 1866, when he moved to Missouri, and finally
settled at Harwood. ."Xn active supporter of thj
Methodist Episcopal Church, he was a valued mem-
ber of that denomination. In politics he was a re-
publican. John Maring was married in Rchland
Countv, Ohio, to Elizabeth Glover, born at Harris-
burg, Pennsvlvania, May 14, 1831. She died st Los
Molinos. California. May 11. 1916. Their children
were as follows : Wilbur F., who is in the insurance
business at Carthage, Missouri ; Edward, who is a
hardware merchant of Ponca City, Oklahoma:
Elmer, who is a farmer of Los Molinos, California;
Jesse, who is a railroad man with the Frisco Sys-
tem, lives at Enid, Oklahoma ; and John C, who
was the youngest born.
John C. Maring attended the public schools of
Western Missouri, and remained on his father's
farm until he was sixteen years old, at which time
he entered the employ of the Kansas City, Fort
Scott and Memphis Railroad in the maintenance of
way department as a clerk to the roadmaster, and
held that position for two years. In 1894 he entered
the employ of the Northern Pacific Railroad at
Livingston, Montana, as a car clerk, and was suc-
cessively promoted through the various positions
until he was made cashier, and then in 1898 he was
sent to Billings, Montana, as freight and passenger
agent for the road, and remained there for two
years. In igoo Mr. Maring came to the Butte,
Anaconda and Pacific Railroad as a clerk in the
freight house at .Anaconda, and has steadily risen
until he is now general freight and passenger agent
for the road with offices in the general office build-
ing belonging to his company, located on West Com-
mercial Avenue, Anaconda.
In 1901 Mr. Maring was married at Billings,
Montana, to Miss Maude Whaley, born at Clinton,
Ontario, Canada, and they have one son, Gilbert,
who was born on February 26, 1902. He was
graduated from the Anaconda High School in 1919
and is a very promising lad. Mr. Maring is a
democrat, but aside from giving an intelligent sup-
port to the candidates of his party has participated
but little in politics. The family residence is at No.
500 Main Street, Anaconda. The Episcopal Church
holds Mr. Maring's membership and has his co-
operation in all of its religious work. A hard
worker, Mr. Maring has devoted himself to his
business and his rapid advancement shows that his
efforts have received a gratifying appreciation at
the hands of his superiors. Having risen from the
bottom he is conversant with all the details of his
work and thus able to discharge the responsibilities
of his position efficiently and satisfactorily.
John T. Spencer, editor and proprietor of the
Bridger Times, of Bridger, Montana, is one of the
trenchant writers of his part of the state, and his
newspaper is devoted to the support of the prin-
ciples and candidates of the republican party. Mr.
Spencer is the adopted son of his mother's brother,
his father, John Tobiason, having been killed in a
shipwreck on Lake Ontario- when John T. Spencer
was an infant. Born in Norway, John Tobiason
followed the sea for a livelihood and sailed all over
the globe, braving the dangers of many ocean voy-
ages to meet his death on one of the treacherous
"inland seas" of his adopted country while following
his calling. He married Ellen Spencer, a native of
England, after he came to the United States, and
their only child, born September 13, 1875, was left
to the care of the bereft young widow, who died at
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1889. John Tobiason was
a member of the Norwegian Lutheran Church.
."Kfter the death of his father, John T. Spencer was
taken by his maternal uncle, Samuel Spencer, who
was born in England in 1844 and died at Sheboygan,
Wisconsin, in August, 1917, having come to that
city in 1871. For a number of years he was a
member of its police force.
When he was three years old John T. Spencer,
who had been given the name of his adopted father,
was taken from his birthplace of Sheboygan to
England, but was brought back to it two years
later, and there he was reared, being kept at school
until he was seventeen years old by his excellent
uncle, who knew the value of a sound educational
training. When he was seventeen he left school
and for a short period worked in a chair factory,
leaving it to become a printer's apprentice at She-
boygan. In time he became the owner of his own
printing plant and conducted it at Sheboygan from
1896 to 1900. He then traveled on the road as the
representative of a furniture manufacturing com-
pany, covering Minnesota and North Dakota for
five years, traveling out of St. Paul, Minnesota.
In 1905 Mr. Spencer came to Missoula, Montana,
with the Missoulians and was sent to Thompson
Falls, Montana, and started the "Sanders County
Ledger" for the Missoulian Company in 1906, when
Sanders County was established. After placing this
journal on a firm basis Mr. Spencer went to Sand
Point, Idaho, for eight months. In September, 1910.
he located at Bridger, and the following year, March
17, 191 1, bought the "Bridger Times," which he has
vince edited, continuing its sole proprietor. It has
an excellent circulation in Carbon and surrounding
HISTORY OF MONTANA
counties and is a strong factor in moulding and
influencing public opinion. Mr. Spencer owns the
building in which his plant and offices are located,
and the entire establishment is thoroughly modern
in equipment and methods. His paper was estab-
lished in 1909, but since it came under his charge
has been considerably expanded and its policies
developed. Mr. Spencer also owns a ranch three
miles south of Bridger. A very stanch republican,
he served Bridger as alderman, and later as mayor,
proving himself capable and fearless, and .always
lining up with the best element in civic affairs.
For several years he has been on the Republican
County Central Committee, and is very prominent
in politics. The Episcopal Church holds his mem-
bership. Fraternally he belongs to Golden Fleece
Lodge No. 66, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
Carbon Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, of Red Lodge,
Montana ; Aldemar Commandery No. 5, Knights
Templar, of Billings, Montana ; Algeria Temple,
.'\ncient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine,
of Helena, Montana; and Bridger Lodge, Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows. He is a director
of the American National Bank of Bridger.
On June 11. 1903, Mr. Spencer was united in
marriage with Miss Mary J. Pelletier, at Butte,
Montana. She is a daughter of Paul and .\nnie E.
Pelletier. Mr. Pelletier was a stockman during his
later years, but earlier in life was a placer miner
during the pioneer days of Montana, and served
with the Vigilantes before law and order was firmly
established in the state. His death occurred at New
Chicago, Montana, but his widow survives him and
makes her home with Mr and Mrs. Spencer. There
are no children in the Spencer family.
James P. Bolf. entered the newspaper profession
soon after leaving high school. While he has found
time for every interest, having qualified as a lawyer
and gained admission to the bar. newspaper work
has kept a steady hold on him and he has never
found it congenial to interrupt his work in that
profession. Mr. Bole is editor of the Bozeman
Daily Chronicle and also has some important public
responsibilities as receiver of public monies in the
United States Land Office at Bozeman.
He is of Scotch ancestry on both sides. He was
born at Belfast. Ireland, May 7, 1868. His father.
Rev. John Bole, was born at Newton Stuart, Scot-
land, in 1822, was reared and married in Scotland,
and was a graduate in both the classical and
theological courses in Glasgow University. He
came to the Untied States as a regalurly ordained
minister of the Presbyterian Church in 1848. He
was pastor of the church at South Ryegate, Ver-
mont, which he served for ten years. After this
long period of work in that pastorate he returned
to Great Britain and for about six years was pastor
of the Presbyterian Church on Linen Hall Street,
Belfast, Ireland. It was during this time that his
son James P. was born. In 1869, when this son
was about a year old, the family returned to
.\merica, and the father again resumed work with
his old friends and neighbors in the adjoining
parish of West Barnet, Vermont, and continued
active for thirty years, until he retired in 1899.
The family residence, which he established in West
Barnet and where he died in 1909, is still kept by
his children just as he left it, and it is the scene of
almost annual reunions among the children and
their families. Rev. John Bole married Marion
Simington Brown, who was born at Glasgow, Scot-
land, in 1826 and died at West Barnet, Vermont, in
1913, having survived her husband four years.
Margaret S., the oldest of their children, is the wife
of Dr. Charles A. Hamilton, who for many years
has been a prominent physician and surgeon at
N\'aterbury, Connecticut. William M., the oldest
son, is a prominent Montanan, being editor of the
Great Falls Tribune. Dr. Robert S. Bole is a
physician and surgeon at St. Paul, Minnesota.
.Andrew S. is a minister of the Congregational
Church, his home being at East Hardwick, Ver-
mont. Marion B. is unmarried and lives with her
sister Margaret.
James P. Bole, the youngest of the family, soon
after graduating from' the Burlington High School
in 1887 came West and began newspaper work at
St. Paul. For a time he lived in Chicago, and
while there was a student in the Chicago College of
Law. He was admitted to the bar in 1896, after
examination before the Supreme Court of Illinois at
Chicago. The following year. 1897, found him at
Great Falls, Montana, where he resumed newspaper
work and was connected with the Tribune and the
Leader until he came to Bozeman in 1907. For the
past twelve years he has been editor of the Bozeman
Chronicle, as well as stockholder in the Chronicle
Publishing Company.
August 30, 1890, at St. Paul Mr. Bole married
Miss Mary Josephine McCormick, a daughter of
W. F. and Catherine McCormick, of Little Meadows.
Pennsylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Bole have two daugh-
ters, Margaret and Elizabeth. Margaret is a grad-
uate of the .Montana State College at Bozeman with
the Bachelor of Science degree, and is a member
of the Chronicle force. Elizabeth is in the second
year of her work at the Montana State College.
George P. Wellcome. The great importance to a
community attaching to such lines of business as
real estate and insurance is not always relative to
its volume, but rather to the integrity of those en-
gaged in the public's behalf. With land as the
real basis of wealth, its ownership should be en-
couraged with titles clear of any entanglements,
while insurance protection must be inviolate and
above all possibility of lack of good faith. A trust-
worthy business man of Anaconda, dealing in real
estate, loans, insurance and also handling coal, is
George P. Wellcome, who is president and manager
of the Wellcome-Durston Company.
George P. Wellcome was born at Hoboken, New
Jersey, August 18, i860. His parents were Jacob
and Sarah J. (Hagadorn) Wellcome, the latter of
whom was born in the State of New York, in 1842.
and now resides at Long Beach, California. The
father of Mr. Wellcome, a descendant of an old
English family of the name, was born in Maine, in
1820, and died at Baltimore, Maryland, in 1901. He
grew to man's estate in Maine and after his mar-
riage in New York engaged in business in New
York City but maintained his home in Hoboken,
New Jersey, until he removed to Newark in 1862.
He continued in the cotton and wool brokerage busi-
ness in New York until 1872, after which he traveled
for some years, then retired and settled at Baltimore.
Of his three children, George P. is the only survivor.
The eldest, John B., settled at Butte, Montana, in
1889, where he was engaged in the practice of law
for some time, when he retired to his valuable
property known as the Creeklyn ranch, near White
Hall, Montana, where his death occurred. The
youngest of the family, Blanche E., died at Los
Angeles, California, at the age of thirty years.
George P. Wellcome attended the public schools
of Newark, New Jersey, and afterward of Newport,
New Hampshire, and in 1878 was graduated from the
Newport High School. His first business associa-
tion was a clerical position in the great Boston
HISTORY OF MONTANA
house of Jordan. Marsh & Company, where he
remained three 3'ears. gaining first hand experience
in the dry goods line, which served him well after
locating at Fargo, Dakota Territory. After three
years of dry goods experience there he embarked
"in the business for himself at St. Cloud, Minnesota.
In 1889 he sold his interests there and came to
Butte. Montana, in July of the same year coming
to Anaconda. Here for two years he was in the
employ of the firm of Mahan & Lindsley in the real
estate and insurance business, then was an employe
of the First National Bank of Anaconda, which
later became the banking house of Hoge, Daley &
Company. He remained with this institution in vari-
ous capacities for nine years, when he embarked
in the real estate and insurance line on his own
account at Anaconda. During his entire previous
business career Mr. Wellcome had been associated
with business houses of the highest possible standing
and his standards of business integrity are firmly
grounded. Upon the same sound foundation he has
built up his own business, which has expanded into
one of the largest enterprises of its kind in this
section of the state. In 1914 he incorporated as the
Wellcome-Durston Company, of which Mr. Well-
come is president and manager and H. H. Durston
is vice president, secretary and treasurer. The com-
pany occupies a suite in the Daley Bank annex. No.
1 10 East Park Avenue. The company handles city
real estate and farm loans in Deer Lodge and sur-
rounding counties. A general insurance business is
done, and this feature of the business is one of great
importance. The firm at one time owned much ranch
property but has disposed of it to a large extent,
but has heavy investments in city realty.
.^t Anaconda, in 1895. Mr. Wellcome was united
in marriage to Miss Katherine Evans, a daughter of
Morgan and Ann Evans, both of whom are de-
ceased. Mr. Evans came to this neighborhood as
a pioneer in 1862. driving from Logan, Utah, his
team of a horse and cow hitched to a wagon. He
homesteaded 160 acres in Deer Lodge Valley, which
he subsequently increased to 640 acres. Both he
and his wife were born in Wales. Mrs. Wellcome
is a graduate of Deer Lodge College, Deer Lodge,
Montana. Mr. and Mrs. Wellcome have one son,
George P., who was born October 21, 1910. Mr.
Wellcome owns his beautiful modern residence, No.
700 Hickory Street, Anaconda.
In addition to business interests already noted,
Mr. Wellcome is president of the Anaconda Coal
Company, of which H. H. Durston is vice president,
and this firm, does the largest coal business in Ana-
conda. As a staunch republican Mr. Wellcome has
been somewhat active in party councils, believing
good citizenship demands expression in the assump-
tion of political responsibility. He has served four
terms on the City Council and has also been school
trustee and on many advisory committees. During
the great war he was deeply and patriotically in-
terested and was appointed by Governor Stewart a
mernber of the Council of Defense. He was unre-
mitting in his efforts to make the various war meas-
ures successful, and was careful and iudicious as
one of the trustees of the War Chest Fund. Fra-
ternally he is identified with the Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, belonging to Anaconda
Lodge No. 239. and is a member also of the Ana-
conda, the Anaconda Country and the Rotary clubs.
John Berkin. The name of Berkin is connected
with the pioneer history of Butte and Montana so
intimately that it is but proper that an extended
notice of the men bearing it appear in a work
of this high class. No history of the region would
be complete without an account of the work accom-
plished by John Berkin, mine superintendent and
Ijusiness man, and his father, William Berkin, who
has attained to a venerable age and is the second
oldest living pioneer of Montana.
John Berkin was born at Swannington, Leicester-
shire, England, on April 11, i860, a son of William
Berkin, also born in Leicestershire, the date of his
birth being June 14, 1826. He is a son of Thomas
Berkin, born in Leicestershire, England, where he
spent his long and useful life, and where he died at
the advanced age of ninety-three years. During all
of his active years he was engaged in farming, and
he spent practically all of his life in Leicestershire.
A conservative in politics and a Calvin ist in re-
ligion, he was one of the most conscientious of men,
stern, but rigidly upright. He married Sarah Tugby,
who was born in Leicestershire, England, and died
there at the age of eighty-eight years. Their chil-
dren were as follows : John, who owned and oper-
ated a hotel at London, England, died in that city
at the age of seventy-six years ; Sarah, who died in
Leicestershire, England, at the age of seventy-two
years; Thomas, who was chief of police in London,
England, where he died at the age of sixty-eight
years ; Matilda, who died in Leicestershire, Eng-
land, at the age of sixty-five years ; Fannie, who died
at Helena, Montana, in 1908, married John Hull,
a farmer who died at Boulder, Montana, came
with her husband to Montana in the late '80s ; Wil-
liam, who is mentioned below ; and Jesse, who was
a miner, died at Rossland. British Columbia, Canada.
William Berkin attended the schools of his native
place, and then served an apprenticeship of seven
years to the machinist trade at Glasgow, Scotland,
completing it by the time he reached his maiority.
He then returned to Leicestershire and took the
contract for erecting the pumping works at the
Calcutta coal mines, and his work was so satis-
factory that the company which owned these mines
sent him into Derbyshire to put up hoisting and
pumping machinery at a town called Clay Cross.
Returning to Glasgow, William Berkin had charge
of the installation of an engine in the steamship
"John Bell," and when this work was completed
went on its initial trip as second engineer to Mont-
real, Canada. Upon his return to England he was
employed in the machine shop on the docks at
Battersea, London. While there he branched out
and became a deep sea diver for the London Dock
Company, keeping old lock gates in repair.
William Berkin made another change, removing to
Jersey, one of the Channel Islands, and spent some
time there as a diver on the construction work of
a breakwater. His services were next secured by
the French government and he was employed as a
diver in putting in an addition to a battery at Cher-
bourg, France. Once more he returned to England
and made two trips out of Southampton. England,
to Alexandria, Egypt. Subsequent to that William
Berkin was employed in the shops of the Semudas
Ship Building Yards at London, England, and while
he was there the "Great Eastern" was built in an
adjoining ship yard. He helped to put in the
engines in the pleasure yacht of Prince Constantine
of Russia, and delivered this boat at Odessa, Russia.
Going back to Scotland, William Berkin went
from there to Canada in 1859 and began working
for the Grand Trunk Railroad as a locomotive en-
gineer. Later he visited Niagara Falls, New York,
and Portland, Maine, and still later went to Saint
John's and Nova Scotia. New Brunswick. Canada,
to inspect some mines. It was during i860 that he
made a short stay at Chicago, Illinois, and from
there went on south to St. Louis, Missouri, where
he secured employment as a locomotive engineer
^y^^T^i^f^-i^^^^iAyfi^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
for the Belleville Railroad, and later was promoted
to be master mechanic at the Illinois Town round-
house.
The year 1863 marked the arrival of William
Berkin into Montana, and for some j'ears his ex-
periences read as an early-day romance. The story
of his expedition along the Musselshell River to
try and find a better road from Virginia City to the
head of navigation of the Missouri River is one of
the romances of the early days of Montana. Mr.
Berkin is admitted to have endured more hardships,
braved more dangers and had more exciting ex-
periences than any of the other pioneers.
William Berkin came out to Fort Benton, Mon-
tana, in 1863 for the American Fur Company, a
subsidiary of the Hudson Bay Company, and was
commissioned to sell a stock of mining tools and
supplies which was then in storage at Fort Benson.
He hired a negro and a French guide and started
his pack train for Virginia City in 1864.
When he arrived there he successfully disposed
of the stock, pick handles bringing $3 each ; axe
handles, $3; gold pans, $5: long-handled shovels,
$5 ; tobacco, $8.50 per pound ; white flour at $l per
pound, and other merchandise sold at proportion-
ately high prices. His was the first pack train to
make the trip from Fort Benton to Virginia City.
The second trip was made with a bull train of
twenty-one teams yoked ten and twenty animals to
the wagon. The merchandise which was carried by
this train had been brought to Fort Benton by the
American Fur Company by boat from St. Louis,
Missouri.
About this time Mr. Berkin conceived the idea of
finding a better road from Virginia City to Fort
Benton by following the Musselshell River. He
determined to build a new road, if it could be done
cheaply enough, and organized an outfit to blaze
the trail. The story of that expedition, as related
by Mr. Berkin, is as follows :
"I left Boulder, Jefferson county, February 20,
1865, taking eight hired men and three volunteers.
We were equipped with saddle horses, one wagon,
five yoke of oxen and supplies for the trip, including
rifles and ammunition, one twelve-pound howitzer
cannon, two caseTof howitzer ammunition and two
cases of grapeshot.
"The route was from Boulder by way of Crow
Creek, crossing the Missouri River at about where
Toston is now. From there we went up Gracing
Creek to the summit, where we found heavy snow-
drifts. We had to go over steep mountains and
often were compelled to let the wagon and cannon
down the hillsides with heavy ropes.
"We went on to White Sulphur Springs and over
the trail to where Martinsdale is now located. There
were no white men in this country. From there we
went to a creek about six miles from Martinsdale.
It is now called Daisy Dean Creek. Next we reached
Haymaker Creek, where we had our first scrap with
the Indians.
"We made our camp on March i. One of the
men reported to me that one of the cattle was
missing. As it had spowed a little during the night
we were enabled to follow the tracks of the In-
dians who had driven the steer away from the herd.
I picked out six of the men and followed the tracks,
coming upon the war party in a deep coulee.
"They had not seen us yet, but in the excitement
one of my men accidentally discharged his rifle just
at the moment I was in the act of firing a shot
with my arm through my bridle rein. The bullet
from his gun shot my horse through the jaw and
the animal pulled me down when he fell. Shooting
commenced immediately. I noticed one of the men
standing beside me flinch and I asked. Are you
hit?' He replied that he was and I told him to
keep on shooting as long as he could.
"When the scrap was over we looked him over
and found that the bullet had gone through his
buckskin shirt and burned a red mark on his ribs,
it having been a glancing shot. There were nine
Indians in the party and we got four of them down
in the coulee. They made hurried exits for the
'Happy hunting grounds.' The others fled up the
hill on the other side.
"One of my men, Elmer McLaughlin by name,
and myself, crossed the coulee and found on the
prairie an Indian lying face down in the snow. Mc-
Laughlin was going to shoot him to make sure that
he wouldn't recover, but I told him to save his
ammunition as we were going after the others who
were wounded and were escaping.
"We left our horses and took after them on
foot. We soon overtook and disposed of them.
When we returned to where we left the horses
the Indian who had been lying in the snow sup-
posedly dead had gotten up and escaped with Mc-
Laughlin's horse.
"I took my horse and followed him about three
miles. I could see blood in the snow occasionally
and after awhile I came across his old flint-lock gun
which he had discarded. I knew then that he was
about gone and just before I caught up with him
he fell from the horse. He put up his hands, say-
ing, 'kaka nopin,' which means 'hold on, white
man.'
"We left camp next morning and went along the
Musselshell valley toward the east end of the Snowy
Mountains. We came to a creek which flowed from
the Snowies and there made camp. There were
some buffalo there and one of the men asked me to
let him have a horse that he might try to kill one
of them for meat. He did not return in the evening,
and I sent two men out to look for him. They
found his horse with the saddle still on, and a short
distance awav the man was found lying in the
snow, dead.
"We buried him on this creek and called it 'Care-
less Creek,' because we surmised that this man's
horse had fallen with him and that his gun had
discharged itself with the fall, killing him. When
the government surveys were made this creek was
called 'Careless Creek' in their report.
"We moved from here around the east end of the
Snowy Mountains and crossed a creek now known
as Flat Willow, and went down another called
'Crooked Creek.' On account of the men being
Snow-blind, I had to leave all but two, eight miles
from Crooked Creek. These two men and myself
made it to the mouth of the Musselshell, where
it empties into the Missouri River. The river was
breaking up and there was a series of immense
ice gorges which made it a grand sight.
"We went back to get the rest of the men and
prepared to start on our return trip. We made
camp on the banks of a small creek which is a
tributary to Flat Willow Creek. Here in the night
we were again attacked by the Indians, a large
band of what we supposed were Blackfeet Indians.
We had to crawl down the creek, fighting as best
we could until daylight.
"Here we lost another man. .^fter the Indians
had been driven off we went back to camp and
found that they had killed all of our cattle. They
had also taken all of our horses but three, which
they had somehow overlooked. They had rendered
the wagon useless by knocking out the spokes in
the wheels and had sawed the axle of the gun
carriage and spiked the gun.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
"All of our cooking utensils had been destroyed
and our provisions stolen. We made our way with
difficulty back to Boulder and a short time later I
took one man, saddle horse and pack horses, and
brought back the cannon, which was made of brass
and weighed about i8o pounds. This was returned
to the company and was taken down the river by
steamboat to St. Louis.
"The rest of the articles, two cases of grape shot
two cases of shells, a grindstone, log chains and
much other stuff we cached under the bank of a
tributary of Flat Willow. This cache was dis-
covered a short time ago by my son, T. A. Berkin,
and other people living near the place on Flat
Willow."
The contents of this cache was later presented
to the State Historical Society and placed on display
at Helena as one of the mementoes of the pioneer
days of Montana.
William Berkin was the man who shipped the
first copper ore from Butte, some years after the
above related e-xperience, having located the Moun-
tain Chief Mine, from which he took out several
tons of ore and shipped it from Butte to Boulder,
building a road for this purpose. From Boulder this
ore was hauled to Corrinne by bull teams which
Mr. Berkin was then operating for the American
Fur Company. Shipment was made by railroad
from Corrinne to the Atlantic Coast, and by steam-
ship to a point in Wales, where the nearest smelter
was located. Mr. Berkin has still in his possession
a copy of the bill of lading which he received from
the railroad company, and other papers in the deal.
This ore was smelted in Wales and Mr. Berkin
netted a nice profit from the transaction notwith-
standing the heavy transportation charges.
Mr. Berkin built the road from Fort Benton to
Virginia City for John J. Roe & Company of St.
Louis, Missouri, and continued to freight for this
company from 1864 until 1867, between the two
points named. From 1867 until 1871 he was en-
gaged in placer mining in' Jefferson County, and
then began quartz mining in the same county and
located some of the first claims in Butte, and
operated in and out of what is now Butte from
1866.
The Mountain Chief Mine above referred to as
located by him was the second patented claim in
the Butte District, and in it he had as a partner
Nicholas Wall, of St. Louis, the date of the regis-
tration of their patent being June 16, 1868. and
they also secured a mi'.lsite for the mine, which
they owned until 1870. From then on William
Berkin has followed placer and quartz mining, and
in spite of his advanced age is still engaged in this
line of business. As his family record shows, he
comes of a long-lived race, and he has not learned
that there is such a word as "retire" in the dic-
tionary. He has always been an active supporter of
the democratic party. During 1865 and 1866 he
rendered an effective public service as deputy United
States marshal ; he was commissioner of Meagher
County from 1886 until 1892 ; and commissioner at
Lewiston when Fergus County was organized, and
held that office for two terms of four years each.
Mr. Berkin was a member of the first Territorial
Legislature of Montana, being elected at Bannock
in 1864. For many years a Mason, he belongs to
Helena Lodge No. 3, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons.
In 1850 William Berkin was married in Leicester-
shire, England, to Miss Jane Hall, born at Swaning-
ton, Leicestershire, England, in 1835. She died at
Anaconda, Montana, in 1809, having borne her hus-
band the following children : Fannie, who married
Kenneth McKinzie, foreman of the foundry of the
Washoe Reduction Works at Anaconda, Montana;
a daughter who died when four years old; John,
whose name heads this review ; William, who was
a rancher, died at Livingston, Park County, Mon-
tana, aged twenty-eight years; Thomas A. is game
warden for the district of Flat Willow, Fergus
County, Montana, and deputy game warden for the
State of Montana ; Sarah, who married John Allen,
watchman of the Orphan Girl Mine at Butte ; Eliza,
who died at Boston, Massachusetts, married W. R.
Allen, ex-lieutenant governor of Montana, but now
a resident of Boston, although he has large mining
interests in the Elkhorn mining district of Montana
and is building a railroad up the Big Hole River,
having promoted these large interests, and a sketch
of him appears elsewhere in this work ; and Hattie,
who married Daniel Kirkpatrick, manager of a chain
of stores for the Huerfane Trading Company, re-,
sides at .A.lamosa, Colorado.
John Berkin was brought to Fort Benton when
only six years old by his mother and oldest sis-
ter, who "traveled first to St. Louis, Missouri, and
thence to Montana, where they joined his father.
After a short stay at Fort Benton the family moved
to Alder Gulch, and still later to Boulder, Montana.
All of his educational training was received at Jef-
ferson City, Montana, and he left school when he
was sixteen years old, and for six years was en-
gaged in placer mining in Jefferson County. He
then went in for quartz mining in Jefferson, Madi-
son and other counties of Montana until 1878. He
carried the mail from Butte to Boulder, making the
trips on horseback, and continued at this for over
a year, when in 1880 he was appointed deputy
sheriff of Fergus County and discharged the duties
of that dangerous position until 1882, when he re-
turned to Boulder, and that same year came back
to Butte, where ever since he has been connected
with mining interests.
Beginning as an underground miner, Mr. Berkin
has gained a thorough and intimate knowledge of
mining in all its phases and has been an extensive
lessor for himself at Butte and in Madison County
for several years. In 191 5 he became connected
with the Anaconda Copper Mining Company as
foreman of the Nettie Mine, and in 1916 was made
superintendent of the Bonanza and Orphan Girl
mines, both properties of that company. The Orphan
Girl Mine is located one-half mile west of the Butte
School of Mines, and produces silver and zinc.
Like his father a strong believer in the prin-
ciples enunciated by the democratic party, Mr. Ber-
kin represented Jefferson County in the Seventh
Session of the State Assembly as the successful
candidate of his party, and was sent to the Eleventh
Session of the same body from Silver Bow County
on the same ticket. During the labor trouble in
1914 he was appointed sheriff of Silver Bow County
at the time when the candidate elected to that office
was recalled from office by the people. It was dur-
ing this period that the Industrial Workers of the
World blew up the Miners Union Hall and other
buildings and openly defied law and order. It took
courage of no ordinary character and a strong per-
sonality to bring order out of the chaos then reign-
ing, but Mr. Berkin succeeded in restoring every-
thing to normal conditions, thereby winning his own
place in the history of his own times and the
gratitude and respect of his fellow citizens.
During the World war Mr. Berkin was very active
in assisting in all of the war work and support-
ing the policies of the administration, and was ex-
ceedingly generous in his own contributions to the
Liberty Loans and other drives. He also was ex-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
383
tremely helpful in assisting in suppressing all dis-
loyalty and punishing sedition against the Govern-
ment. He is a Mason, and also belongs to Butte
Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, and the Silver Bow Club, and is active in all.
In addition to his other interests Mr. -Berkin owns
stock in an irrigation project known as the Fergus
County Land & Irrigation Company at Flat Willow,
Fergus County, Montana, and also in the Little
Missouri Irrigation Company in Fallon County,
Montana. He is president of the Motor Car Dis-
tributing Company of Butte, and in 1907 bought a
ranch on the Smith River in Meagher County, and
operated it until he sold it to the Story & Work
Sheep Company at Bozeman. Mr. Berkin maintains
his residence at the Thornton Hotel.
In conjunction with his father's experiences with
the Indians it is interesting to learn of his own
with the red man. He was reared in a neighbor-
hood occupied by the X^ez-Perce Indians and knew
their chief, Joseph, so well that he lived among them
and learned to speak their language, and became
acquainted with other tribes. Mr. Berkin arrived
at the battle ground on the Big Hole two days after
the massacre of Captain Logan, who was killed
outright, and General Gibbons, who was wounded
and afterwards died from the effects, and the com-
mand in 1877, and assisted in taking care of the
wounded and getting them back to Helena, a dis-
tance of nearly 200 miles. During 1880 and 1881,
although yet a very young man, he was active in
suppressing the depredations of horse thieves in what
were then Fergus and Meagher counties, and he also
participated in several skirmishes with the Indians
during the earlier days.
Mr. Berkin has the following children: Nellie,
who was graduated from the Boulder High School,
married W. G. Whetstone, assistant manager of the
Butte Motor Car Distributing Company; Hazel, who
was graduated from the Butte High School, married
M. R. Hanley, a real-estate operator of Lewiston,
Montana ; and Isabelle, popularly known as "Mike,"
who was injured in an automobile accident on Sep-
tember 18, 1919, while on the way from Great Falls
to Lewiston, and died on September 22d. She was
educated as a violinist at Butte, and was a pupil
of Professor Shadduck of Philadelphia, Pennsyl-
vania. She began playing in public when only eight
years of age, and her remarkable talent soon de-
veloped to a point that marked her as a true artist.
At the age of eighteen years she began her profes-
sional career and was starred as "The Girl from
Butte." For several years she was on the Orpheum
Circuit and had thousands of admirers in Montana
and throughout the United States. When she was
married to H. W. Berry, she retired from the stage
and she and her husband were residents of Butte,
Montana. Her death was a distinct blow to many
all over the country, as well as to her immediate
family and wide circle of personal friends, for she
had endeared herself to them all as well as awakened
admiration for her talent.
Both John Berkin and his venerable father are
men of a remarkable type. Rugged, fearless and
upright, they have gone straight ahead doing what
they felt to be their duty regardless of personal
risk or adverse criticism. Coming into a wild
region they had the ability and willingness to take
advantage of the opportunities of a newly opened
territory, but, while they achieved a material suc-
cess, they never prospered at the expense of the
community, but at all times placed it under obliga-
tion to them for their services in behalf of law
and order whenever it was necessary. Without such
men as these Montana would never have become
the great commonwealth it is today, and conse-
quently the record of their lives is an important
part of its history.
C. W. RomsoN. About a year after getting his
law diploma from the Chicago Law School Mr.
Robison came to Montana and located at Dillon,
where for nearly twenty years' he has enjoyed a
constantly increasing prestige as an able 'and hard-
working attorney.
He was born at Winterset, Iowa, Janoary 22, 1875,
and some of his family were among the first
pioneers of that state. The Robisons were colonial
settlers in Massachusetts. The grandfather, Spencer
Robison, was born in Indiana in 1802 and was one
of the first men to break the prairie sod and bring
the land of Delaware County, Iowa, into produc-
tiveness. He spent his active career as a farmer
and died at Winterset, Iowa, in 1870. His wife was
a native of Indiana and also died at Winterset.
Four of their children are still living: James, a
retired farmer at Manchester, Iowa; Joseph, a
farmer in Delaware County; Jennie, wife of Ham
Lee of Kalispell, Montana; and W. S. Robison.
W. S. Robison, father of the Dillon lawyer, was
born in Delaware county, Iowa, in 1853, and lived
there to the age of nineteen, when he removed to
Winterset. He lived at Des Moines until 1917, since
which year his home has been in Omaha, Nebraska.
He is "a republican and a member of the Masonic
fraternity. He married at Winterset Sarah Guye,
who was born in Madison County, Iowa, in 1854.
Her father, George Guye, was born in Virginia in
1824 and is still living at Winterset, Iowa, at the
venerable age of ninety-five. He and his father
and his brother James were the first white men to
take up land and settle in Madison County, Iowa.
George Guye married a Miss Button, a native of
Ohio, who died in Madison County, Iowa. The
Guyes are of English ancestry and were early set-
tlers in Virginia. C. W. Robison is the oldest of
his father's ^ four children. His brother Charles
died in Madison County, Iowa, at the age of three,
and his sister Grace died at Dexter, Iowa, aged
twenty-six. His only living sister is Frances, who
makes her home with her parents at Omaha.
C. W. Robison attended public school at Winter-
set, graduated in 1891 from the Dexter Normal Col-
lege at De.xter, Iowa, and took his regular college
course in Drake University at Des Moines. He
received the degree Bachelor of Oratory from that
institution" in 1897 Mr. Robison spent one year
in the office of Senator A. B. Cummins at Des
Moines, and thus came in touch with one of the
ablest lawyers and one of the now senior statesmen
of the country. Mr. Robison received his LL. B.
degree from the Chicago Law School in 1899 and
the following year came to Dillon and began his
professional career. He served as county attorney
during 1903-04, but for the most part has given all
his time to his growing private practice. His offices
are in the Telephone Building. Mr. Robison is a
very prominent member of the Improved Order
of Red Men. He belongs to Bannack Tribe, is Great
Sachem of the State of Montana, is present Great
Keeper of Wampum and for twelve years repre-
sented the order in the National Convention.
I. D. O'DoNNELL. In August, 1919, the Country
Gentleman of Philadelphia, published under the title
"The Best Farmer in Montana." a long article con-
cerning I. D. O'Donnell of Billings. Editorially the
paper said : "Thoughtful readers have doubtless
learned the Country Gentleman's idea of a 'best
farmer' from the series of articles under that title.
384
HISTORY OF .MONTANA
A 'best farmer' is not only a 'best' business man,
but a 'best' husband, 'best' father, 'best' neighbor
and citizen."
Aside from the conspicuous honor thus conferred
by a nationally well known farm paper, I. D. O'Don-
nell is a Montanan concerning whom it will be ex-
pected something should be said by way of bio-
graphical mention. The article in the Country
Gentleman gives a good picture of Mr. O'Donnell
not only on his farm but as a business man and
citizen. Many of the entertaining paragraphs must
be omitted in the present sketch, but the essential
facts needed to tell the story of this prominent
Montanan are chiefly in the words found in the
magazine.
He was born in a log cabin in i860, and lived
there until he was twenty-one years old. The cabin
was located back in the woods, a few miles out of
Saginaw, Michigan. There were ten brothers and
sisters in the family and they lived the simple life
of the backwoods people of the time. "We boys,"
said Mr. O'Donnell. "attended school in the winter-
time, when there was any to attend, which was not
often; so our winters were chiefly spent getting
out black-ash hoop stock."
At the age of twenty-one Mr. O'Donnell had the
equivalent of a seventh grade public school educa-
tion, a strong, well trained body and unlimited am-
bition. These constituted his entire working capital
and it sufficed to carry him a long way towatd suc-
cess. The great unknown West was the lure for all
the young and adventurous spirits in those days,
so young O'Donnell made his way to Montana.
That was in 1882, thirty-seven years ago. He now
ranks as one of the old settlers.
The first work O'Donnell found to do in Montana
was on a horse ranch owned by the Billings estate.
Frederick Billings was at that time president of the
Northern Pacific Railroad, and on the ranch were
his nephew, E, G. Bailey, and son Parmly Billings,
both of whom took a fancy to O'Donnell. After a
year and a half of horse wrangling they induced
him to move to the Village of Billings. He might
easily have become a railroad man, and if he had
would undoubtedly have risen to prominence in the
transportation world; but he preferred life in the
open, so shortly afterward they put him in charge
of the Billings ranch, a tract of several thousand
acres, which he proceeded to farm on an extensive
scale. The next year, in addition to his farming
operations, he undertook the management of the
large irrigation system controlled by the 'Billingses
and placed it on a substantial basis. Much of the
early construction work had been poorly done and
he was compelled to do a great amount of rebuild-
ing.
Eight years later, in 1892, he carried on all the
negotiations which led up to the purchase of this
system by a company of farmers, and after they
were concluded he was elected president of the
irrigation company, which position he has retained
up to the present time. This irrigation system.
which serves an area of 100,000 acres, is recognized
even today as one of the very best in the entire
West.
There was one piece of land on the project that
appealed to Mr. O'Donnell especially, but it was
owned by the Rev. B. F. Shuart, a Congregational
missionary who had_ taken up the land under the
homestead, pre-emption and desert claim acts be-
fore the irrigation system was constructed. Mr.
Shuart came to Montana from North Dakota in
1882, and was the first minister of the gospel in
that part of the state. In addition to preaching and
looking after the spiritual welfare of his flock he
was a very good farmer and established what for
those days was a big dairy herd. He started in first
to raise corn, but abandoned that for alfalfa, of
which he had at one time a considerable acreage.
Hesper Farm, as the place was christened, was
recognized as a leading farm in the valley from the
very first, but its fame in early days did not rest
either on alfalfa or on dairying. It rested on the
fact that more weddings were solemnized there
than at any other place in the state. When the
young fellows began to succeed and send back home
for their best girls, the wedding parties met the
trains and drove out immediately to Hesper Farm.
An opportunity came in 1888 to purchase the farm,
and O'Donnell took possession and began farming
for himself. The Billingses who had recognized
his abilities on many occasions, backed him with
their credit. Thus his power to make friends and
impress other people with his personality was a
valuable asset when' he wanted to start in business
for himself. It has been an asset to him ever since
and has enabled him to organize many new indus-
tries for the City of Billings, which he found neces-
sary in order to make his farm operations more
productive.
For example, he was the first to investigate sugar
beet possibilities in Montana, discovering that sugar
beets would not only grow well but they contained
a higher percentage of sugar than beets grown in
most other places. He foresaw possibilities in sugar
beet culture, both for the farmers of his vicinity and
for the City of Billings, was one of the leaders in
organizing a company to erect a sugar-beet factory.
It is rather unusual for a farmer to go into an
undertaking of this nature, involving the expendi-
ture of $1,000,000, but O'Donnell thinks in big fig-
ures and the people had confidence that whatever
he recommended would prove feasible. Contracts
covering more than 8,000 acres were made with
farmers for raising sugar beets and negotiations
were entered into for the sale of the bonds. About
this time the Great Western Sugar Company of
Denver began extending its operations and it made
the new company an offer for its plant, which was
accepted.
The formation of a sugar beet company and the
erection of a plant not only brought a valuable in-
dustry to the City of Billings but it has been of
immense value to the farmers of the immediate
vicinity. In an indirect way it proved to be one of
the most lucrative ventures that O'Donnell ever
undertook, for it resulted in the building up of a
new system of agriculture on his farm that has in-
creased its value and brought in a splendid income
every year.
The sugar beet factory is only one of a number
of industries in Billings that Mr. O'Donnell has
assisted. He is one of the city's principal boosters
and has had more to do with organizing and getting
new businesses started than almost any other man
there. He built the first creamery, which has since
become a large plant, and is still president of it.
He founded the Billings Foundry and Machine
Company, and is a director in the Merchants Na-
tional Bank. In fact, he is interested in so many
business enterprises in the city that one begins to
doubt the validity of his reputation as a farmer.
This doubt is dispelled, however, when one meets the
man and visits the ranch. The farm consists
of a square section of 640 acres. It lies on the first
bench above the Yellowstone River, and water is
deliverfd to the entire project of 100,000 acres of
which it is a part, by gravity. The soil is sedimen-
tary and naturally fine, dark and rich. The whole
section lies almost level except that it has a slight
HISTORY OF MONTANA
385
dip toward the south and east, just enough to pro-
vide fall for the irrigation water. There was almost
no leveling to do in the beginning, and the cost of
the ditches was not so higli as on many projects.
It all lies ideally for irrigation. There is a railroad
station within one mile of the farm, where the
produce, including sugar beets, is loaded for mar-
ket, and the roads are very good.
The problem of making money on large farms is
one of business management, of handling men and
of preventing waste. On many large ranches and
everywhere the same problem stands out. A farm
of 640 acres is not a big ranch where dry-land
farming is practiced, nor a very large ranch in the
humid regions ; but under intensive methods of irri-
gation it ranks as a very large farm, requiring the
most careful kind of management of crops, water,
soil, the various methods employed and of marketing.
The Hesper Farm is incorporated. Air. O'Donnell
is president of the corporation, Mrs. O'Donnell is
vice president, and the six children are shareholders.
Mr. O'Donnell was one of the very first in the
state to experiment with the raising of alfalfa, and
was raising alfalfa in quantity and making money
long before most of the other farmers even knew
what it looked like. As early as 1895 he began to
serve aj a farm institute lecturer, and every win-
ter for years he worked with the institute staff
spreading the gospel of alfalfa.
One of the best pieces of public work Mr.
O'Donnell ever performed and the one he looks
back upon with the greatest pride was in connection
with the United States Reclamation Service. Five
years ago Secretary Lane announced that he in-
tended to discontinue all reclamation work in the
State of Montana. This aroused the people of the
entire West and especially of Montana, so they ar-
ranged for a hearing; and when Secretary Lane
visited them O'Donnell explained what was wrong
and suggested the proper remedy. The result of
the conference was the formation of a Reclamation
Commission, composed of five members. The com-
mission was given complete charge of all reclamation
work of all the various government irrigation proj-
ects scattered over seventeen western states, and
O'Donnell was made head of the operations and
maintenance, with the title of supervisor of irriga-
It was a red letter day for the settlers on govern-
ment irrigation projects when O'Donnell took hold
of their problems. He straightened out all their
difficulties and made it possible for them to succeed.
He not only relieved their difficulties with regard
to water and payments, but he worked with them
and showed them just how to arrange their fields,
how to handle the water, what crops to plant and
how to market them. In short, he became a sort
of national farm adviser, a task he was eminently
qualified to perform, since he had had years of
practical experience and was himself a successful
irrigation farmer.
The humanizing of the Reclamation Service has
been Mr. O'Donnell's greatest public service. He
has never held political office and does not expect to,
but he has always been interested in boosting his
business, in boosting his city, and in boosting his
state. He resigned his position with the Reclama-
tion Service last year, but has not resigned from
doing what he can for the general public welfare.
This is evident from the fact that he has been for
years a member of the board of trustees of the Pub-
lic Library of Billings. The library was founded
and endowed by his old friend Frederick Billings,
and has been a special hobby with Mr. O'Donnell.
In connection with his library work he has made it
a part of his business to gather together all the
data available concerning early Montana history.
He is also president of the Midland Empire Fair,
one of the trustees of the Billings Chamber of Com-
merce, president of the irrigation company, an
officer of the Montana Farm Bureau, a member of
the first State Board of Horticulture, and a member
of the State Council of Defense. He is president
of the Billings Polytechnic Institute, one of Mon-
tana's leading educational institutions, has served
on the Montana State Fair board, also on the Stock
Commission for the state and for a number of
years on the school board of his district.
Vet, in spite of his various business and public
activities, he is, first of all, a farmer. He started as
a farmer, made money as a farmer, and has had
a greater influence on farming in his adopted state
than any other man in the state. The various out-
side activities above mentioned are merely incidental
to farming, which is his chief interest and his prin-
cipal source of revenue.
H.\RRY J. Kelly, who is registrar of the United
States Land Office at Lewistown, is a veteran news-
paper man, and has worked with leading journals
all over the West from the Missouri River to the
Pacific Coast. He has been a resident of Montana
upwards of thirty years.
Mr. Kelly was born at Prairie du Chien, Wiscon-
sin, October 6, 1869, a son of Hugh H. and Ellen
(Leonard) Kelly. His parents were natives of
Ireland. Hugh Kelly came to this country with his
parents and grew up at Rochester, New York,
where he finished his education. He became a con-
tractor and builder, and in i860 located at Prairie
du Chien, Wisconsin, and in 1878 transferred his
home and business to Omaha, Nebraska, where he
continued contracting and building until his death
at the age of sixty-five. His wife died at the age
of forty-eight. They had eight children, six of
whom are still living. Harry J. is the fourth child.
His father was a Catholic and a democrat in politics.
Mr. Kelly acquired a public school education at
Omaha and also attended the Creighton University
there. He acquired his early experience in the
newspaper business in the offices of the Bee and the
Republican-Herald at Omaha. From there in 1888
he removed to Leadville, Colorado, subsequently to
Southern California, thence to Seattle, Washington,
and in all these places was connected in some ca-
pacity with newspapers. He came to Montana and
located at Missoula in 1889, and for a time was con-
nected with the Missoulian. He worked on the
Butte Miner in 1899, ^"d subsequently helped bring
out the first issue of the Anaconda Standard. He
returned to Missoula in 1902, and later for about
two years was connected with the Spokane Review.
In 1905 he moved to Hamilton and bought the Bit-
teroot Times, a paper which he owned and published
for about three years. Mr. Kelly was at Helena
serving as sergeant at arms during the sixth session
of the State Legislature. Returning to Butte, he
was with the Butte Miner, and later came to Lew-
istown and with Tom Stout organized the Democrat
News. He later sold his interest in that paper to
Mr. Stout at the time he was appointed, on July i,
1913, registrar of the United States Land Office.
He was re-appointed to the office in 1917. Mr.
Kelly had also been elected alderman from the
First Ward of Lewiston in 1913, but resigned his
place in the municipal government when he accepted
his Federal appointment. Mr. Kelly belongs to the
Elks and is a democrat in politics.
August 2, 1899, he married Miss Mary See. a
native of Montana. They have four children : Helen.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
employed in tlie office of the Democrat-News; Mar-
garet, a student in high school ; William G. and
Harry J., Jr.
Albert M. Johns. The record of Albert M.
Johns, the efficient and popular postmaster at Wil-
sall, is that of an enterprising gentleman whose life
has been intimately associated with the material
prosperity and moral advancement of this locality
during the most progressive period of its history,
and he has always been found on the right side of
questions looking to the development of his county
in any way.
Albert M. Johns is descended from Welsh ances-
try and inherited the sterling qualities which char-
acterize that people. His paternal grandfather,
Jackson Johns, who died at Belmont. Ohio, before
the birth of the subject, was one of the pioneers
of Belmont County, having moved there from Johns-
town, Pennsylvania. He was a blacksmith by voca-
tion and a representative of that sturdy class of
men who were willing to brave the dangers and
endure the hardships of a frontier life in order
that their descendants might enjoy the fruitage of
their labors. His son, George Johns, was born in
1853 in Belmont County, Ohio, and was there
reared and educated. He followed the life of a
farmer all of his active days, but is now retired
and is living at Metamora. Shortly after his mar-
riage he had moved to Batesville, but in 1883 set-
tled at Metamora. He is a democrat in politics and
is a member of the Christian Church and of the
Masonic fraternity. He married Jennie Bishop,
who was born in Guernsey County, Ohio, in 1855,
and to them were born the following children : Al-
bert M., whose name forms the caption to this re-
view; Nellie, who is the wife of Marion Cline, a
farmer at New Metamoras, Ohio; Homer, a farmer
at Greenbrier, Ohio; Archibald, who is mayor of
Friendly, West Virginia; Maude, who is the wife
of Herold Cline, an oil operator at Oil Fields, Cali-
fornia ; Dot, who is the wife of Forest Morgan, a
merchant at Amsterdam, Ohio; Wick, a student at
Amsterdam, Ohio, as is also his twin brother,
Wade.
Albert M. Johns was born at Batesville, Noble
County, Ohio, on July 14, 1877, but was educated
in the public schools of New Metamoras, Ohio,
graduating from the high school there in 1896. He
attended the State Normal School at Athens, Ohio,
for two years, and then engaged in teaching in
Monroe County, Ohio, which vocation he followed
for three years. During the following four years
he ^\'as engaged in the mercantile business at Green-
brier, Ohio, but sold out and engaged in the same
line of business at Fleming, Ohio, in which he con-
tinued until 1913. In the latter year Mr. Johns came
to Wilsall. Montana, and engaged in the general
mercantile business, being a pioneer in that line here.
He sold out on April i, 1919, in order to give his
entire atention to his duties as postmaster, but it
is his intention to resume the business again when
he relinquishes his official position. On December
20, 1916, Mr. Johns was appointed postmaster of
Wilsall and has discharged the duties of that posi-
tion to the entire satisfaction of the department
and the patrons of the office. Courteous and oblig-
ing, Mr. Johns has endeavored to make the office
serve the people, and he has won the hearty appro-
bation of all with whom he has had dealings.
Politically Mr. Johns is an earnest supporter of the
democratic party. Fraternally he is a member of
American Union Lodge No. i. Free and Accepted
Masons, at Marietta, Ohio; American Union Chap-
ter No. I, Royal Arch Masons, of Marietta; Mari-
etta Council No. 78, Royal and Select Masters ;
Marietta Commandery No. 50, Knights Templar;
Wilsall Lodge No. 103, Lidependent Order of Odd
Fellows. Of American Union Lodge, referred to
above, it is worthy of note that the lodge was first
constituted at Waterman's Tavern on February 20,
1776, nearly five months before the signing of the
Declaration of Independence. It worked in the
patriot army until 1783, during which period it was
visited by General Washington and others of the
patriot leaders. The lodge was re-opened in Campus
Martins, Marietta, Ohio, on June 28, 1790, by Jona-
than Heart, worshipful master, and was the first
lodge of Freemasons opened in the Northwest Ter-
ritory.
In 1898, at New Metamoras, Ohio, Mr. Johns was
married to Stella Adamson, the daughter of Bar-
nett and Priscilla (Devaul) Adamson. The father,
who was a merchant at Rinards Mill, Ohio, is now
deceased, and his widow resides at Marietta. To
Mr. and Mrs. Johns have been born the following
children : Ernest, born July 8, 1900, is a freshman
in the State Agricultural College at Bozeman ;
Georgia, born in May, 1902, is a junior in the Wil-
sall High School ; Lynn S., born April 14, 1904, a
sophomore in the Wilsall High School ; Eleanor,
born on July 14, 1906, is a public school student;
Lloyd George, born May 15, 1918. Mr. Johns' life
has been one of unceasing industry and persever-
ance, and the systematic and honorable methods .
which he has followed have won him the unbounded
confidence of his fellow citizens.
Charles P. Nevin. The concerns doing the
largest amount of business in Montana are, gen-
erally speaking, in the hands of men who are still
in the very prime of vigorous young manhood and
who are able to bring to their work the enthusiasm
of youth combined with broad and varied experi-
ence, because the majority of them have been other-
wise engaged before permanently establishing them-
selves in the lines in which they are finding their
life occupation. One of these alert young men is
Charles P. Nevin, president of the Magill-Nevin
Company of Butte, the largest concern of its kind
in the state, wholesalers and retailers of plumbing
and heating appliances and materials, and con-
tractors for plumbing.
Charles P. Nevin was born at Virginia City, Ne-
vada, on February 7. 1S81, a son of Dennis Nevin.
born in County Galway, Ireland, in 1843. He and
six brothers came to the United States, and three
of them located in Massachusetts, but Dennis Nevin
and the three others came west to Nevada. They
were married to four sisters, daughters of James
Donohue, and were married according to their ages,
the eldest Miss Donohue being married to the eldest
Nevin brother, and so on to the youngest mernbers
of the two families. These_ very unusual marriages
were regarded with romantic interest by the young
people over a wide territory, and are still spoken
of by the "oldtimers" in and about Virginia City.
Only sixteen years old at the time of his entry
into the United States, Dennis Nevin spent a short
time at Boston, Massachusetts, before he and his
three brothers crossed the plains to the West.
The present generation has no conception of what
such a trip meant in those early days. Not only
were there no proper railroad connections, but there ^
were no roads a good part of the way, and the'
traveler was in constant danger while passing
through the western country from the hostile
Indians. The majority of the travelers made their
way on horseback, if fortunate enough to own a
horse, and. if not, traveled on foot. Parties were
-^^^ ,(^^7:—- .i^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
387
made up of a sufficient number to put up a de-
fense against attacks from the Indians, and the
women and children were carried in canvas-covered
wagons drawn by horses or oxen. In spite of the
hardships and dangers of these trips thousands
flocked across plains and mountains, for gold had
been discovered and the lure of the gold fields drew
them not only from the eastern states but frorn
foreign countries as well. The Nevin brothers be-
longed to the latter class and journeyed westward
with hopes of making their fortunes by digging
the gold from the soil of first California and later
Nevada.
While possessed of the spirit of adventure, Dennis
Nevin was an extremely shrewd business man, and
he realized that while some might make a lucky
strike, there was more real profit in an intelligently
conducted business concern that would supply the
needs of the miners than in taking a chance at
prospecting for gold. Consequently he established
and conducted one of the pioneer mercantile houses
of Virginia City, Nevada, and so prospered that he
was requested by Marcus Daly to come to Butte,
Montana, and assume the management of his large
properties as superintendent of one of his mines.
Complying, Mr. Nevin was made superintendent of
the Wakeup Jim Mine, where he lost his life, being
accidentally killed in that mine on September 15,
1885. He was a man of very forceful character and
reliability and served for two terms as treasurer
of Storey County, Nevada, being elected to that
office on the democratic ticket. All of his life
he vias a devout member of the Roman Catholic
Church. Mr. Nevin was a famous rifle shot, and be-
longed to the Emmett Guards, serving it as captain
of a company.
Dennis Nevin and Winifred Donohue were mar-
ried as above stated, being one of the four couples
composed o£ four brothers and four sisters. She
was born in County Galway, Ireland, in 1S48, and
died at Butte, Montana, on December 23,^ igoo.
She and her husband had the following children :
Mary Jane, married P. S. Sullivan, who lives at
Butte, was assessor of Silver Bow County for three
terms, and is now in the employment department
of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company; Martha
Rose, who died at the age of thirty-six years, mar-
ried Thomas Sheehan, also deceased, who was a
merchant of Butte, and a son of one of the pioneers
of this city; George F., who is a master mechanic
for the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, lives at
Butte ; Margaret, who married Oscar Comstock,
lives at Butte; William H., who is superintendent
of the Anaconda Mine, is spoken of at length else-
where in this work; Winifred, who married John
Donnelly, a traveling salesman, lives at Butte ; and
Charles P., who was the sixth.
Charles P. Nevin attended the parochial and public
schools of Butte, and was graduated from the Cath-
olic school in the class of 1897. He then entered
All Hallows College, Salt Lake City, Utah, and
was graduated therefrom in 1900 with the degree of
Bachelor of Science. Following the completion of
his collegiate course, Mr. Nevin entered the employ
of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company in No-
vember, 1900, and remained with this corporation
until 1909. He resigned to go into the hotel busi-
ness with his brother-in-law, P. S. Sullivan, and for
a year was joint proprietor of the Southern Hotel
of Butte. Mr. Nevin then entered the commission
and brokerage business under the firm name of
Rabbitt & Nevin, and later combined it and the
O'Meara Fruit & Produce Company in 1910 under
the name of the Montana Provision Company, pf
which Mr. Nevin was president. In 1912 Mr. Nevin
sold his interest in this concern and invested in the
purchase of the Krueger Plumbing & Heating Com-
pany, and with it as a nucleus organized the Magill-
Nevin Company, which is incorporated, and has
plant and offices at No. 114 North Main Street,
Butte. This is the largest firm of its kind in Mon-
tana, and carries on a wholesale and retail business
in handling plumbing and heating appliances and
materials, and doing a general contracting and job-
bing business, with a market that extends all over
Western Montana. The officers of the company
are as follows: Charles P. Nevin, president; W.
J. Magill, vice president and manager; Ira G. Bacon,
secretary, and Charles R. Leonard, treasurer.
Mr. Nevin has always been a strong democrat,
and in 1903 was candidate for the office of clerk of
the District Court and polled the highest vote, but
was counted out by two votes. In 1906 he was chair-
man of the Democratic County Central Committee
and conducted the campaign for T. J. Walsh for the
office of congressman from the State of Montana.
Mr. Nevin was candidate in igo8 for the office of
state railroad commissioner and was defeated. The
people of Butte elected him mayor in 1909 by the
largest majority ever given a candidate for this
office, he being the first one to carry every ward in
the city. After serving during 1910 and 1911, he
retired from active participation in politics_ on ac-
count of the growth of his business, which was
rapidly assuming enormous proportions and required
his whole attention. Mr. Nevin is president of the
Nevin Trunk Company, a director of the Ellis
Paint Company, the Centennial Brewing Company,
the Cooney Brokerage Company and the Alpine
Mining Company, which operates at Banks, Idaho,
and takes a constructive part in all of these con-
cerns. His company owns twenty acres of land
within the city limits and other real estate, and a
large warehouse at the Great Northern Railroad
tracks which it uses for the storage of its stock.
Mr. Nevin owns a comfortable modern residence at
No. 945 West Woolman Street, Butte.
Both by inheritance and conviction Mr. Nevin is a
Roman Catholic. He belongs to Butte Council No.
668, Knights of Columbus, in which he has been
made a fourth degree Knight, and he is enrolled as
one of its charter members. He also belongs to
Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, to the United Commercial Travelers,
to Butte Camp No. 153, Woodmen of the World, to
the Rotary Club, to the Silver Bow Club, of which
he is also a director, and to the Butte Countrv
Club.
In 1902 Mr. Nevin was united in marriage at
Butte to Miss Matilda O'Mallev, a daughter of Wil-
liam P. and Bridget (Lavelle) O'Malley. Mr.
O'Malley was a pioneer miner of Butte who came
into this region in the early '70s, and died here.
His widow survives him and resides at Spokane,
Washington. Mr. and Mrs. Nevin have one child.
Jack, who was born on April 23, 191 1.
It would be difficult to find a man more repre-
sentative of the best type of American citizenship
than Mr. Nevin. Not only is he that, but he is a
splendid type of the western business man whose in-
terests are all centered in this region and whose
training has all been of the vigorous young west.
His father and uncles bore a very important part in
the development of this part of the country, and
when he came to manhood's estate he was eager
and ready to continue the good work. As a poli-
tician he left his mark on contemporary history,
and while he was not elected to all of the offices
for which he was his party's candidate._ he polled
enough votes in a strictly republican district to stand
HISTORY OF MONTANA
as a very gratifying monument to his personal pop-
ularity and prestige. Increasing business cares
necessitated his withdrawal from politics, but his
influence remains and his advice is sought and taken
upon many questions pertaining to civic matters,
and the results of his energetic occupancy of the
mayor's chair are shown in a better government
and improvements and an awakened interest on the
part of the ordinary voter in the public weal. Genial
by nature, Mr. Nevin is deservedly popular in the
different fraternities and social organizations with
which he maintains membership as he _ is with
people generally, while his business associates and
competitors accord him a respect his acumen exacts.
John W. Jackson. One of the important in-
dustries of a community which may well be re-
garded as a contributory factor in raising its
standards and increasing its love of the beautiful
is that which has to do with the cultivation of
flowers. It has been often claimed that no man can
become successful in this line unless he has deep in
his heart a love of the work and a genuine apprecia-
tion of its possibilities. Certain it is that the ma-
jority of florists possess these characteristics, and
when they are supplemented by a technical training
and sound business capabilities the outcome is sure
to be gratifying. John \V. Jackson, one of the suc-
cessful florists of Anaconda, belongs to the class
indicated above, and he is also recognized as one of
the representative business men of the city. Mr.
Jackson was born at Bradford, England, April 29,
1881. a son of William Jackson, and grandson of
Charles Jackson, a native of the same city as his
grandson, and there he rounded out his useful life,
passing away in 1882. All of his active years he
was engaged in mining.
William Jackson, born at Bradford. England, in
1856, died at Rimini, Montana, in 1904. Like his
father, he was a miner in England, and when he
came to the United States in 1881 he sought em-
ployment in the mines in Illinois, where he remained
until 1883, and in that year came to Livingston,
Montana, where he continued to engage in coal
mining. He was engaged in mining at other points
in the state. First the Church of England and later
the Episcopal Church held his membership. His
wife, who bore the maiden name of Frances A.
Harrison, was born at Bradford, England, in 1853,
and she survives him, making her home at Helena,
Montana. Their children were as follows : Edith,
who married W. J. Tracy, lives at Helena, Montana,
Mr. Tracy, who was formerly a mining engineer
being deceased ; John W., whose name heads this
review ; Emily, who is a trained nurse in the employ
of the government at Fort Sheridan, Illinois ; Mary
M., who married Lea Marston. a ranchman of
Smoky Butte, Montana ; Annie, who lives with her
mother ; and Rhoda, who also lives with her
mother.
John W. Jackson completed the courses of the
graded schools and took a two-year course in the
Helena High School, and then, in 1900, began learn-
ing the florist business at the state nursery at
Helena, Montana, rising to be one of the stock-
holders. In 1917 he sold his interests, and coming
to Anaconda bought tlie greenhouse located at No.
713 Locust Street. He now has 15,000 square feet
of glass, and his is the leading one of its kind in
Deerlodge County. His offices and store are at No.
203 Main Street, and here he carries on a retail
business supplying the people of .\naconda and
Deerlodge County. Mr. Jackson is independent in
his political views. He Ijelongs to the Episcopal
Church of Anaconda. A Mason, he is a member of
King Solomon Lodge No. g. Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, of Helena, Montana ; Helena Con-
sistory No. 3, in which he has attained to the
thirty-second degree ; Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of
Helena, and he is also a member of Broadwater
Camp No. 29, Woodmen of the World, and the
Rotary Club of Anaconda. The family residence
is at No. 721 Locust Street.
Mr. Jackson was married at Butte, Montana, in
1916 to Miss Byrd Monahan. who was born in
Charlotte, Iowa. She is a graduate of the Academy
of Clinton, Iowa. Mr. and Mrs. Jackson have one
child, Loretta Caroline, born November 6, 1919.
Havelock G. Coy, who is a leading hardware and
implement merchant of Anaconda, is one of the
representative men of this region, and his business
operations form an important factor in the com-
mercial interests of the city. He was born April 30,
1866, a son of Samuel Coy, and great-grandson of
Edward Coy. Edward Coy was a pioneer farmer
of New Brunswick, Canada, to which he went in
1763 from Pomfret. Connecticut. In 1752 he mar-
ried Amy Titus, and both died in New Brunswick.
The Coys originated in England, but came to the
American colonies at an early day, and it is claimed
that a member of the family married a lineal
descendant of one of the passengers of the May-
flower. Benjamin Coy, son of Edward Coy and
grandfather of Havelock G. Coy, was born in New
Brunswick, Canada, and there he died before his
grandson was born, being then eighty years of age.
He was a clergj'man of the Baptist Church of New
Brunswick.
Samuel Coy, a son of Benjamin Coy and father
of Havelock G. Coy, was born in New Brunswick,
Canada, in October, 1803. and died there in 1882,
having spent his entire life in that province as a.
farmer. He was a liberal in politics and served in
the local militia. Samuel Coy was married to
Amelia Esty, born in New Brunswick, in 1825, and
died there in 1881. Their children were as follows:
Minnie B., who married David S. Coy, a grocer of
Toronto. Canada ;. and Havelock G., whose name
Iieads this review.
Havelock G. Coy received a preparatory normal
school education in the public schools of Ne.w
Brunswick, which he left when sixteen years old to
engage in farming, continuing this calling in his
native province until 1887. In May of that year he
came to Anaconda. Montana, as a pioneer and fol-
lowed many callings, including laboring, contracting
and building and teaming, and then in 1898 he estab-
lished his present business in a srnall way and
enlarging it as his trade increased until he now has
one of the leading establishments of its kind in^ this
entire section. In 1916 he incorporated his business
as the Coy Hardware and Implement Company, of
which he is president, his associates being A. M.
Strom, vice president, and Mrs. Emma Dyas. secre-
tary and treasurer. The store and offices are
located at Nos. 409 and 411 East Park Avenue,
Anaconda.
Mr. Coy is a republican and was appointed by
Judge Winston Commissioner of Deer Lodge Coun-
ty. He is a member of the Baptist Church, and is
serving as chairman of its board of trustees. A
member of the Rotary Club he is now its president,
and he is also president of the Commercial Men's
Club. The family residence on Main Street, at No.
600, is owned by him and is modern in every respect.
In 1893 Mr. Coy was married at Boston, Massa-
chusetts, to Miss Annie Edmunds, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Tames Edmunds, both of whom are
HISTORY OF IMONTANA
deceased. Mr. Edmunds was a pattern maker of
Canada and Boston, Massachusetts. Mrs. Coy at-
tended tlie provincial normal school of New Bruns-
wick and was an educator prior to her marriage.
Mr. and Mrs. Coy have the following children:
Annie May, who is attending the University of
Minnesota at Minneapolis, taught school for a year
at Rockford, Minnesota ; and Edmund, who is at-
tending the Anaconda High School.
Having resided at Anaconda for so many years,
Mr. Coy has passed through its formative period
and has taken part in much of its development.
His business is the outgrowth of his intelligent
methods and comprehensive appreciation of the
needs of his customers, and he richly deserves the
prosperity which has attended him, as well as the
high position he occupies in public esteem.
Samuel Wesley Collett came to Montana with
his father and other members of the family over
thirty years ago. His home is still on a farm, and
farming has constituted one of his chief activities
all the years he has been in the state. However, he
is widely known as a Bozeman business man, and
his office has been the medium for a tremendous
amount of real estate buying and selling. Mr. Col-
lett is one of the best posted men on realty values
in Bozeman and over that section of the state.
He is of Scotch-Irish ancestry. The first of the
Colletts in America were pioneers in Indiana.
Samuel Wesley Collett was born at Belle Plaine,
Iowa, August 0, 1869. His father, Samuel Collett,
a well known Montana pioneer, was born in Indiana
in 1847, and as a boy went to Iowa and served three
and a half years with an Iowa regiment of infantry
in the Civil war. After the war he lived on the farm
in the northern part of that state and subsequently
moved to a farm near Belle Plaine. Leaving Iowa
in the spring of 1887, he came to Bozeman, and
homesteaded 160 acres eighteen miles west of that
city. He lived on his Montana ranch for eighteen
years and after that had his home in Bozeman,
where he acquired extensive real estate properties.
He was one of the successful old timers of Montana
and his death at Bozeman in 1917 was greatly re-
gretted liy his former associates. He was a very
active member of the Methodist Church and was
affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows, while in politics he always voted the republi-
can ticket. Samuel Collett married Martha Winslo'w,
who was born in Iowa in 1846 and died at Bozeman
in 1915. A brief record of their children is: John,
a former county commissioner and farmer who died
at Bozeman in 1918; Samuel Wesley; Melvina, wife
of Cal Merritt, a pioneer farmer, rancher and cat-
tleman at Whitehall, Montana ; Harry, owner of
a grain ranch at Logan, Montana ; and Charles,
who has a farm south of Bozeman.
Samuel W. Collett acquired his early education in
the public schools of Spirit Lake, Iowa. He was
eighteen years old when he came to Bozeman in
1887. and after that for twenty years was actively
engaged in farming and stock raising. Since 1909
he has been developing a large real estate business,
and is regarded as one of the most competent men
in that line in Gallatin County. An indication of
his prestige as a real estate man and also of the
general volume of real estate business during the
period is furnished by the record of business done
in his office from January i until June I, 1919, the
transactions of this period making an impressive
aggregate of approximately $442,000. Mr. Collett
is a successful farmer on his own account, and owns
600 acres, though a large part of his former holdings
he has sold. He still lives on his farm seven miles
west of Bozeman.
Mr. Collett is a member of the Chamber of Com-
merce, is a republican, a trustee of the Methodist
Church, and is affiliated with Salesville Lodge, In-
dependent Order of Odd Fellows, and Bozeman
Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks.
In 1899, at Anaconda, he married Miss Artie
Wall, a native of Indiana. She died on the home
farm west of Bozeman in 1907. She was the
mother of three children : Gladys, a graduate of the
Bozeman High School and of the Columbia Insti-
tute at Milton, Oregon, is the wife of Everett
Cutting, teacher of wireless telegraphy in the State
University at Missoula: Gerald, who was educated
in the grammar and high schools at Bozeman, is in
business with his father and lives on the farm;
Leonard, also on the farm, is a graduate of the
Gallatin County High School. In 191 1, at Bozeman,
Mr. Collett married Mrs. Zada (Fausett) Thomp-
son, a native of Salt Lake City.
Harry S. Masters is in point of years of service
one of the oldest telegraphers and dispatchers in
the employ of the Northern Pacific Railway. He
learned telegraphy during his youth in Canada. He
is a native of England but was reared in Canada.
Several of his brothers have been railroad men or
engaged in some public utility service, and one of
his brothers was a Canadian soldier during the
World war,
:\Ir. Masters, who is dispatcher for the Northern
Pacific at Livingston, a position he has held for_ a
number of years, was born near the City of Salis-
bury, England, March 23, 1872. His father, Eli
Masters, was born at the same English city in 1839,
was a farmer there in early life, and in 1875 brought
his family to Canada and settled far out on the
Western frontier, near the old military post of
Fort Gary, now Winnipeg. He developed a farm
on the Western prairies and lived there until his
death in 1918. He was a liberal in politics, was a
Methodist in religion, and belonged to the Masonic
fraternity. In England he had a military training
with the English Yeomen. Eli Masters married
Harriet Benjafield, who was born near Salisbury in
1838 and is still living, at the age of ei.ghty-one at
Winnipeg. Nathaniel, the oldest of their children,
is connected with the Municipal Electric Light plant
at Winnipeg. Hedley is supervisor of the Winnipeg
waterworks. Tom is a telegraph operator with the
Canadian Pacific at Vancouver. British Columbia,
while Sidney, a farmer in Winnipeg, enlisted in the
Canadian army at the outbreak of^ the war, was
sent overseas and was employed in construction
work until mustered out after the signing of the
armistice. Harry S. is the fifth in the family. Eva
is the wife of J. S. Kerr, a conductor with the
Canadian Pacific' Railway, living at Winnipeg, and
Annie is the wife of Walter McPherson, an employe
of the Canadian postal service at Winnipeg.
Harry S. Masters was three years old when taken
to the Canadian frontier, received his education in
the public schools of Winnipeg, and left that city
in 1802. At St. Paul. Minnesota, he was a telegraph
operator with the Western Union Company for a
vear and a half, and on March I. 1804. arrived at
Livingston, Montana. For eight vears lie was man-
ager of the Livingston office of the Western Union,
and since then has been in the service of the North-
ern Pacific Railway Comnanv. As dispatcher his
business headnuarters are in the general office build-
ine on Park Street.
Mr. Masters is also owner of a ranch of 160
HISTORY OF MONTANA
acres in the Potter Basin of Park County and has
a modern home at 107 North Third Street. He is
now serving his third term as alderman of the
Second Ward, and is a repubhcan m pohtics. He
is a vestryman in the Episcopal Church, and a mem-
ber of Livingston Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons.
In April, 1898. he married Miss Grace Potter,
daughter of William and Martha (Eraser) Potter.
The Potters live in the Potter Basin of Park
County. Her father was one of the pioneer home-
steaders there and today owns 6,000 acres and is
extensively engaged in the sheep industry. Mr. and
Mrs. Masters have four children: Harry S., Jr..
Gladys, wife of Dan Gallagher, a rancher at Clyde
Park, Montana, Marv and Grace, the former in the
eighth grade and the latter in the first grade of the
public schools at Livingston.
R. Proctor Barclay. Since 1898 R. Proctor Bar-
clay has been a resident of Butte and has risen in
business circles until he is now president of the
Barclay & Booth Abstract Company, one of the most
dependable in its line in the state. The Barclay
family was founded in the Virginia colony at a
period antedating the American Revolution. The
grandfather, Philander Barclay, died in Kentucky
before the birth of his grandson R. Proctor Barclay.
R. Proctor Barclay was born at Bowling Green,
Kentucky, on April 10, 1872, a son of Joseph W.
Barclay, born at Glasgow, Kentucky, in 1830. His
death occurred at Pembroke, Kentucky, in 1913.
where he previously had large property inter-
ests, and had also been an extensive property
owner at Chicago, Illinois, and Atchison, Kansas.
Growing up at Glasgow and Russellville, Kentucky,
he went to Bov/ling Green, Kentucky, following the
close of the war between the states, there being
engaged in farming until 1900, when he moved to
Pembroke and lived retired until his death. Po-
litically a democrat, he took no active part in public
affairs. The Baptist Church held his membership.
He was a Mason.
Joseph W. Barclay was married to Sally Proctor,
born in Logan County, Kentucky, in 1838, a daughter
of Thomas L. Proctor, whose birth occurred in
1797. He died in Logan County, Kentucky, in 1879.
He was either a native of Kentucky or brought
into the state from Virginia during pioneer times.
His wife was Agnes Carson^ prior to her marriage,
and she, too, was born in either Kentucky or Vir-
ginia. Her death occurred in Logan County, Ken-
tucky, before the birth of her grandson. Thomas
L. Proctor was a farmer and miller and owned ex-
tensive timber interests, owned and operated a saw-
mill and was a large slave owner and one of the
prominent men of Logan County whose business
operations were diversified and of considerable mag-
nitude. The Proctors were Scotch-Irish and the
family was founded in Virginia during the colonial
period of American history. Mrs. Joseph W. Bar-
clay died at Bowling Green, Kentucky, in 1911. She
and her husband had the following children : Agnes,
who is unmarried, lives at Montgomery, Alabama,
and is a teacher in the public schools of that city:
R. Proctor, whose name heads this review ; and
Waller P., who came to Montana in 1899, and is
associated with his brother in the abstract business.
By a former marriage with Sallie Tandy, born at
Hopkinsville, Kentucky, Joseph W. Barclay had the
following children : Ernest, who is a farmer and
tobacco grower of Pembroke, Kentucky: Annie, who
is unmarried, is a resident of Bowling Green, where
she is engaged in teaching in the public schools ;
Sallie, who is a resident of Bowling Green, is the
widow of J. W. Evans, who died at Russellville,
Kentucky, where he had been engaged in mer-
chandising.
R. Proctor Barclay attended the public schools of
Bowling Green, and was graduated from Ogden Col-
lege of Bowling Green in 1893 with the degree of
Bachelor of Arts. He then became deputy clerk
of the court of Warren County and held that posi-
tion until January i, 1898, when he entered the
employ of the Warren Deposit Bank, remaining with
that institution until in May, 1898, when he came
to Butte, Montana, and formed connections with
the Ras Rochester Hardware Company, which were
maintained until Mr. Rochester sold his interests in
July of that year, Mr. Barclay being chosen to close
up the affairs. He then associated himself in Octo-
ber of 1898 with Judge A. H. Barret in the abstract
business, operating under the name of the Security
Abstract Company. In 1899 Mr. Barrett was elected
state treasurer, and ]\Ir. Barclay continued to con-
duct the business under his own name until April,
1901, when he took T. E. Booth into partnership
with him, and in March, 1902, incorporated the busi-
ness as the Barclay & Booth Abstract Company.
Mr. Booth withdrew in May, 1903, and engaged in
a loan business, but the name has not been changed.
The present officials of the company are as follows :
R. P. Barclay, president; W. P. Barclay, vice presi-
dent : and E. R. McMahon, secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Barclay is the active manager and conducts all
of the business of the company, and has built up the
largest abstract business in Montana. Practically
all of the abstracts of the claims that constitute
the holdings of all of the large companies in the
Butte District within the last twenty-one years have
been made by Mr. Barclay. He also has a large
business in the general real estate line of abstract-
ing, and this is the only abstract cornpany in Mon-
tana that specializes in abstracting properties
throughout the whole state and the entire northwest.
The offices are at No. 108 West Granite Street,
Butte. Mr. Barclay's residence is at No. 4 Malay
Block on Hamilton Street, Butte.
In his political faith Mr. Barclay is a democrat,
but he has never held any elective office, as his
duties have been too heavy to permit of his as-
suming any of a public character. Having been
reared in the Baptist Church, he joined that de-
nomination and has continued to worship with it.
The Rotary Club of Butte holds his membership
and he is one of its directors. At the International
Convention of Rotary held at Salt Lake, in June,
1919, he was elected international secretary of the
abstract section of Rotary. He also belongs to
Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, the Silver Bow Club and the Butte
Country Club, all of Butte. He is not married.
A man of dependable character, painstaking and
conservative, Mr. Barclay has concentrated his abili-
ties on the development of his business, and has
brought it to a state of perfection that must be
gratifying. The name of the concern he has founded
and fostered stands for so much not only in Butte
and Montana, but all over the West, that to have
its guarantee back of a title insures a sale of any
realty wherever located, and it is a recognized fact
that it is because Mr. Barclay is in active charge
of the affairs of the company that his concern has
such weight in the matter of guaranteeing pur-
chasers gf property against loss through faulty titles
or dishonest representations.
Joseph Sudar, manager of the Bear Creek Trad-
ing Company, the leading general mercantile estab-
lishment of this part of Montana, is one of the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
substantial and enterprising men of Bear Creek,
who has risen to his present position througli his
own ability and steadfast adherence to business. He
was born at Cratian, Austria, March lo, 1878, a son
of Jerry and Martha (Ratkovich) Sudar, both
natives of Cratian, Austria. There they were reared
and married, and, after useful lives, passed away.
They were consistent members of the Roman Catho-
lic Church. The children born to Jerry Sudar and
wife were as follows : Frank and Paul, who live
at Cratian, Austria ; Katy and Mary, both of whom
also reside at Cratian, Austria ; Joseph, whose name
heads this review; Jerry, who is a merchant of
Bear Creek, Montana; Jack, who is a miner of Bear
Creek. Montana ; Rosa, who married George Nag-
lich, a miner of Bear Creek; Milka, who married
George Dragich, who is also a miner of Bear Creek.
After attending the public schools of his native
city Joseph Sudar worked as a clerk in one of its
mercantile concerns, and then in 1903 came to the
United States, landing at Baltimore. Maryland,
from whence he went to Arkansas and was there
engaged in railroad work. During 1904 and 1905 he
was engaged in mining at Rugby, Colorado, and then
was at Bridger, Montana, until 1907, continuing
there as a miner. For five years after coming to
Montana he was engaged in mining and clerking
in a store, and then with his partner purchased the
Bear Creek Trading Company. This store is con-
veniently located on Main Street, and a very large
business is carried on annually.
In politics Mr. Sudar is a democrat, and he is
now a member of the City Council and takes an
active part in civic affairs. Born and reared a
Catholic, he belongs to the Catholic Church of
Bear Creek. Since locating permanently at this
point Mr. Sudar has displayed his faith in its future
by investing in real estate, and owns a comfort-
able residence here. He is not married. The ad-
vancement Mr. Sudar has made in so short a period
demonstrates the fact that this country offers un-
limited opportunities to those willing to work and
save, and his good sense and sterling integrity have
won for him the respect of his associates, and in-
creased the volume of business of his company.
Charles W. Allin, proprietor of the Anaconda
Lumber Yard, is a man who enjoys the confidence
and respect of his fellow citizens and is entitled to
both. He was born at Bedford. Missouri, February
IS, 1883, a son of Dr. C. W. Allin. Doctor Allin was
born at Harrisburg, Kentucky, in 1836, and died at
Bedford, Missouri, in 1913. Leaving Harrisburg,
Kentucky, in young manhood. Doctor Allin came to
the vicinity of Bedford, Missouri. He was gradu-
ated from the Keokuk. Iowa Medical College and
became a pioneer physician of Livingston County,
Missouri, where he was engaged in practice the
remainder of his life. During the conflict between
the North and South he espoused the cause of
the latter, and was a soldier in the Confederate
army. Politically he was a democrat. Doctor Allin
was' married at Bedford, Missouri, to a Miss HofT-
man, who died in Missouri, having borne her hus-
band three children, namely: Mav. who married
T. P. Garham, a farmer of Hale. Missouri; an in-
fant daughter; and Hallie. who married A. E.
Wright, a farmer of .Aivalon. Missouri. After the
death of his first wife. Doctor .Mlin was married
second to Elizabeth Rickerson. born in .^pril, 18^2,
near Georgetown, Kentuck-y. and Charles W. Allin
is the onlv child of this union.
Charles W. Allin attended the public schools of
Livingston County, Missouri, completing the ninth
grade. He then took a commercial course at the
Chillicothe Business College at Chillicothe, Missouri,
completing it in September, 1901. Leaving Missouri,
he then went to Milligan, Nebraska, and went to
work in the lumber yards there, becoming a gen-
eral helper for F. M. Spaulding, remaining with
him for three years. Mr. Allin then went to Hol-
dredge, Nebraska, and was yardman for C. A. Cal-
laway for three years. In June, 1907, he went with
the Belgrave Lumber Company of Belgrave, Mon-
tana, as manager, acting as such for five years, and
in 1911 he embarked in a lumber business of his
own at Graybull, Wyoming, under the name of the
Allin-Saunders Lumber Company, his partners be-
ing two brothers by the name of Saunders. Dis-
posing of his interests in 1914, he came to Ana-
conda and established himself under the old name
of the Allin-Saunders Lumber Company, but in
1918 became sole owner. This is one of the lead-
ing lumber concerns of Deerlodge County, the
offices and yard being at No. 223 West Commercial
Avenue, at the corner of Commercial Avenue and
Locust Street. Mr. Allin also has a large ware-
house along tlie tracks of the Butte, Anaconda &
Pacific Railroad. His business extends all over
Deerlodge County. The family resides at No. 223
West Commercial Avenue. In politics Mr. Allin
is an independent.
In 1908 Mr. Allin was married at Belgrade, Mon-
tana, to Miss Bertha Davis, a daughter of David
and Candace (Wakefields) Davis. Mr. Davis was
a farmer of the Gallatin Valley, in which he set-
tled in 1863, coming to it from Wales. During the
gold rush he was at Virginia City and Alder Gulch,
but decided that there would be more profit in
homesteading and farming, so secured his ranch
in the Gallatin Valley, and was one of the suc-
cessful pioneer ranchmen of thalt locality. Mrs.
Allin was graduated from the Montana State Col-
lege at Bozeman. Mr. and Mrs. Allin have one
son, Charles W., who was born August 6, 1909.
Mr. Allin is proud of his family and of the fact
that Ife is 100 per cent American, the Allins having
come to the American colonies from Scotland some
time prior to the Revolutionary war and located in
Virginia, from whence they later moved into Ken-
tucky. A man of experience in his business, Mr.
Allin has been able to conduct it in a manner to
bring him ample patronage, and his concern is
ranked among the sound commercial factors of the
city.
H. P. Sandles. The Sandles family is one of
the oldest in Pennsylvania, where it was founded
in colonial times, and its representatives have since
then taken part in constructive work with rela-
tion to the government, and been instrumental in
developing many of the states of the Union. Its
representative at Red Lodge, Montana, H. P.
Sandles, county clerk of Carbon, is one of the alert
and thoroughly progressive young men of this sec-
tion, who during the late war lived up to the high-
est standards of his progenitors and rendered his
country invaluable service during the period of
such great stress. H. P. Sandles was born in In-
diana County, Pennsylvania, October 24 1882, on
the farm purchased by his great-grandfather and
owned successively by his grandfather and father.
The latter, also named H. P. Sandles, was born
on this same farm in 1850. and here he has spent
his life, still being actively engaged in conducting
the homestead, and operating ouite extensively as
a stock dealer. A republican, he is active in his
party, but not an office holder. The Presbyterian
Church holds his membership and benefits through
his generosity and piety. Fraternally he belongs
392
HISTORY OF AIOXTANA
to the Modern Woodmen of America. His wife,
who bore the maiden name of Jennie Kier, was
also born in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, in 1861.
Their children are as follows: Claude, who is a
roller in an Ohio steel mill ; Marck, who is a roller
in the Gary, Indiana, steel works; Lyle, who is an
attorney of Cincinnati, Ohio; H. P., whose name
heads this review; and Albert, a twin brother of
H. P., who is superintendent of a mine at Hannis-
town. Pennsylvania. , ,. ,
After completing his courses in the local schools
of Indiana County, Pennsylvania, H. P. Sandles
became a student of the Elders Ridge Academy,
from which he was gradauted in 1901, and was
engaged in work as a construction engineer in
Pennsylvania, Ohio and Illinois for some time be-
fore going to Fernie. British Columbia, where he
remained until 1905. During that year he came
back to the United States and served as construc-
tion engineer for the Northwestern Improvement
Company along the Northern Pacific Railroad until
1907, in which year he was sent to Red Lodge,
Montana, and remained with the same company
until 1916, during that period constructing the Sun-
set Mine. As a side line Mr. Sandles invested in
a moving picture theatre and for seven years was
its m'anager, but sold his interests in February, 1919.
In 1016 he was the successful candidate of the
republican party for the office of county clerk, and
was re-elected in 19 18. Few men of Carbon Coun-
ty, or for that matter of Montana, have been as
effectively active in promoting the well being of
their communities as has Mr. Sandles, and dur-
ing the great war he acted as chairman of the local
board on war drives, and made each one of them
a success. In addition he transacted all of the
governmental business which could be taken care
of by the county clerk, and did not spare himself
or his own interests to further those of his country.
A Presbyterian by inheritance and inclination, Mr.
Sandles is active in that denomination, as he is in
any body with which he is connected, and his serv-
ices are appreciated by his fellow members. Bear
Tooth Lodge No. 534, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, holds his membership, and he also
belongs to the Red Lodge Chamber of Commerce.
Since coming to Red Lodge he has made the city
his place of residence, and his office is at present
in the courthouse.
In 1910 Mr. Sandles was married at Red Lodge
to Aliss Mabel Chapman, a daughter of Louis and
Alma Chapman. Mr. Chapman was one of the
pioneers of Oregon. He came to Montana in 1906
and is now one of the leading lumber merchants
of the city. Mr. and Mrs. Sandles have no chil-
dren. Mr. Sandles is proud of the fact that his
family is of Scotch stock, and he inherits many of
the sturdy and desirable characteristics of those
people. His fidelity to the responsibilities of pub-
lic office, and his ability to discharge them effec-
tively and promptly, make him one of the best
men in the county's roster, and his future if he
cares to remain in public life is a bright one, much
higher honors no doubt lying in store for one who
has proven himself so worthy of them.
R. A. Kelly". The selection of Anaconda as
headquarters for the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company has brought here a large influx of people
who have made it their permanent home and ex-
pect to receive from the business men a service
in every line of trade. This has created a large
demand in all branches, and some of the best minds
of the state of a commercial bent are occupied
in satisfactorily meeting the wants of the popula-
tion. One of these men is R. A. Kelly, proprietor
of the Washoe Coal Company, and a dealer in real
estate and insurance.
R. A. Kelly was born at St. Martins, Ohio, De-
cember 17, 1883. a son of John Kelh-, and a grand-
son of Thomas Kelly, born in County Cork, Ire-
land, in 1821, who died at St. Martins, Ohio, in
1895. He founded the family in this locality, and
was engaged in farming for many }'ears. John
Kelly was born at St. Martins, Ohio, in 1840, and
died there on April 7, 1917, having spent his entire
life there as a farmer. His farm was the one on
which he was born and descended to him from his
father, the original owner. He was a democrat
and a Roman Catholic, and strong in both his po-
litical and religious convictions. During the war
between the states he served in the Union army
for two years and ten months, as a member of
the Seventh Ohio Cavalry, participating in the
Battle of Gettysburg and General Sherman's
"March to the Sea." His widow, who bore the
maiden name of Catherine Huber, survives him
and still lives on the old homestead. She was born
at Faj'etteville, Ohio, in 1850, and bore her hus-
band the following children : T. J., who is in charge
of the copper shipped by the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company from Anaconda to Texas, with
headquarters at Galveston, Texas ; Mary, who mar-
ried C. J. Tobin, claim agent for the American
Railway Express Company at Cincinnati, Ohio ;
John, who is with the United Steel Company, lives
at Chicago, Illinois; Henry, who operates the old
homestead for his mother, lives at St. Martins,
Ohio; Margaret, who married William Dunham,
a rancher of Blancliester, Ohio ; Catherine, who
married John McConn, president of the Fayette-
ville Bank, lives at Fayetteville, Ohio; R. A., whose
name heads this review ; and Anna, who is a teacher
in the schools of St. Martins, Ohio.
Growing up in a wholesome home atmosphere,
R. A. Kelly was taught to be industrious and thrifty
by his excellent parents, and was sent to the pub-
lic schools of his native place. He remained on
the farm until eighteen years of age, but then
feeling that his tastes would not be satisfied with
a' rural life, he went to Cincinnati, Ohio, and en-
gaged with the Adams Express Company for a year,
and then for the next two years was in that com-
pany's Chicago office. The great copper interests be-
gan to attract attention to Montana about this time,
and Mr. Kelly felt that he was willing to take almost
any position which would bring him into contact with
the men who were developing such tremendous
industries. Coming to Montana, he became a wiper
for the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railroad, rising
to be fireman and then locomotive engineer of that
same road, and remaining with it until in January,
1917, when he bought the business of the Washoe
Coal Company in partnership with W. H. Tuch-
scherer, who is now in Siberia with the American
Expeditionary Forces, so that the conduct of the
company is entirely in Mr. Kelly's capable hands.
This company conducts one of the leading coal
businesses in this region, and the offices are at
No. 209 Main Street, Anaconda, while the yards
are along the tracks of the Butte. Anaconda &
Pacific Railroad. In addition to his coal inter-
ests Mr. Kelly conducts a real estate and insur-
ance business, operating extensively in the former,
and representing the leading insurance companies
in the latter line. His wide acquaintance gained dur-
ing the nearly fourteen years he has been at Ana-
conda has proved useful to him, and those who
do business with him know that they will receive
<2^^ ^x \
I
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a fair and equitable deal and place implicit faith
in his judgment.
On May 5, 1914, Air. Kelly was married at Ana-
conda to Miss Matilda Tuchscherer, a daughter of
A. J. and Matilda (Trilling) Tuchscherer, of Ana-
conda. Mr. Tuchscherer is now engaged in the
ice business, but was the leading brewer of Deer-
lodge County until his industry was closed by the
war prohibition act. Mr. and Mrs. Kelly became
the parents of the following children: Margaret,
who was born February 21, 1915; .\rthur Robert,
who died at the age of nine months; and Edna
Marie, who was born December 11. 191 7.
Like his father and grandfather, Mr. Kelly is
a strong democrat, but aside from voting the ticket
of his party has not entered public life, although
if he cared to do so there is no doubt but that
he would poll a heavy vote on account of his per-
sonal popularity. In him the Catholic Church has
a consistent member. He belongs to Anaconda
Council No. 8S2, Knights of Columbus, being both
a third and fourth degree knight ; and to the Lo-
comotive Engineers' and Firemen's .Association.
Socially he finds congenial companionship at the
Anaconda Club. Not only does he own his mod-
ern residence at No. 621 West Fourth. Street, but
another house at No. 409 Walnut Street, for he
has faith in the future of Anaconda and proves it
by investing in city realty as well as handling it.
Keenly alert, Mr. Kelly has never let an oppor-
tunity for advancement slip bj' him, provided he
could take advantage of it without wronging an-
other, and while he has been rising he has benefited
his community in interesting outside capital and
inducing those already here to invest their savings
in homes of their own. Recognizing the fact that
the owner of his home is a much more interested
citizen than the man who drifts about as a renter,
he feels that his work in the realty line is good
patriotism as well as a sound business proposition,
and he has other plans for the future looking to-
ward a still further growth of the city. Genial
and warmhearted, he makes and retains friends,
and he and his wife are very popular in a congenial
circle.
Thomas A. Grigg, M. D. Several years ago
Doctor Grigg, who located at Butte in 1892, earned
a place of genuine eminence in the profession of
medicine and surgery in Montana. He was one of
the earliest physicians and surgeons of Montana
entitled to the distinction of specialist. He had
been in practice for several years in Pennsylvania
before he came to Montana, and he possessed means
as well as the thorough training, upon locating at
Butte, to confine his practice largely to the lines
of his choice, as a specialist in diseases of the eye,
ear. nose, throat and chest.
Doctor Grigg has also acquired extensive busi-
ness interests in Montana, and in later years has
had much to do with the public affairs of his home
city. He was born on Prince Edward Island, Can-
ada. February 11, 1861, youngest child of Dr. Wil-
liam and Willann (Daughert>') Grigg. His father
was a native of England, was educated in London,
and lived on Prince Edward Island from 1826 until
his death at the age of eighty-one in 1881. He
was a physician of fine talents, practiced his pro-
fession many years, but accumulated his fortune
chiefly through his extensive interests in the ship
building industry. He married for his first wife a
Miss Brooks, and of their nine children one is still
living. Mary, whose home is at West Devon, Prince
Edward Island. She is the widow of Josiah Pawe,
who was a hotel proprietor and farmer. Dr. Wil-
liam Grigg by his second wife, who died at the age
of fifty-six, had only two sons, John F. W. and Dr.
Thomas A. The former is a farmer in Tyne Valley,
, Prince Edward Island.
His father being a man of wealth and substantial
position, Thomas A. Grigg had every opportunity
and encouragement to obtain the most complete
qualifications for his chosen work. After leaving
high school he studied medicine under his father
and other physicians, and in 1883 entered the Uni-
versit>' of Pennsylvania. He was graduated from
the Medical School of that university in 1887, with
high honors and with recommendations from several
members of the faculty, including men of wide re-
nown in medicine and surgery. Doctor Grigg began
practice at Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania, in 1887,
and remained there four years. At the same time
he was doing advanced work in Philadelphia hos-
pitals, including the Will Eye Hospital and the
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. In
1891 he received a special diploma" on the eye, ear.
nose and throat and lungs from the Philadelphia
Pjolyclinic.
The strain of concentrated study and practice
made it necessary for Doctor Grigg to leave his
practice in Pennsylvania and for six months he lived
on Lake Chelan, Washington, and in October, 1892,
located at Butte. During the many years he has
practiced in Butte Doctor Grigg has become known
to his professional brethren for his original methods,
his advanced thought, and his faithful study and
devotion to his profession, particularly along the
lines of his specialties. He is a member of the
American Medical Association, the Rocky Mountain
Interstate Medical Association, the various local so-
cieties, the State Medical Society of Pennsylvania,
and has been a frequent contributor of professional
articles to the Medical Sentinel, published in Port-
land, Oregon, and other medical publications. He
has been honored with the office of president of
both the Silver Bow County Medical Society and
the State Medical Society. He is examining physi-
cian for the Butte Young Men's Christian Associa-
tion, and is examining physician for Butte Camp
No. 153, Woodmen of the World, which he served
as first consul commander. He is a member of the
Fraternal Aid Union, University Club, Damon Lodge
No. I, Knights of Pythias at Butte, and has his
Masonic affiliations in Mahanoy City Lodge No. 357,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, in Pennsyl-
vania.
Doctor Grigg is secretary and treasurer of the
Beaverhead Alberta Oil and Gas Company, operating
south of Dillon in Montana. In past years he ,has
acquired extensive mining properties and other real
estate in Butte and in the State of Washington. In
1900 he was appointed a member of the Board of
United States Examining Surgeons for the Pension
Department in Silver Bow County.
Doctor Grigg is a republican, but in the earlier
years of his professional work always declined
public honors. In 1910 he was elected a member
of the board of aldermen to represent the Sixth
Ward, and served two terms.
August 20, 1888. Doctor Grigg married Miss
Joanna S. Miller. She was born in the same town
as Doctor Grigg. Her father, John Miller, was a
prominent shipbuilder. Mrs. Grigg is a past presi-
dent and trustee of the Woman's Club of Butte,
and is a member of the Academy of Fine Arts of
Chicago. She has been prominent in Butte's social
life for many years and as a result of long study is
an authority on many matters of art, particularly
ceramics, oils and water colors. Doctor Grigg and
family reside at 232 West Porphyry Street. He is
394
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the father of three children. Elmer Roy, a grad-
uate of the Jefferson IMedical College of Phila-
delphia, is a young physician and surgeon and now
occupies the post of city physician of Butte. Leon
Alison, the second child, is a graduate of the Dental
School of the University of Pennsylvania at Phila-
delphia, and is now well established in his profession
at Spokane, Washington. Joanna Ethel, the only
daughter, is a graduate of the Butte High School,
and is the wife of J. W. McCready, who operates
a motor truck service in Butte.
Elmer Roy Grigg, M. D., present city physician
of Butte, is a son of Dr. T. A. Grigg, whose career
has been set forth above.
The son was born during his father's residence at
Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania, November 22, 1890.
He received his early education in the schools of
Butte, graduating from high school in 1910, and soon
afterward entered Jefferson Medical College at
Philadelphia, where he was graduated with the class
of 1914. While in college he was a member of the
Alpha Kappa fraternity and served as president of
the local chapter in 1914. He was also a member
of the Hiram R. Loux Urological Society and the
Keen Surgical Society at Jefferson Medical College.
Returning to Butte after his graduation, he began
practice and in the fall of the same year opened
an office at Anaconda, where he remained two years.
Since then he has been one of the hard working
general physicians and surgeons at Butte. His of-
fices are in the Rialto Building. In May, 1918, he
was appointed physician to the Butte Tuberculosis
Clinic, and since May, 1919, has also been health
officer of the city. He maintains offices in the city
hall.
Doctor Grigg is a republican, a member of the
Presbyterian Church, Silver Bow County Medical
Society, and the American Medical Association. He
is a director in the Beaverhead Alberta Oil and
Gas Company.
Doctor Grigg resides at 319 South Jackson Street.
At Helena January 10, 1916, he married Miss Lavina
Victoria Bartzen, daughter of Clem and Mary
(Youngers) Bartzen. Her parents live at Butfe,
her father being master mechanic at the Timber
Butte Milling Company. Mrs. Grigg is a graduate
of the Butte High School with the class of 1911.
B. G. Shorey. The number, extent and impor-
tance of the industries, enterprises and institu-
tions owned or controlled by B. G. Shorey both
in the past and present are and have been such
as to make him one of the leading business citi-
zens and financiers of the City of Billings. His
career has been intensely t>'pical of self-made man-
hood, and its early history is filled with the romance
of the plains, under whose harsh but efficient mold-
ing the crude, raw youth was developed into a self-
reliant, resourceful and capable man. Rancher,
banker, man of large business affairs and substan-
tial citizen, Mr. Shorey has at all times exemplified
the highest t>-pe of true western manhood and the
spirit of enterprise.
B. G. Shorey was born at Belfast. Maine, Sep-
tember 7. 1862, a son of Wellington and Louisa
(Durham) Shorey. The family, of English-Irish
descent, was founded in Maine in colonial days,
and in that state, in 1831, Wellington Shorey was
born. He was a farmer by vocation and a republi-
can in his political adherence, and never left the
state of his birth, dying at Belfast, in 1903. Mr.
Shorey married Louisa Durham, who was born in
Maine in 1837, and died at Belfast in 1907, and they
became the parents of seven children : John D.,
a contractor and builder of White Sulphur Springs,
Montana; J. W., a farmer and stockman of Rich-
land County, Montana; Jennie, the widow of John
McGray, a farmer of Knox, Maine, where she re-
sides ; Emma, who died unmarried at Belfast in
1909; Charles, a stockman and farmer of Waldo,
Maine ; Raymond O., a farmer and stockman of
Roberts, Montana; and B. G.
The public schools of Belfast furnished B. G.
Shorey witli his educational training, and until he
was eighteen years of age he worked on his father's
farm. At that time he decided to strike out for
himself, to see something of the world and to make
his own opportunities, and accordingly left the pa-
rental roof. On March 17, 1882, he arrived over
the narrow-gauge railroad at White Sulphur
Springs, Montana, the last part of the journey,
from Ogden, being made by stage, via Butte and
Diamond Gulch. From March to June, 1882, he
was employed by Cook & Hussey, following which
he went into the Judith Basin and took up a ranch
at Ross' Fork. This he sold one year later and
went to work for Severance & Son, sheepmen at
Judith Gap, a position which he retained one year.
Next Mr. Shorey entered the service of Mrs. Cor-
son, who was at that time known as the "Sheep
Queen of Montana," and whose ranch was at Hop-
ley's Hole, near the present site of Hollowtown.
He remained with Mrs. Corson until the spring of
1S86, when he went down into Lake Basin and
located a ranch of his own, upon which he spent
the next twenty-one years. It was on this prop-
erty that Mr. Shorey's real abilities were demon-
strated, for from a small beginning he developed
one of the finest properties in the state, a ranch
of 32,000 acres on which it was his custom to run
20,000 sheep and 800 head of cattle. When he sold
this property in 1907 he came to Billings, where
he has since occupied his handsome $25,000 home
at North Thirty-second Street and First Avenue,
a residence erected by him in 1903 and still as good
a home as there is to be found at Billings. Mr.
Shorey is the owner of four large ranches ; one
at Roberts, Montana, a tract of 1,073 acres; a
summer range in the mountains for his cattle, com-
prising 320 acres; a ranch of 1,963 acres at Custer,
on the Big Horn ; and one at Sidney, of 1,128 acres.
In addition to raising cattle Mr. Shorey is exten-
sively^ engaged in growing grain. He is the owner
of two other dwellings at Billings ; the concrete
warehouse at Fifth Avenue and Twenty-seventh
Street, and the coal docks on Twenty-eighth Street,
and also has a large interest in the Babcock Theatre
Building, one of the leading business blocks of
Billings. In 1910 Mr. Shorey was made president
of the Billings State Bank,' a position which he
held until 1913, when he resigned, and his other
connections are numerous and important, includ-
ing a wide range of industries and enterprises.
Ever interested in the welfare of his adopted city,
he is a co-operant factor in many measures for the
public good, in which his name is an indication of
such a movement's worth. In his political belief Mr.
Shorey upholds the principles of the republican party
and exercises his right of franchise accordingly. He
is a member of the Billings Midland Club and
Billings Lodge No. 394, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
On August II, 1889, Mr. Shorey was married at
Billings to Miss Helen Simmons, daughter of A. J.
and Addie (Ray) Simmons, the latter of whom
still survives as a resident .of Waldo, Maine. Mr.
Simmons who was for many years a farmer and
blacksmith at Waldo, and a highly esteemed citizen
of that place, is now deceased. He and his wife
HISTORY OF MONTANA
395
were the parents of ten daughters and one son, all
of whom were reared to maturity. Mr. and Mrs.
Shorey have one daughter : Adelaide, who is the
wife of James Edgar. Mr, Edgar, who has recently
been mustered out of the United States service, is
superintending operations on Mr. Shorey's big ranch
at Sidney.
George Bennett L.\dd. Prominent among the
business men of the younger generation at Billings
is found George Bennett Ladd, manager of the grain
elevator of Ladd & Cousins. Mr. Ladd is distinc-
tively a member of the progressive and energetic
element to which the city owes so much for its
present prestige in commercial circles and to which
it confidently looks for its future continued ad-
vancement. During his comparatively short career
he has had the opportunity of gainnig experience
both as a grower of grain and as a dealer therein,
and in his present capacity is in a position to appre-
ciate and recognize the conditions applying to the
cases of both producer and handler.
George B. Ladd was born at Inwood, Iowa, Aug-
ust 20, 1884, a son of George P. and Alary Ellen
(Skewis) Ladd, and a member of a family which,
originating in England, was founded in Massachu-
setts in colonial times. George P. Ladd was born
in Massachusetts in 1851, but as a youth was taken
to Wisconsin, where he was educated and reared,
and where for some years he was a resident of the
Town of Shellsburg. In 1881 he removed to Lyon
County, Iowa, where he engaged in farming and
rose to a high place in the esteem of his fellow-
citizens, who elevated him to the office of county
treasurer, a trust which he was holding at the time
of his death, which occurred at Rock Rapids, Iowa,
April 3, 1914. He was a stanch democrat in his
political allegiance, and an active member and gen-
erous supporter of the Congregational Church, in
which he served as deacon and a member of the
Boara of Directors. He married Mary Ellen Ske-
wis, who was born in 1852, at Shellsburg, Wis-
consin, and survives her husband as a resident of
Rock Rapids, Iowa, and they became the parents
of seven children : Clarence, who is engaged in
the hardware business at Inwood, lovva; Carrie,
who is the wife of C. L. Jones, a practicing attor-
ney at Parker, South Dakota; William Parkhurst,
a prominent grain broker of Billings and member
of the firm of Ladd & Cousins; Allie W., who is
unmarried and makes her home with her mother;
George Bennett (Ben), of this notice; Jennie, who
is the wife of R. S. Towne, an agriculturist of the
locality of Sisters, Oregon ; and Earl, who is an
automobile agent and the proprietor of a garage
at Rock Rapids, Iowa.
George Bennett Ladd was educated in the public
schools of Inwood, Iowa, and after his graduation
from high school took a commercial course in the
Cedar Rapids Business College. Leaving that
preparatoi"y institution in 1905, he was variously
employed at Inwood for two years and then went
to Colorado, where he homesteaded 160 acres four
miles northwest of Merino in Logan County, a
tract of land which he still owns. Mr. Ladd has
always been a firm believer in the value of. real
estate, particularly farming and ranch property,
and has invested a share of his earnings therein,
at the present time being the half-owner of 309
acres of good land on Blue Creek, Yellowstone
County, Montana, the owner of the other half
being his brother William P. Ladd. George B.
Ladd resided on his Colorado homestead for eight
years, but in 1915 turned his attention to the grain
business, in which he had recognized great possi-
bilities. For one year he was located at Huntley,
Montana, from whence he went to Roberts, this
state, and continued in the same line until Septem-
ber 3, 1918, at that time coming to Billings to take
charge as manager of the- Farmers Elevator, which
is leased by Ladd & Cousins. He has continued
to satisfactorily manage this business to the pres-
ent time, and has displayed marked business capac-
ity and a thorough knowledge of the grain busi-
ness in all its ramifications. The elevator, a mod-
ern structure, with a large capacity, is situated at
No. 3325 First Avenue, South.
Mr. Ladd was married in 1910, at Merino, Colo-
rado, to Miss Ida H. Watkins, daughter of James
and Mollie (Clutf) Watkins, of Osceola, Nebraska,
well known and highly esteemed farming people of
that locality. To this union there have come two
children: Lloyd, born June 17, 1911, and Lowell,
born September 17, 1912. Mr. and Mrs. Ladd re-
side at their pleasant home at No. 3939 Second
Avenue, South. Mr. Ladd is a democrat and has a
number of civic and social connections. During
the comparatively short period that he has resided
at Billings he has given his earnest support to all
movements which have promised advancement of
the general welfare.
Walter W. Livingston came to Montana as one
of the pioneer agents for the Northern Pacific Rail-
way. After a few years he left railroading to estab-
lish the pioneer electric light company at Bozeman,
and for a quarter of a century or more had a
responsible place in connection with the public utility
service at Bozeman. He was manager of the Mon-
tana Power Company of Bozeman and was also
secretary of the Pioneer Building & Loan Associa-
tion.
Mr. Livingston was born at Henderson, Ken-
tucky, December 17, 1855, and died at Bozeman,
Montana, November 21, 1919. His paternal ances-
tors came from Scotland and settled in New York.
The grandfather. John Livingston, was born in
York County, Pennsylvania, and went at a very early
day to Wayne County, Ohio, where he cleared up
a tract of land from the woods, spent the rest of
his life as a farmer and reared a family of eleven
children. His wife was a Miss Dinsmore, a native
of York County. Pennsylvania. William Samuel
Livingston, father of Walter W., was born in
Wayne County, Ohio, in 1820. He was reared in
his native state, but when a young man went to
Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, where he married. He
studied for the ministry and for many years was
one of the capable preachers in the Presbyterian
Church. He preached at Chillicothe, Zanesville, Ash-
land, Cleveland and other places in Ohio. His last
years were spent at Sewickley, near Pittsburg, Penn-
sylvania, where he died in 1884. Politically he was
a republican. Rev. Air. Livingston married Julia H.
Brooks, who was born at Williamsport, Pennsyl-
vania, in 1822. She died while visiting at Bozeman
in November, 1889. Walter W. was the oldest of
their children. J. B. was a railroad official and
died in New Jersey. John W. is an accountant
at Butte, Alontana, ' and Frank G. is in a similar
business at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Mildred R.,
the youngest, is the wife of John P. Martin, who
is in the postoffice at Bozeman.
Walter W. Livingston attended public school in
Ohio, and is indebted for much of his early edu-
cation to his scholarly father, who directed his
studies at home. He' also attended an academy
at Pittsburg. Leaving school at the age of seven-
teen he began his railroad career with the Penn-
sylvania Company at Pittsburg. He was messenger
396
HISTORY OF MONTANA
boy for a time under Mr. \\'illiam Thaw, father of
William Thaw, Jr. In time he became an operator
and remained in that capacity with the railroad
until 1875. From 1875 to 1881 he was connected
with one' of the pioneer .lines in the central west,
the Kansas Pacific, as operator and station agent.
He spent part of the year iSSi with the Denver
& Rio Grande in Colorado, and in the latter part
of the same year returned to Pittsburg and re-
sumed his service with the Pennsylvania Company
until 1883.
Mr. Livingston came to Montana in September,
1883. He was accountant for a few months in the
railroad office at Glendive, in December was ap-
pointed as ticket agent and accountant at Living-
ston, in the spring of 1884 was assigned to duty
at Forsyth, and in October of that year was made
station agent at Bozeman. Mr. Livingston in 1S86
became associated with George Wakefield and
Charles S. Hartman in organizing the Bozeman
Electric Light Company. This company built and
equipped the first electric plant in Bozeman, and
Mr. Livingston was one of the men responsible for
the first lighting of streets and homes with electric
power. He continued as manager of the company
until :887, but from that year until 1892 followed
other lines of employment, chiefly in county offices
and the Bozeman postoffice. In 1892 he rejoined the
Bozeman Electric Company as manager and ac-
countant and continued at this post of duty
for over a quarter of a century. Some years ago
the Bozeman Electric Company was taken over by
the Montana Power Company, which has its head-
quarters at Butte.
The Pioneer Building and Loan Association is
another important institution at Bozeman owing
its existence largely to Mr. Livingston, who or-
ganized it in 1889. He became its secretary in 1891
and afterward held that office continuously. It is
the onlv building and loan association in Bozeman,
and has enjoyed a substantial growth through the
years and has' been the means of supplying Bozeman
with approximately 300 homes. The association
has its offices in the Electric Building, at 60 East
^lain Street.
Mr. Livingston was a republican, but only once
was a candidate for office, when in 1889 he ran for
clerk of court. He always supported his party
and its candidates. He served as vestryman of the
Episcopal Church and was a charter member of
Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, was a past exalted ruler, for
five years was trustee of the lodge and held an
honorary life membership in the same. He was also
a member of the Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Livingston owned his home at 329 South
Black .-Vvenue and owned an adjoining dwelling.
October 7, 1884, at St. Paul, Minnesota, he married
Miss B. B. Cooper, daughter of John and Nancy
Cooper, both deceased. Her father was at one
time a contractor and builder at Sewickley, Penn-
sylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Livingston had two chil-
dren : Walter T., who is a graduate of the Montana
State College at Bozeman with the class of 1910,
and is now a civil engineer with the Milwaukee
Railway, living at Miles City, Montana, and Mil-
dred B., also a graduate of Montana State College.
W. K. DwYF.R, for fifteen years connected with
the city schools of Anaconda, most of the time as
superintendent, is one of the most prominent edu-
cators in Montana. He is a man of thorough cul-
ture and scholarship and though trained in the law
he has done little active practice. Education is the
field to which he was naturally inclined, his father
having been a distinguished Irish educator.
Mr. Dwyer was born in County Cork, Ireland,
July 8, 1870. His father, William Dwyer, was born
at Castletown-Bere, County Cork, in 1833, was edu-
cated in Marlboro College at Dublin, and for half
century was principal of the schools at Castletown-
Bere. Several noted men of Montana, including
Judge Lynch and John Harrington, both of Butte,
were among his pupils. He was a liberal in poli-
tics and a member of the Catholic Church. He
died at Castletown-Bere in October, 1917. His
wife was Mary Hooley, who was born at Castle-
town-Bere in 1844 and was educated at Swansea,
Wales. She died in her native town in Ireland in
1908. Of their children, Mary, the oldest, died at
Bandon, Ireland, wife of Timothy Lynch, who is a
revenue officer in the City of Cork and is an uncle
of Judge Lynch of Butte, above noted. John M.
Dwyer, who died at Castletown-Bere, Ireland, at
the age of forty-four, was a physician and surgeon
and at one time was chief physician for the Brit-
ish Government in British Central Africa. Patrick
was a mechanical engineer, came to the United
States in 1880, spent several years in Texas and
New York State, and then returned to Ireland and
died at Castletown-Bere at the age of forty. David
T. is pastor of St. Patrick's Catholic Church at
Denver, Colorado. W. K. Dwyer is the fifth in the
family, and the j'oungest is Vincent, in the shoe
business at Cambridge, Massachusetts.
W. K. Dwyer was educated in the national schools
at Castletown-Bere, attended St. Michael's College
in County Kerry, graduating in 1888, and in 1891
graduated from St. Patrick's College in Tipperary.
The year he completed his work in the latter in-
stitution he came to the United States, and for five
years or more was a student in some of the best
institutions of learning in this country. In 1896
he graduated A. B. and A. M. from St. Mary's
University at Baltimore. After that he lived for
several years in Chicago, where he pursued post-
graduate work in constitutional law, literature, his-
tory and education in the University of Chicago,
and for one year attended the night law school of
Lake Forest University. While attending law school
he put in a regular day of work with the Western
Electric Company at Chicago.
Mr. Dwyer came to Montana in 1902. The first
year he studied law in the office of Peter Breen,
then county attorney at Butte. For one year he
was instructor in the Butte High School and in
1904 came to Anaconda as principal of the Anaconda
High School. Mr. Dwyer was elected superintend-
ent of the city schools of Anaconda in 1905, and his
long service in that position coupled with his many
versatile gifts of mind make him one of the best
known school men of Montana. At Anaconda he
has under his supervision seven schools, a staff
of sixty-five teachers, with a scholarship enrollment
of 1,800. His offices are in the high school building.
Mr. Dwyer for the past four years has been
state director for Montana of the National Edu-
cation Association. He has served eight years as
a member of the State Text Book Commission,
was chairman for 1919 of the State Schoolmasters
Club, and since 1918 has been Montana State Di-
rector of the National Education Association. Mr.
Dwyer is independent in politics, is affiliated with
Anaconda Council No. 882. Knights of Columbus,
with the Anaconda Club and Rotary Club, and has
been closely associated with a number of civic
movements in his home city. He owns a modern
home at 505 Hickory Street.
-^^^??$=;?^u,^,-,-..^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In June, 1908, at Anaconda, Mr. Dwyer married
Miss Alice Malvey, a daughter of P. J. and Mary
(Sullivan) >Ialvey, who reside at Anaconda. Her
father is in the copper refining department of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company. Mr. and Mrs.
Dwyer have two children : William, born April 3,
1909; and Horace, born May 6, 1911.
CH.'UiLES Arthur Lewis. The handling of realty
creates a position of dignity in any live and growing
community, and some of the oldest and most re-
liable firms of Billings and other large Montana
cities are engaged in this line of endeavor. , As
Billings has grown, stretching out its arms to
embrace outlying communities, new operators liave
been attracted, who have contributed materially
to the city's growth and development. In this
class is found Charles Arthur Lewis, who com-
menced his career at Billings in the realty field
in 1917, and who has since not only been successful
in this direction, but also in farming, ranching and
the dairy business.
Mr. Lewis was born in Gage County, Nebraska,
>March 35, 1880, a son of Richard and Anna
(George) Lewis. The family originated in Wales,
its members being lineal descendants of Lord
Wales, a member of the peerage, and in that coun-
try the grandfather of Charles A. Lewis, Edward
Lewis, passed his life as the owner of a large
estate. Richard Lewis was born in 1845 i" Wales,
and was sixteen years of age wlien he left his
native land and immigrated to America, where he
spent four years in a lumber camp in the province
of Ontario, Canada. Following this he came to
the United States and for two years was engaged
in farming near Janesville, Wisconsin, subsequently
becoming a pioneer farmer and stockman on the
frontier of Nebraska, owning a farm in Gage
County. There he passed the remainder of his
career, competing successfully with discouraging
conditions, and eventually won prosperity and the
ownership of a valuable property, where his death
occurred in 1890. Mr. Lewis was a republican and
one of the prominent and influential men of his
party. After serving fifteen years as a member of
the Board of County Supervisors he was sent to the
State Senate, where he gave his constituents, his
county and his state e.xcellent service and estab-
lished a reputation for conscientious discharge of
duty. He was a member of the United Brethren
Church and an active supporter of its movements,
dying firm in its faith. Mr. Lewis married Anna
George, who was born in Wales in 1854, was four
years of age when brought to the LInited States,
and was reared at Janesville, Wisconsin. She sur-
vives her husband and resides at Beatrice, Nebraska.
There were four children in the family: Elizabeth
I., the wife of Perle E. Rhea, of Billings; Charles
Arthur; Lester T.. who has resided at Billings since
1919; and Nettie F., the wife of Albert King, of
Billings, at present with the American E.xpedition-
ary Forces, overseas.
Charles Arthur Lewis received a public school
education at Beatrice, Nebraska, and remained on
his father's farm until he reached the age of
twenty years. At that time he entered upon an in-
dependent career as an agriculturist in Gage County,
and during the next nineteen years contented him-
self with the tilling of the soil of Gage County and
the reaping of his crops. For some time, however,
he had been cognizant of the opportunities offered
the careful, shrewd and capable operator in realty,
particularly in Montana, and in 1917 Mr. Lewis
came to Billings and embarked upon a venture of
his own, in which he has since been definitely suc-
cessful. He maintains offices at No. i Selvidge-
Babcock Building and is doing a thriving business
in handling city properties and ranches, but does
not confine himself to this one line, as his farming
interests are also large, he being the owner of a
valuable ten-acre tract on Orchard Avenue, as well
as of an interest in a ranch on Yellowstone Avenue,
thirty-eight miles north of Billings. Likewise, he
is the owner of the City View Dairy, No. 326 Cus-
ter Avenue, one of the largest enterprises of its
kind in the city, having his cattle on the ranch and
retailing and wholesaling milk, cream and dairy
products at Billings and in the surrounding terri-
tory. At the present time he has a splendid herd
of twenty pure-bred Holstein cattle. Mr. Lewis is
the owner of a modern residence at No. 512 Clark
Avenue. He is a republican, but takes only a good
citizen's interest in public and ptilitical affairs.
Mr. Lewis was married July 11, 1900, to Miss
Lydia Fisher, of Beatrice, Nebraska, daughter of
Fred and Alary (Boward) Fisher, the latter of
whom resides in Gage County, Nebraska, where Mr.
Fisher, formerly an extensive farmer and stock
raiser, died. Mr. and Mrs. Lewis have four chil-
dren: Bernice, born December 18, 1901, residing
with her parents ; Beryl, born March 9, 1903, a
freshman in the Billings High School ; Fordyce, born
January 8, 1906, attending the graded school; and
Harlin, born June 10, 1909, also a graded school
student.
William H. Maloney, who was elected mayor of
Butte in 1916, has had a brilliant career as a lawyer
in Silver Bow County, and his record completely
justifies the expectations of his friends and admirers
in the early stages of his career.
Mr. Maloney was born March 15, 1878, at Cam-
bridge, Massachusetts, near the classic campus of
Harvard University. The parents were Walter J.
and Ellen (Mullen) Maloney, the former a native
of Maine and the latter of New Hampshire. Wil-
liam H. Maloney spent his youth at the home of
his parents in Michigan, attended local schools, and
received his higher education at Joliet College in
Quebec Province. His career is an instance of how
a youthful enthusiasm and purpose may be trans-
lated into mature achievement. As a boy he
dreamed of becoming a lawyer, and while he never
had the means to attend a college of law he never
deviated from his purposes. His first lessons in law
were received from a well known attorney at Nor-
way, Michigan.
Mr. Maloney has been a resident of Butte since
1898. He earned a living working in the mines aiid
at night and in every spare hour was absorbed in
his law books. Later he studied under Judge Don-
Ian and Matthew Comming, and after a successful
test at the bar examinations was admitted in 1905.
During the past fifteen years Mr. Maloney has
earned by his intellectual gifts and concentrated
purpose a high rank in the Butte bar. He has en-
gaged in general practice and has accepted and per-
formed the duties imposed by his profession without
fear or favor.
Mr. Maloney was appointed assistant county at-
torney in January, 1909, and his work in that office
added much to his reputation. Politically he is an
independent democrat, but his election as mayor of
Butte was due to his unflinching stand for honesty
and efficiency in municipal government. Mr. Ma-
loney is a Catholic, affiliated with the Fraternal
Order of Eagles, being a past president of that
order, also with the Catholic Order of Foresters,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Ancient Order of Hibernians and the Loyal Order
of Moose. June 26, 1906, he married Miss Marine
Helen Putnam.
Charles N. Kirby. Among the ranchers of the
BiUings community of Montana who have become
the owners of large landed possessions through the
medium of their own efforts, one to whom special
mention is due as an example of self-made man-
hood is Charles N. Kirby, who with his brother
George B. Kirby carries on extensive operations in
ranching and horse and cattle raising. Mr. Kirby
is a native of Young County, Texas, and was born
March 4, 1880, his parents being John M. and
Rachela (Sails) Kirby.
The Kirby family is of Scotch-Irish descent and
several of its early members settled in Pennsylvania,
in which state John M. Kirby was born in 1835.
He was reared in the Keystone State and in Illinois,
and in the latter was married and passed several
years as a farmer and stockman, but eventually re-
moved to Young County, Texas, in 1875. That was
his home until 1887, when he went to Dayton,
Wyoming, but in the summer of 1888 returned
to Texas and then went to Florida in 1890, and
for three years was interested in the conduct of
an orange grove. He returned to Texas in 1893
and resided for two years, and in 1895 practically
retired from active pursuits and came to Montana
with his son George B., but subsequently took up
his atode at Paola, Kansas, where his death occurred
in 1900. He was a stalwart democrat, an interested
and active member of the Masonic and Odd Fel-
low fraternities, and a faithful member of the
Baptist Church. He married Rachela Sails, who
was born in Illinois and died in Young County,
Texas, in the spring of 1887. and their children were
as follows: Tames A., a retired farmer of Young
County, Texas; George B., associated with his
brother Charles N. in ranching and stockraising;
Ella, the wife of C. G. Carroll, a real estate broker,
of Sheridan, Wyoming; Orpha, deceased, who was
the wife of Wesley Gregg, a Texas farmer ;_ Ira
J., an ex-farmer and deputy sheriflf of Sheridan,
Wyoming; W. B., a merchant of Wellington, Texas,
and formerly postmaster there; Emma, the wife of
J. A. Church, engaged in the storage and ware-
house business at Sheridan, Wyoming, of whi-h
city he was formerly mayor; Dora, the wife of C. B.
Austin, a resident of Sheridan, Wyoming; and
Charles N., of this review.
Charles N. Kirby was educated in the rural schoo's
of Texas and Montana, and as a lad accompanied
his father on his trip to Florida. In 1895 he came
to Montana and located in Custer County, at the
head of the Rosebud, where he engaged in the stock
business. In 1902 he came to Billings, where he
had been preceded by his brother George B. two
years before, and since that time they have been
engaged in extensive operations as handlers of live-
stock. Their ranch is situated on the Yellowstone
River, four miles northeast of Huntley, where they
have 600 acres of irrigated land, and raise hav and
grain, although their home is at No. 504 North
Broadway. Billings. Mr. Kirby is an independent
democrat in politics, and an ex-member of the Higli-
landers. He i% unmarried.
George B. Kirby first came to Montana in 1887
and settled at the head of the Rosebud, where he
purchased a relinquishment of 160 acres, to which
from time to time there have been added purchases
of land until the ranch now comprises 600 acres.
as above noted. The brothers have bought and sold
ranches continuously, and George B. is now the
manager of the ranch, where he has full charge
of the operations, and is also a partner in some of
the brands of cattle. The brothers removed from
the Rosebud with their cattle to the Missouri River
in 1901, locating in Dawson County, near the mouth
of the Musselshell, but after six years returned to
the Yellowstone, where they are located today.
George B. Kirby kept the ranch here, but in the
spring of 1916 the brothers removed their cattle
to the Crow Reservation, where they keep their
cattle, and also engage extensively in the raising
of stock horses. George B. Kirby is a democrat
in his political faith.
The hrst marriage of George B. Kirby occurred
when he was united with Ada Kelley, a native of
Texas, who died at Billings in 1910, leaving two
children : Neva, unmarried, who is employed in
the Montana National Bank at Billings; and Lil-
lian, the wife of J. C. Whitham, of Miles City,
Montana, a superintendent in the United States For-
estry Service. In 1919 Mr. Kirby was again mar-
ried.
J. P. Stacg is one of the men to whose energy and
foresight is due a great deal of the growth in com-
mercial importance of the business houses of Ana-
conda. By setting the example of carrying a stock
as complete as could be found anywhere, and plac-
ing it before the public at reasonable prices under a
very satisfactory service, he has taught the citizens
of the city that it is not necessary to go elsewhere
to trade, and awakened in them a pride in their
commercial and industrial enterprises and a desire
to patronize them to the exclusion of outside com-
petition. Air. Stagg has confined his efforts to
building up a fine trade in hardware and house fur-
nishings, and his customers are gathered from
the city, county and outlying districts.
The birth of J. P. Stagg took place in Jennings
County, Indiana, October 28, 1862. His grand-
father, Thomas Stagg, born in New York State,
founded the family in Indiana, where for some years
he was a prosperous farmer of Jennings County.
His death occurred prior to the birth of Thomas
Stagg. Thomas Stagg was a son of Michael Stagg,
a 'captain of a company of soldiers during the
American Revolution, for even then the Staggs
had long been residents of the colonies, having come
here from Holland.
One of the sons of Thomas Stagg was Thomas
Stagg, father of J. P. Stagg, and his birth occurred
in Jennings County, Indiana, in 1837, and there he
died in 1901. His entire life was spent in that com-
munity, and his efforts directed in the lines of agri-
cultural production. A man of earnest purpose, he
found expression for his political views in the
principles of the republican party, which he ardently
supported, and his religious faith was embodied in
the tenets of the Methodist Episcopal Church, of
which he was a conscientious member. The Sunday
School connected with the church received a vigor-
ous support from him and for years he acted as
its superintendent. His wife, who bore the maiden
name of Martha Snell, was born in Jennings
County, Indiana, in 1839, and died in Ripley County,
Indiana, in 1917, surviving him for many years.
Their children were as follows: Mary, who lives
on the farm of her late husband, David Tabolt,
in Ripley County, Indiana ; J. P., whose name heads
this review ; and Delia, who married Ben Brande-
weidc, a farmer of Jennings County, Indiana.
J. P. Stagg attended the rural schools of Jennings *
County, and was reared on his father's farm, learn-
ing^ from that excellent man habits of industry and
thrift, and the principles of uprightness and hon-
orable living. He remained at home until he at-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
399
taiued his majority, during the last three years
being employed during the winter months in teach-
ing school in his home county. Going to Vinton,
Iowa, he spent a winter in school teaching, and then
in the spring of 1S84 came to the Deerlodge Valley
near Anaconda, where for four years he put to prac-
tical use the lessons in farming he had learned dur-
ing his minority. Feeling that he was better fitted
for commercial life, Mr. Stagg then came to Ana-
conda and for five years was in the employ of the
Montana Lumber and Produce Company, in the
meanwhile keeping his eyes open and watching for a
favorable opportunity. This he found when he re-
alized the lack of proper facilities for giving the
people of tlie city and vicinity a choice in hardware
and house furnishings, and so he began in a small
way to carry out his ideas in this respect. That '
he was right in thinking the demand existed is
proven by the fact that his business has expanded
to large proportions, and his liouse is the leading
one of its kind in this part of the state. Mr. Stagg
owns the large store building at No. ,^19 East Park
Avenue which he occupies, with a floor space of
SO by 140 feet facing East Park Avenue, and 75 by
140 feet facing East Third Street. He has also
floor space to the extent of 100 by 140 feet in the
second story, and a warehouse 150 by no feet,
two stories in height, along the tracks of the Butte,
Anaconda & Pacific Railroad. He owns a modern
residence at the corner of Hickory and Sixth streets,
formerly owned by Marcus Daly, which is one of the
best and most comfortable homes in the citv.
Mr. Stagg is a republican. He belongs to Acacia
Lodge No. 33, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons;
Anaconda Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; Montana
Commandery, Knights Templar ; Bagdad Temple,
Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine, of Butte, Montana; Colfax Lodge, No.
20, Independent Order of Odd Fellows; and
Anaconda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent Protec-
tive Order of Elks. Socially he belongs to the
Rotary Club, of which he is treasurer, and to the
Anaconda Club, the Anaconda Country Club and
to the Silver Bow Club of Butte.
In 1892 Mr. Stagg was married at Anaconda to
Miss Mary E. MacPherson. born at Cornwall, On-
tario, Canada, in 1865, died January 19, 1919, at
Anaconda. Mr. and Mrs. Stagg had two children,
namely: Ira J., who was graduated in 1919 from the
University of Southern California at Los Angeles,
California, with the degrees of Bachelor of Law
and Bachelor of Art, is now at home ; and John
A., who is now attending the University of South-
ern California.
George Henry Daniel. The chief train dis-
patcher of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railroad
at Anaconda, George Henry Daniel, is one of the
alert, experienced railroad men this organization
has secured for the places of responsibility of its
system, and he fully justifies the advancement he
has secured in his handling of his everyday prob-
lems. He was born at Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin,
February 17, 1872, a son of Henry Daniel, who was
born in Hesse-Darmstadt. Germany, in 1840, died
at Carroll. Iowa, in 1882. In 1859 he came to the
United States, and spent some time in West Vir-
ginia, where he was in the employ of a brewing
company, leaving that state for Wisconsin, and es-
tablishing himself in a brewing business at Fort
Atkinson, This he operated until 1873, when he
went to Jefferson in the same state, and founded
a brewery that was in operation until closed under
the governmental war prohibition act in 1919. Leav-
Vol. n— 26
ing Jefferson in 1876, Mr. Daniel went to Tama
City, Iowa, and for two years was engaged in
brewing, and then finally located at Carroll, Iowa,
where he built and conducted a brewery until his
death. He was a democrat and a Catholic, and
lived up to his political and religious faith in a
consistent manner. His wife, who bore the maiden
name of Margaret Lang, was born in Hesse-Darm-
stadt, Germany, January 2, 1837. She survives him
and lives at Carroll, Iowa. Their children were as
follows: .Andrew, who died in infancy; Marie, who
also died in infancy; Emanuel W., who is a farmer
residing at Carroll, Iowa; George Henry, who vvas
the fourth in order of birth ; Regina, who married
John H. Lux, a farmer of Carroll, Iowa; and
Joseph A., who is an operator for the Western
Union Telegraph Company, lives at Oklahoma City,
Oklahoma.
George Henry Daniel's attendance at the public
schools of Carroll was terminated when he was
ten years of age by his father's death, and he
began working as a newsboy on the Chicago &
Northwestern Railroad and between runs was an
apprentice to the jeweler's trade, continuing in this
way for three years. He then entered a clothing
store at Carroll and spent eight months in its
employ, but finding that he preferred railroad work
he returned to the Chicago & Northwestern Rail-
road, and beginning as engine wiper rose steadily
until he was made fireman and later locomotive
engineer. Very ambitious, he utilized his spare
moments in learning telegraphy, and so was able
to secure a position as telegraph operator with
the road, holding positions as such in Iowa and Ne-
braska until 1891. In that year he took a position
as telegrapher, agent and train dispatcher with the
Northern Pacific Railroad, and was sent to various
stations in Minnesota, remaining with it until Sep-
tember I, 1898. He then formed connections with
his present road, and coming to Anaconda entered
the superintendent's office as a clerk, from which
position he has risen to his present position through
those of acting chief clerk and dispatcher, reaching
it in 1903. His offices are in the general office build-
ing of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railroad on
West Commercial .Avenue. Anaconda. Mr. Daniel
is a member of the Roman Catholic Church. He
belongs to Anaconda Council No, 882, Knights of
Columtus, of which he is a fourth degree knight;
to Staples Camp, Modern Woodmen of America,
of Staples, Minnesota: and to the Train Dispatchers
.Association. The modern residence at No._520 Elm
Street, Anaconda, occupied by the Daniels is owned
by Mr. Daniel, and he also owns a ranch in Lake
County, Oregon.
On January 23, 1898, Mr, Daniel was married
at Carroll, Iowa, to Miss Mary Schiltz, a daughter
of Peter and Margaret (Hess) Schiltz, the former
of whom was a contractor and builder of Carroll,
where he died in 1915. The latter survives her
husband and continues to reside at Carroll. Mr.
and Mrs. Daniel have the following children:
George H., Jr., who was born March 28, 1901, is
studying electrical engineering; Jfargaret, who was
born in October. 1904. is attending the parochial
school ; and Marie, who was born on June 21, 1906,
is also attending the parochial school.
Few boys of today could start out at the tender
age of ten years and become self-supporting, and
without any outside assistance rise steadily to posi-
tions of importance, and yet this is just what Mr.
Daniel has done and takes no special credit in what
he hag accomplished. Step by step he advanced,
always giving to each duty a conscientious atten-
400
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tion, but never neglecting any chance to improve
himself or increase his store of practical knowledge,
and he is today one of the best examples of self-
made men to be found in this part of Montana.
John Joseph Kopp is proprietor of the largest
wholesale meat business in Gallatin County. He is
a native Montanan, has spent all his life in the
Northwest, and some years ago he took over a
business which had been built up by his father and
uncle, and has shown a rare degree of enterprise
and ability in making it what it is today.
He was born at Bozeman July i6, 1881. His
father was John Kopp and his grandfather Joseph
Kopp, both natives of Switzerland. Joseph Kopp
spent his active career in Switzerland as a farmer
and in 1S79 came to Bozeman, Montana, and lived
retired until his death in that city at the age of
ninety years. John Kopp, who is now living in
Portland, Oregon, was born in Switzerland in 1853.
He arrived at Bozeman in 1877, was one of the
pioneers of the city, and for a time was employed
by old Dan Maxey, the pioneer butcher of Galla-
tin County. In 1879 he and his brother Joseph
became partners in a business of their own, which
they first established in a small log building on
Main Street. After a few years John Kopp left
Bozeman and went to Seattle, Washington, where
he was a brewer and subsequently continued {!ie
same business at Astoria, Oregon, for eighteen
years. In 1903 he returned to Bozeman and took
over his father's meat business and was a factor
in the upbuilding of the establishment, now the
leading institution of its kind in Southern Alon-
tana. After a few years John Kopp retired from
his Bozeman business, and has since lived at Port-
land. He is a democrat. For twelve years he was
a police commissioner at Astoria and also a member
of the City Council. He and his family are mem-
bers of the Catholic Church. John Kopp married
Anna Boentgen, who was born in Germany in 1855.
A brief record of their children is as follows:
Julia, wife of C. T. Crosby, a candv manufacturer
at Portland, Oregon; John Joseph; Elizabeth, wife
of William Haley, now a rancher, but until June
I, 1919, associated in the meat business of Kopp
Company at Bozeman ; Anna, wife of Charles V.
Brown, owner of a large shoe business at Astoria,
Oregon; Lena, wife of Charles A. .A.lward, a drug-
gist at Seaside. Oregon, formerly a resident of
Bozeman, where his father was a pioneer in the drug
business; Hattie, living with her parents, widow of
Paul C. Boord. who was in the grocery business
m Indiana and died at Portland', Oregon.
John Joseph Kopp received his earlv education in
the grammar and high schools of .\storia, Oregon
and graduated from a business college at Portland
m 1899. He also attended the Portland Academy
one year. He worked in the office of his father
at Astoria and in 1903 came to Bozeman and from
the first took an active part in the meat business.
He took over the interests of his uncle, and in fif-
teen years has greatly extended and increased the
busmess. It is now both wholesale and retail.
He is sole proprietor of the wholesale establish-
ment, while in the retail department he has Ray
Purdy as a partner.
Mr. Kopp is a democrat, a member of the Catholic
Church, is affiliated with Bozeman Council No.
1413, Knights of Columbus, Bridger Camp No 6^
Woodmen of the World, Gallatin Camp No. 5245]
Modern Woodmen of America, and Bozeman Lodge
No. 463 of the Elks. Mr. Kopp and familv reside
at 318 South Tracy Avenue. He married "in Mis-
souri in 1904 Miss Leila Shotwell, daughter of A.
D. and Lilly (Shepperd) Shotwell. Her parents
are residents of Fort Worth, Texas, where her
father is a train dispatcher. Mrs. Kopp is a gradu-
ate of the high school at Somerset, Kentucky. They
have three children : John, born December 22,
1908; Charles Baxter, born in October, 191 1; and
Leila, born January 12, 1918.
John L. Templeman has been a Butte lawyer
in successful practice for twenty years. Much of his
work has been in mining and corporation law, and
his services have been called upon to solve the very
complicated problems in property and business ad-
ministration.
. Mr. Templeman was born near Axminster, Devon-
shire, England, March 11, 1872, son of Robert J.
and Mary A. (Little) Templeman. His father was
a farmer and stock raiser in Devonshire and died
in 1881, at the age of forty-one.
John L. Templeman was nine years of age when
his father died. Up to that time he had attended
school several j'ears, and at the age of ten he ac-
companied his mother and the other children to
-America. They lived in Jasper County, Iowa, but
his mother died at Parsons. Kansas, in 1907. The
other five children were Robert, Charles, Joseph,
Henry and Kate.
John L. Templeman attended the district schools
of Iowa, graduated from the New Sharon High
School in 1893, and had a very liberal education as
the foundation for his professional career. He
graduated from Iowa College in 1897, and in 1899
received his LL. B. degree from the University of
Virginia Law School.
Mr. Templeman was admitted to practice in the
Supreme Court soon after he came to Butte in
1900, and was associated with the law firm of
Roote & Clark until 1903. The following two years
he held the office of city attorney. The next year
he was again in practice with Roote & Clark, and
then became one of the legal advisers of Senator Wil-
liam A. Clark. Mr. Templeman formed a partner
ship with Sydney Sanner. a sketch of whom apnears
he was appointed chief counsel for the Clark in-
terests in Montana. In 1919 he formed a partner-
ship with Sydney Tanner, a sketch of whom appears
on other pages of this work. Judge Sanner is an
ex-justice of the Supreme Court of Montana. The
firm name is Templeman & Sanner.
For a number of years Mr. Templeman has been
a prominent worker in the ranks of the democratic
party. He is a member of the Montana Bar Asso-
ciation, the Silver Bow and University clubs at
Butte. In June, 1902, he married at Butte, Montana,
Irene Isabelle LeBeau. They have one son, Percy
LeBeau.
Ernest Joseph Parkin. For more than fifteen
years Ernest Joseph Parkin has given his able and
scholarly services to the Gallatin County High
School at Bozeman, first as an instructor and now
for a number of years as principal and active ad-
ministrative head of that institution.
Mr. Parkin is a scholar and educator of univer-
sity training, and while education has constituted
his life work he has also acquired some valuable
property interests in Montana, including some fer-
tile and productive agricultural land.
He was born at Pine Island. Minnesota, December
26, 1873. His people were among the pioneers of
that section of Minnesota. He is of English an-
cestry. His grandfather. George Parkin, was born
in England in 1817, and in 1848 brought his family
to the United States. He lived three years at New
i
HISTORY OF MONTANA
401
Orleans, six years in St. Louis, and then removed
to Green County, Wisconsin, and some years later
joined a pioneer colony in Minnesota and took up
a tract of government land at Pine Island. That was
the last stage of his migrations and experiences,
and in the midst of plenty and prosperity he died
at Pine Island. He was a democrat after becoming
an American citizen. George Parkin married Ann
Garlic, a native of England, who died at Pine
Island at the age of seventy-two.
Thomas Parkin, father of the Bozeman educator,
shared in common with many of the experiences
of his father. He was born in Yorkshire, England,
in 1842, and was six years of age when brought
to the United States. He spent part of his boyhood
at New Orleans and St. Louis, and came to man-
hood in Green County, Wisconsin, from which lo-
cality he enlisted in the Thirty-Seventh Wisconsin
Infantry and saw active service as a Union soldier
in many of the battles of the Civil war. He was at
Cold Harbor and Gettysburg, and while in the
trenches at Petersburg before Richmond was
wounded in the head by a shrapnel during a mine
explosion. _ .^fter the war he returned to Wisconsin,
was married in Green County, and shortly after-
wards, with a team of horses, a prairie schooner,
and with a meager equipment of household goods
he emigrated to Pine Island. Minnesota. There
he bought land and was busily engaged in farming
until recently he sold out and is now living retired
at Pine Island. For several years he served as
town supervisor. He is a member of the Grand
-A.rmy of the Republic, a republican in politics, and
belongs to the Baptist Church. Thomas Parkin
married Ann E. Ross, who was born at Ludlow,
Vermont, in 1846. The oldest of their children was
Ada, who died when thirteen years of age. Minnie
is the wife of C. L. Stebbins, a farmer at Lemon,
South Dakota. Edgar and Arthur are associated in
the dairy business and as dealers in cheese at Pine
Island and do business on a large scale there.
Ernest Joseph Parkin is the fifth in the family.
Lois is the wife of W. H. Marsh, a dealer in farm
implements at Pine Island. Wilbur is a wholesale
ice cream manufacturer at Rochester. Minnesota.
Thomas is proprietor of a confectionery business
at Rochester, while Guy is a chemist and is em-
ployed in his profession at St, Paul.
Ernest Joseph Parkin graduated from the high
school at Pine Island. Minnesota, in 1898. He com-
pleted his sophomore year in Carlton College at
Northfield, Minnesota, and from there entered the
University of Minnesota at Minneapolis, graduating
with his A. B. degree in 1902. For one year he
taught mathematics and science at Windom. Min-
nesota, and the following summer carried on studies
and was instructor of mathematics in the summer
school of the University of Minnesota. Mr. Parkin
has been at Bozeman since the fall of 1903, and the
first four years he was teacher of physics in the
Gallatm County High School, and since then has
been principal. He has under his supervision a staff
of twenty-seven teachers, and 470 scholars are en-
rolled in the County High School.
Mr. Parkin has a home of most substantial com-
forts, a new modern residence at 522 South Sixth
Avenue. As a practical farmer his interests center
in a ranch of 640 acres twenty miles west of Boze-
man. He is a member of the State Teachers' Asso-
ciation and the Inland Empire Teachers' Associa-
tion, is a member of the board of trustees of the
Baptist Church of Bozeman and a deacon, is an
independent republican in political affiliations, and
is a past master of Gallatin Lodge No. 6, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, serving two years as
master, is past high priest of Zoma Chapter No.
12. Royal Arch Masons, and for one year was
eminent commander of St. John's Commandery No.
12. Knights Templar.
In 190;. at Bozeman, he married Miss Alice M.
De Boer, a daughter of David and Switska (Postu-
mus) De Boer. Her parents were residents of
Rodney, Michigan, where her father, a retired
farmer, died in 1918, and where her mother is
still living. Mrs. Parkin is a graduate of Ferris
Institute at Grand Rapids, Michigan. To their mar-
riage have been born two children ; Mila, born Octo-
ber 12, 1906, and Max, born December 16, 1910.
W. L. Collins. Some men seem born to be
leaders, and not only command others in a business
way, but are capable of reaching and holding high
positions in politics. W. L. Collins is freight ticket
agent of the Butte.' Anaconda & Pacific Railroad
at Anaconda and also commissioner of Deerlodge
County, and is equally proficient in both. He was
born at Memphis. Tennessee, March 15. 1874. a
son of Jeremiah Collins. The birth of Jeremiah
Collins took place in County Cork. Ireland, in 1842,
and his death at Puyallup. Washington, in Febru-
ary, 1919. When he was still fi boy his parents
immigrated to the L'nited States and located in
New Hampshire, where he was reared, but he left
Keene. that state, for Memphis, Tennessee, in young
manhood, prior to the outbreak of the war between
the North and South. In 1861 he enlisted for
service in that conflict as a member of Company
G. Merrill's Cavalry from Missouri and remained
for 214 years, when he was honorably discharged.
Returning to Memphis, he was there married, and
remained there working at his trade as a machin-
ist until 1882. In that year he went to Eldridge,
North Dakota, and was engaged in farming until
his retirement, at which time he moved to Puyallup,
Washington. In politics he was a republican, while
in religious faith he was a Roman Catholic. His
widow, who bore the maiden name of Mary Mad-
den, survives him and resides at Puyallup, Wash-
ington. She was born at Nashville. Tennessee, in
1852. Jeremiah Collins and his wife reared ten chil-
dren, seven sons and three daughters.
W. L. Collins attended the public schools of Eld-
ridge and other points in North Dakota, and was
on his father's farm until he was seventeen years
old. At that time he entered the employ of the
Northern Pacific Railroad and continued with it in
North Dakota until 1895, when he was transferred
to Billings, Montana, being employed by the North-
ern Pacific and Chicago, Burlington & Quincy rail-
roads as joint ticket agent at that point for four
years. In 1899 he came to the Butte, Anaconda
& Pacific Railroad, and was its cashier at the Butte
headquarters for eight years, or until 1907. when
he was made freight and' ticket agent for this same
road at Anaconda, and has so continued ever since.
His offices are in the freight house of his road on
West Commercial Avenue. Anaconda. Mr. Colhns
is a republican, and since coming to Anaconda has
served as a member of the city council for^ two
terms. In 1914 he was elected county commissioner
for a term 'of six years. He is chairman of the
board for Deerlodge County, and is president of
the State Associations of County Commissioners,
being elected to the latter oosition at Missoula m
IQ18 and re-elected at Livingston in January, 1919-
Mr. Collins belongs to Anaconda Lodge No. 259,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks; Ana-
conda Camp No. i,^4. Modern Woodmen of
America, and to the Rotary Club. He owns his
402
HISTORY OF MONTANA
modern residence at No. 614 Locust Street, Ana-
conda, -n, , T J
In 1896 Mr. Collins was married at Red Lodge,
Montana, to Miss Metta Sperry, born at Alden,
Iowa. After being graduated in the high school
course in her native state Mrs. Collms attended the
Jamestown College at Jamestown, North Dakota,
and is a highly cultivated and charming lady. Mr.
and Mrs. Collins have one child, Fay, who was born
December 26, 1899, and is attendmg the Montana
Universit\' at Missoula, after having been gradu-
ated from the Anaconda High School. Mr. Collms
has risen to his present position entirely through
his own industry and ability, no outside influence
having been e.xerted in his behalf, and therefore
all the more credit is due him. It is not difficult
for a man to obtain promotion when money and
powerful friends are backing him, but when he
succeeds without these aids it means that he pos-
sesses more than average capability and willingness
to work, and is therefore more valuable to his
company and his community. As a public man
Mr. Collins measures up equally strong, and there
is no doubt but that further political honors await
him in the future, for he has proven his worth in
the offices to which he has already been elected,
and his constituents are liable to want him to rep-
resent them in still higher bodies.
Bayard Skiff Morrow, superintendent of the
concentration department of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, is one of the many young men
who are putting into their work not only care-
fully trained knowledge, but also the enthusiasm
of youth and its vigor and mental strength. He
was' born at Challis, Idaho, October 21, 1881, a
son of James B. Morrow, born at East Aurora,
New York, in 1841. died at Boise, Idaho, in 1909.
Growing up in his native place, he enlisted for serv-
ice during the Civil war in 1861 as a member of
the Seventy-second New York Volunteer Infantry.
and was mustered out at the close of the war as a
first lieutenant of the Sixty-fifth New York Volun-
teer Infantry, to which he had been transferred.
Only a lad of nineteen at the time of his enlist-
ment, he soon developed into a seasoned soldier,
and was with General Grant's command in the
campaign in and around Richmond. He had the
misfortune to be captured in a raid on a railroad
in Virginia and sent to Libby Prison, and after
six months of confinement was exchanged. After
his discharge he crossed the plains from New York
to Salt Lake City, Utah, and then came into Mon-
tana, and was engaged in placer mining during
1867 on the present site of Helena. After a short
time he left for another placer mine near Salmon
City, Idaho, and a few years later became a cattle-
man in that vicinity. He continued to operate
as a cattleman and rancher until t8o8. when he
retired and moved to Boise City, Idaho, although
he continued to hold his ranjch. ^[r. Morrow was
one of the pioneers of that part of Idaho, and
Challis is near the old site of his large ranching
property, where he was so profitably engaged for
so many years.
James B. Morrow was married to Vira Skiff,
born at Hume. New York, in 1853, who survives
him and makes her home at Boise. Idaho, Their
children were as follows : Bayard Skiff, whose
name heads this review; Beryl, who married George
Huebner, an attorney-at-law, lives at Emmett.
Idaho : Hazel M., who is unmarried and lives with
her mother ; and McKenn F.. who is an attorney-
at-law and resides at Boise. Idaho. James B. Mor-
row was a democrat, but aside from casting his
vote for the candidates of his party took no part
in politics. Well known as a Mason, he was con-
nected with the local lodge in his vicinity.
Bayard Skiff Morrow was reared on his father's
ranch and attended the schools of Custer and Lemhi
counties in Idaho, and was graduated from a high
school of Boise, Idaho, in 1902, following which he
took the regular course at the University of Idaho
at Moscow, Idaho, from which he was graduated
in 1906, with the degrees of Bachelor of Science in
Mining Engineering. Immediately following his
graduation he went to Wallace, Idaho, and for six
months worked in the mines there to secure a prac-
tical experience. He then was made assistant as-
sayer in the company's assay office, and held that
position for six months. Leaving that company,
he became assayer and chemist for the Hecla Min-
ing Company at Wallace, Idaho, and remained there
for six years. In 1913 he came to Anaconda, and
beginning in the testing department of the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company has risen to his
present position through those of foreman of ex-
perimental flotation, foreman of the flotation and
the concentrator, on the installation of the process,
superintendent of the grinding and flotation de-
partment, and superintendent of the copper concen-
tration. His offices are in the general office build-
ing of the Washoe Reduction Works, two rniles
east of Anaconda. Mr. Morrow is a republican.
He belongs to the Anaconda Club. Anaconda Coun-
try Club, and the American Institute of Mining
Engineers. In addition to his other interests Mr
Morrow is a stockholder in the Hecla Mining
Company, the Western Union Life Insurance Com-
pany of Spokane, Washington, and in the Idanha
Hotel of Boise, Idaho, the latter being a property
inherited by his father's heirs, as well as his resi-
dence at No. 610 Main Street, Anaconda.
In 1909 Mr. Morrow was married at Kooskia.
Idaho, to Miss Jessie Rowton, a daughter of J. G.
and Emma (Clark) Rowton, Mrs. Rowton is de-
ceased, but Mr. Rowton still lives at Kooskia. be-
ing a retired farmer. Mrs. Morrow is a graduate
of the University of Idaho, with the degree of
Bachelor of Science. Mr. and Mrs. Morrow have
the following children: Marguerite M., who was
born April 2, 1912; and James B„ who was born
March 16, 1917.
The Morrow family is an old one in New York
State, having been founded there during colonial
times by representatives of it who came there from
the north of Ireland and were Scotch-Irish. The
grandfather. Henrv Morrow, was born in the Em-
pire State, and died at East Aurora before his
grandson B. S. Morrow was born. By trade he
was a cabinetmaker and was very well known at
East Aurora, where he spent the greater part of
his life. His wife was a McKeen, and she also died
at East Aurora.
On the maternal side of the house B. S. Morrow
also comes of an old family, Stephen Skiff found-
ing it in Connecticut, going there from Wales, and
served in the American Revolution. Later a de-
cendant blazed his way through the dense forests
from Oneida County. New York, to .Mle.ghany
County in the same state. J, B. Skiff, the maternal
grandfather of B, S, Morrow, was born near Hume.
New York, in 1817. and died there in 1895, having
spent his entire life in and about Hume, where
he was engaged in farming. He married Lydia
Fitch, who was born in New York State, and died
at Hume, New York, in 1888. The children born
Po J.B. Skiff and his wife were as follows: Mrs.
Morrow, mother of B. S. Morrow ; Lucina, who
married H. H. Cochran, a retired ranchman, lives
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Emmett, Idaho ; Addie, who married E. C.
Thomas, who is conducting the old homestead, lives
at Hume, New York; Harvey J., of whom there is
no definite record; John AI. and Stephen, killed
in action during the Civil war; Chester A., who
died at Hume, New York, in 1897; and Milton,
who died at Hume, New York, at the age of seven-
teen. Mrs. James B. Morrow is a member of Boise
Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, and
has served as state historian of her chapter.
Frank M. Gray has a secure place in the legal
profession of Montana. He is a native of Boze-
man and is enjoying a successful practice as a lawyer
in the same community where he grew up.
He was born in Bozeman, November 29, 1S89.
His father was the late John Gray, a Montana
pioneer. John Gray was born in Limerick, Ire-
land, in 1846, son of John Richardson Gray, who
spent his life in Limerick, was a member of the
landed class, and had a tenant lease under the
Crown and was well-to-do. John Gray though
reared in a home of substantial comfort chose a
life of independence and adventure in extreme early
boyhood. He went around the world from Cork,
Ireland, as a first cabin boy on an English man-of-
war. Much of his time while on tlic war vessel
was spent patroling the waters of Algeria. He
next joined a whaling expedition to the North Seas.
He was only fifteen years of age, but had seen
many ports of the world when he left his vessel
at San Francisco, California. Not long afterward
he joined an overland train engaged in a hunting
expedition to the wilds of Montana. He teached
the Gallatin Valley in 1S63 and for several years
was employed by freighters and stockmen, rode
the range and in 1872 bought a ranch on Reese
Creek in Gallatin County. In the "fall of 18S9 he
left his ranch and moved to Bozeman, and after
that conducted an extensive business as a brokers'
exchange, dealing in mining and real estate mort-
gages, and handling many interests with uniform
success. He owned a farm of 520 acres on Reese
Creek, three dwelling houses in Bozeman, and an
examination of his estate at the time of his death
also disclosed possession of various mining prop-
erties and real- estate mortgages. His success in
business was matched by his splendid public spirit
and an influence freely extended in behalf of the
welfare of his home city. He was a leader in the
fight for the location of the state capital at Boze-
man. Politically he was a democrat, was a member
of Gallatin Lodge No. 6, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, a member of Bozeman Cliapter No. 12,
Royal Arch Masons, St. John's Commandery No.
12, Knights Templar, and was a thirty-second de-
gree Mason. He was deeply interested in the Ma-
sonic craft and went abroad to Paris, France, to
take his higher degrees. During the early '90s he
was also a member of a Masonic excursion to China.
John Gray married Martha F. Phipps, who was
born at Kirksville, Missouri, August 22, 1863, and is
still living at Bozeman. They had a family of seven
children: Charles E., a farmer at Kewanee, Illi-
nois ; Mary G., wife of Alvin C. Busby, a mechanic
at Ellensburg, Washington ; John W., an agrono-
mist with the State Agricultural College at Bozeman;
Ellen v., who died at the age of twelve years ;
Frank M. ; Agnes G., wife of Kenneth A. Wilber,
a civil engineer at Glendale, California ; and Robertz
M.. an accountant living at Los Angeles.
Frank M. Gray attended the rural schools of
Gallatin County while a boy on his .father's ranch,
was graduated from the Gallatin County High
School in 1910, spent one year in *he Missouri State
Normal School at Kirksville, his mother's old home,
and another year in the Montana State College at
Bozeman. Mr. Gray has a broad and extensive
knowledge of the United States, acquired during
a period of 2j4 years in which he traveled in prac-
tically every state in the Union and also in Canada
and Mexico. In preparation for the law he was
first in the law office of H. A. Bolinger at Boze-
man, and was admitted to the bar, January 13,
1914. For the past five years he has conducted a
general civil and criminal practice. Three years
of that time he was justice of the peace and is the
present coroner of Gallatin County. Mr. Gray has
an interest in his father's estate. He is a demo-
crat in politics, a member of the official board of
the Christian Church, is affiliated with Gallatin
Lodge No. 6, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
and is a member of the Gallatin County, State and
American Bar associations. He owns a modern
home on the Yellowstone Trail at 109 North Seventh
Avenue.
July 22, 191 5, at Livingston, he married Miss
Shorley M. McCartney, daughter of John H. and
Mary L. (Oldham) McCartney. Her parents re-
side at Cambridge, Ohio, her father being a retired
business man. Mrs. Gray is a graduate of the
Cambridge High School in Ohio, attended a Penn-
sylvania college, and before her marriage was a
teacher in the public schools of Cambridge. Mr.
and Mrs. Gray have one son, Frank M.. Jr., born
October 25, 1917.
John P. Swee, the present mayor of Ronan, has
been a successful lawyer there for the last ten years.
He graduated in law at Minneapolis and for five
years was in law practice in that city before coming
to Montana.
Mr. Swee was born at Pine Island, Minnesota,
June 29, 1877. His father, Arnt J. Swee, was born
near Christiania, Norway, in 1854, and lived in his
native land until he was eighteen years of age. He
was a Norwegian sailor. On coming to this coun-
try he settled as a pioneer in Goodhue Countv, Min-
nesota, and is still living there at Wanamingo. His
efiforts as a farmer have brought him much pros-
perity, he has always been an influential figure in
his community, and has reared a large family, most
of whom are already independent producers and
doing well for themselves. Arnt J. Swee is an
ardent republican, has held township offices, and
is a member of the Lutheran Church. His wife
was Miss Ragnhild Hoseth, who was born in 1855,
also near Christiania, Norway, but they were m.ar-
ried in Goodhue County, Minnesota. They are the
parents of fifteen children: Henry, a farmer in
Goodhue County; John P.; Mattie, wife of Sivert
Hegge, a farmer in Goodhue County; Martin, in
the automobile business at Wanamingo ; Gustav,
who runs his father's farm; Emily, wife of Joseph
Miller, a bookbinder at Chicago; Peter, a farmer
in Goodhue County; Josephine, wife of Andrew
Blakstad, a farmer in Goodhue County; Anna, wife
of Fred Haller, who is an automobile mechanic
at Wanamingo ; Christina, wife of John Ulevig, a
Goodhue County farmer ; Albert, who also followed
agriculture in Goodhue County; Joseph, a farmer
in Goodhue County; Adolph, a linotype operator at
CHntonville, Wisconsin; Rosella, who is unmarried
and lives with her sister Emily at Chicago; and
Sidney, at home.
John P. Swee as a boy lived on his father's farm,
attended country schools, and spent two years in
the Southern Minnesota Normal College at Austin.
He was a teacher in his native state until 1902,
and in that year entered the law department of the
404
HISTORY OF MONTANA
University of Minnesota at Minneapolis, receiving
his LL. B. degree in 1905. By subsequent studies
at the University he was awarded the degree i-L M..
in 1909. In 1905 Mr. Swee began practice at Min-
neapdis with the firm of Gertsen & Lund in the
New York Life Building, but gave up his promising
Work in the Minnesota metropolis and came to
Ronan on November 10, 1910. His time has since
been engaged in a general civil and criminal prac-
tice and he has his offices on Central Avenue. In
the spring of 1919 Mr. Swee formed a partnership
with Lloyd I. Wallace under the firm name Swee &
Wallace Mr. Swee also owns ranch lands in Mis-
soula and Flathead counties to the aggregate o a
thousand acres, and has a modern home on Sterhng
Street in Ronan.
He is an independent republican in politics and
is affiliated with Hell Gate Lodge No. 383 of the
Elks at Missoula, and Ronan Lodge of Odd
Fellows and Ronan Camp Modern Woodmen of
America. ., ,,. ,
In June, 191 1, at Cambridge, Minnesota, he mar-
ried Miss Lvdia Carlson, daughter of Mr and
Mrs Siefert 'Carlson, of Cambridge. , Her father
is a carpenter and builder. Mrs. Swee is an expert
stenographer and at one time was regarded as the
most rapid court stenographer in Minneapolis bhe
is a graduate of the Minneapolis Business College.
Thomas D. Tregloan. One of the best known
and most highly esteemed citizens of Park County
is the veteran ranchman, Thomas D. Tregloan, a
pioneer cattle man who has done his full share in
the development of the southern part of Montana,
which he has honored by his citizenship for a halt
century, having consistently given his support to
all measures for the public good, and his name has
ever been synonymous with honorable dealing in
a'l the relations of life. As he has passed so many
years in this locality he has a wide acquaintance
among its best citizens, many of whom are included
within the circle of his warm personal friends.
Thomas D. Tregloan was born in Grant County.
Wisconsin, on June 13. 1850. His father, James
Tregloan, was born in Cornwall, England, in 1805.
and spent his mature years there as a miner until
1845, when he came to the United States. He first
located in Wisconsin, where also he followed min-
ing, but in 18.S2 he moved to the vicinity of Galena,
Illinois, where he owned and operated a smelter un-
til his death, which occurred in 1855. He was a
republican in his political views and was a Metho-
dist in his religious faith and a local minister. He
married Hannah Goldsworthy, who was also a na-
tive of Cornwall, England, born in 1807, and who
died at Galena. Illinois, in 1853. Their children
were as follows: James, who was a Confederate
soldier during the Civil war, entered the employ
of the Santa Fe Railway and died in Texas shortly
after the close of the war ; William, who served the
four years in the Civil war as a cavalryman, is
a farmer in Carroll County, Iowa; Honor is the
widow of Thomas .Mien, formerly a miner, and
now resides at Hazel Green, Wisconsin; Hannah,
who lives in Denvsr, Colorado, is the widow of
Thomas Farley, late a miner ; John, of Hazel Green,
Wisconsin; Samuel, who is a successful fruit raiser
in the Yakima Valley, Washington; Thomas D.,
whose name forms the caption to this review; and
Margaret is the wife of Matthew Rodda, a farmer
at Hazel Green, Wisconsin.
Thomas D. Tregloan attended the public schools
of Jo Daviess County. Illinois, and remained under
the parental roof until the death of his father. In
the fall of 1869 he came to Gallatin County, Mon-
tana, and became a cowboy, riding the ranges over
a large part of this section of the state. In 1875
he came to what is now Park County, though then
still a part of Gallatin County, and engaged in the
cattle business on his own account. He has been
a hard worker and a good manager and has been
uniformly successful through the years, so that
today he is accounted one of the most successful
ranchmen in Montana. He owns 5,000 acres of
fine ranch land, situated three miles south of Clyde
Park, and here may be found some magnificent
herds of blooded Shorthorn and Hereford cattle
and grade Shire horses. Mr. Tregloan raises enor-
mous quantities of grain and hay and, knowing
every angle of the business, he is able to reap suc-
cess where others might meet nothing but fail-
ure. Until May 4, 1915, he was in partnership with
John Harvey, a period of forty years, and the death
of Mr. Harvey required the property to be equally
divided, one-half being set apart for the Harvey
heirs and he retaining the other half. On May 28,
lyig, Mr. Tregloan suffered a disastrous fire, the
outbuildings, barns and other property being de-
strayed, but the same have been replaced with more
n.oQern and better arranged buildings than those
destroyed.
Mr. Tregloan is a stanch republican in politics
and is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
His fraternal relations are with the Livingston
Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
In 1886, at Hazel Green, Wisconsin, Mr. Treg-
loan was married to Mrs. Esther (Cox) Austin,
the daughter of John and Eliza (Cundy) Cox. To
Mr. and Mrs. Tregloan have been born the follow-
ing children: Jane, who is a graduate of Oberlin
College, at Oberlin, Ohio, married Alay i, 1912,
Clifford Helgejon, a farmer at Clyde Park, Mon-
tana, and they have two children, Esther Elizabeth
and Thomas Clifford; Homer, who is a graduate
in the civil engineering course at Princeton Uni-
versity and is assisting his father on the ranch,
married November 27, 1913, Marguerite Thomas,
and they have one child. Jean Armour.
Ill summing up the chief events in the life of the
subject it has been the aim to avoid fulsome en-
comium; yet there has been a desire to hold up
for consideration tbose facts which have shown the
distinction of a true, useful and honorable life —
a life characterized by perseverance, energy and
well defined purpose. In doing this we are but
reiterating the dictum pronounced upon the man
bv the people who have known him long and well.
He enjovs a wide acquaintance throughout the
southern "part of the state, and it is undoubtedly
true that ia this region no man enjoys to a greater
degree the universal esteem of the people than he.
John R. Haley. It is oftentimes considered , by
those in the habit of superficial thinking that the
history of so-called great men only is worthy of
preservation and that little merit exists among the
masses to call forth the praises of the historian or
the cheers and appreciation of mankind. A greater
mistake was never made. No man is great in all
things and very few are great in many things. It
is not a history of the lucky stroke which benefits
humanity most, but the study and effort which
made the lucky stroke possible. It is the prelimi-
nary work, the method, that serves as a guide for
others. Among the citizens of Southern Montana
who have achieved success along steady lines of
action is John R. Haley, of Wilsall, a man who
richly merits the confidence and esteem which all
freely accord him. for he has taken a deep inter-
est in the development of the locality and always
HISTORY OF MONTANA
405
stands ready to do his full share in the work of
progress.
John R. Haley was born in Sommerset, Pulaski
County, Kentucky, on December 31, 1886, and is a
son of John P. and Elizabeth Jane (Shepard) Haley.
John P. Haley, who is now a resident of Wilsall,
was born at Sommerset in 1845 and was reared
and married there. He engaged in the mercantile
business, which commanded his attention until 1898,
when he came to Montana, locating first at Liv-
ingston, and then coming to his ranch of 640 acres,
located about fourteen miles west of Wilsall. It is
irrigated land and he devotes it to the grazing of
high-grade cattle and horses. He is a member of
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the
Improved Order of Red Men. His wife was born
in 1851, in Sommerset, Kentucky. She bore her
husband the following children ; Thomas, who is
a ranch owner at Boise, Idaho; lola was the wife of
John B. Newf 11, but both are deceased ; Elizabeth
Pearl first married Oliver Morgan, who was a
rancher and a clerk in the recorder's office, and
who died in 1911, and later she became the wife of
William D. Bell, a real estate broker ; William is a
rancher at Bozeman ; and John R.
John R. Haley was educated in the public schools
of Sommerset, Kentucky, and the rural schools of
Gallatin and Park counties, Montana. Until eighteen
years of age he remained with his father, but at
that time, ambitious to be independent, he went
to Bozeman and entered the employ of the Wilson
Company, drygoods and gentlemen's furnishings,
with whom he remained for two years. During the
following three years he worked in Kopp Com-
pany's meat market at Bozeman, followed by a year
of farming. In 191 1 he came to Wilsall and bought
an interest in the livery business of his father-
in-law, James McClartv. The firm, which is known
as McClarty & Haley, keeps a good line of horses
for general purposes, and also conducts a dray
line. They carry a general line of feed and handle
practically the entire coal and ice trade of the
city. They are also agents for the Continental
Oil Company. Mr. Haley is a stockholder in the
United States Building and Loan Association of
Butte. He is a man of sound and conservative
business judgment and has been prospered in a satis-
factory manner since coming to Montana.
In 1912 Mr. Haley was married to Anna May
McClarty, of Wilsall, and they have one child, Mar-
garet Wiileta, born on March 31, 1913.
William A. Davis. The prosperity and substan-
tial welfare of a town or community are in a large
measure due to the enterprise and wise foresight
of its business men. It is progressive, wide-awake
men of affairs that make the real history of a
community, and their influence in shaping and di-
recting its varied interests is difficult to estimate.
William A. Davis, head of the well-known seed
house at Bozeman bearing his name, is one of the
enterprising spirits to whom is due the substantial
growth of the city whose interests he has at heart.
With a mind capable of planning, he combines a
will strong enough to execute his well-formulated
purposes, and his great energy, keen discrimina-
tion and perserverance have resulted in material
success.
The family from which the subject of this re-
view springs is of Welsh origin, his emigrant
ancestor having come from that rock-ribbed little
country to Canada. The subject's grandfather,
William Davis, was born in Ontario, Canada, and
died at Ingersoll, province of Ontario, in 1881. He
followed the vocation of farming in that province
all his life. He married Miss Swazie, also a native
of Ontario, and among their children was Samuel
Davis, father of the immediate subject of this
sketch. He was born in 1832 in Niagara, province
of Ontario, Canada, and died at Detroit, Michi-
gan, in January, 191 1. He was reared to manhood
and married in his native province, but eventually
he came to Buchanan, Michigan, where he followed
his trade, that of a carpenter and builder. Later he
returned to Ontario, Canada, where he followed his
trade until his removal to Detroit, Michigan, in
1882. He spent the remainder of his days there
m that vicinity. He was a stanch republican in
politics.
Samuel Davis married Hannah Baker, who was
born in 1842 in South Bend, Indiana, and now
resides in Bozeman, Montana. To them were born
the following children : The first child, a girl,
died at the age of three years ; Almira is the wife
of James E. Geedy, a farmer at Delhi, Ontario,
Canada ; Nellie became the wife of Dr. David
Stoval, late of Detroit, now deceased, and she now
lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan; Katie is the wife of
Charles E. Scott, a dealer in real estate at Port-
land, Oregon ; Noah died at the age of fourteen
years ; Samuel is a member of the police force of
Detroit, Michigan ; Hall died in infancy ; James H.,
who was in the furniture business at Detroit, Michi-
gan, died at the age of twenty-nine years; William
A. is the next in order of birth ; Florence died at
the age of four years ; and May died at the age of
two years.
William A. Davis, who was born at Ingersoll,
Ontario, Canada, November 3, 1877, received his
education in the public schools of Detroit, Michi-
gan. At the age of seventeen years he entered
Smith's Business College at Detroit, completing the
course there in 1894. Then for a short time he
was employed in an art store, but soon afterwards
accompanied the family on its removal to Birming-
ham, Michigan, where his parents located on a
farm. The subject remained there until he was
twenty-one years of age, when he became employed
by the Jerome B. Rice Seed Company of Detroit,
with whom he was identified for twelve years.
Starting at the very bottom of the ladder, he
worked his way through various promotions until
at length, in February, 191 1, he was sent to Boze-
man as the company's representative, having for
six years been a field representative for the com-
pany. The advent of the Rice Company in Boze-
man was the starting of the seed pea growing indus-
try in Montana. Mr. Davis at all times enjoyed
the fullest measure of confidence on the part of
his employers and in return he gave them his very
best efforts. On December 20, 191 1, he severed
his relations with the Rice Company and during
1912 he was engaged with a ranching enterprise.
In the spring of 1913 he organized the William A.
Davis Seed Company, which w'as incorporated and
of which Mr. Davis was the president. In l\Iarch,
igi6, the company was reorganized, under the title
of The William A. Davis Company, with the fol-
lowing official personnel : President and treasurer,
William A. Davis; vice president, R. J. Hutton,
of Detroit ; secretary, B. C. Parker. The company
has built up a phenomenal business and is now
numbered among the big seed concerns of the
country. They have erected a fine big warehouse
on South Wallace Avenue, designed and arranged
specially for the handling and cleaning of various
seeds, particularly peas. Immense quantities of
their seeds are shipped to Wisconsin and New York
State, while many shipments are made to Eng-
land and France. The active head and manager
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of the company is, as might naturally be supposed,
Mr. Davis, who thoroughly understands every phase
of the seed business and whose business ability and
indefatigable energy has borne fruit m the enviable
position which the company now occupies in local
business circles.
Politically Mr. Davis gives his earnest support
to the republican party and he is a member of the
Presbyterian Church. , , ^ nr
On August 21, 191 1, at Shenandoah, Iowa, Mr.
Davis was married to Bettie I. E. Renstrom, a
native of Iowa and a graduate of the Shenandoah
Normal College. To them have been born two
children, William Arthur, Jr., born August 25,
igi2, and Maribel Elizabeth, born July 4, igiS-
G. B. Long has been a leading rancher in Sweet-
grass County for over ten years, and is now filling
the office of sheriff, to which he was elected as a re-
publican in 1918. Sheriff Long has been on his own
responsibilities so far as making a living was con-
cerned since early boyhood, and has been a farm
hand, farmer, cowboy, independent rancher, and,
while his activities have been satisfactory from a
financial standpoint, he has also won the confidence
and trust of the best people of every community
where he has lived.
He was born on a farm in Macon County, Missouri,
April 13, 1878. His father, George Long, was born
in Germany in 1821, and in order to escape military
conscript he left Germany in 1841 and became a set-
tler in Pennsylvania. He lived at Punxsutawney,
that state, for sixteen years, married there, and \vas
a farmer during the summer seasons and in winter
helped raft logs down the Susquehanna River. In 1870
he moved to Macon County, Missouri. He was a
farmer in that locality until his death in 1885. He was
a very ardent democrat in politics, a member of the
Lutheran Church and of the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. By his first wife he had six children:
Margaret, living at Bellingham, Washington, widow
of Henry Cress, a former rancher; John, who lives
on the old home farm in Macon County; Joseph and
Henry both farmers in Macon Countv, Missouri;
Dave, also identified with the agricultural activities
of Macon County; and Mary, wife of William Gwin-
ner, a farmer in Macon County. For his second
wife George Long married Jane (Baithgell) Sher-
oughs, who was born in Pennsylvania in 183.'^. She
died in Macon County, Missouri, in 1890. By this
marriage there were two children: Emma, wife of
Austin McGee, a farmer in Macon County, Missouri ;
and G. B. Long. Mrs. Long by her first husband had
four daughters : Mary, living at Novinger, Missouri,
widow of John Nesbith. who was a brick moulder :
Caroline, wife of George Lowmaster, a farmer in
Macon County; Sarah, wife of Frank Harrison, a
Macon County farmer; and Florence, deceased wife
of John Long, mentioned above, her step brother.
G. B. Long lived at home with his mother to the
age of twelve years, and then became a farm hand
during all the summer months, and his work paid
for his schooling during the winter season. In
1896. when he was eighteen years, old, he went to
Springfield, Illinois, and worked on a farm there
for twenty-two months. His arrival in Montana
was in March, 1898. In Meagher County he spent
two years on a ranch, acquiring all the arts
of the cowboy, and for another six months he was
employed in roundup work, which requires the great-
est skill on the part of a cowboy. His employer
during that period was Dr. G. H. Wilson. Mr. Long
then bought a livery stable at Two Dot, Montana,
and conducted it five years and nine months.
On October i, 1907, he came to Sweetgrass County,
buying a ranch on Deer Creek. He finally sold the
ranch and in the spring of 1914 disposed of his
cattle. He was active in that locality from 1907 to
1914, and since then has continued his operations as
a cattle man and banker on an irrigated farm of
320 acres located 5J/2 miles north of Big Timber.
Mr. Long also owns a modern home in Big Timber.
Since his election to the office of sheriff he has given
his time to the duties of his official position. He is
a member of Doric Lodge No. 53, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, at Big Timber. Mr. Long married
at old Big Elk in Meagher County, January 19, 1901,
Mary Viola Nelson, daughter of Eli and Lovina
(Shields) Nelson, residents of Butler, Missouri,
where her father is a farmer.
John Henry Heidelman, M. D. Through the
greater part of his long and successful professional
career DoctorHeidelman was a Government physician
and surgeon under the Indian Bureau. In that serv-
ice he first came to Montana about twenty years
ago, and was physician on several Indian reserva-
tions in this state. Doctor Heidelman since retiring
from the Government work has been busied with a
large practice at Ronan.
He was born at Madison, Indiana, September 29,
1866. His father, A. H. Heidelman, was born at
Osnabruk, Germany, in 1829. came to this country
when a young man and lived in Cincinnati, where
he married, afterward removed to Madison, Indiana,
and in 1876 settled at Indianapolis, where he lived
until his death in 1912. He was a millwright and
carpenter and followed his trade for many years.
During the Civil war he was a Union soldier,
serving in the Fortieth Indiana Infantry. He was
all through that struggle, was in the division _ com-
manded by Thomas and Rosecrans, and participated
at Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain, Missionary
Ridge, Knoxviile campaign, and in fact in all the
engagements of his regiment. He came out of the
war almost totally deaf, and for many years drew
a well deserved pension from the Government. He
was a strong democrat in political affiliations and
■a member of the Catholic Church. A. H. Heidel-
man married Elizabeth Ernest Glatt, who was born
at Donnersdorf, Oldenberg, Germany, in 1829, and
died at Indianapolis in 1915. They had nine chil-
dren: Benjamin, formerly a carriagemaker and for
a number of years employed on finishing work on
passenger coaches for the Big Four Railway, now
practically retired and following gardening at In-
dianapolis; Catherine, wife of Frank Osfield, a
butcher at Cincinnati; Josephine, wife of Michael
Rieger, timekeeper in the freight depot at Indianap-
olis; Louise, wife of Joseph Hoffstatter, who for
many years has been in the furniture making busi-
ness, and is a stockholder and overseer in a fac-
tory at Indianapolis ; Elizabeth, of Indianapolis,
widow of Frank Muhlbacher, a tailor and grocer;
Andrew, a blacksmith at Memphis, Tennessee;
Doctor Heidelman ; Joseph, a machinist at Indianap-
olis ; and Mary, also a resident of the Indiana cap-
ital.
_ Doctor Heidelman attended public school at In-
dianapolis, where he lived from the age of ten. He was
a student in high school and also at the college in
Irvington, an Indianapolis suburb, one year. He
entered the Cincinnati College of Medicine and
Surgery and graduated M. D. in 1891. For one
year he practiced at Indianapolis and in 1892 en-
tered the Indian service of the Government. The
first year he was assigned to duty at Pipestone, Min-
nesota, two years at Winnebago and Omaha, Ne-
braska, and three years at White Earth, Minnesota.
^J/^rpyru ^x^^^e^^
^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
407
In December, 1899, in the course of his duties, he
arrived in Montana, and for a year and a half was
surgeon for the large Indian school at Fort Shaw.
The next year was spent in the Bitter Root Valley,
and in January, 1902, he was made surgeon and phy-
sician at Jocko on the Flathead Reservation and later
at Dixon. Doctor Heidelman resigned from the
Indian service in April, 1918, and has since enjoyed
a prosperous practice at Roiian, his offices and home
being at D and Third streets.
For a number of years he served as a member
of the School Board at Jocko. Governor Stewart
appointed him examiner of the local draft board
at Dixon during the World war. He is independent
in politics, is affiliated with Missoula Lodge No. 13,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, is a Royal Arch
Mason and an honorary member of the Modern
Woodmen of America at Missoula. He belongs to
the Alumni Association of the University of Cin-
cinnati Medical School and is a member of the
County, State and American Medical associations.
Doctor Heidelman is also interested in several
banks, being a director and stockholder in the First
National Bank of Ronan, a stockholder in the First
National Bank of Jocko and the Farmers and Mer-
chants Bank at Dixon.
In June, 1898. in the St. Paul Parsonage of the
Episcopal Church, Doctor Heidelman married Miss
Elizabeth Baker, a native of Oak Harbor, Ohio.
Mrs. Heidelman is descended from the Lindsley
and Green families, well known names in the colo-
nial history of New Jersey and Virginia, and is
eligible for membership in the Daughters of the
American Revolution. Mrs. Heidelman is a grad-
uate of Valparaiso University at Valparaiso, In-
diana, and is an artist of much skill and taste. She
painted many portraits while among the Flathead
Indians, and also the wonderful scenery of the Flat-
head Reservation has been a subject for her artistic
brush. She is a trustee of School District No. 28
at Ronan. Doctor and Mrs. Heidelman have one son,
John Paul, born November 13, 1899. He is now a
student of the Ronan High School, and toward the
close of the war was called by the draft and was
drilled at Bozeman College.
Fred M. Brown has occupied the office of county
surveyor of Gallatin County for ten years, is now
serving his sixth consecutive term, and both officially
and otherwise has had a wide and varied experience
in engineering and public work.
He is one of the few men of mature years who
can claim Bozeman as their native city. He was
born there November 20, 1881, when the town was
in its pioneer stage of development. His grand-
father was Joseph Nelson Brown, who was born in
Illinois in 1815, and died at Oregon City, Oregon,
in 1905. For many years he lived in Iowa, where
he followed his trade as a carpenter and builder,
and on retiring from business moved out to Ore-
gon. J. N. Brown, father of the county surveyor,
was born in Illinois in 1850, was reared and married
in Iowa, and in 1870 settled among the pioneers in
the Gallatin Valley of Montana. He pre-empted
160 acres, proved it up and lived on it for many years.
He has been widely known as a brick manufacturer
and for many years has followed the business of
contracting for dirt roads. He has constructed
many miles of highway in Gallatin County and is
still engaged in that business. While he sold his
original homestead he still owns a farm near Man-
hattan. As a resident of Bozeman he has served as
alderman and is a republican in politics. J. N.
Brown married .^^iminta McQuillan, who was born
in Iowa in 1861. Fred M. is the oldest of their six
children. Edith is the wife of John Milloy, and
they live in the Province of Saskatchewan, Canada.
Everett, the youngest, is associated with his father's
business at Bozeman.
Fred M. Brown received his early education in
the public schools of Bozeman, graduating from high
school in 1899, after which he spent two years in
the State Agricultural' College. For one year he
pursued a special course in civil engineering at
the University of California, and then joined his
father for two years. He operated the brick plant
and also did contracting. During another two years
he had some valuable experience as an employe of
the United States Department of the Interior, en-
gaged in reclanration work in Montana. Mr. Brown
was elected county surveyor of Gallatin County in
1908. He entered upon his duties in January, 1909,
and has been five times re-elected. He is an asso-
ciate member of the American Society of Civil En-
gineers. He belongs to the Bozeman Chamber of
Commerce, is a vestryman of the Episcopal Church,
is a past master of Bozeman Lodge No. 18, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and a member of Zoma
Chapter No. 12, Royal Arch Masons, at Bozeman.
Politically he is a republican.
Mr. Brown built his modern home at 822 South
Third Street in 1908, and he also owns a ranch of
720 acres in the Sedan neighborhood. He married
at Billings in October, 1904, Miss Mary Holland,
daughter of John and Matilda Holland. Her mother
is deceased and her father is a retired mining en-
gineer living at Norris, Montana. Mrs. Brown is a
graduate of the State Agricultural College at Boze-
man. They have two children : Fred H., born June
9, 1905, and Esther, born September 19, 1909.
Walter Aitken was born in Streetsville, Ontario,
Canada, on June 17, 1869, being the youngest of nine
children of William and Janet Aitken. Mr. Aitken's
parents were born, reared and married in Scotland,
the father born in Alloa, Clackmannanshire, and the
mother (Janet Macgregor) near Deanston, Perth-
shire. Two children were born to Mr. and Mrs.
Aitken before they left Scotland, and the rest of
the family were Canadian born, the parents emi-
grating to Canada in the early '50s. The father
died in 1878, and the mother died in New York City,
in 1907. Both are buried in Mountain View Ceme-
tery in Gait, Ontario.
Walter Aitken was taken by his parents to Gait
when he was but a few months old. He was edu-
cated in the public schools of that town and remained
there until he was eighteen years of age, when he
went to New York City, and while there was a stu-
dent under private instruction. In 1889 he came to
Montana and has been here ever since, except for
occasional eastern visits. He settled on Shields
River, Park County, and engaged in ranch and live-
stock work and, as soon as old enough, took up a
homestead near where what is now the Town of
Clyde Park. He was a cowboy for eight years, of?
and on, riding the range in the Shields River, Mussel-
shell and Judith Basin countries. In 1895 he for-
sook the range for newspaper work, doing his first
reportorial work on the Livingston Post in the win-
ter of that year. In the spring of the same year he
established a weekly newspaper at Columbus, Mon-
tana, the first newspaper in Stillwater County. In
the fall of the same year he moved the plant to Big
Tirnber and established the Big Timber Express,
which he owned and edited until 1900, when he went
to Kalispell and established the Bee for Marcus
Daly. After the latter's death Mr. Aitken returned
to Livingston and was editor of the Livingston Post
for two years and of the Livingston Enterprise for
HISTORY OF MONTANA
four years. For eight years of his newspaper life
he was secretary treasurer of the Montana Press
Association, and upon his resignation in 1905 was
elected an honorary life member of that organiza-
tion.
While engaged in newspaper work Mr. Aitken
had also been a student of the law, and in 1905
took the bar e.xamination before the Supreme Court
at Helena, was admitted to practice and in 1906
"hung out his shingle" at Belgrade in Gallatin Coun-
t}^ He remained there until 1915. and then moved
to Bozeman, where he has a law office and enjoys
a good practice. He is a past C. C. of the Knights
of Pythias Lodge of Big Timber, a past W. M. of
Belgrade Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, and a member of the Elks and Woodmen of
the World. He is a former president of the Gallatin
County Bar Association and is now vice president
for Gallatin County of the State Bar Association.
He organized the municipal government of Belgrade,
and during the nine years of his residence there was
continuously city clerk and city attorney. In poli-
tics he is a democrat.
On May 22, 1898, Mr. Aitken was married at
Livingston to Miss Florence N. Reese, daughter of
T. G. and Mary A. (Carter) Reese, the latter now
deceased. Mrs. Aitken's father came to Montana
in 1882, spent many years as a rancher and stockman
in the Paradise Valley, south of Livingston, and is
now enjoying a retired life in Los Angeles. Mr. and
Mrs. Aitken have two children : Florence R., born
May 17, 1900, at Big Timber, who is in the second
year of her work in the Montana State College of
Agriculture and Mechanic Arts, and is also assist-
ant librarian of the Bozeman Public Library; Her-
bert Macgregor, horn December 26, 1903, at Living-
ston, is a sophomore in the Gallatin County High
School. The family reside in their own home at 310
South Black Avenue.
M.\RTIN A. Gary. The man who made a success
of life and won the honor and esteem of his fellow
citizens deserves more than passing notice. Such
is the record, briefly stated, of Martin A. Gary, a
well-known citizen of the Town of Livingston, Park
County. By a life of persistent and well applied en-
ergy along honorable lines he has earned the right
to specific mention in a work of the province assigned
to the one in hand, along with other progressive
and public-spirited men who have their influence
felt in their respective communities.
Martin A. Gary, manager of the Livingston branch
of the Gary Hay and Grain Company, was born on
February 29, 1876, in Sanilac County, Michigan. His
father, John Garj-, was born in Ireland in 1841 and
died at Bozeman, Montana, in 1895. At the age of
sixteen years he came to -'America, locating in the
Province of Ontario, Canada, and in 1861, came to
Michigan, where he became a cattle buyer and farmer.
In 1889 he became a pioneer settler at Big Timber,
Montana, where he engaged in cattle and sheep buy-
ing. He followed the same line of business at Boze-
man, to which place he removed in 1894, and there
remained until his death. He was a democrat in poli-
tics and a member of the Catholic Church. His
wife, whose maiden name was Sarah O'Hara, was
also a native of Ireland, born in 1848, and her death
occurred in Bozeman. Montana, in 1909. To this
worthy couple were born three children, namely;
Agnes, the wife of F. C. Downing, who is a travel-
ing representative of the Gary Hay and Grain Com-
pany of Bozeman, Montana; John P., secretary and
manager of the Gary Hay and Grain Company at
Bozeman ; and Martin A.
Martin A. Gary attended the public schools at San-
ilac, Michigan, and Big Timber, Montana, until the
age of fifteen years, when he engaged in such gen-
eral work as he could find to do at Big Timber. In
the meantime he had formulated definite plans, fol-
lowing what he had learned of business opportunities,
and in 1897, he went to Bozeman and with his
brother John P. established the firm of Gary
Brothers, dealers in groceries, hay and grain. Their
interests grew steadily, so that in 1917 the business
was incorporated under the name of the Gary Hay
and Grain Company of Bozeman and Livingston.
The ofiicers of the corporation were as follows : T.
C. Power, of Helena, Montana, president; E. A.
Stiefel, of Belgrade, Montana, vice president; Thom-
as L. Martin, of Helena. Montana, who died October,
1919, secretary; John P. Gary, of Bozeman, treas-
urer and manager; Martin A. Gary, of Livingston,
assistant manager. In 1918 the company bought
out Bill Miles & Brother, of Livingston, hay and
grain dealers, and Martin A. Gary then came to Liv-
ingston and took charge of the company's interests
at this point. The Bill Miles & Brother business was
one of the pioneer concerns of this locality, having
been established more than forty years ago. The
retail warehouses and offices of the Gary company
are situated at No. 327 South Main Street, while the
elevator is situated on West Park Street. The busi-
ness of the Gary company is the largest of its kind
in Park County, and indeed is among the most ex-
tensive of its kind in the State of Montana. In
addition to his business interests above referred to
Mr. Gary and his brother John P. own a ranch, con-
sisting of t86 acres of irrigated land at Clyde Park,
Montana, and which is developing into a very valu-
able piece of property.
In June, 1902, at Bozeman, Montana, Mr. Gary
was married to Evelyn Corcoran, the daughter of
Patrick and Josephine (Duggan) Corcoran, both of
whom are now deceased. Her father was a farmer
at Gallatin Valley, whither he had removed as a
pioneer in 1863. Mrs. Gary possesses a splendid
education, being a graduate of the Gallatin County
High School and Montana State College. To Mr.
and Mrs. Gary have been born six children, namely:
Ronald, born in 1903 ; Martin, born in 1905 ; Jo-
sephine, in 1909; Margaret, in 1911 ; Robert Emmet,
in 1913, and Patrick, in 1917.
Mr. Gary is a firm believer in the principles of
the democratic party, though not a seeker after pub-
lic office. His religious membership is with the
Catholic Church, while fraternally he belongs to the
Knights of Columbus, in which he has taken the
fourth degree. He is a member of the Chamber of
Commerce at Livingston and Bozeman and of the
Rotary Club in tlie city of his residence. He has
been successful in liis business affairs and because of
his unswerving honesty in all his dealings with his
fellow men and his generous and kindly nature he
has won and retains a host of warm personal friends
throughout the locality honored by his citizenship.
John P. G.\ry, who came to Montana as a youth
of fifteen, has found many opportunities to prove his
usefulness and ability. He is one of the active men
in the corporation of the Gary Hay & Grain Com-
pany, which probably handles more hay than any
other firm dealing in that commodity in Montana.
Mr. Gary is manager of the business at Bozeman.
He was born at Minden City. Michigan, January
19, 1874. His father, John Gary, was born in Ire-
land in 1841, spent his early life at London, England,
and at the age of sixteen came to America and set-
tled in the Province of Ontario, and about 1861
moved to Michigan and homesteaded in Sanilac
County. His genius and the particular direction
"^vnnrf
HISTORY OF MONTANA
taken by his abilities from youth until his last years
was stock buying. He was well known as a drover
both in Michigan and Montana, coming to the latter
state in 1889 and settling at Big Timber. He was
in the stock commission business there. In 1893
he moved to Bozeman and continued in the cattle
business until his death in 1895. He was a demo-
crat and a Catholic. John Gary married Sarah
O'Hara, who was born in Ireland in 1848, and died
at Bozeman in September, 1909. She was reared in
Ontario. They had a family of three children :
Agnes, wife of F. C. Downing, a grain merchant at
Butte ; John P. ; and Martin A., who is manager of
the Livingston branch of the Gary Hay & Grain
Company.
John P. Gary received his early education in the
common schools of Sanilac County, Michigan. He
also attended school in Big Timber, Montana, but
his education was finished at the age of seventeen.
The next three years he worked in different lines,
and at the age of twenty entered the service of the
Benepe Owenhouse Company at Bozeman, remaining
with them three years. For nineteen years he and
his brother Martin were associated as Gary Brothers
in the grocery, hay and grain business. In the mean-
time, in about 1900, they engaged in the grain busi-
ness under the management of John P. Gary. In
the year 1909. they bought out the Bozeman Elevator
Company's business and plant, consisting of a large
100,000 bushel elevator and a fifty car warehouse.
The grain business continued to grow and in the
year 1917, in order to engage in broader fields, a
new company was organized, and known as the Gary
Hay & Grain Company, Incorporated. The firm has
branches and elevators at Livingston and other points.
The ofifices are in the Owenhouse Block at Boze-
man. T. C. Power, of Helena, is president of the
company; E. A. Stiefel. of Belgrade, is vice presi-
dent ; John P. Gary is treasurer and manager ; and
Martin A. Gary is manager at Livingston. John P.
Gary has full charge of the business at Bozeman.
He is also interested in Montana farming with
Martin A. Gary, owning an irrigated ranch of 186
acres on the Shields River. He also has a modern
home at 324 South Black Avenue in Bozeman. Mr.
Gary is a democrat, a member of the Catholic Church,
is a fourth degree Knight of Columbus, being affili-
ated with Bozeman Council No. 1413, Knights of
Columbus. He is a member of Gallatin Castle No.
82 of the Royal Highlanders, and of the Bozeman
Chamber of Commerce.
In 1904, at Bozeman. he married Miss Mae Mar-
ley, a daughter of John F. and Mary (Downs)
Marley. Her mother is deceased and her father,
who was a pioneer homesteader at Big Timber, is
now living at Bozeman. Mrs. Gary is a graduate
of the Sweetgrass County High School. To their
marriage were born six children : Helen, born May 2,
igo6; Elizabeth, born in 1908; John, born July I,
igog ; Agnes, born in June, 191 1 ; Mary Frances, born
in June, 1913; and Jean, born August 17, I9I7-
Charles Lester Harvey is the only son of the
late John Harvey, one of the prominent pioneers of
Park County, and is now engaged in the operation of
a splendid grain and livestock ranch of 500 acres
two miles south of Clyde Park. A considerable part
of this ranch has been owned by John Harvey and
his son Charles L. for forty years.
The late John Harvey, who died at his country
home in 1915, was born in Jo Daviess County. Illi-
nois, in 1850. His parents, .tames and Letitia (Hos-
king) Harvej', were of English families. James
Harvey was superintendent of a large copper mine
in the Lake Superior region, and was killed by a
falling stone in 1856. John Harvey was then six
years old. He received a public school education,
and at the age of sixteen left home and sought his
fortune in the West. In 1866 he joined the Willson-
Rich train, commanded by Charles Rich, and after
many encounters with the Indians arrived in Mon-
tana, where John Harvey spent the first two years in
the Madison Valley of Gallatin County. He helped
build the log school house and for two winters at-
tended school there under Stephen Allen. In the
course of time he had enough money to go into the
ranching business for himself, and also did freight-
ing and dealing in livestock. In 1879 he and Thomas
Tregloan began a partnership which was continued
until it was dissolved by the death of John Harvey.
Thomas Tregloan is still one of the prominent ranch-
ers of the Shields River Valley. John Harvey and
Thomas Tregloan developed a ranch of over 2,000
acres, engaged in raising grain and hay and livestock,
and for a number of years also conducted a large
meat market in Livingston. John Harvey was affili-
ated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows at
Livingston and was a republican voter, and his wife
was a member of the Methodist Church.
In February, 1885, John Harvey married Miss Jen-
nie Cox, daughter of John Cox, who was born in
England in 1820, came to the United States when a
young man, was a miner in Wisconsin, and lived at
Hazel Green for many years, where he died in 1885.
He married Eliza Cundy, who was born in Cornwall,
England, and died on the Harvey ranch in Montana.
Mrs. John Harvey was educated in public schools
at Hazel Green. She was the mother of two chil-
dren, Jamie, who died at the age of three months,
and Charles Lester.
Charles Lester Harvey was born near Clyde Park
in Park County, August 24, 1891. He was educated
in the public schools of Livingston, graduated from
the Park County High School in 1909, and subse-
quently continued his higher education in Oberlin
College at Oberlin, Ohio. He received his A. B.
degree from that institution in 1914. He was a mem-
ber of the Phi Beta Sigma college fraternity. He
distinguished himself in athletics at Oberlin, and
after graduating remained a year as a special student
of physical culture and graduated in physical train-
ing in 1914. For one year he had also coached the
athletic teams of the college. He was captain of the
Oberlin Track Team in 1914, and that team stood
second among the colleges of Ohio that year. Mr.
Harvey has a record in Ohio for the high jump,
clearing the bar at 6 feet i]4 inches. For one year
after returning from Ohio, Mr. Harvey was in-
structor and physical director of the Railway Club
of Livingston, and then returned to the ranch
and has been active manager of the Harvey estate.
The partnership interests between the Harvey family
and Mr. Tregloan were dissolved in the spring of
1916, C. L. Harvey taking half the land, cattle and
horses, and though one of the younger men in the
valley he is rated as one of its most successful
ranchers. He specializes in high grade horses, and
paid $2,500 for his shire stallion.
' Mr. Harvey is a republican, a member of the Epis-
copal Church, and is affiliated with Livingston Lodge
No. 214, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
In 1917, in Park County, he married Miss Lottie
Gallagher, daughter of George and Mary Gallagher,
ranchers near Clyde Park. Mr. and Mrs. Harvey
have one son. Lester, Jr., born August 30, 1918.
Roy Allen Stark is the leading representative
and exponent of osteopathy in Ravalli County, and
has been established in his profession at Hamilton
since 1913.
410
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Doctor Stark has lived most of his hf e in the north-
western states, having been born in Madeha, Min-
nesota, June 19, 1S88. His paternal ancestors came
from England and were among the early Puritan
settlers at Plymouth, Massachusetts. His grand-
father Stark was born in Vermont in £827 and was
a pioneer settler at Mankato, Minnesota, where he
engaged in lumbering. He died at Sioux i-alls,
North Dakota, in 1914- During the Civil war he
served in the Quartermaster's Department under
General Sherman. S. H. Stark, father of Doctor Stark
of Hamilton, was born at Mankato, Minnesota in
1862, lived there during his youth, was married at
Kasota in the same state, and after his marriage
moved to Madelia, where he followed farming. In
1897 he took his family to Parma, Idaho, where he
is 'Still living and is engaged extensively in farming
and stock raising. He is an independent in politics
and a member of the Ancient Order of United
Workmen. S. H. Stark married Celia Pettis, who
was born at Kasota, Minnesota, in 1864. They had
a family of five children: Myrtle, wife of Harvey
Hatch, a farmer at Adrian, Oregon; Ralph, a farmer
and stockman at Parma, Idaho; Roy Allen; May,
wife of Joseph Stone, a farmer at Roswell, Idaho;
and Henry, who died aged twenty-two at Boise.
Roy Allen Stark acquired his early education in
the public schools of Roswell, Idaho, attending the
high school through the senior year. At the age
of seventeen he began earning his living as a helper
on his father's ranch, and remained there until he
was twenty-two. He then entered the American
School of Osteopathy at Kirksville, Missouri, and
was graduated after completing the course with
the degree D. O. in January, 1913. On May 30,
1913 Doctor Stark located at Hamilton, and in hve or
six years has built up the leading practice m Ravalli
County. His offices are in the Colter-Bell Building
on South Second Street, Doctor Stark is a member of
the American and Montana Osteopathic societies.
He is a past chancellor of Ravalli Lodge No. 36,
Knights of Pythias, is a member of Ionic Lodge
No 38, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and in
politics is independent. He owns a modern home on
South Third Street.
September 20, 1916, at Hamilton, Doctor Stark mar-
ried Miss Emma Nicol, daughter of R. W. and
Nellie (Groff) Nicol, the latter now deceased. Her
father is a retired rancher at Hamilton, where
Mrs. Stark finished her education in the Hamilton
High School.
Perry M. Parker. The record of the subject of
this sketch is that of a man who by his own unaided
efforts has worked his way from a modest beginning
to a position of comfort and influence in his commu-
nity. His life has been one of unceasing industry
and perseverance, and the systematic and honorable
methods he has followed have won for him the un-
bounded confidence of his fellow citizens.
Perry M. Parker traces his line of descent back to
Irish origin, whence the family came to America and
.settled in Ohio and the Central West. His father,
Wesley Parker, was born near Cincinnati, Ohio,
where he was reared and where he devoted himself
to agricultural pursuits. Shortly after his marriage
he moved to Indiana, locating near Peru. In 1871
he went to Minnesota, locating on a farm near Min-
neapolis. Still later he located at Anoka, that state,
where he engaged in the lumber business. In 1885
he went to the State of Washington and engaged in
the lumber business, and there his death occurred
in 1910. He was a stanch democrat in his political
views. He married Angelinc Large, who was born
in 184s, near Peru, Indiana, and who now resides
at Anoka, Minnesota. To them were born the fol-
lowing children : Florence, who was killed in a rail-
road accident at the age of eighteen years ; Perry
M. is the next in order of birth ; Casper operates a
garage at Roseburg, Oregon ; Arthur is an electrician
at Oakland California.
Perry M. Parker was born on November 22, i86g,
at Peru, Indiana, but his education was secured in
the schools of Anoka, Minnesota. He laid aside his
text-books at the early age of fourteen years and
began working by the day at whatever he could
turn his hand to. He then went to work in a flour
mill, where he remained for six years, thoroughly
learning every detail of the business. He then went
to Minneapolis and went to work in the Pillsbury
Mills, where he was employed for ten years. There-
after he followed milling in various parts of Minne-
sota and in North Dakota, South Dakota and Mon-
tana. In 1905 Mr. Parker went to Belgrade as
superintendent for the Gallatin Valley Milling Com-
pany, with which he remained for eleven years. At
the end of that period he came to Bozeman and ever
since has been superintendent of the lower mills of
the Bozeman Milling Company. The mills are situ-
ated one mile north of Bozeman and have a daily
capacity of 700 barrels of flour. He is an expert in
the milling business, and since coming to Bozeman
has demonstrated his ability in no uncertain manner,
so that he enjoys the fullest measure of confidence
on the part of his employers.
Politically Mr. Parker is a stanch democrat, and
while living at Belgrade served six years as alder-
man. He is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
In 1897 Mr. Parker was married to Jessie Mabel
Moore, the ceremony occurring at St. Francis, Min-
nesota, and they have one child, Donald, born in
1903.
The Moore family, from which Mrs. Parker de-
scended, is of Scottish origin, her ancestors having
come to America in the days of the colonies and set-
tled in the State of Maine. Her father, M. B. Moore,
who now resides near Billings, Montana, was born
in 1849, near Calais, Maine. He married in that
state and became a traveling salesman by vocation.
Eventually he went to Anoka, Minnesota, where he
became connected with the lumbering industry. In
1911 he came to Montana, and since that time has
operated a ranch near Billings. He is a democrat
and a member of the Masonic fraternity. He married
Melvina A. EUingwood, who was born at Winter-
port, Maine, and their children are as follows: Jes-
sie Mabel (Mrs. Parker) ; Ralph E., who is a lumber-
man at Seattle, Washington ; Margie is the wife
of Floyd R. Jones, who has a prominent position with
the Standard Oil Company at Casper, Wyoming.
Mrs. Parker's maternal grandfather, Nathan Filing-
wood, was a native af the State of Maine and died
at Greenbush, that state, in 1886, though his home
had been at Winterport. He was a farmer and lum-
berman. After his removal to Greenbush he ran a
tavern, in which was also situated the village school,
besides a store and livery stable. In fact, he became
the most important personage in the town, having
charge of practically every interest. Mrs. Parker
is entitled to membership in the Daughters of the
American Revolution on the maternal side.
Pearl Duncan Hodce. assistant cashier of the
Empire Bank and Trust Company of Lewistown, ac-
quired his early experience in banking in his native
State of Missouri, and has been a resident of Mon-
tana for the past five years.
He was born on his father's farm in Audrain
County, Missouri, on May 8, 1888, a son of John
Richard and Dora B. (Younger) Hodge. His
HISTORY OF MONTANA
parents were both natives of Missouri, his father
born May 13, 1857, and his mother December 13,
1859. His father grew up and was educated in Cal-
laway County, Missouri, and after reaching manhood
became a farmer and stock raiser. He was especially
successful as a breeder of fine saddle horses and
jacks, and his farm was one of wide note and reputa-
tion in Northeastern Missouri. He has lived retired
from active business since 1918. He is a member of
the Modern Woodmen of America, and for many
years has been a deacon in the Methodist Church
and is a democrat in politics.
Pearl Duncan Hodge was the fifth in a family of
four sons and two daughters. He spent his boyhood
days on his father's farm, working at farm labor
when not in the public schools. He attended the Lad-
donia High School, the State Normal School at
Kirskville, Missouri, and after graduating taught
for one year. He took a business and stenographic
course in the Dakota Business College at Fargo,
North Dakota, and also attended Central College at
Fayette, Missouri. From 1912 to 1914 he was book-
keeper and stenographer with the Farmers Bank
at Laddonia, Missouri, and in June. 19 14. removed
to Lewistown and entered the service of the Lewis-
town State Bank as bookkeeper and stenographer.
He was promoted to assistant cashier iti January,
1918, and since December, 1918, has held a similar
position with the Empire Bank & Trust Company.
Mr. Hodge is a member of the Masonic fraternity,
the Chamber of Commerce, the Methodist Church,
and in politics is a democrat.
June 7, 1915, he married Miss Bessie Pearle Trip-
lett. She was born at McKinnev, Texas, a daughter
of George W. and Laura P. (Wood) Triplett,' her
father a native of Missouri and her mother of Texas.
Mrs. Hodge is the only child of her parents. Her
father has long been a prominent farmer and stock
raiser near the Town of Triplett, Missouri, which
is named for this family, an old and prominent one
in that state. Her father is a member of the Ma-
sonic order and a democrat in politics.
Hugh C. Gruwell. Descended from honored
parentage and himself numbered among the leading
citizens of his section of the state. Hugh C. Gru-
well, cashier of the Farmers State Bank at Wilsall,
is entitled to specific recognition in a work of this
character. His residence and business relations here
have but strengthened his hold on the hearts of the
people with whom he has been associated, and to-
day no one here enjoys a larger circle of warm
friends and acquaintances, who esteem him because
of his sterling qualities of character and his business
ability.
Hugh C. Gruwell was born at West Branch, Iowa,
on October 28. 1891. He is the son of E. T. Gruwell,
who, in varied lines of effort, was one of the most
effective and successful men in this part of the coun-
try during his residence here and whose removal to
the Pacific Coast was generally a matter of regret
in this state. E. T. Gruwell was born on July ig,
1864. on a farm near West Branch, Iowa. His early
education was obtained in a district school, supple->
mented by two years of preparatory work in the
Cornell College (Mount Vernon, Iowa) Academy.
In 1896 he was graduated from the college proper
and from the Cornell School of Oratory. His
scholastic attainments have been recognized by the
honorary degrees of Bachelor of Philosophy, Doctor
of .Philosophy and Doctor of Divinity. After his
graduation he entered the ministry of the Methodist
Episcopal Church as a member of the Upper Iowa
Conference, where he filled three very successful
pastorates, at Coggon, Oelwein and Hampton. Then
for two years he acted as financial agent for Cornell
College, followed by four years' service as superin-
tendent of the Cedar Rapids district of the Methodist
Church, and it is noteworthy that he was the young-
est man engaged in district work in the conference.
Mr. Gruwell possessed a natural analytical mind and
keen business insight and he gradually became in-
terested in banking institutions in his state, being
connected as officer or director in nine different
banks. He was also personally interested in journal-
ism, the versatility of his genius being apparent in the
fact that at different times he owned three news-
papers, two of them church papers and one of them
a weekly publication at West Liberty, Iowa.
In 1912 was bestowed upon him the highest honor
in the gift ot his home conference, when he was
selected delegate to the General Conference of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, which met at Minne-
apolis. In civic affairs he also has a gratifying rec-
ord. As mayor of the City of Mount Vernon, Iowa,
he rendered a clean-cut, business-like administra-
tion and was singled out again for the same office.
In his re-election there was but one dissenting vote
cast. After moving to the Shields River Valley,
Montana, he was urged to run for the Legislature,
but deemed himself too new in the country and de-
clined a nomination.
In 1912 Mr. Gruwell came to Wilsall, Montana,
and organized the Farmers State Bank, of which
he became the first cashier, holding the position until
1916, when, upon the resignation of E. G. Blair, he
was elected president, retaining that position until
his removal to Spokane, Washington, in July, 1918,
where he became vice president of the Northwestern
Trust Company, one of the big financial institutions
of the Pacific Coast. Mr. Gruwell was also inter-
ested as a stockholder and director of the Northwest-
ern National Bank at Livingston. Under Mr. Gru-
well's guidance the Farmers State Bank became one
of the most important banks in Southern Montana
and has been for a number of years a potent factor
in the splendid development which has characterized
this section of the state.
On New Year's eve, 1885, E. T. Gruwell was mar-
ried at West Branch. Iowa, to Anna B. Jackson, and
to them were born three sons, Albert R., deceased,
Hugh C, whose name forms the caption to this
sketch, and Elmer T., Jr.
As an evidence of the enviable standing of Mr.
Gruwell in the Shields River Valley section of Mon-
tana, the following excerpt is taken from a tribute
to him published in the Livingston Enterprise in
1917: "One of the most effective and consistent
boosters for Montana, in general, and the Shields
River Valley, in particular, is Mr. E. T. Gruwell,
banker and enterprising citizen of Wilsall. By his
works he has proved his faith in the Treasure State ;
and by the same tokens will its future greatness be
demonstrated. Men of his caliber upbuild cities and
develop states. They never sit idly by, guessing,
doubting and wondering: they prove their enterprise
and show their faith by rolling up their sleeves and
doing things worth while for the community in which
thev live."
Hugh C. Gruwell attended the public schools of
Hampton, Iowa, and attended the high school there
through the junior year. He then took the senior
year work at Cornel College Academy. Mount Ver-
non. Iowa. He then took one vear of preparatory
work at Cornell and i'A years of the regular college
course, leaving there in 10T2. In 1014 he entered
Harvard Universitv. where he was graduated in 1016.
with the degree of Bachelor of .A.rts. His gradu-
ating thesis was on "Montana Banking." He is a
member of the Greek letter fraternity. Sigma Alpha
412
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Epsilon. During the period from 1912 to 1914 Mr.
Gruwell had served as assistant cashier of the Farm-
ers State Bank at Wilsall, and on his graduation
from Harvard he was elected cashier of that insti-
tution, succeeding his father, who had been elected
its president. At that time he was the youngest bank
cashier in Montana. That his selection was a wise
one is today voiced bv all who are conversant with
the record of this well-known bank. The bank is
capitalized at $50,000, with surplus and profits of
$22,000. The present officers of the bank are: S. S.
Working, president; S. O'N. C. Brady, vice presi-
dent; Hugh C. Gruwell, cashier; R. A. Cook, assist-
ant cashier.
In 1917, at Long Beach, California, Mr. Gruwell
was married to Gertrude Kint, the daughter of J. W.
and Emma S. (Kaufman) Kint, who now reside at
Los Angeles, California, where Mr. Kint is con-
nected with the Home Savings Bank. Mrs. Gruwell
is a ladv of unusal accomplishments, being a gradu-
ate of the Leland Powers School of Expression at
Boston, Massachusetts, and an entertainer of rare
ability and charm.
Politically Mr. Gruwell is a republican and fra-
ternally he is a member of Wilsall Lodge No. 103,
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He is also
affiliated with the Montana State Bankers' Associa-
tion and the .American Bankers' Association. He is
an active member of the Methodist Episcopal Church
and is chairman of the board of stewards of his
church at Wilsall. A man of generous impulses and
genial disposition, he has won and retains a host of
warm and loyal friends and is numbered among the
representative men of his community.
Roy Osburn, whose active e.xperience since he left
his Indiana home at the age of sixteen has carried
him over nearly all the states and territories south
and west, has been a Montanan since 1903, and is a
prominent rancher in the Big Timber section, where
he is secretary of the Veasey Land Company of Big
Timber.
His grandfather was an Englishman by birth and
an early settler in Indiana. Roy Osburn was born
in Terre Haute in that state August 6, 1876. His
father, I. W. Osburn, is still living in Terre Haute.
He was born in Indiana in 1855. and has spent his
life there as a carpenter and builder. He is a re-
publican and a Methodist. His first wife was Mary
Harrington, who was born in Indiana and died near
Terre Haute in 1880, when her son Roy was four
years old. Roy was the second of four children.
The oldest, Preston, is a carpenter and builder at
Terre Haute. Fred is a resident of Dillon, Mon-
tana, while George was a carpenter and was taken
ill while working in Pueblo, Colorado, and went home
to Terre Haute, where he died in 1904. I. W. Os-
burn by a second marriage has several sons and
daughters. The son Millard was with the American
Expeditionary Forces in France.
Roy Osburn also has a military record. He was a
member of the Regular .^rmy during the Spanish-
American war period. He had received his early
education in the rural schools of Vigo County, In-
diana, also in high school, and left school at the
age of sixteen and the following year left home and
began seeing the world, traveling south and west un-
til he had seen a great deal of every state except
California and Oregon. In 1898 he joined the Heavy
Artillery Regiment from Indiana, was sent to Fort
Barrancas, Florida, and while there he enlisted in
the Regular Army and served three years, being on
duty chiefly at Fort Barrancas.
The winter of igoi he spent at New Orleans, and
then went to the oil fields of Texas around Beau-
mont. When he came to Montana in 1903 he located
for a brief time at Livingston, then went to Belgrade
as an employe of the Northern Pacific Railroad, and
the same year reached the Melville community of
Sweetgrass County, where he was in business four
years and also became interested in ranching. He
established a livery business at Big Timber in 1910
and personally managed it for two years, since which
time he has leased it. The Veasey Land Company,
of which he is secretary, has a 7,000 acre grain and
cattle ranch located twenty-six miles north of Big
Timber. Mr. Osburn lives at Big Timber, his home
being at the corner of McLeod Street and Sixth
Avenue.
He is a republican in politics and is affiliated with
the Knights of Pythias at Big Timber. He mar-
ried at Livingston, Montana, in April, 1908, Mar-
garet Veasey, a daughter of Edward and Bridget
Veasey, both deceased. Her father was one of the
early settlers of Sweetgrass County and acquired
extensive interests as a rancher and stockman.
Mr. and Mrs. Osburn have five children : Gene-
vieve, born in 1910; Edward, born in 1912; Marion,
born in 1913; Marguerite, born in 1915, and Evelyn,
born in 1918.
A. P. Johnston. In the development of the
mineral resources of which the county of Mineral
is an index, in the development of the roads and
other transportation facilities, and all the more im-
portant measures for the prosperity and well being
of the country and its people, A. P. Johnston is
easily the foremost figure at Superior and in Min-
eral County. He has been in Montana forty years
and his life record justifies the placing of his name
among the state builders.
He was born on the river St. Claire at Courtright,
Lampton County, Ontario, Canada, January 4. 1851.
His father, George B. Johnston, was born in County
Tyrone, Ireland, in 1819. and came to America and
settled at Courtright, Ontario, as early as 1832.
For a time he was in the drug business and in 1837
took up an agricultural homestead on the river
St. Claire. He died at Courtright in 1892. Through-
out a long life he was one of the leading men in
his section of Ontario. He was a reformer in
politics , served as county assessor of Lampton
County, was reeve of Moore Township in this
county, and for the last twenty-five years of his
life held the office of justice of the peace. He
was a close friend of Alexander McKinzie, the
Canadian Premier, and for years the citizens of his
community reposed in him their confidence and
esteem in connection with all civic and political
afTairs. He was a very active supporter of the
Episcopal Church and was a thirty-second degree
Scottish Rite Mason. He served as a member of the
Home Guard during the Canadian Rebellion of
1837. George B. Johnston married Emily S. Don-
nelly, who was born at St. Anne in the Province
of Quebec in 1818 and died at Sarnia, Ontario, in
1894. Her father was Doctor Donnelly, an eminent
surgeon of the English navy. George B. Johnston
and wife had seven children.
The oldest, George B. Johnston, Jr., was for years
a prominent figure in the mining districts of the
West and in Montana. He was a miner and
prospector in California and Nevada and came to
Montana in 1866. He early became associated with
the late Marcus Daly. At that time Daly was
shift boss at Washoe, Nevada, in the Comstsck
Mine. George B. Johnston was a miner under
him, and was an influential member of the first
miners union. There arose a conflict between the
union and the owners and operators of the mine,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and it was largely through the influence of George
B. Johnston that the trouble was compromised.
This brought him the close friendship of Marcus
Daly. From 1875 George B. Johnston was engaged
in prospecting in the Cedar Creek Placer district
in Western Montana. While he was developing
some of his mines he also served as principal of
the high school at Helena. In 1878 he located at
Butte, where he bought a half interest in the Butte
Miner. It was his able editorials and influence
that made this paper a power in western jour-
nalism. On account of ill health caused by over-
work he sold his interest in the paper and died
at Butte July 2, 1881.
Brief reference to the younger children is as
follows : Edmund T., a miner and rancher living at
Canal Flat in British Columbia ; Maria C, widow
of Thomas E. Banker, a lumberman and mechanic,
living at Detroit, Michigan, and her daughter, Grace
Emily Banker, is a prominent artist ; the fourth of
the family is A. P. Johnston ; Emily Bella is the
widow of Hon. Frank Smith, a wealthy oil man
and owner of municipal street car lines and at
one time a representative in the Canadian Par-
liament, who died at Sarnia, Ontario, and his widow
now has three residences, one at Sarni^, one in
Toronto, and at the old Johnston homestead at
Cortright, Ontario, a place which her means and
taste have greatly beautified : Froome T.. a hotel
proprietor at Wabogan, Ontario; and Grace M.,
wife of Louis Allison, an accountant living at Van-
couver, British Columbia.
A. P. Johnston received his early education in
the public schools of Courtright and Sarnia and
finished with a high school course. He lived on
his father's farm until 1873 and then for the benefit
of his health spent two seasons as a steward on
lake boats. He also for three years worked for
the Grand Trunk Railway Company at Port Ed-
ward, Ontario. In 1879 he returned' home for a
visit and on the 5th of July, 1880, started for the
West, the country which has ever since claimed
his residence and highest enthusiasm. He came to
Montana by way of Port Arthur and Duluth and
Fort Benton, and from that post drove a team to
Helena, thence by stage to Butte, and on August
20. 1880, left the stage at ^lissoula. He came to
what is now Superior, Montana, in a wagon driven
by C. W. Berry, the only resident of the Superior
locality. Berry at that time was proprietor of the
Cedar" Creek Ferry and postoffice. Mr. Johnston
at once acquired an interest in some of the Trout
Creek placer fields, then owned by the late Marcus
Daly and his two brothers and associates. He
spent all the succeeding winter with his brother
George engaged in placer mining. Through the
death of George Johnston in the following year
all his property reverted to A. P. Johnston through
the assignments of Marcus Daly and associates.
Mr. Johnston continued working these properties
for five years. Eventually his operations brought
him financial embarrassment. Init he \yas enabled
to continue through credit extended him, enabling
him to purchase the Bill Berry ranch, then known
as the Cedar Creek Ferry and Superior Postofiice,
a mile east of the present site of Superior. At
that time Mr. Johnston became a popular figure and
trader with the travelers over the old Mullan Road
and the miners of the vicinity.
Travel and business tlirough Sunerior were greatly
increased as a result of the initial development in
the Coeur d'.'Mene field in 1883. In 1887 occurred
the discovery of metal in the Iron Mountain district,
and that was another cause contributing to the
traflic and industry and the consequent increase in
the prosperity of Mr. Johnston's mercantile busi-
ness. In 1888, when the Iron Mountain mines were
discovered at the head of Platte Creek, Mr. John-
ston made requisition to the Government to remove
the postoffice a mile west of its former site. He
then appropriated the ground on which the townsite
is today, and subsequently sold about half of the
ground to the Milwaukee Railway. He still owns
half the townsite, and as a town builder takes great
pleasure in the fact that Superior is now tlie county
seat of the rich and prosperous Mineral County.
Mr. Johnston spent $28,000 on the Trout Creek
placer, beginning a bed rock tunnel which was
never completed. Within the last three years
he has installed a Keystone drilling machine for
modern gold prospecting, so that the ground
can be worked as it should be. In 1918 his
prospects drew the attention of New York cap-
italists as a result of a very rich drill test.. These
capitalists secured an option from Mr. Johnston al-
lowing further drill tests on the property. July i,
1919, a new test was started and on the first of
August the syndicate was completely satisfied with
the richness of the ground and exercised their
rights under the option, and also bought valuable
adjacent territory. This syndicate is now negotiating
for the installation of a large dredge and modern
machinery to mine the gold. Mr. Johnston in addi-
tion to cash considerations still retains a working
interest in the property. Tliis ground is located
south of Superior and immediately east of the
noted Cedar Creek, which cuts the same mineral
belt as Trout Creek and several other tributaries
in the vicinity. Several hundred acres at the heads
of these creeks have been mined. Further down
these creeks the gravel is deeper and the old miners
with their methods were never able to reach bed
rock. As a result of improved processes thousands
of acres will be made available and experts predict
that they will become the richest mining fields of
Montana.
For years Mr. Johnston has been the most en-
thusiastic leader for good roads, especially for the
Yellowstone Trail, following the old Mullan road
between Missoula and Spokane. The improvement
of this famous trail was one of the causes that led
to the organization of Mineral County in 1914. Two-
thirds of the entire distance of the trail, 212 miles,
between Missoula and Spokane, lies in Mineral
County. By 1920, on the basis of work already done,
all the hills will have been eliminated. During 1919
Government gravel trucks were moving gravel to
the highway daily.
Mr. Johnston is an orator, able to express him-
self clearly and convincingly on subjects with which
he is familiar, and in recent years he has been called
upon for speeches in fourteen towns between Mis-
soula and the Bitter Root range. As a result of
meetings which he has addressed he has brought
citizens into organization as the Yellowstone Trail
Club for the purpose of paying assessments into the
Yellowstone Trail Fund and also securing funds to
purchase advertising literature, including folder
maps, showing the trail, its camping places and ac-
commodations between Missoula and Spokane.
Mr. Johnston's home is on his ranch a mile east
of Superior along the line of the Chicago, Milwaukee
& St. Paul Railway. In 1886 he set out an orchard
of seventy-five trees on his land. Six of these trees
were sent to him wrapoed in tin foil and moss by
his mother from Courtright, Canada. They are
apple trees, and by subsequent grafting they have
produced many crops of fine apples. Mr. Johnston
also specializes in the ever bearing strawberry and
has raised great quantities of this fruit.
He is a republican in politics, a member of the
Episcopal Church, and was the first noble grand
414
HISTORY OF MONTANA
when Welcome Lodge Xo. 107 of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows was installed on March I,
1915. This Lodge now has seventy-two members.
Mr. Johnston is a director of the Superior State
Bank, and he donated one of the four best corner
lots in the city for its building. He has also given
other lots for newspaper buildings, for the Red
Men's Hall, and the Municipal Cemetery, and for
every other public purpose. He has unselfishly de-
voted himself to every movement that would up-
build and improve the city.
September 30, 1900, at Missoula, Mr. Johnston
married Mrs. Mary L. (Cockrell) McCartney,
daughter of Thomas and Keziah (.Church) Cockrell.
Her father was a native of \\'ashington, Indiana, and
a brother of the late Francis Cockrell, long a prom-
inent United States senator from Missouri. Thomas
Cockrell was a Union soldier during the Civil war
and for many years a member of the Grand Army
of the Republic. He was a farmer and stockraiser
and died at Neal, Kansas, in 1916. Mrs. Johnston's
mother is also deceased. Mr. Johnston has one
daughter, Grace A., born June I, 1905. He also has
two step-children, Leta, wife of Roy Bascum, a
Northern Pacific engineer living at Missoula, and
Bernard, who is in the employ of the Forest Re-
servation near Superior and lives at home.
William Freeman Schoppe. In one of the most
exacting of all callings the subject of this sketch
has attained distinction, being recognized as an able
and successful member of the faculty of the Mon-
tana State College at Bozeman. He is a well edii-
cated, symmetrically developed man, his work in his
particular field of education having brought him
prominently to the notice of the public, the result
of which has been a demand for his services w^here
a high standard of professional is required. He is
a gentleman of scholarly tastes and studious habits,
keeping abreast the times in advanced methods and
his general knowledge is broad and comprehensive.
William Freeman Schoppe was born in Coorse
County, New Hampshire, on September 14, 1883, and
is the son of H. S. and Mary E. (Cushman) Schoppe,
who now reside in West Auburn, Maine. H. S.
Schoppe was born in 1849 at Beddington, Maine.
where he was reared and educated. Shortly after
his marriage, which also occurred there he removed
to New Hampshire, where he was identified with
the lumbering industry until 1886, when he removed
to West Auburn, Maine, at about which time he was
also in Nicaragua. Central America, handling ma-
hogany timber. He has also followed the lumber
business in Honduras and Cuba and other places,
aside from the states, but is now retired from active
work and is living quietly in a comfortable home at
West Auburn. He is a republican in his political
views, and is a member of the Congregational Church
and of the Masonic fraternity. Mr. Schoppe was
married to Mary E. Cushman, who was born in 1854
in Maine, and their only child is the subject of this
sketch.
William F. Schoppe received his elementary edu-
cation in the public schools of West Auburn, Maine,
and then attended Hebron Academy, at Hebron,
that state, where he was graduated in 1903. He then
entered the University of Maine, at Orono. where he
was graduated in 1907. with the degree of Bachelor
of Science. While in the university he was a mem-
ber of the Greek letter fraternities Sigma Alpha
Epsilon and Alpha Zeta. Immediately following his
graduation Mr. Schoppe was called to the State Ag-
ricultural College at Kingston, Rhode Island, as
assistant in research work in poultry husbandry,
where he was engaged from August, 1907, to June,
1908, when he came to Bozeman, Montana, as fore-
man of the poultry department of the Montana State
College. He remained here until the fall of 1911,
when he returned to his alma mater, the University
of Maine, an associate professor of animal hus-
bandry, poultrj- division. During the period while
Professor Schoppe occupied this chair he was also
doing post-graduate work and for this work received
the degree of Master of Science in Biology. In June,
1913, Professor Schoppe returned to the Montana
State College as assistant professor in poultry hus-
bandry, being so occupied until 1916, when he was
advanced to the professorship of poultry husbandry
and is still head of this department. He has been
remarkably successful, not only in his technical abil-
ity as an instructor, but what is of equal importance,
in his ability to arouse a general interest in the
importance and value of scientific care of poultry.
Politically Professor Schoppe gives his support to
the republican party and is a member of the Pres-
byterian Church, while his fraternal affiliations are
with Bozeman Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Alasons. He is a member of the American
Poultry Association, the American Association of
Investigators and Instructors in Poultry Husbandry,
of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science and of the American Breeders' Association.
In 1909, at Belfast, Maine, William F. Schoppe
was married to Margaret Dorothy Pilsbury, the
daughter of Charles and Blanche A. (Sutherland)
Pilsbury. The father, who was formerly a news-
paper man at Belfast, Alaine, is deceased, and his
widow now makes her home with Mr. and Mrs.
Schoppe. Mrs. Schoppe is a lady of splendid cul-
ture, being a graduate of the University of Maine.
To Professor and Mrs. Schoppe have been born two
children, namely: William F., Jr., born July 7, 191 1,
and Robert Pilsbury, born July 27, 1916.
Clyde M. Lyon. Throughout an active and inter-
esting career duty has ever been the motive of ac-
tion with Clyde M. Lyon, one of the well-known
agriculturists and ranchmen of Southern Montana,
and usefulness to his fellow men has by no means
been a secondary consideration with him. Thus
strong and forceful in his relations with his fel-
lows, he has gained the good wall and commenda-
tion of his associates and the general public, retain-
ing his reputation among men of integrity and high
character, and never losing the dignity which is the
birthright of the true gentleman.
Clyde M. Lyon was born at Williamsburg, Iowa.
on October 25, 1882, and is the son of N. W. and
Rosa Jeanette CLewis) Lyon. The father was born
in Ohio in 1839, and died at North English, Iowa,
in 1910. He was reared and married in his native
state, and removed to Williamsburg, Iowa, where
he owned and managed a hotel. Subsequently he
moved to Sheldon. Iowa, but in 1904 he retired and
returned to North English, where he spent his
remaining days. He was a republican in politics, an
earnest member of the Presbyterian Church, was
affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. He was a veteran of the Civil war, having
served for three years as quartermaster in the Eieht-
eenth Regiment of Ohio Volunteer Infantry. Mrs.
Rosa Lyon was born in 1857, in Ohio, and her death
occurred at North English, Iowa, in 1911. To these
worthy parents were born the following children :
Ida May, deceased ; Clyde M., whose name heads this
sketch : and Vivian Virginia, who resides with her
brother, Clyde, and is a graduate of the Billings
Commercial School.
Clyde M. Lyon received a good public school edu-
cation at Williamsburg, graduating from the high
HISTORY OF MONTANA
415
school there in 1899. He was then a stuUent in the
Iowa Business College at Des Moines, where he
graduated in 1901. For a while he was employed in
the office of the Des Moines News, and then re-
turned to Williamsburg and for 4J4 years ran the
Hotel Victoria, of which his father had formerly
been proprietor. At the end of that period Mr.
Lyon went to South Dakota and proved up on a
homestead of 160 acres in Lyraan County, which he
still owns. Later he located in North English, Iowa,
and engaged in the mercantile business there for
five years. During the following year he roamed
around the great West, getting acquainted with the
country and searching for a satisfactory place at
which to locate. In 191 1 Mr. Lyon came to Wilsall
and began ranching. In 1919 he sold his home ranch
of 320 acres and in that year also sold three other
ranches. He is still the owner of 1,600 acres of
land in Park County, and 8,500 acres in Meagher
County. He owns a comfortable and modern resi-
dence and a store building in Wilsall and is num-
bered among the prosperous and well-to-do citizens
of this community. He engages extensively m the
real estate business, having handled many thousands
of acres of the best land in this section of the state
and been the means of locating some of our best
citizens here. He is also interested in the raismg
of thoroughbred Hereford cattle, in which he has
been eminently successful. Mr. Lyon has abounding
faith in the Shields River Valley, a country which is
said to enjoy the distinction of winning more prizes
for its grains and grasses than any other locality in
the West.
Politically Mr. Lyon is independent and his reli-
gious affiliation is with the Methodist Episcopal
Church, of which he is an earnest supporter. Fra-
ternally he belongs to North English (.Iowa) Lodge,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ; to Cedar Rap-
ids Consistory of the Scotish Rite (thirty-second de-
gree), and to Wilsall Lodge No. 103, Independent
Order of Odd Fellows.
At Lakota, North Dakota, Mr. Lyon was married
to Jeanette Olive Evans. Her father, D. R. Evans,
who now resides in North English, Iowa, was born
near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1835. and was
reared and married there. He followed the trade
of boilermaking there until 1879, when he moved to
North English, Iowa, and conducted a farm until
his retirement, about twenty years ago. He is a
democrat in politics and a strong and active member
of the Christian Church, as he was also of the Ma-
sonic fraternity. He married Hannah Starr, who
was born in 1840 at Brownsville, Pennsylvania, and
whose death occurred at North English, Iowa, in
1914. To Mr. and Mrs. Lyon were born the follow-
ing children: Myrna, born June 5, 1904; Maxine,
born June 13, 1908; and Bernice, born June 14, I9I7-
Because of his splendid personal qualities and his
active efforts contributing to the prosperity of this
locality Mr. Lyon enjoys to an unusual degree the
confidence and regard of his fellow citizens.
Inca Solberg is one of Montana's women actively
identified with the public life of their home state, and
is now in her third consecutive term as county su-
perintendent of schools for Sweetgrass County.
Miss Solberg has spent her life in the Treasure
state, and was born eleven miles east of Big Tim-
ber, on a farm. Her father, Samuel Solberg, was
born near the famous Cathedral city of Trondhjen,
Norway, in 1846. He grew up there and was a
schoolteacher before he came to the United States.
He first came to this country when a single man,
and had a varied and adventuresome experience
■working in stores and mines in Michigan, Wyoming
Vol. 11—27
and Montana. He then went back to Norway to
claim his bride, and brought her to this country and
in 1880 became a permanent settler in Montana. For
a couple of years he was a miner at Glendale in
Beaverhead County, and in 1882 settled on the home-
stead of 160 acres eleven miles east of Big Timber,
where his daughter was born. He lived on the
homestead until 1912, and when he sold his property
there he had accumulated 1,820 acres. He is now
living retired at Big Timber, where he has a modern
home on McLeod Street between Fifth and Sixth
avenues. He is a republican and a member of the
Lutheran Church. Samuel Solberg married Louise
Lundgren, who was born at Romsdalen, Norway,
in 1854. Of their children the oldest is Samuel D.,
a mechanic at Big Timber, Edwin is a barber at
Tacoma, Washington, and Conrad is a mechanic at
Harlowton, Montana. The fourth of the family is
Miss Inga. Harold, the next in age is a pharmacist
by profession, and was in the drug business at Big
Timber when he enlisted in February, 1918, and
went overseas in June, 1918, with the Medical Corps.
The youngest is Clara, wife of Roy S. Moore, a
rancher near McLeod, Montana.
Miss Inga Solberg acquired her primary educa-
tion in the rural schools of Sweetgrass County, and
graduated in 1905 from the Bozeman Preparatory
School, remaining one year longer in the Agricul-
tural College there. She then taught a year in her
native county, following which she entered and was a
student in Valparaiso University of Indiana one
year. Then followed two years more of work in the
rural schools, and for 2Y2 years she was connected
with the city schools of Big Timber. Miss Solberg
was elected county superintendent in 191 5, and the
people have stamped their approval upon her admin-
istration of the office by re-electing her in 1916 and
again in 1918. From her office in the court house
at Big Timber she keeps close supervision over 55
schools in the county, a staff of 55 teachers, and a
scholarship enrollment of 700.
Miss Solberg is a republican in politics, a mem-
ber of the Lutheran Church, and is secretary of
Sweetgrass Chapter No. 22 of the Eastern Star.
Edwin B. Catlix, chairman of the Board of the
Hearst Free Public Library at .Anaconda, is a pioneer
printer of that city, locating in Anaconda thirty years
ago. He has been continuously identified from the
first with the Anaconda Standard and the Standard
Publishing Company.
Mr. Catlin was born at Weedsport, New York,
December 2. 1858. His paternal ancestors came
from England and settled at Bridgeport, Connecticut,
in 1745. His great-grandfather, Jacob Catlin, was
a soldier in the Revolutionary war. Mr. Catlin's
father, David Catlin, was born near Weedsport in
1817 and died there in 1887. spending his active
career as a grain merchant. He served all through
the Civil war as a member of the Ninth New York
Infantrv. He was a republican, active in the Baptist
Church^ and a member of the Masonic fraternity.
His wife was Caroline Newland, who was born in
New York State in 1823 and died at Weedsport in
Edwin B. Catlin was the only child of his parents
to reach mature years. He acquired his early educa-
tion in the public schools of his native town. Leav-
ing school at the age of fourteen he learned the
printing business at Weedsport and followed his
trade as a journeyman at Syracuse and .A.uburn. New
York, prior to coming to Anaconda in 1889. At
Anaconda he assisted in establishing the Standard.
He has been connected with its mechanical and busi-
ness management ever since, and is now superin-
416
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tendent of the manufacturing and stationery depart-
ments of the Standard Publishing Company.
Mr. Catlin is a democrat. He is a member of the
Theosophical Society. He resides in a home of his
own at 315 West Sixth Street. In 1880 at Canadai-
gua, New York, he married Miss Jennie E. Gyer,
daughter of Frederick and Elizabeth (Beeman)
Gyer. Her father was a Union soldier and spent his
business life as a tailor at Canandaigua, New York.
Mr. and Mrs. Catlin have three children : Harry C,
born in 1882, is a miner at Butte; Caro M., born in
1884, is the wife of Everett E. Pickell, livmg at 615
Maple Street, Anaconda, and in charge of the ma-
chinery warehouse of the A. C. M. Company; Flor-
ence E., born in 1887, is assistant librarian of the
Hearst Free Public Library.
Robert P. McClelland. Biographies should not
be published unless there is something in the life
and character of the individual worthy of emulation
or imitation by others under the circumstances —
certainly not for self-aggrandizement; but sufficient
has been drawn from the life history of the gentle-
man whose name appears above to show that there
is something in the inner life of the man worthy
of more than incidental mention. He began life
practically at the bottom of the ladder, which he has
climbed to the top with no help but a strong heart,
industrious hands, and an intelligent brain, and is
a living example of what may be accomplished in this
republic by thrift and perseverance, even under
discouraging circumstances. Robert P. McClelland
comes of sterling old Scottish stock, the subject's
paternal ancestors having come to this country and
located in Virginia in the days of the colonies. Later
the family located in Bourbon County, Kentucky.
where was born the subject's grandfather, Alfred
McClelland. He was a breeder and raiser of live
stock, a vocation which has been adopted by many of
his descendants. Among his children was T. A. Mc-
Clelland, who was born in Kentucky in 1848. He was
reared in Texas and Missouri, and was married at
Kirksville in the latter state to Mary Norton, a na-
tive of Ohio, and who died at Kansas City, Missouri,
in 1898. After his marriage Mr. McClelland lived
for a time in Joplin. Missouri, engaging in the
breeding and raising of cattle. His stock ranged
in the Indian Territory, Colorado and Texas, and of
course he followed them. In 1894 he removed to
Kansas City, Missouri, and engaged in the real
estate business. His death occurred there in 1909.
He was a democrat in politics, was a veteran of the
Civil war, having served in the cause of the Con-
federacy. To him and his wife were born three
children, namely: Robert P.; Thomas N., an oil
operator in Kansas City, Missouri ; Elisha R., also
of Kansas City, a mine operator.
Robert P. McClelland was born at Joplin. Mis-
souri, on July 19, :879, and received an elementary
education in the public schools of Jackson County,
Kansas. At the early age of twelve years he left
home and thereafter he was responsible for his own
fortune. After knocking around on various jobs
for a time he at length became a cowboy and for a
number of years rode the ranges in Texas, Arizona
and Old Mexico. It was a hard life, but he was
endowed by nature with the qualities that insure suc-
cess in any vocation, and as the years went by he
not only gained valuable experience, but also made
financial headway. In 190; he went to Oregon, in
the vicinity of the Nevada state line, and then to the
Big Elk River. Nevada, where he "ran" cattle and
horses, and later spent a year at Corvallis, Oregon.
In 1914 Mr. McClelland came to Livingston, Mon-
tana, engaged in the cattle and land business on a
large scale and has become closely identified with this
community. His partner is Walter J. Hill, son of
James J. Hill, and they operate under the corporate
name of the Hill & McClelland Cattle Corporation.
The company is capitalized at $500,000, with no in-
debtedness, and is counted one of the strongest con-
cerns in its line in the State of Montana. Their
interests are large and varied. They own a large
block of stock in the First State Bank of Livingston,
of which Mr. Hill is vice president. They own •
ranches in Shields Valley and Yellowstone Valley,
comprising approximately 200,000 acres, on which
they run 6,000 head of pure-bred, high-grade cattle
every year. They also own many well-bred Per-
cheron, Shire and Clydesdale horses. One cow,
"Suttyanne," which is valued at $5,000, was a prize
winner at the International Livestock Exposition
held in Chicago, and they also own a fine bull, which
was first in his class as a yearling and for which
they have been oflfered $12,500. From these few
facts it can readily be seen that the Hill & McClel-
land Cattle Corporation does things on an extensive
scale and they are numbered among the really impor-
tant concerns of this section of the state.
Personally Mr. McClelland is genial and approach-
able, true to his friends and popular among the circle
of his acquaintances. He follows the highest code
of business ethics and among his business associates
his judgment is held in high esteem. He has per-
sonally learned by hard knocks every detail of the
cattle business from the ground up, and the success
which is now his has been richly earned.
In 1903, at Denver, Colorado, Robert P. McClel-
land was married to Maude Oleson, a native of
Colorado, and they have one child, Mary Lorraine,
born June 20, 1909.
Politically Mr. McClelland takes an independent
attitude, voting for the men and measures which
meet his approval rather than according to party
dictates. Fraternally he is a member of Livingston
Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free and .'\ccepted Masons,
and of the Albany (Oregon) Lodge, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks. He also holds member-
ship in the Chamber of Commerce and the Commer-
cial Club at Livingston.
John Wesley Miller is vice president of the First
State Bank of Thompson Falls, and for many years
has been one of the most substantial business men
and public-spirited citizens of Sanders County.
When he first knew Thompson Falls its only pre-
tentions to distinction as an industrial and commer-
cial center was a single saw mill. Mr. Miller for
many years was a saw mill operator in the lumber
woods of Montana and is a man of rugged mold
and has all the characteristics of the old time lum-
berman and pioneer.
He was born in County Dundas, Province of On-
tario, Canada, February 23, 1862. His father, Peter
Miller, was born in County Wicklow, Ireland, in
1827. Now, at the age of ninety-two, he is spend-
ing his declining days in the home of his son John
at Thompson Falls. He came to this country at
tKe age of twenty-one, and for several years lived
at Ogdensburg. New York, where he was employed
at a hotel and was also a railway employe. In 1851
he went to Ontario, where he operated a saw mill
and also followe.d his trade as a carpenter. He
was married in Ontario, though he had first become
acquainted with his wife, Catherine Hill, when
she came over on the same boat from Ireland. She
was born in Countv Wexford in 1830 and died in
Ontario in 1872. Her father. John Hill, was a
pioneer farmer and woodsman in the Province of
Ontario. In 1876, after the death of his first wife.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
417
Peter Miller moved his family to AIcLeod County.
Minnesota, and became a farmer. In tlie spring
of 1884 he went to McLean County, North Dakota,
and finally retired when nearly eighty years of age
and has lived at Thompson Falls since 1906. He
is a republican voter, and has been honored with
various local offices. He was a town supervisor in
Ontario and held a similar office in Minnesota, and
for four years was county judge of McLean Countv,
North Dakota. He is a regular member of the
Episcopal Church. By his first marriage he had
three children, John Wesley being the oldest. Emma
is the wife of Duncan McDonald, superintendent
of the Grant Construction Company at St. Paul ;
Mary Elizabeth is the wife of Henry Heisler, also
residents of St. Paul, Minnesota, where Mr. Heisler
is department manager of the Golden Rule Store.
Peter Miller married for his second wife Jane
MacElroy, who was born in Ireland in 1829 and
died in McLean County, North Dakota, in Decem-
ber, 1903. She was the mother of two children :
Christiana, wife of Charles Billows, who is em-
ployed in the Cement Works at St. Paul ; and Hul-
bert, who died at the age of six years.
John Wesley Miller attended his first schools in
a country district of County Dundas, Ontario. He
was about fourteen years of age when his father
moved to Minnesota. He was on his father's farm
to the age of nineteen. One winter he worked in
the woods near Staples, Minnesota. He came to
Montana in the fall of 1881, and in the Missoula
County of that time he helped clear the right of
way for the Northern Pacific Railway, .•\fter that
he worked in the woods and in the summer of 1883
was an employe in a brick plant at Missoula. For
eighteen years Mr. Miller did the work of a lumber
jack in the woods and saw mills of Montana, part
of the time around Butte, also on the Flathead
Reservation and several years at Thompson Falls.
He first came to Thompson Falls in 1883. He
located there permanently in 1892, but in 1903, after
retiring from the lumber business, he removed to
McLean County. North Dakota, and for three and
a half vears conducted a farm there. He sold this
North Dakota farm, consisting of 462 acres, in 1919.
His home at Thompson Falls has been continuous
since the fall of 1906. Mr. Miller owns 680 acres,
consisting of 400 acres of timber land in Sanders
County, a well developed farm of eighty acres two
miles west of Thompson Falls, and another timber
tract of 200 acres up the Thompson River. Whije
most of his fortune has been made in land and
timber, Mr. Miller also confesses to a moderate
success in mining and prospecting. Among other
property he is owner of two dwelling houses and
a modern home at Thompson Falls, and is an im-
portant stockholder in the First State Bank, of
which he is vice president.
Mr. Miller served one term of six years as
county commissioner of Sanders County and has
also been a member of the School Board at Thomp-
son Falls. In politics he is a republican. He is a
past master of Thompson Falls Lodge No. 70,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, is past grand
of Lone Star Lodge No. 33, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, and a member of Missoula Encamp-
ment No. 5.
In 1892, in Missoula County, he married Miss
Irena Coats, daughter of D. C. and Mary (Green)
Coats, the latter now deceased. D. C. Coats lives
with Mr. and Mrs. Miller. He was a Minnesota
pioneer, settling in that territory in i8^2. He farmed
in Minnesota, and was with a regiment from that
state in the Civil war. He came to Montana in
1887, bringing with him the machinery and equip-
ment for a saw mill, which he established in the
Flathead district. For ten years he lived at Ka-
lispell, where he conducted a confectionery store
and owned several dwelling houses. He has lived
retired at Thompson Falls since July, 1909.
J. Charles Johnson. Occupying a place of prom-
inence in the business affairs of Fairview, J. Charles
Johnson has achieved marked success as a lumber
dealer, and as a man of sound judgment and keen
foresight has acquired city property of value, own-
ing not only the Johnson Lumber Yard, but the
Orpheum Theatre and the Blue Rock Products
Company, all being well paying investments. A son
of J. O. Johnson, he was born February 4, 1882, in
Decorah, Iowa, of Danish-Norwegian ancestry.
Born in Copenhagen, Denmark, J. O. Johnson re-
ceived excellent educational advantages in his native
city, and there became familiar with the printer's
trade. Immigrating as a young man to the United
States, he located in Decorah, Iowa, where he has
since resided, for many years having been editor and
manager for the Lutheran Publishing Company. He
married a native daughter of Norway, and they be-
came the parents of two children, J. Charles, the
subject of this brief sketch, and William, of Min-
neapolis, Minnesota.
J. Charles Johnson was educated in Decorah, and
after leaving the public schools continued his studies
for four years at the Lutheran College. Going to
Minneapolis, Minnesota, as a youth of twenty years,
he was first employed by the Imperial Elevator
Company, and was later with the Goodrich-Call
Lumber Company, and also established a lumber yard
that he sold to the Basin Lumber Company. Com-
ing to Montana in 1907, Mr. Johnson embarked in'
the lumber business at Lewistown, which he man-
aged most satisfactorily for six years. Locating in
Fairview in 1913, he established the Johnson Lum-
ber Yard, one of the successful enterprises of the
city, to which he largely devotes his time and
attention. Judiciously investing his money in other
ventures, Mr. Johnson erected in 1914 the Orpheum
Theatre, which yields him a good income, all public
entertainments being held therein, and there all
traveling troupes put on their plays and shows. In
1918 Mr. Johnson established the Blue Rock Prod-
ucts Company, which was incorporated in the fall of
1919 with a capital of $25,000. This company, which
manufactures soft drinks of all kinds, obtains its
water supply from Blue Rock Spring at Fairview,
a water which analysis shows to be almost chemically
pure.
On January i, 1906, at Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Mr. Johnson was united in marriage with Kathryn
McKee, who was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Septem-
ber 28, 1885, and completed her school life at St.
Mary's Academy in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Three
children have blessed their union, two daughters
and a son. A stanch republican in politics, Mr.
Johnson cast his first presidential vote for Col.
Theodore Roosevelt in 1904.
Joseph Maudru. While it is undoubtedly true
that the western states ofifer golden opportunities to
the alert young men of the country, it is equally
true that these openings have been created through
the labors of men of the same calibre as are now
attracted from the East, great industries in this
part of the country having been built up and devel-
oped into national institutions. One of these cor-
porations which is constantly branching out and
controls an immense amount of business is the Great
Western Sugar Company, with main plant and offices
one mile south of Billings, Montana, of which
Joseph Maudru is assistant general superintendent.
He has been associated with this company for some
418
HISTORY OF MONTANA
years and has grown with it, although he has only
"resided at Billings since 1916.
Joseph Maudru comes of French extraction, his
grandfather, for whom he is named, having founded
the family in America, coming here from France and
locating at Canton, Ohio, where he was interested in
farming. He died at Canton before his grandson
was born. His wife, who bore the maiden name of
Seraphine Caty, was born in France in 181 1, and
she died at Canton, Ohio, in 1891. The birth of
Joseph Maudru, whose name heads this review,
occurred at Canton, Ohio, April 9, 1879, and his
father, also Joseph Maudru, was born in Stark
County, Ohio, in 1838, and he died at Canton, Ohio,
in 1895, having spent his entire life in that section.
For many years he was engaged in a mercantile
business at Canton, and was prominent in local poli-
tics, having been elected on the democratic ticket
treasurer of Stark County, and for some years he
was director of the poor farm of that same county.
The Roman Catholic Church had in him a firm
believer and faitliful member. His wife, who was
Louise Vesseriat before her marriage, was born in
Stark County in 1854, and she survives him and lives
at Canton, Ohio. Their children were as follows :
Joseph, who was the eldest born ; Frank, who is a
merchant of Canton, Ohio; and Viola, who married
Marion Thurin, a merchant of Canton, Ohio.
Joseph Maudru, of this sketch, attended the public
schools of Canton and was graduated from its high
school in 1897, after which he became a student of
the Case School of Applied Science at Cleveland,
Ohio, from which he was graduated in 1901, with
the degree of Bachelor of Science. He belongs to
the Greek letter fraternity Phi Delta Theta.
After the completion of his educational trainmg
Mr. Maudru in 1901 became connected with the
Massillon Iron and Steel Company of Massillon,
Ohio, as chief chemist, remaining with_ it for two
years and leaving in 1903 for a year's travel in
Cuba, studying the sugar industry. Returning to
the United 'States, he was associated with a Michi-
gan sugar company for a year, and then in the fall
of 1904 he entered the employ of his present com-
pany as chief chemist of the plant at Windsor,
Colorado, holding that position for three years, when
he was transferred to the company's plant at Fort
Collins, Colorado, for a year, where he still acted
as chief chemist. Another change took him to
Brush, Colorado, to serve the company as superin-
tendent until 1912, when he went to Longmont,
Colorado, and acted as superintendent of the plant
at that point until 1916, in which year he came to
Billings as superintendent of the Billings plant. A
year later he was again promoted, and since 1917
has been assistant general superintendent of this
district, comprising plants at Billings and Missoula,
Montana, and Lovell, Wyoming. Mr. Maudru is a
man whose fruitful toil has resulted in successive
advancements and he possesses a real capability for
his present responsibilities, handling with tact and
success a number of difficult problems.
In 1910 Mr. Maudru was married at Greeley,
Colorado, to Miss Leota Powers, a daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. W. F. Powers of Windsor, Colorado,
owners of a large ranch. Mr. and Mrs. Maudru
have one son, — Edward, who was born September
15, 191 1. Politically Mr. Maudru is a republican.
By birth and inclination he is a Roman Catholic.
Longmont, Colorado, Lodge, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, holds his membership. Mr.
Maudru owns the comfortable and tasteful modern
residence of the family at 804 North Broadway.
Thomas N. Marlowe, a well known Missoula
attorney, is a graduate in law from Yale University
and has been a member of the Montana bar for over
fifteen years.
He was born in Carroll County, Missoula, August
24, 1880, of English ancestry. The Marlowe family
first settled in Maryland. His father, John T. Mar-
lowe, was born in Covington, Kentucky, in 1843 and
when a small boy his parents moved to Missouri.
He grew up and was married in Carroll County,
spent many years as a farmer there, and in 1904 re-
moved to Ganado, Te.xas, where he was interested
in Te.xas agriculture for five years. In 1909 he re-
tired and removed to Missoula, where he died May
II, 1915. During the Civil war he served as a soldier
on the Confederate side. He was a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, a democrat and
a Mason. John T. Marlowe married Alice Roselle,
who was born in Maryland in 1855 and died at Mis-
soula November 30, 1918.
Thomas N. Marlowe spent his boyhood in Carroll
County, Missouri, attending country schools and the
high school at Norborne. He took his early law
course in the University of Missouri at Columbia,
where he graduated LL. B. in 1902. The following
year he graduated from the law school of Yale Uni-
versity at New Haven, Connecticut. Mr. Marlowe
was at one time a fellow student with Tom Stout of
Lewistown.
October 2Z, 1903, he began practice at Missoula
and his offices are in the First National Bank Build-
ing, For one term he was deputy county attorney
and one term county attorney, and is now a mem-
ber of the Fish and Game Commission of the State
of Montana, having been appointed to that office by
Governor Stewart. Mr. Marlow^e is an enthusiastic
sportsman, and as a hunter and fisher has explored
nearly every good hunting ground in Western Mon-
tana. He was president of the Western Montana
Fish and Game Association a number of years, and
has taken a deep interest in proper regulated and
legislative measures restricting and preserving the
game resources of the state.
Mr. Marlowe is a democrat, is a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, at Missoula, and
is affiliated with Missoula Lodge No. 13, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, Hell Gate Lodge No.
.^83 of the Elks, Covenant Lodge No, 6 of the Odd
Fellows, the Royal Highlanders and the Western
Montana Bar Association.
His home is at 105 University Avenue. June 12,
1907, at Hamilton, Montana, he married Miss Nellie
V. McMurray, a native of Missouri. They have two
children : Thomas N. Jr., born July 23, 1910, and
Eleanor Katherine, born July 17, 1912.
William T. Stodden was chosen mayor of the
City of Butte in the soring of 1919 not on the basis
of previous experience and activity in politics, but
merely as a man of undoubted qualifications for the
position, as an old resident of the city, and one
of its sturdy and efficient workers in the great
mining industry. His administration has realized
all the most sanguine expectations entertained of it.
Mr. Stodden was born at Redruth. Cornwall,
England. July 22. 1867. and as a native Cornish
man represents mining as a family tradition. His
father, Roger Stodden, spent all his life at Redruth,
where he was born in 1832 and died in 1916, and
during his active career was a steam engineer. He
was a conservative in nolitics. For sixty years he
held an active membership in the Methodist Epis-
copal Church, and every office open to lay mem-
bers was given him. He married Catherine Eade.
who was born at Redruth in 1831 and died there
'/^^■^<7
C'^d-r^L4L£^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
419
in igi7. A brief record of their children is as
follows : John Henry, who died at kedruth at the
age of twentv-one; Richard, a janitor in the pub-
lic schools at Butte: Mary Catherine, of Plymouth.
England, widow of William Williams, a miner;
William Thomas; George, a miner who died at
Redruth at the age of forty-three ; Fred, also a
miner, who died at Redruth aged forty-one.
William Thomas Stodden went to work in the
mines of Southwestern England at the age of ten
years. Up to that time he had attended a few
terms of country school, and later advanced his
education by work in some of the night schools.
He was nineteen years of age when he came to
the United States in 1886, and from that date has
been a resident of Butte. Here by study in night
school he specialized in steam engineering, and one
of the factors in his success has been a constant
effort to improve his individual abilities. During
1886-87 Mr. Stodden leased and operated a mine.
In 1887 he went to work at the East Colusa Mine,
now the Leonard Mine, and continuously for over
thirty years was identified with that great landmark
in the Butte mining district. He began as a com-
mon miner and gradually qualified himself for the
post of steam and electrical engineer. Mr. Stodden
resigned in May, 1919, to take up his new duties
as ma3'or of Butte.
Mr. Stodden is a member of the Engineers' Union
and the Rotary Club, is a republican, and is affil-
iated with Damon Pythias Lodge of Knights of
Pythias, Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, and Butte Camp No. 1153 of
the Woodmen of the World. He owns a modern
home at 1819 Garrison .\venue.
In 1889, at Centerville, Montana, he married
.^nnie Jenkin. She was born, reared and educated
in England and came to this country in 1888. Mrs.
Stodden died in 1915, the mother of nine children :
W. T., Jr., an electrical engineer living at Meader-
ville, Montana; Flora, wife of Harold DeMain, an
automobile mechanic living at 1820 Grand Avenue in
Butte; Leslie, a steam engineer living at home;
Percy, employed as a tax collector for the City
of Butte; Montana, wife of John Werner, of 1915
Harrison Avenue, and an employe at the original
mine of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company;
Doris, wife of Lee Hankin, an employe of the
Oregon Short Line Railway living at Kemmer, Wyo-
ming; Cecil, a city employe of Butte; Winfield, a
chauffeur ; and Wilbur, who is still continuing his
education in the public schools. Mr. Stodden is
proud of the fact that several of his children were
participants in the ■ great war. Leslie enlisted in
1917, serving one year, and was connected with the
Base Hospital of Camp Dodge. Percy enlisted at
the beginning of the war, was sent to the Mexican
border and saw twenty-two months of service, be-
ginning as a private and finally promoted to ser-
geant. Mr. Stodden's son-in-law, Harold DeMain,
enlisted shortly after his marriage, was sent to
camp in Kentucky and was promoted to first ser-
geant. In April, 1918, Mr. Stodden married Mrs.
Hattie (Smith) Bowden, a native of Minnesota.
J. Bruce Kremer, a prominent member of the
Butte bar, was born at Louisville, Kentucky, Septem-
ber 26, 1878. a son of Charles Lawrence and Anne
Lee (Hendricks) Kremer. He was liberally edu-
cated, attending the University of Virginia, and
graduating in 1898 from the University of Louis-
ville Law Department. He was admitted to the Ken-
tucky bar the same year and has practiced at Butte
since 1901. He is senior member of Kremer. Sanders
& Kremer.
Mr. Kremer is looked upon as one of the coming
men of influence and power in the democratic party,
a position he already holds in Montana. In 1920 he
presided at one of the two Jackson Day Banquet
dinners following the meeting of the National Com-
mittee of the democratic party in Washington, and
on that historic occasion he was described as "a
gifted talker in a party of gifted talkers." He has
been a member of the Democratic National Commit-
tee since 1908 and at one time was secretary. He
was secretary of the Democratic National Conven-
tion in 1916 and also chairman of the Democratic
Speakers Bureau in tlie western division in the na-
tional campaign of that year. He is at present vice
chairman of the Democratic National Committee.
Mr. Kremer is a member of the Silver Bow, Country,
Montana, Silver Bow Democratic clubs and National
Democratic Club of New York and Rocky Mountain
Club of New York.
Owen D. Speer, superintendent of the city schools
of Deer Lodge, is a graduate of the University of
Montana but had his first experience as a' teacher
in his native State of Michigan.
Mr. Speer was born in California Township,
Branch County, near Coldwater, Michigan, October
25, 1888. He is a member of an old American family,
his great-great-great-grandfather John Speer coming
in 1789 with wife and two children and settling in
North Carolina. Mr. Speer's grandfather, James
Stewart Speer, was born in Pennsylvania in 1818,
moved early in life to Ohio, and in 1863 settled on a
farm in California Township, Branch County, Michi-
gan. When he retired from his farm he moved over
the Michigan line to Fremont, Indiana, where he
died in 1905. He was a whig in early life but later
a republican. David Speer, father of the Montana
educator, was born in Ohio in 1858 and spent the
greater part of his life in Branch (Tounty, Michigan,
as a farmer. He died in California Township in
February. 1916. Politically he was a prohibitionist
and was an elder in the Reformed Presbyterian
Church many years. He married Helen Rebecca
Duguid, who was born in Branch County, Michigan,
in 1861, and is no^v living at Missoula, Montana.
James Beryl, the oldest of their children, is registrar
of the State L^niversity of Minnesota; Ella died in
infancy and Clinton at the age of ten years; the
fourth of the family is Owen D. ; Bruce died in
infancy; Lillian is a graduate of the Michigan State
Normal College at Ypsilanti, and is a teacher at
Superior, Montana, while Lucile, the youngest, is
also a graduate of the Ypsilanti Normal and is a
teacher at Bonner, Montana.
Owen D. Speer spent his early life on his father's
farm in Southern Michigan, attended a rural school
there and graduated in 1907 from the high school at
Fremont, Indiana For two years he taught in his
native county and in IQ09 came to Missoula, enrolling
as a student in the State University. He received
his A. B. degree in 1915, but in the meantime had
been superintendent of schools at Deer Lodge during
the year 1912-13. and has had active charge of those
schools for the past six years. The city schools of
Deer Lodge number four, with a stafi of eighteen
teachers and 4.=;o scholars.
Mr. Speer for three years served as a member of
the Executive Board of the State Teachers' Associa-
tion and is a member of the National Education
Association. He is an independent in politics, is
secretary of the Board of the Presbyterian Church,
and a trustee, is a member of the Deer Lodge Cham-
ber of Commerce and is affiliated with the Sigma Nu
college fraternity.
Mr. Speer and family reside at 604 Missoiiri
-\venue. He married at Deer Lodge in 1916 Miss
420
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Ruth Stetson, daughter of H. E. and Harriet
(Smith) Stetson, residents of Deer Lodge. Her
father is office manager of tlie Bonner Mercantile
Company. Mrs. Speer is a graduate of the Library
School of the University of Wisconsin, having a
degree in Library Science. To their marriage were
born two children, David O., born August 14, 1917;
and Martha Haskell, born December 14, 1918.
WiLLi.\M Othniel Boh.\rt. The name of William
Othniel Bohart, of Bozeman, does not need to be in-
troduced to the readers of this work, for he has been
intertwined with the history of Montana for a num-
ber of years. The splendid success which has come to
him is directly traceable to the salient points in his
character. With a mind capable of planning, he com-
bined a will strong enough to e.xecute his well-formu-
lated purposes, and great energy, keen discrimination
and perseverance have resulted in the accumulation
of a handsome property, which places him among the
substantial citizens of Gallatin County. He carries to
successful completion whatever he undertakes, and
his business methods have ever been in strict con-
formity with the ethics of advanced business codes,
so that he has ever enjoyed the confidence and esteem
of all who know him.
Othniel Bohart, as he is generally called, is de-
scended from good old Holland stock, his progeni-
tors having come from the land of dikes and tulips
in the days of the colonies and settled in Pennsyl-
vania. There the subject's grandfather, Peter Bo-
hart, was born, and eventually he became a pioneer
farmer in Indiana, locating near Otisco, where he
died. Among his children was Peter H. Bohart.
who was born in Indiana in 1843. In young manhood
he moved to Missouri, being numbered among its
pioneers, and there married. He lived in Ridgeley
one year and then located near Graham, where he
followed huckstering. In 1878 he went to Kansas
and located on a farm near Leavenworth. Subse-
quently he came to Montana and located about 2'/4
miles north of Bozeman on a fine farm which he
bought and which is now owned by the subject of
this sketch. He also homesteaded 160 acres of land
two miles east of the former tract. Unfortunately
his health began to fail, and in the hope of restoring
it he went to North Carolina. After a while he re-
turned to Graham, Missouri, where he died in 1894.
In politics he was a republican. He was a veteran of
theCivil war, having enlisted in 1862 in an Indiana
regiment of volunteer infantry, with which he served
during the remainder of the struggle, being mustered
out with the rank of captain. He was a member of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, to which he gave
earnest support.
Peter H. Bohart married Frances Olivia Libby,
who was born in Maine in 1845, and who died in
Bozeman in 1884. To these parents were born the
following children: Pussie, who died in infancy;
Robert H. is a farmer at Wardner, British Columbia;
F. L. owns a second-hand store in Bozeman; R. F.
is a farmer at Wilsall. Montana; S. E. is a trader
at Bozeman; William O.; Ruby M. is a trained nurse
and is now in a regular army hospital at Tacoma,
Washington; Dove E. is the wife of Lee Wilson, a
government veterinarian at Omaha. Nebraska.
Othniel Bohart was horn at Rome, Missouri, on
January 3. 1877. After completing his studies in the
rural schools of Gallatin County, Montana, whither
the family had moved, he attended the Montana
State College, where he took a business course. Leav-
ing school in 1897. he apnlied himself at first to such
general work as he could find to do, but indecision
was no part of his make-nn. so he engaged with a
butcher with the definite object of learning the busi-
ness. He was employed in a meat market in Toledo,
Ohio, for two years, at the end of which time he
returned to Montana, and from 1900 to 1909 was
engaged in that business on his own account, and
meeting with splendid success. He then relinquished
that line and gave his attention to the breeding,
raising and buying of pure-bred cattle. In order to
properly conduct this business, which had prospered
from the beginning, Mr. Bohart bought from his
brother the old farm which his father had owned,
2^ miles north of Bozeman, and which comprises
280 acres of fine irrigated land. Mr. Bohart makes
a specialty of Brown Swiss and Guernsey cattle, and
because of the quality of the animals which he has
put on the market he has gained a reputation from
Ohio to the Pacific coast. In 1918, at the National
Dairy Show at Columbus, Ohio, Mr. Bohart exhib-
ited a full herd of Brown Swiss cattle, which won
three blue ribbons and many second and third prizes.
In 1919, at the Chicago National Dairy Show, his
cattle won all the blue and purple ribbons on bulls,
this being the first and only dairy herd from Mon-
tana to win these prizes. Besides his investment in
the stock farm, Mr. Bohart owns eighty acres of
city lots in Bozeman and 105 acres of land 3^ miles
southwest of Belgrade.
Politically Mr. Bohart is independent. Fraternally
he is a member of Bozeman Aerie No. 326, Fraternal
Order of Eagles; Eureka Homestead No. 415,
Brotherhood of American Yeomen ; and Bridger
Camp No. 62, Woodmen of the World.
In October, 1904. at Graham, Missouri, William
Othniel Bohart was married to Margaret E. John-
ston, daughter of W. E. and Mary (Robinson) John-
ston. The father, who was a prominent ranchman
and farmer at Graham, Missouri, died there. Mrs.
Bohart graduated from the high school at Graham
and from the Chillicothe (Missouri) Normal Col-
lege. Mr. and Mrs. Bohart have two children : Wil-
liam Peter, born May 15, 1906, and Katherine Olivia,
born January 21, 1909. Mr. Bohart has, because of
his fine personal qualities, his unassuming ways and
his wonderful success, won not only the admiration
of his fellow men, but their sincere esteem as well.
C. D. ScoviLL is known to thousands of automobile
owners in Southern Montana and along the Yellow-
stone Valley. He has been in the. garage business
for a number of years, formerly at Red Lodge and
now at Columbus.
Mr. Scovill was born at Dawson in Nemaha
County, Nebraska. March 16. 1879, and is Scotch
in the paternal line and German through his mother's
ancestry. His father, Oscar F. Scovill, was born in
Pennsylvania in 1846, and has spent his life in many
localities, and many times yielded to the urge of
adventure to seek new scenes. He grew up on the
Nebraska frontier, was a pioneer liveryman in
Nemaha County, and is now living retired at Potter,
Nebraska. He is a republican and an Odd Fellow
and for three years was with a Nebraska regiment
of infantry during the Civil war. He married Ollie
Shockey, who was born in Ne'maha County,
Nebraska, in 1861 and died in that county in 1900.
Their children were : Charles P., a barber in
Nebraska; C. D. Scovill; Tuddie B. and Ted, twins,
the former the wife of Harry Warner, a merchant
at Potter, Nebraska, and the latter a mechanic em-
ployed in his brother's garage at Columbus.
C. D. Scovill attended rural schools in Nemaha
County. Nebraska, and at the age of twelve became
self-supporting. For two years he worked on a farm
in Nemaha County and at the a.ge of fourteen gained
his first experience in business with a lumber and
hardware house at Nemaha. He began as yard man.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
421
was with the firm four years and the last two years,
was manager of the Edwards & Bradford Lumber
Company's plant at Nemaha. The headquarters of
this firm were at Sioux City, Iowa.
Mr. Scovill came to Montana in 1905, and at Boze-
man hired out for one season to a transportation
company, spending most of his time in the Yellow-
stone National Park. For another season he was on
construction work during the building of the short
line railroad to Belfry. He then moved to Red
Lodge, for nine months was employed by Olcott &
Nutting in their retail lumber business, and then
followed eight years of active connection with the
harness and saddlery business. He sold out that
business and built the Motor Inn at Red Lodge, the
first garage in that town. He sold the garage in the
fall of 1916 and then moved to Columbus, where he
built the Scovill Garage. This is a thoroughly
modern and complete plant, comprising a two-story
building 50x140 feet, and with a perfect service as
a garage. He also handles automobile accessories
and is local distributor for the Dodge, Reo and Buick
cars. _
Mr. Scovill is a republican and a member of Yel-
lowstone Lodge No. 85 of the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows at Columbus. He owns a modern home
in the town. He married at Red Lodge in igo6 Miss
Louise Kienitz, daughter of Michael and Wilhelmina
Kienitz, who live on a farm near Avoca, Wisconsin.
Mr. and Mrs. Scovill have four children : Harold,
born in June, 1907; Henry, born in 1912; Lois, born
in 1913; and Kenneth, born August 12, 1918.
Charles F. Rothwell, an old time Montana resi-
dent, long identified with the Yellowstone Valley, is
a business associate of Mr. C. D. Scovill in the
Scovill Garage at Columbus.
He was born in Kendall County, Illinois, June S,
1859, son of William H. and Hattie (Haywood)
Rothwell. His father was born at Manchester,
England, in 1833, came to the United States in early
manhood, was a farmer in Illinois, moved to the
vicinity of Grafton, Nebraska, in 1878, and finally
went to Booneville, ."Arkansas, where he lived for
twelve years and where he died in 191 1. He spent
all his active career as a farmer. He was a repub-
lican and a member of the Baptist Church. His
wife, who was born at Manchester, England, in
1843, is still living at Booneville, Arkansas. William
H. Rothwell and wife came to America on the same
ship and were married in Illinois.
Charles F. Rothwell attended rural schools in Ken-
dall County, Illinois, and lived on his father's farm
to the age of twenty-one. He was then in the loco-
motive works or shops of the Chicago & North-
western Railway at Chicago for three years, and in
1883 he arrived in Montana, taking his first employ-
ment from the Northern Pacific Railway Company
as a stationary engineer at Glendive. He was there
two years, and then went on the range as a cowboy.
He followed tliat interesting and arduous occupation
for fifteen years, chiefly in Custer County. He was
a merchant at Rosebud for two years until his store
was burned, and in 1897 he identified himself with
the Town of Columbus, where for ten years he was
a general merchant, and then in the furniture and
undertaking business until 1916, when he sold out and
has since been associated with Mr. Claude D, Scovill
in the garage business.
Mr. Rothwell has served as a member of the coun-
cil at Columbus, is secretary and treasurer of the
Columbus Cemetery Association, owns a modern
home in town and has other property interests in-
cluding a ranch of 160 acres on Pershing Creek. He
is a republican, and is affiliated with Yellowstone
Lodge No. 85 of the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows and Columbus Camp No. 7409 of the Mod-
ern Woodmen of America.
At the Crow Agency in Montana in 1891 Mr.
Rothwell married Miss Gertrude Steele, daughter of
W. H. and Mary (Selby) Steele, the former a car-
penter. Her parents reside at Sage Creek, Montana.
Mr. and Mrs. Rothwell have four children : Howe
C, who was born in 1893. is a civil engineer and is
now connected with the drainage works in the Lake
Basin and lives in Stillwater County; Bertha May,
wife of Wesley Blackaby, an electrician for the Mon-
tana Power Company, living at Columbus : Craig S.
and Helen, both high school students, the former in
school at Bozeman and the latter at Columbus.
John R. Movle. who came to Montana at the
age of seventeen, has had a varied and successful
business experience at Butte, and today is at the
head of one of the most complete general insurance
organizations in the entire state.
Mr. Moyle was born at Iron Mountain, Michigan,
June 5, 1885. He is of English ancestry. His
grandfather, William Moyle, spent all his life as
a farmer at Helseton, England, where he died at
the age of eighty years. The father of John R.
Moyle is William Moyle, Jr., who has been a
resident of Butte for many years. He was born
at Helseton, England, in 1849, was reared and edu-
cated in his native county, and in 1872 came to
America and for five years was a gold miner in
California. On returning east he first visited Butte
in 1877, remaining about a year. After that he
went to the Northern Peninsula of Michigan, was
a merchant at Calumet two years, and after that
did merchandising at Iron Mountain until 1902. He
then returned to Butte and was active as a mer-
chant in the city until 1917, and is now living prac-
tically retired. He is a republican, a member of the
Episcopal Church, and a former member of the In-
dependent Order of Odd Fellows. William Moyle
married Elizabeth Reynolds, who was born in Illi-
nois in 1859 and died at Iron Mountain, Michigan,
in 1891. Of their six children John R. is the
youngest. William, the oldest, is owner of a meat
market at Butte ; Bennett is in the insurance busi-
ness with his brother ; Libby is the wife of William
Temby, a farmer in the State of Washington ; Gar-
field died at the age of nineteen, and Mamie died
at the age of eight years.
John R. Moyle attended the grammar and high
schools of Iron Mountain through the sophomore
year in the latter, and at the same time acquired
a thorough knowledge of business, working in gro-
cery and meat marlcets. After coming to Butte
in 1902 he spent two years in the mercantile house
of P. J. Brophy Company, and in 1904 entered the
service of Andy Daum, superintendent of the West
Colusa Mine. He spent seven years with him,
learning the trade of carpenter and following that
employment at the mine. Mr. Moyle engaged in
the insurance business in 191 1 as state manager for
the North American Accident Insurance Company
of Chicago. While he still has the general agency
for that company, he has developed his business
along all the lines of general insurance, including
life, accident, health, automobile, bonds and also
real estate. Since 1917 Mr. Moyle has^ also been
a prominent figure in Montana mining circles. He
is president and one of the chief stockholders of
the Butte & Plutus Mining Company, operating in
the Butte district; is president and a large stock-
holder in the Scratch Awl Mining and Developmg
Company, operating at Philipsburg; and is presi-
dent and a stockholder in the Jefferson Mines Com-
pany, operating near Whitehall.
422
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr. Moyle's offices are in the Phoenix Building.
He owns a modern home at 1149 Caledonia Street
and much other local real estate. He is a republican.
a member of the Episcopal Church, and is affiliated
with Butte Lodge No. 240 of the Elks and the Silver
Bow Club.
In 1906, at Butte, he married Alice Montana Mas-
terson, daughter of John W. and Dessie (Davis)
Masterson. Her parents for the past ten years have
lived on their ranch at Henrys Lake, Montana. Her
father was a Butte pioneer and for many years an
engineer for the .Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany, and also an early lumberman. He is a veteran
of the Civil war and a member of the Grand Army.
Mrs. Moyle is a graduate of the Butte High School
and the Butte Business College. To their marriage
were born two children, Hallie Pauline in 1907, and
Dorothy Reynolds in 1909.
Rov E. A VERS, judge of the Tenth Judicial Dis-
trict, is enjoying honors and responsibilities fitly
bestowed in recognition of his capable services as a
lawyer at Lewistown during the past fifteen years.
Judge Ayers is a native son of Fergus County and
represents the second generation of Montana citizens.
He was born on his father's farm in Fergus County
November 9, 1882, a son of George W. and Mary
(Sullenger) Ayers. His father, who was born in
Keokuk County, Iowa, May 7, i860, has for many
years been a prominent ranchman in Montana. When
a small child he accompanied his parents overland
with ox teams and wagons to Oregon, grew up in
that state and received his education and had his
oarly experiences in stock ranching. He married in
Oregon Mary Sullenger, a native of that state. They
were married at Hepner. and Judge Ayers is the
oldest of their familv of three sons and three daugh-
ters. In 1882 George W. Ayers moved to Meagher
County, now Fergus County, Montana, homesteading
on Spring Creek, near where Lewistown now stands.
Here he accumulated extensive interests as a sheep
and cattle man, and the business is operated under
the name of the .Ayers Ranch Company. George W.
Ayers was made a Mason in Oregon, and is a char-
ter member of Lewistown Lodge No. 2,7, Ancient
Free and .Accepted Masons. He is also affiliated
witTi Lewistown Lodge No. 456, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks, and is a democrat in politics.
Judge Ayers acquired his early education in the
schools of Lewistown and studied law at Valparaiso
University, Valparaiso. Indiana, receiving his LL. B.
degree with the class of 1903. He was admitted to
the Indiana bar the same year, and on the 15th of
November received the privileges of an attorney in
Montana. The following year he was chosen to
the office of county attorney of Fergus County, and
by re-election in 1906 served two terms. After that
he engaged in a general practice until called to the
duties of judge of the Tenth Judicial District in
1912. He is now serving his second term, having
been re-elected in 1916. Judge Ayers was admitted
to the United States Circuit and District courts in
1905. Outside of his office his chief interest is in the
Ayers Ranch Company at Grass Range. This com-
pany operates a ranch of 5.000 acres. Judge .Ayers
is affiliated with Lewistow^n Lodge No. 456 of the
Elks, and with Judith Lodge No. 30 of the Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows. Politically he fol-
lows his father in the democratic party.
June 7, 190.1, he married Miss Ellen Simpson, who
was born in Bozeman, Montana. Their three chil-
dren are also natives of Montana, named Eleanor,
Arthur and Roy Don.
George C. J.\ckson has been one of the useful
men in the service of the .Anaconda Copper Alining
Company for a number of years. He is now chief
clerk of the accounting department at .Anaconda.
Mr. Jackson is an expert accountant and thoroughly
trained business man. He also spent about a year
in the service of his country in the Philippines, and
during the late war gave not only of his means
according to his abilities, but also a large portion of
his time to various patriotic causes.
Mr. Jackson was born at El Dorado, California,
January 8, 1872. His ancestors were Scotch-Irish
who settled in Boston, Massachusetts, about 17.SI,
and later became actively engaged in the Revolu-
tionary war. His great-grandfather, Lyman Jack-
son, entered the service as captain of minute men
and advanced to the rank of brigadier general be-
fore the close of the war. His grandfather,
Ebenezer Jackson, was born in Boston and became
an early merchant and farmer in New York State,
in Chautauqua County, where he died. He was a
soldier in the War of 1812. His wife was Betsey
Pringle. descendant of Sir John Pringle of Edin-
burgh University, who earned distinction as a
physician.
Julius D. Jackson, father of George C, was born
in New York State in 1821, and spent his early life
there. .About 1852 he went via Panama to California,
and lived in that state the rest of his life. He and
his brother Charles P. were engaged in the banking
business in the early days. Later he was superin-
tendent of an irrigating ditch company at Placer-
ville. and held that post until his death in 1880. He
married at El Dorado Miss Mary .A. Coulter, who
was born in Frederickton, New Brunswick, Canada,
in 1841, and died at Anaconda, Montana, May 29,
1918. Julius Jackson was a democrat in politics, a
member of the Masonic fraternity and the Episcopal
Church. He and his wife had three children, Julius,
the oldest, dying at the age of five vears. Ogden is
a real estate and insurance man at Woodland, Cali-
fornia.
George C. Jackson, the youngest, was educated in
the public schools of Placerville, California, and
after his father's death he went to St. Paul, Minne-
sota, graduating from the high school of that city in
1880. For one year he clerked in a wholesale house,
and then entered the accounting department of the
Northern Pacific Railway at St. Paul. In i8q8 he
resigned to enlist in the Thirteenth Minnesota Regi-
ment of Volunteers and was sent to the Philippines,
where he served during the Spanish war and later
helped put down the Filipino insurrection in those
islands. He was mustered out with the grade of
sergeant in 1899, and on returning to St. Paul re-
sumed his connections with the Northern Pacific
Railway in the accounting department. After his
return 'from the Philippines he was commissioned a
first lieutenant in the National Guard by the gov-
ernor of Minnesota.
Mr. Jackson came to Anaconda January i, looi,
and since that time has been steadily in the service
of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company. He was
in the supply department when the Washoe Reduc-
tion Works were being constructed, and has been
given various increased responsibilities until ap-
pointed to his present office as chief clerk in the
general office building of the Washoe Reduction
Works, two miles east of Anaconda.
Mr. Jackson is a republican voter, and in 1919 and
1920 served as State Central Committeeman from
Deer Lodge County. He is a vestryman of the
Episcopal Church at Anaconda, and is affiliated with
Anaconda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent and Protective
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Order of Elks, and is a member of the Anaconda
Club, was treasurer in 1918-19 of the Rotary Club
and is a member of the Anaconda Country Club.
He is a member of the Anaconda School Board,
having been appointed in 1918 and in April, 1919,
elected for a three year term. Mr. Jackson owns a
modern home at 422 West Third Street and also has
some real estate in Missoula.
In June, 1904. at Lawrence, Kansas, he married
Miss Clara R. Jaedicke, daughter of Frederick W.
and Otelia Jaedicke, both now deceased. Her father
for many years was a prominent hardware merchant
at Lawrence. Mrs. Jackson is a graduate of the
Lawrence High School and attended the University
of Kansas at Lawrence. To their marriage were
born two children, George Frederick, born Septem-
ber 22, 1908; and Elizabeth Virginia, born July 8,
1912.
During the war Mr. Jackson had an active part in
his home community in promoting subscriptions to
the Liberty Loans, the War Chest fund, was chair-
man of the Executive Committee of the Red Cross,
was county director for Deer Lodge County in the
sales of the War Savings Stamps, and was also a
four-minute speaker and a member of the Board of
Instruction of the Selective draft. His district stood
among the very first in Montana in respect to the
sales of War Savings Stamps.
Robert D. Alton, M. D. One of the best equipped
medical college graduates of his day. Doctor Alton
chose as the scene of his professional career a. com-
paratively new community in Montana. He arrived
at Livingston in 1883, and in that one town has
practiced for over thirty-five years. In point of
years of continuous service he is now the oldest
physician and surgeon in Livingston, and is one of
the best known medical men in the state.
Doctor Alton was born at Carbondale, Pennsyl-
vania, February 9, i860. His paternal ancestors
came out of England and settled in Massachusetts in
colonial times. The ancestor who came from Eng-
land afterward served with the Continental army in
the struggle for independence. Doctor Alton's
grandfather, Davis Alton, was a native of Massa-
chusetts and when a young man traveled from his
native state with wagon and ox teams to LeRoy,
Xew York, and became a farmer there. He died
before the birth of his grandson Doctor Alton. The
father of the latter was Davis Alton, born at LeRoy,
New York, in 1828. He was reared in his native
town, was a graduate of Williams College at Wil-
liamstown, Massachusetts, and spent his active career
as an attorney at law at Pittston, Pennsylvania,
where he married. At the beginning of the Civil
war in 1861 he enlisted with a Pennsylvania Regi-
ment of Infantry, and it was the hardships and ex-
posures of a soldier's life which shortened his career.
He died at Sandusky. Ohio, in 1867, before he was
forty years of age. He was a member of the Episco-
pal Church. Major Davis Alton married Helen
Caroline Williams, who was born in Massachusetts
in 1830. She had two sons, Jesse Williams and
Robert D. With these sons soon after her husband's
death she removed to Cleveland, Ohio, in order to
give them better educational advantages. The older
son, Jesse, died at Cleveland, where he was a manu-
facturer. The mother finally came to Livingston,
Montana, and died in this city in 1887.
Doctor Alton graduated from the Cleveland High
School in 1878, and completed his undergraduate
studies in medicine at the Western Reserve Univer-
sitv. He graduated in 1881, and spent the following
year as an interne in St. Vincent's Hospital at Cleve-
land. Since then he has taken a number of post-
graduate courses, attending the Chicago Polyclinic
several times, and in 1899 took special work in dis-
eases of the eye at London, England.
He came to Livingston in 1883. For a number of
years he- was local surgeon for the Northern Pacific
Railway, finally resigning that position in order to
devote all his time to his private practice. His
offices are in the Miles-Krohni Building, and he also
owns a modern home at 119 South Yellowstone
Street. Doctor Alton is a Fellow of the Arnerican
Medical Association, and is also identified with the
County and State Medical Society. He served on
the Livingston School Board three terms, is a repub-
lican, a member of the Episcopal Church, and affi-
liated with Livingston Lodge No. 32 of the Masonic
Order. Doctor Alton owns 160 acres of farm land
east of Livingston. He is a stockholder in the
U. S. National Bank at Portland, Oregon.
In 1888. at Hutchinson, Kansas, he married Miss
Anna Mintie, a daughter of F". L. and Eleanor
(Russell) Mintie. Her parents are deceased. Her
father came to Livingston in 1883 and was a pioneer
lumber dealer in the city, but in 1886 removed to
Hutchinson, Kansas, and was in the grain business
there. Mrs. Alton is a graduate of St. Mary's Semi-
nary at Fairibault, Minnesota. Doctor and Mrs.
Alton have one son. Robert M., who is a graduate
lawyer from the University of Michigan, and has his
law practice at Portland, Oregon. He enlisted in
May, 1917, and went overseas in October, 1918. Dur-
ing a considerable part of the war he was personnel
adjutant with the Eighth Division and held the rank
of major.
Charles S. Truax. To the ordinary man per-
haps a very smaU portion of the adventures and ac-
tivities that have been developing elements in the
life of Charles S. Truax, now mayor of the City of
Lima, Montana, would seem sufficient as experience.
Thrown on his own resources when twelve years
old. the seventh member in a large family where
worldly goods were not abundant, he had no in-
fluential friends to advance him. He had, however,
endowments of courage, persistence and faith in
himself from his sturdy old Holland ancestry. These
have carried him through to financial independence,
personal esteem and political honors.
Charles S. Truax was born at Baraboo. Wiscon-
sin, February 2, i8,S7. His parents were W. D. and
Sarah (Gibbons) Truax, the former of whom was'
born in 1830, in Vermont, and died at Marblerock,
Floyd County, Iowa, in 1897, and the latter, born in
England, In 1837, died at Breckenridge. Minnesota,
in 1912. The father of Mr. Truax came to Wiscon-
sin when a young man, and at Waterford in that
state was married to Sarah Gibbons, who had ac-
companied her parents from England in 1840. She
was reared and educated well in Michigan. To this
marria.ge the following children were born : Cynthia,
who resides at Cedar Rapids, Iowa, married first
Luke Knapp. and second a Mr. Miller, who is also
deceased ; John H., who lives in Iowa, is a black-
smith by trade; Sarah, who died young; W. E.. who
was a physician and surgeon, died at San Diego,
California; May, who died in Iowa in 1894. was the
wife of Reverend Baldwin, a Methodist minister,
also deceased; Laura, who is the wife of ?ilr. Van
Anthrop. a cabinetmaker at Williston, North Da-
kota; Charles S., who is the only member of the
family in Montana; Emma, who is the wife of
Wilson Pearsall, a rancher near Spokane, Washing-
ton ; Clara, who is deceased ; W. A., who is a ranch-
man in California; Bert, who died when young:
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Nellie, who is the wife of Casper Thein, auditor of
the Northern Pacific Railway, lives at St. Paul,
Minnesota ; and Maggie, who is deceased.
After marriage the parents of Mayor Truax set-
tled at Baraboo, Wisconsin, where the father was
the pioneer blacksmith. He had gone over the plains
with ox teams in search of gold in California, but
was taken sick and after a year of mining returned
to Wisconsin by way of the Panama route, not hav-
ing met with much success as a prospector. In 1864
he moved to Marblerock, Iowa, and there worked at
his trade during the rest of his life. He was a demo-
crat in politics and a member of the Masonic fraterri-
ity. He .was always very proud of the fact that his
was an old American family of Holland descent, his
ancestors coming to New York with Peter Stuvesant.
Charles S. Truax's school days ended when he was
twelve years old. He then left home and went to
Sioux City, Iowa, where he hired out as a cabin
boy on a steamboat called The Miner, which oper-
ated between Sioux City and Fort Benton. He
worked through the season and then went into the
Wisconsin woods and worked in lumber camps for
three seasons. After coming West he drove a
freight team at Omaha, Nebraska, for a season, then
went back home for a visit. Finding no favorable
business opening in the home village, he once more
turned his face westward. He reached Kansas in the
year following the grasshopper invasion and as the
next season proved one of great drouth he decided
after a trial of eighteen months at farming that he
would turn his attention to something else.
In 1878 he drove a team from Beloit. Kansas, to
Denver, Colorado, in which city he sold his team
and went to Gunnison, during the gold excitement,
did some prospecting there and found work in a saw-
mill making railroad ties. In thf fall of 1879 he
returned to Denver, went from there to Golden,
Colorado, and at that place worked for eighteen
months in the smelter, following which for a year
he operated a dairy. Then began his connection
with railroading, and he was a fireman on the Union
Pacific until the fall of 1884, when he was trans-
ferred from Denver to Eagle Rock on the Utah
Northern in Idaho, arriving there December 26, 1884.
On January i, 1885, he came into Montana, stopping
at the division point called Spring Hill, now the City
of Lima, of which he is the mayor and a prominent
citizen. He continued to work for the railroad as
a locomotive engineer until 1909. He then bought
the Peat Hotel at Lima, which is the leading hotel
in this section of Beaverhead County, and has con-
tinuously conducted it ever since with the exception
of five years when he lived at Portland, Oregon,
where he owns a fine modern residence. He also has
a dwelling house at Lima and a valuable ranch
located one and a half miles from the citv.
On .-Vpril 14, 1878, Mayor Truax was united in
marriage to Miss Francelia Russell, at Marblerock.
Iowa. Mrs. Truax died June 14, 1914, at Portland,
Oregon. She was a daughter of William and Maria
(Srnith) Russell, the former of whom was an ex-
tensive farmer in Iowa and in Kansas and died near
Beloit in Mitchell County, Kansas. Four children
were born to Mr. and Mrs. Truax, as follows: L.
H., who is a graduate of the Montana Normal Col-
lege at Dillon, Montana, is a resident of Lima and is
proprietor of the leading garage in southern Beaver-
head County; Daniel, who died at the age of
eighteen months ; Grace C, who is a graduate of the
Montana Normal College, has been a stenographer
in the assessor's office at Dillon since her return from
Washington City, where she spent seven months
working for the government during the World war ;
and Cora, who was educated in the Montana Normal
College, died at Portland, Oregon, when aged but
twenty-one years.
Always a democrat in politics, Mr. Truax has
served his party faithfully. In April, 1918, he was
elected mayor of Lima. He is very active in the
order of Knights of Pythias, is past chancellor com-
mander of Delta Lodge and is a member of the
Grand Lodge of the order in Montana.
P.\TRICK J. Brophy. An imposing list of achieve-
ments representing real success in business and cit-
izenship might be compiled as an incident to Patrick
J. Brophy's forty years of residence in Montana.
Mr. Brophy, who came to Montana territory in
1881, was born in County Carlow, Ireland, August
5, 1855, son of Thomas and Johanna (Walsh)
Brophy. His father spent his long life as an Irish
farmer. He was born in 1808 and died in 1879.
His mother died in 1903, at the age of eighty-six.
One of nine children Patrick J. Brophy acquired
a high school education and served a mercantile
apprenticeship before leaving Ireland. At the age
of twenty-one in 1876 he came to this country, and
after a year in Chicago came to the Northwest and
for three years worked in a store at Evanston,
Wyoming. He arrived at Butte in February, 1881,
and soon afterward formed a partnership with
George H. Casey under the name Casey & Brophy.
After Mr. Casey withdrew in 1888 the business was
conducted as P. J. Brophy & Company until 1906,
in which year incorporation papers were taken out,
the capital stock being fixed at $50,000. Mr. Brophy
remained as president of the corporation, but re-
tired from the active management. During the
long period of years when he was sole owner of
the business the firm became well known all over
Montana and adjacent states for its extensive busi-
ness as wholesale and importing grocers. In Mon-
tana business history there is no name more closely
associated with integrity, credit, substantial achieve-
ment and success than that of Brophy.
In later years Mr. Brophy has given much of
his time and attention to placer mining in Lincoln
County, Montana, where he has been one of the
active executive officials of the Libby Placer Mining
Company. During the past thirty odd years Mr.
Brophy has frequently wielded an important in-
fluence in the affairs of the democratic party of
his home state. He served as president of the
Butte Business Men's Association in 1910-11, for
eight years was a member of the Butte School
Board,' and is a member of the Silver Bow Club,
Butte Country Club, Ancient Order of Hibernians
and Knights of Columbus. He is a stanch Catholic
and his family are of the same faith.
At Joliet, Illinois, in January, 1893, Mr. Brophy
married Miss Margaret D'Arcy. She died at Butte
in 1902, survived by three sons. Mr. Brophy mar-
ried for his second wife Miss Mary E. Ryan, a
native of Canada.
As a business man and citizen Mr. Brophy can
rest content with his individual experiences and
achievements, and he also has that added sense of
satisfaction that comes from the knowledge that
every one of his three sons did their part as pa-
triots when the country was engaged in war. His
oldest son, Thomas D'Arcy Brophy. who was born
at Butte in October, 1893, finished the course at
Gonzaga College in Spokane, Washington, and
later took the architectural course at the Massachu-
setts Institute of Technology, commonly known as
the Boston "Tech," graduating therefrom with spe-
cial honors in 1917. He is now Maj. Thomas
D'.\rcy Brophy of the Coast Artillery Reserve.
John A. Brophy, the second son, was born at Butte
HISTORY OF MONTANA
425
June 13, 189s, graduated with the A. B. degree in
1914 from Gonzaga College, entered the second offi-
cers' training camp in August, 1917, at the Presidio.
California, was commissioned second lieutenant, and
served with the Twenty-First Infantry at Camp
Taliaferro and Kearney. He was promoted to first
lieutenant in July, 1918, and after a service of two
years resigned in August, 1919, and is now taking a
course in agriculture at the University of Wiscon-
sin. The third and youngest son, Patrick J., Jr.,
born in April, 1899. was only eighteen when the war
with Germany broke out, and he was also with
the colors. He is now a student in the Tome School
at Port Deposit, Maryland.
Frederick William C.«rick Whyte. general
manager of the coal department of the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company, is a man of wide business
experience and knowledge of his special line of en-
deavor. He was born at Biggar, Scotland, July 27,
1863, a son of Robert Whyte, who was born at Kin-
nesswood, Scotland, in 1829, and died at Buenos
Ayres, South America, when his son Frederick W. C.
Whyts was a baby. Growing up in Scotland, Robert
Whyte became a wool merchant, and it was on a
business trip to South America in 1863 that his death
occurred. Like the majority of his countrymen, he
was a rigid Presbyterian. The maiden name of his
wife was Catharine Carrick, and she was born at
Glasgow, Scotland, in 1831, and died at Petrograd,
Russia, in 1909. Their children were as follows:
Marion Dunn, who was born in Scotland, died there
in 1898, never having been married ; John Livingston,
who was born in 1859, died at Great Falls, Montana,
in 1908. is buried there, and during his life held
clerical positions ; Jane Elizabeth, who married Alex-
ander Sokoloff. lives at Petrograd, Russia, although
the family have lost track of her during the revolu-
tion in that country, in which conflict her husband, a
Russian ofiicer, was killed ; and Frederick W. C.
Whyte, whose name heads this review.
Growing up under his mother's care, Frederick W.
C. Whyte attended the public schools of Bridge of
Allan and at Stirling, Scotland, and was graduated
from the high school of the latter city. At the age
of fifteen years he was apprenticed to Johnstones &
Rankine, civil and mining engineers in Glasgow,
where he remained from 1878 until 1883, and then
from 1883 to 1885 was assistant engineer to his
former preceptors. For the subsequent year he was
an engineer in the office of public works of Glasgow.
Scotland, and then between 1886 and 1887 he was
assistant engineer in the office of Johnstones & Ran-
kine. In February, 1887, he severed his connections
with his native land and set sail for the United
States, and spent the time between March, when he
landed, until June, 1887, in New Mexico, but in the
latter month came to Montana.' and, locating at
Helena, engaged with the Great Northern Railroad
Company as assistant engineer on the construction
work then in progress, being thus occupied until July,
1892, except a short time with the Woolston Com-
pany, which had the contract for the construction of
the Helena Water Works. In the meanwhile Mr.
Whyte spent some months now and then in prospect-
ing, learning much about the deposits of the state.
From July, 1892, to June, 1894, he was chief engineer
of the construction work of the Butte-Anaconda &
Pacific Railroad, and then in order to gain a knowl-
edge of the resources of Montana from a new angle
he was on a sheep ranch from June, 1894, until July,
1895, in the Sweet Grass hills of Montana, of which
he was part owner. Once more he returned to his
profession, and from July, 1895, until 1896, was en-
gineer in charge of the construction at the Belt Coal
Mine of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, and
displayed such an intimate and practical knowledge
of this line of work that in 1896 he was placed in
charge of the coal department of the company, and
has held that position ever since, having now six
mines under his supervision, or all operated by the
corporation, and 1,000 men. His offices are in the
general office building of the Anaconda Copper Min-
ing Company's reduction plant two miles east_ of
Anaconda. He is an independent democrat, and is a
member of the State Board of Examiners for state
coal mine inspectors and has held this office for six
years. He affiliates with the Episcopal Church of
Anaconda, but was reared a Presbyterian. For the
past twenty years he has been a member of the Mod-
ern Woodmen of America, and he belongs to the
American Institute of Mining & Metallurgical En-
gineers, the Montana Society of Engineers, and the
Montana Coal Operators .Association, of which iie
has been president for the past ten years. The
pleasant, modern residence at No. 207 West Seventh
Street, Anaconda, occupied by the Whyte family, is
their property.
In March, 1892, Mr. Whyte was married to Miss
Sarah Adeliza Crichton, a daughter of William and
Adeliza (Hopkinson) Crichton, both of whom are
now deceased. Mr. Crichton was in the live stock
business at Haddington, Scotland. Mr. and Mrs.
Whyte have one son, Keith Carrick, who was born
October 21, 1897. He is taking a course in electrical
engineering at Cornell University, Ithaca, New
York. Mr. Whyte is one of the solid men of Ana-
conda, where he has resided for so many years
that he has been one of those responsible for its
development. Sound in his judgments, his advice is
sought and taken by his associates, and he is recog-
nized as one of the most capable men of his great
corporation.
- John W. Schofield was formerly connected with
the United States Bureau of Fisheries at Bozeman,
and resigned his position there to become local agent
at Bozeman for the Henningsen Produce Company.
Mr. Schofield was born at Alexandria, Virginia,
June 25, 1892, and passed his years until he came to
Montana practically in sight of the national capital.
His grandfather was born in Scotland in 1835, came
to America when a young man, was manager of a
large cotton mill near Baltimore, Maryland, and
afterward had charge of a similar mill at Alexandria,
Virginia, where he died in 1907. D. W. Schofield,
father of the young Bozeman business man, was
born in Maryland in 1858, grew up there, but since
early manhood has lived at Alexandria, Virginia,
where he is a wholesale grocer. He is a democrat
and is senior deacon of the First Baptist Church of
Alexandria and one of its chief members. He is
a past grand of the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. D. W. Schofield married Evelyn Franks, who
was born at Alexandria in i860. Of their four chil-
dren John W. is the youngest. Mary Mercer, the
oldest, is the wife of B. C. Watkins, proprietor of a
large nursery business at Midlothian, Virginia. C. M.
Schofield enlisted in June, 1917. was sent overseas
with the Ambulance Corps in Section No. 584, and
saw active duty at the front until as a result of shell
shock he was sent home and placed in the hospital at
Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana. Lucy Virginia,
the third of the family, is living with her parents at
Alexandria.
John W. Schofield attended the public schools of
Alexandria, and completed his junior year in a high
school at Washington, D. C. Leaving school in igio,
he spent four years learning the trade of machinist
at Alexandria, and worked as a journeyman for one
426
HISTORY OF MONTANA
year. He was then in a real estate business until
February, 1917. when he came to Bozeman in the
service of the United States Bureau of Fisheries. In
February, 1919, he resigned and became local agent
for the Henningsen Produce Company, which is one
of the largest produce companies in the Northwest,
with headquarters at Butte and branch houses in
many towns and cities.
Mr. Schofield is a democrat, a member of the
Baptist Church, is affiliated with Bozeman Lodge
No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
and with Seminole Wigwam No. 35, Improved Order
of Red Men at Alexandria. He is unmarried and
makes his home in the Y. M. C. A. Building at Boze-
man.
James M. Noves. In so many instances the same
spirit which brought the venturesome from the sea-
board states along the Atlantic to thfe then wild
lands of Ohio and Indiana, prompted their sons to
journey a little further West, and their grandsons
to take up the line of march toward the setting sun.
A review of the lives of the majority of those who
are making history for Montana and other of the
Western states proves this, and also shows that other
desirable characteristics of the pioneers of years
ago have been inherited as well as that of the reach-
ing forth into new territory. James M. Noyes, city
treasurer of Billings, is a striking instance of this,
for he not only comes of a pioneer father, but his
grandfather came into Indiana at a very early day
in its history from one of the Eastern states and be-
came a tavern keeper at Manchester, Dearborn Coun-
ty, his old fashioned hostelry being located on an old
road between Lawrenceburg and Indianapolis. Here
he rounded out a long and useful life, dying a highly
respected resident of Manchester.
James M. Noyes was born in Southern Indiana, in
the woods seventeen miles south of Madison, Julv 22.
1858, a son of Israel Noyes. The latter was born in
Pennsylvania in 1834, and there grew to manhood.
He came to Ripley County, Indiana, at a time when
pioneer conditions prevailed, and securing unde-
veloped land, cleared it off and made of it one of the
best farms in his neighborhood, and here he is still
residing. He is a republican, having lived through
the birth and growth of that party. The Methodist
Episcopal Church holds his membership, and re-
ceives his hearty support both of money and personal
effort. After coming to Ripley Countv, Indiana, Mr.
Noyes was united in marriage with Isabella Perdue,
born in Ripley County in 1844, and she died on the
homestead in 1874, having borne her husband the
following children: James M., whose name heads
this review; Leander, who died at the age of twelve
years; Mattie, who married a Mr. Williams, a farmer
and blacksmith, lives in Ripley Count}' ; Charles, who
is an Illinois farmer; Cora, who died at the age of
sixteen years ; and Anna, who married a physician
and moved to one of the Southern states. After the
death of his first wife Israel Noyes was married
second to Harriet Perdue, a sister of the first Mrs.
Noyes, and she died shortly afterward, leaving no
issue. As his third wife Israel Noyes married Bettie
Hyatt, who was born in 1849 in Ripley County, In-
diana, and they had children as follows : Emma,
who married a Mr. Kenneth, a farmer, lives in Dear-
born County, Indiana; Elmer, who resides on the
homestead in Ripley County; and William, who is a
farmer of Ripley County.
Until he was nineteen years old James M. Noyes
remained at home alternating attendance at the local
schools with farm work, but at that time he left the
parental roof and spent a year in Missouri in farm
labor. Returning to Ripley County, he was employed
in a sawmill for a year, and then went West, going
first to York County, Nebraska, where from i88i to
1883 he was employed on a farm. For the subse-
quent six years he was engaged in a coal business
at Geneva, Nebraska, but sold it to go into the hotel
business in that city, in which he continued until
1893. In that year he became proprietor of the Ash-
land, Nebraska, Hotel, and conducted it until 1897,
when he sold his interests and moved to Sheridan,
Wyoming, and that city continued his home until
1901. From 1901 to 1904 Mr. Noyes was proprietor
of the Wymore, Nebraska, Hotel, but sold it in the
latter year, and going to Kansas City, Missouri,
conducted a restaurant there for two years. During
1906 Mr. Noyes came to Montana, and locating at
Marshall River, Yellowstone County, helped to build
106 miles of the Milwaukee Railroad, and continued
his railroad construction work at New Ontario, in
the extreme northern part of Canada, assisting in
laying 150 miles of the government railroad, and
remaining there from October, 1907, to April, 1908.
In the latter year he came to Billings, which has
since continued his home. Upon his arrival in this
city he embarked in a cigar business under the name
of the Billings Cigar Company, and conducted it
until 1913, when he became associated with the
United States Telephone Company, leaving it in 1915
to once more go into the cigar business, which he
sold in 1917 to devote all his attention to the duties
of the office of city treasurer of Billings, to which
he had been elected on the republican ticket, his
office now being in the City Hall. He had already
had experience as a public official, as he had served
as a member of the City Council of Gevena, Ne-
braska. In former years he was a member of the
order of Elks, but no longer maintains his connection
with that fraternity.
In 1880 Mr. Noyes was united in marriage with
Miss Laura L. Lane, born at Madison, Indiana,
where the wedding ceremony was performed. Mr.
and Mrs. Noyes have the following children : Carrie,
who is Mrs. Benjamin Reynolds, is a widow, her
husband having been a railroad contractor, who died
leaving her with the following children, Mary Louise,
Caroline, Tyler and Benjamin; Anna, who married
Lon Button, a music teacher, lives at Billings and
has one child, Anna; Louise, who died in March,
1917, aged twenty-eight years, married Frank Allen,
associated with the Thompson Lumber Company,
and since her death he lives with Mr. Noyes, and has
one daughter, Louise ; James L., who is mentioned
below ; and Horace, who is also mentioned below.
James L. Noyes enlisted for service during the Great
war in the aviation branch, December i, IQ17, and
was mustered out a sergeant at Hampton. Virginia,
in February, 1919. Returning to Billings, Montana,
he entered the employ of the Billings Hardware
Company. Horace Noyes is another of the young
men of' Billings who enlisted at the call of their
country during the Great war, on the same day as
his brother, and he too was mustered out as a ser-
geant at Hampton, Virginia. Upon his return to
P5illings, his services were secured by the Stone,
Ordean, Wells Company as city salesman.
During all of his changes in location and business
Mr. Noyes has ever displayed the same enthusiasm
for his work which made him successful at the be-
ginning of his career, and at the same time he culti-
vated his talent for making and retaining friends.
-fMways interested in civic matters, since coming to
Billings he has paid special attention to local politics,
and his election to his present office was a happy
choice on the part of his constituents, and the record
he is making indicates that other honors will prob-
ably be offered him, for he possesses those qualities
MxaZ^T-T^-i^^ M X).
HISTORY OF MONTANA
427
which enable a man to give the public efficient
service.
S. E. Dodge, general manager and a director of
the Park Milling Company at Livingston, is an ag-
gressive young business man with a veteran's ex-
perience in the flour milling and grain business, and
acquired his active experience in the northwestern
states of Minnesota and Montana.
Mr. Dodge was born in Waseca County, Minne-
sota, September 9, 1881. His paternal ancestors
came originally from England and were early set-
tlers in Pennsylvania. His father, D. J, Dodge, was
born in New York State in 1846. When a boy he
was taken to Waseca County, Minnesota, grew up
there, and was a youthful soldier in the Civil war.
He was a farmer and for many years engaged in
the hardware business in Waseca County and since
1917 has lived retired at Minneapolis. At one time
he represented Waseca County in the Legislature,
for two terms was county treasurer, was clerk of
court three terms, altogether twelve years, and, as
these offices indicate was one of the most promi-
nent men of affairs in that county. Politically he
is a republican, is very much interested in the Epis-
copal Church, and is a Mason. D. J. Dodge married
Flora E. Long, who was born in 1852. Their oldest
child, Harley, died in infancy. Edith is a trained
nurse with home in Milwaukee, and for two years
during the World war was an army nurse in France.
Ethel is the wife of D. C. Cordry, who is division
sales manager at Minneapolis for Marshall Field
& Company of Chicago. Myra lives with her parents
and is cashier for the Thorpe Company of Min-
neapolis. The next in age is S. E. Dodge. Flora
is unmarried and is assistant cashier of the Twenty-
sixth Street State Bank at Minneapolis.
S. E. Dodge as a boy attended the rural schools
of his native county and in 1898 graduated from the
Janesville High School. The following three years
he worked with the County State Bank at Janes-
ville, but since that time his experience has been
almost altogether in the flour milling industry. He
spent nine years with the Winnebago Flour Mill of
Winnebago, Minnesota, beginning as bookkeeper
and being promoted to assistant manager. For three
years he was sales manager of the Chippewa Mill-
ing Company at Montevidio, Minnesota, and then
became sales manager of the Crescent Milling Com-
pany at Fairfax, Minnesota, remaining there three
years.
Mr. Dodge came to Livingston in the fall of 1917.
The Park Milling Company in which he is a stock-
holder and director, as well as manager of the
mills, was organized in December, 1916, and operates
on a capital of $50,000. The company has a modern
equipped mill with a capacity for 200 barrels daily,
also has a large elevator, and the industry serves
to convert much of the hard wheat raised around
Livingston into products ready for consumption.
The head of the company is J. M. Darroch, president,
a resident of Spokane, Washington. The vice presi-
dent is H. B. Futter, a ranch owner in the Shields
Valley. F. B. Holcomb, of Livingston, is secretary
and treasurer.
Mr. Dodge is a republican, and is a vestryman
in the Episcopal Church at Livingston. He is af-
filiated with the Lodge of Masons at Fairfax, Min-
nesota, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks
at Willmar in that state, and is a member of the
Rotary Club of Livingston, and the Livingston Cham-
ber of Commerce. He resides at 319 North Main
Street. In 1916 he married at Chicago Miss Anna
Bradke, a daughter of .August and Carolina (Schultz)
Bradke. Her parents are retired farmers living at
Maxwell, Iowa.
John William Brophy, M. D. A Butte phy-
sician and surgeon whose skill and attainments are
readily recognized. Doctor Brophy is member of
an old Irish family, several of whom are repre-
sented in Montana, and before taking up the study
of medicine he was employed in a business capacity
in Butte.
Doctor Brophy was born in County Carlow, Ire-
land, April I, 1885. His grandfather, Thomas
Brophy, was born in l8o8 and died in 1879, spending
his entire life as a farmer in Ireland. He married
Johanna Walsh, a native of Wexford County, who
died in 1903 at the age of eighty-six. They were
the parents of nine children, one of whom is Pat- ,
rick J. Brophy, a Montana business man for over
thirty years.
James Brophy, father of Doctor Brophy, was
born in County Carlow in 1850 and spent his life
there in the quiet vocation of farming. He died in
December, 1885. He was a member of the Na-
tionalist party, the Catholic church, and the Land
League. He married Elizabeth Nourse, who was
born in County Carlow in 1845 and died there in
1910. Of their children Doctor Brophy was the
youngest. Thomas, the oldest, is a farmer in County
"Carlow; James has long been a resident of Butte,
connected with commission houses and in the auto-
mobile business ; Patrick is a farmer in County
Carlow ; and Joanna is the wife of Sylvester Bourke,
a farmer in County Wicklow, Ireland.
Doctor Brophy was educated in the country
schools and the Christian Brothers School of County
Carlow, and received the equivalent of a high school
education in St. Mary's Seminary at Carlow. In
1909 he graduated with the A. B. degree from the
Royal University of Ireland at Dublin, and very
soon afterward came to the United States and lo-
cated at Butte. For one year he was employed by
the Hennessy Company, for another year taught
Latin in the Mount St. Charles College at Helena,
and then entered the Medical Department of Creigh-
ton University in Nebraska, where he took the reg-
ular course and graduated M. D. in 1915. This
was followed by a period of intensive training in
St. Joseph's Hospital at Denver, where he spent
fifteen months as an interne. On returning to
Butte he was for one year a member of the staff
of St. James Hospital, and in July, 1917. accepted
an appointment to the staff of the Montana State
Hospital for the Insane at Warm Springs. Doctor
Brophy returned to Butte and engaged in a gen-
eral practice as a physician and surgeon in June,
1919. His offices are in the Phoenix Building. He
is a member of the Silver Bow Medical Society, the
State Medical Society, is a Fellow of the American
Medical .Association and a member of the American
Medical Psychological .Association.
Doctor Brophy, who is unmarried and resides in
the Curtis Hotel at 21 West Park Street, is a dem-
ocrat, a member of the Catholic Church, is a third
degree Knight of Columbus, being affiliated with
Helena Council No. 844, and is also a member of
the Knights of the Maccabees of the World and
the Fraternal Brotherhood.
Ira D. Franklin. Self-made men deserve more
credit for what they accomplish in life than those
whose prosperity is the result of inherited wealth
or the outcome of technical knowledge supplied by
collegiate training. One of the advantages of this
country, and one that is emphasized in its Western
states, is that no height is too high for the ambi-
tious, hard-working lad to aim for, and to the credit
of those who have their own way to make be it said
that a very large percentage not only reach but pass
the goal of their youthful hopes. One of these
HISTORY OF MONTANA
men who owes all he today owns and is to his per-
sonal sturdiness and faithful endeavors is Ira U.
Franklin, proprietor of the "F-Bar-W ' Ranigi on the
Little Powder River, who came to Montana as a
runaway lad of twelve years, and has since made
this state his home and the field of his operations.
Ira D Franklin was born at Canton, Minnesota,
September i", 1874, a son of John Demster and
Celia Maude (Stevens) Franklin. John U. frank-
lin was born in New York State, his father being a
canal boatman on the Erie Canal, but left his native
place for Minnesota and for a time was engaged m
farming. He then went to Valley City, North Da-
kota, and engaged in a hotel business, and he also
lived at Jamestown, North Dakota. His death oc-
curred at Canton, Minnesota, but his widow sur-
vives him and is now Mrs. Oliver Brown of Puget
Sound, Washington. Mr. and Mrs. Franklin had
two sons, namely : Ira D. and Walter, also of Little
Powder River.
Until he ran away from home on account of
disagreements with his step-father Ira D. Franklin
attended the schools of Jamestown, North Dakota,
and has supplemented the knowledge there gained by
close observation and contact with men. He boarded
a freight train at Jamestown and rode it to Miles
City, beating his way, for the child had no money,
and although thrown off it several times by over-
zealous trainmen, he managed to crawl back and
reached his destination with a sound body. Upon
reaching Miles City he secured employment in the
restaurant of Reuben Riley, working for his board
until he found a paying job driving a team for
Charley Becker. AH through the ensuing winter
this little lad drove a team in all kinds of weather,
receiving for the work $20 per month and board,
and he earned every cent he received.
The following spring he went to work as sheep-
man and herder for W. E. Harris, and remained
with him for five years, and then left, for he found
he was making no headway, his sole assets after all
his hard work being his horse, saddle, bed and $23
in money. Making his way to the Little Powder
River, Mr. Franklin made some money during the
subsequent winter in hunting and trapping, catch-
ing coyotes and wolves and killing deer and antelope.
The next spring he engaged with the "YT" outfit as
horse wrangler, and remained with it as long as the
firm was in the cattle business. He next went with
the Biddle Cattle Company on the Little Powder
River, and also saw them wind up their affairs, for
the closing of the open range was putting these old-
time outfits out of the industry. While still en-
gaged as a hand, Mr. Franklin had seen the ap-
proaching end and invested his savings in horses,
and when he left the ranch of the Biddle Company
he began speculating in horses.
Like all of the forehanded cowboys of that period,
Mr. Franklin had taken up a claim, which was lo-
cated on Horse Creek, and here he developed a ranch
of lyi sections of land, maintaining there his home
until 1918. His pioneer home was a "hole in the
bank," and he confesses that while living there alone
his housekeeping arrangements resembled those of
a coyote. However, he never lacked for plenty to
eat, and could sit in the doorway of his dugout and
shoot both deer and antelope.
In 1910 Mr. Franklin acquired the Matheney
Ranch on the Little Powder River, and has im-
proved it with a view of making it his permanent
home. His residence is a modern ten-room bunga-
low, lighted by the Delco system, and supplied with
hot and cold water and bath, with a full basement
beneath, equipped with laundry conveniences, and a
furnace for hot water heating of the house. His
outlay on his house cost him $13,000. His other per-
manent buildings are his granary, with a capacity
of 3,500 bushels on the first floor and 8,000 bushels
on the second, with a driveway running through
it, and a garage, blacksmith and tool shop for the
care of his machinery, all of which he takes care
of himself, having a natural attitude for the work.
This ranch consists of 320 acres, and he is farming
more than half of it, the land being under a water
ditch of his own construction, his big reservoir
impounding water for his irrigation supply. In
addition to his ranching interests Mr. Franklin is
a stockholder of the Powder National Bank of
Broadus and the Broadus Independent Publishing
Company, owners of the weekly newspaper issued at
the county seat of Powder River County.
Mr. Franklin has been twice married, first at Belle
Fourche, South Dakota, June i, 1905, to Ina Crink-
law, a daughter of Angus Crinklaw, a Scotchman
by birth and a ranchman by occupation. Mrs. Frank-
lin was reared in South Dakota. She died in iyo6.
leaving a son, Gerald. Mr. Franklin was married
secondly to Miss Myra Emigh, a daughter of Peter
Emigh, who was born at Friend, Nebraska, in 1884.
Mr. and Mrs. Franklin have five children, namely :
Eva, Dale, Leia, Ernest and Annie. Since casting
his first presidential vote for William McKinley in
1896, Mr. Franklin has given an earnest support
to the republican party on national issues. He has
served his district as trustee for six years, and dur-
ing the great war subscribed the limit for baby
bonds and very liberally for the other bond issues
and auxiliary war work, having always hewed to
the line as a true American for the advancement
of his community and his country, never willing to
shirk the duties before him or pass over what he
felt ought to be carried on. Had there not been
in the makeup of the lad who made his way into
the state the essentials of true manhood and noble
character, the man of today could not have been
developed. At a period when the majority of chil-
dren are tenderly cherished Ira D. Franklin had to
depend entirely upon his own exertions to keep life
in his body and clothing on it, and yet no one ever
heard him whine then, or complain since, and out
of those early hardships he has emerged a he-man,
sound, reliable and dependable, a fine product of a
fine state, and one of whom other residents of
Montana have every reason to be very proud.
John P.\rker W.^tson. Among the younger gen-
eration of business citizens who have come rapidly
to the forefront in recent years as participants in
the business life of Logan, few have made a more
favorable impression upon their associates than
has John Parker Watson, manager of the Copeland
Lumber Company. His career has been one of
steady and consistent advancement, for he began
at the bottom of the ladder in the lumber business,
and through his own ability has raised himself to
a place where he is an active factor in the develop-
ment of the industry in this section.
Mr. Watson was born at Somerset, Kentucky, No-
vember 6, 1894, a son of Andrew Jackson and Lola
Ellen (Gragg) Watson. His grandfather, John H.
Watson, was born in 1837, in Kentucky, where he
was a farmer and sheriff of Pulaski County. In
1901 he came to near Belgrade, Montana, where he
ranched for a tsme, subsequently resided at Bel-
grade for about two years, and about 1909 moved
to his present ranch of 640 acres near Three Forks,
where he continues in successful operations, being
accounted one of the substantial men of his locality.
.Andrew Jackson Watson was born in 1859, at
Somerset, Kentucky, where he was reared and mar-
ried, and while farming also served as deputy sheriff
HISTORY OF MONTANA
429
of Pulaski County under his father. In 1899 he be-
came a pioneer farmer near Manhattan, Montana,
where he also became a prominent and influential
citizen, and was made county road supervisor, a
position which he was holding at the time he was
accidentally killed by a train at Central Park, Mon-
tana, in May, 1904. He was a democrat and a mem-
ber of the Masonic fraternity, and was a man of
excellent reputation and the strictest integrity. Mrs.
Watson, who survives him and is a resident of Man-
hattan, Montana, was born in Pulaski County, Ken-
tucky, in 1869. They were the parents of three
children : John Parker, of this review ; Susie Bob-
bitt, the wife of Frank Curtice, of Manhattan, deputy
sheriff of Gallatin County; and Andrew Jackson,
attending high school at Manhattan, where he re-
sides with his mother.
John Parker Watson received his education in the
graded schools of Manhattan and the Gallatin County
High School, which he attended through the sopho-
more year, and when he left the latter institution
in 1910, began work on a ranch near Manhattan,
where he remained two years. In 1912 he received
his introduction to the lumber business at Man-
hattan, starting at the bottom as yard man for the
Flint-Lynn Lumber Company. He remained there
until 1 91 5 and then went to Anaconda, where he
contributed one year to the carpenter trade, and
. after a sickness of one year's duration went to Am-
sterdam and began to work as yard man for the
Copeland Lumber Company. There he won steady
promotion until he was chosen as manager for the
yard of this concern at Logan, the only one here, and
assumed the duties of his new position in March,
1918. He has continued in the same capacity ever
since, and has proven himself an energetic, pro-
gressive and thoroughly capable business man, fully
competent to represent his concern's interests. The
yards and offices are situated along the Northern
Pacific Railway tracks, and the headquarters of the
concern are located at Bozeman.
Mr. Watson is a democrat, but the duties of his
position have demanded his attention to an extent
that has precluded the idea of his entering actively
into public affairs. He is unmarried.
SiG GooDFRiEND. Of recent years due apprecia-
tion has been shown to the genius and ability of the
salesman, whether he sells his own goods in his own
store or acts as a representative for others. Sales-
manship is something which cannot be learned unless
a person possesses that innate something which en-
ables him to sense a demand, and then study out
the best way to meet that demand.
One of the men of Montana who has risen to
heights of prosperity through his salesmanship is
Sig Goodfriend, the leading men's clothing and sup-
ply merchant in this part of the state, who is doing
a rousing, big business at Anaconda.
Mr. Goodfriend was born at St. Louis, Missouri,
March 3, 1864, a son of Simon Goodfriend, a na-
tive of Hamburg, Germany, where he was born
in 1821. After his marriage Simon Goodfriend came
to the United States from Hamburg and located
at St. Louis. Missouri, where for some years he
carried on a bakery. In 1870 he went to Collins-
ville, Illinois, but when he retired he returned to
St. Louis and there he died in 1886. He married
Theressa Heller, who was born at Hamburg, Ger-
many, and died at St. Louis in 1881. Their children
were as follows: Louis, who lives in California;
Rose and Annie, both of whom are deceased ; Bertha,
who is also deceased; Sig. whose name heads this
review ; Samuel, who is deceased : Jacob, who is in
Texas ; and David, who is in California.
Sig Goodfriend attended the public schools of Col-
linsville, Illinois, until he was thirteen years old,
and then left Illinois for the West, going first to
Grand Island, Nebraska, where for twenty-one
months he was cashier in a general merchandise
store. Returning to St. Louis, he spent eleven
months in that city as stock boy in a clothing store,
and then for two years was at New Douglas, Illinois,
working in a general store owned by his brother-
in-law. Simon Epstein. During these years Mr.
Goodfriend learned to gauge public needs and felt
qualified to go into business for himself, which he
did at Sidney, Nebraska, for twelve years conduct-
ing a mercantile establishment. On September 9,
189s, having looked the territory over, Mr. Good-
friend felt that here in Anaconda he would find an
opening for a store he had had long in mind, and
therefore opened it up, at first, until he could try
out his plan, in a small way, gradually expanding
until he iiow has the leading establishment of its
kind in this part of Montana. Mr. Goodfriend car-
ries a full and timely stock of men's and boys'
clothing and wearing apparel in his store at Nos.
113 and 115 East Park Avenue. His tr^de is drawn
from the careful dressers of Anaconda and Deer
Lodge County, who appreciate the fact that they
can secure from him everything worn by men and
boys and be sure that each article is the best of
its kind and entirely suitable for the purpose for
which it is designed. Employment is given eight
salespersons, and an unsurpassed service is rendered.
Mr. Goodfriend is a democrat, but his business
cares have been too heavy for his entrance into
politics. Fraternally he belongs to Anaconda Lodge
No. 239, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks;
Colfax Lodge No. 20, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, of which he is past grand; and Montana
Lodge No. 13, Knights of Pythias, of which he is
past chancellor. He is also a member of the Ro-
tary Club, which he served as secretary for two
years; the Anaconda Country Club and the Rocky
Mountain Club. Mr. Goodfriend owns a business
block at the corner of Chestnut Street and Park
Avenue.
On February 23, 1897, Mr. Goodfriend was married
at Seattle, Washington, to Miss Rose Deppe, born
at Decatur, Illinois, in 1872, and who died at Hot
Springs, Arkansas, April 2, 1919. Mr. and Mrs.
Goodfriend had no children. Mr. Goodfriend has
always recognized the fact that it was essential to
possess high moral character as well as business
ability, and has chosen his assistants with this idea
in mind, so that he has been instrumental in de-
veloping among his force high types of citizen-
ship and in this, as in other ways, furthering the
advancement of the city in which he has been located
for so many constructive years and of which he
is recognized to be so potent a factor.
James McCl.^rty, sheriff of Park County, has
been identified with this section of Montana for
many years, was an early homesteader, and while
formerly owner of a fine ranch, he was also promi-
nently engaged in business at Wilsall, and that com-
munity was his home until he came to Livingston
to administer the responsibilities of his present office.
Mr. McClarty was born at Owen Sound. Ontario,
Canada, in January, 1862. His grandfather, James
McClarty, was born in County Antrim. Ireland, in
1779. and on coming to Canada established his home
on a farm at Owen Sound. He was a prominent
character in that locality in the early days. He
was a skillful fifer, and it is said that he played on
his fife the first tune of music ever heard in Owen
Sound. He died there in 1869. William McClarty,
430
HISTORY OF MONTANA
his son, was born in County Antrim, Ireland, in
1829, and was nine years old when he accompanied
his parents in 1838 to Ontario, Canada. He grew up
at Owen Sound, was reared and married there, and
spent his life as a farmer. In 1900 he sold his farm
interests and lived retired at Owen Sound until
his death in 1915. He was a conservative in politics,
was a member of the Masonic fraternity, and was
active in the English Episcopal Church. William
McClarty married Catherine Morrissey, who was
born in County Clare, Ireland, in 1837. She ac-
companied her parents in 1844 to one of the new
farms of western Canada, and her death occurred
at Owen Sound in 191 1. Of their children, Jane,
the oldest, died at the age of seven years, while
Ellen, the second, has never married and is still
living at Owen Sound. The third is James, while
the fourth is William, a farmer in Ontario. Hugh
and Melinda both died in early childhood. Albert
Allen when nine years of age went to New York
City, was educated there, and was a collector for
Whitehall & Tatem, a wholesale drug house, until
he died at the age of thirty. Esther lives at Owen
Sound, but spent her married life on a farm in
Saskatchewan, Canada. Dan is in the mining busi-
ness at British Columbia. Frederick Charles is a
farmer at Owen Sound. Ernest was a farmer at
Swift Current in Saskatchewan, and died there in
1918. May is the wife of Isaac Glenn, a farmer
at Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.
James McClarty was educated in the public schools
of Owen Sound, and lived on his father's farm
until he was twenty-six years of age. It was in
1889 that he came to Livingston, Montana, and the
first year was a farm hand on the Shields River.
He then took up a homestead of 160 acres of rail-
road land, and finally bought the remainder of his
section from the railroad company. He owned 640
acres, and had it well developed as a farm and
ranch. He sold this in 191 1, and afterward ac-
quired 440 acres of ranch lands, and sold this prop-
erty in 1919.
Meanwhile, in 1907, Mr. McClarty had engaged
in the livery business at Livingston, and three and
a half years later sold out and went to Wilsall, a new
town on the Shields River branch. He was the
source of much of the enterprise in that new com-
munity and engaged in the livery, feed, sales stables,
draying and transfer business until the fall of 1918,
and still owns the business, its active manager being
his son-in-law, John R. Haley. Mr. McClarty also
owns three dwelling houses at Wilsall, is a director
of the Farmers Elevator there, and still keeps in
touch with the affairs of that community.
Mr. McClarty was elected sheriff of Park County
in November, 1918, and began his official duties for
a term of two years January 7, 1919. For three and
a half years previously he had served as deputy
sheriff, but kept supervision over his business in-
terests at the same time. While living on his farm
Mr. McClarty served as postmaster five years at
Lat. He is a republican, is a member of the Livings-
ton Chamber of Commerce, and is affiliated with
Wilsall Lodge No. 103, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and Wilsall Lodge, Brotherhood of Amer-
ican Yeomen. He actively supports both the Pres-
byterian and Congregational churches.
November 29. 1890, he married Miss Margaret D.
Mitchell, daughter of Alexander and Susan (Thomp-
son) Mitchell. Her mother resides at Owen Sound,
Ontario, where her father died. Her father spent
all his life as a teacher. Mrs. McClarty died at Wil-
sall September 30, 1917, and was the mother of
three children. Anna May, the oldest, is the wife
of John R. Haley, mentioned above as a partner
of Mr. McClarty in the business at Wilsall. Ellen
Elsie is the wife of Virgil L. Sherwin, manager of
the grocery department of the Wilsall Mercantile
Company. Violet Mitchell married Arthur I. Poor,
a grocery merchant at Bozeman, Montana. Mr.
McClarty was married June 4, 1919, to Mrs. Eloise
Helen Tuggle, widow of the late Archie B. Tuggle,
of Shields, Montana. Mrs. McClarty has two chil-
dren by her former husband, Beatrice Tuggle, aged
twelve years, and Lawrence, aged ten years.
Merle C. Groene, deputy county attorney of Fer-
gus County, and a member of the prominent law
firm of McConochie, Groene & McKenna at Lewis-
town, has been prominently before the public in
several capacities since his arrival in January, 1916.
As a private practitioner and in the performance
of his official duties he has evidenced the possession
of a thorough knowledge of the principles, theories
and practice of his calling, and as citizen and sol-
dier has shown his public spiritedness and patriotism.
Mr. Groene was born at Atchison, Kansas, June
12, 1886, a son of John H. and Lucy A. (Hommer)
Groene, natives respectively of Ohio and Indiana,
and the parents of two children, of whom Merle
C. is the elder. John H. Groene is now a prosperous
real estate dealer of Kansas City, Kansas, and takes
an interest in republican politics. Merle C. Groene
attended the graded and high schools of Kansas
City, Kansas, following which he enrolled as a stu-
dent at the University of Kansas, Lawrence, graduat-
ing with his degree of Bachelor of Law in 1909.
He was admitted to the bar of Kansas, but in the
same year came to Kalispell, Montana, and in July,
1909, was granted permission to practice in this
state. Subsequently he located at Whitefish, where
he was appointed city attorney, and filled that office
for four years in an entirely capable manner,
handling many cases and protecting the city's in-
terests in a masterly way. His work in this office
gained him the appointment of public administrator
of Flathead County, an office which he held for two
years, and in which he also displayed his capacity
for executive work, and in January, 1916, came to
Lewistown, where he embarked in general practice.
On January i, 1917. Mr. Groene was appointed chief
deputy county attorney for Fergus County, but re-
signed that office July i, 1918, to enlist in the service
of his country, and August 4. 1918. arrived at Camp
Johnston, Florida. He received his commission as
second lieutenant, and was assigned as an instructor
in the officers' training school of that camp. The
signing of the armistice, which terminated hostilities,
made the need of further service unnecessary, and
Lieutenant Groene received his honorable discharge
December 4, 1918. Returning to Lewistown, he re-
sumed his duties as chief deputy county attorney,
and again engaged in practice as a member of the
firm of McConochie, Groene & McKenna. This firm
is accounted one of the strong legal combinations of
the county and has taken part in much important
litigation, in which Mr. Groene has exemplified his
legal acumen and soundness of knowledge. He
belongs to the county, state and national bodies of
his profession, and has an excellent reputation among
his fellow practitioners, who have found him a
valued associate and a worthy and honorable oppo-
nent. Mr. Groene's fraternal affiliations are with
Whitefish Lodge No. 64, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, the Loyal Order of Moose, Lewistown
Lodge No. 456. Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, and the Phi Alpha Delta college fraternity,
and he and Mrs. Groene belong to Marie Chapter
No. 36, Order of the Eastern Star. His political
views make him a democrat.
.T^^^^-JS^c^^-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
On July ig, 191 1, Mr. Groene was married to Miss
Leah G. Stephenson, who was born at Bozeman,
Montana, the second of the three children of John
E. and Edith (Tipton) Stephenson, residents of
Westphalia, Kansas, where Mr. Stephenson is en-
gaged in the banking business.
Joseph A. Thaler. It is a pleasure to investi-
gate the career of a successful, self-made man.
Peculiar honor attaches to that individual who, be-
ginning the great struggle of life alone and un-
aided, gradually overcomes unfavorable environ-
ment, removes one by one the obstacles from the
pathway of success and by the master strokes of
his owii force and vitality succeeds in forging his
way to the front and winning for himself a position
of esteem and influence among his fellow men.
Such is the record of the popular member of the
faculty of the Montana State College, to a brief
synopsis of whose life and character the following
paragraphs are devoted.
Joseph A. Thaler, professor of electrical engineer-
ing in the Montana State College at Bozeman, was
born at Koessen, Austria, and is the son of Michael
A. and Anna Thaler. Michael A. Thaler was born
in 1849 at Koessen. and his entire life was spent
there, his death occurring in 1909. He was a scythe
manufacturer and filled a place of importance in the
community. His wife was born at Koessen in 1851,
and died there in 1882. To them was born the
following children: Michael is a lithographer by
trade and is employed by the Morgan Lithographic
Company at Cleveland, Ohio; Joseph A. is the next
in the order of birth; Jacob and Anna rernain in
Austria; Elizabeth is the wife of Simon Zimmer-
man, a retired scythe manufacturer of Kitzbuhel,
Austria.
Joseph A. Thaler received his educational training
in the public schools of his native town, but at the
age of twelve years he left his studies and was
apprenticed to a locksmith for four years, as was the
custom in that country at that time. After com-
pleting his apprenticeship Mr. Thaler worked as a
journeyman locksmith until 1883, when he decided
to come to the LInited States in the hope of finding
opportunities of bettering himself. Upon reaching
this country he continued westward as far as Salt
Lake City, stopping on the way at Kansas City,
Missouri, Colorado and other states en route.
Shortly afterward he enlisted in the United States
Army, being assigned to the Sixth Regiment of
United States Infantry, with which he served five
years. He served as clerk in the commissary de-
partment and also acted as commissary sergeant.
In 1889 Mr. Thaler went to St. Paul, Minnesota,
and for a year was employed as a hotel clerk. He
then entered the employ of the street car company
of that city as a conductor, but was later made a
night foreman, and still later day foreman, in
which capacity he served until 1894. He then en-
tered the University of Minnesota, at Minneapolis,
where he was graduated in 1900 from the department
of electrical engineering. This important event in
Mr. Thaler's life was but the culmination of previous
efforts he had been making, as opportunity of-
fered to secure a technical education. While in the
army he had attended the schools provided by the
army and Young Men's Christian Association. When
admitted to the university he was at first only
admitted as a special student, as it was not thought
that he was qualified for university work, but he
showed such aptitude for study and such progress
that he was admitted as a regular student. While
at college he became a member of the Greek-
letter fraternity Sigma Xi. During his senior year
he was an instructor in mathematics in the uni-
Vol. 11—28
versity, and in 1900 he was appointed instructor in
engineering and mathematics for half the time, the
remainder of his time being spent in the engineer-
ing department of the street railway. During this
same period Mr. Thaler also taught in the night
schools of the Young Men's Christian Association,
so it can be seen that he did not have much leisure
time. In 1902 Mr. Thaler received an appointment
as assistant professor of mechanical engineering in
the Montana State College at Bozeman. In 1903
he became an instructor in mathematics in Purdue
University, at Lafayette, Indiana, but a year later
he returned to the Montana State College as pro-
fessor of electrical engineering, which chair he is
still filling. His offices are in the Engineering Build-
ing. Professor Thaler is one of the most popular
members of the faculty, not only because of his
genial and approachable disposition, but also be-
cause of his splendid ability as an instructor, for
he thoroughly understands his subject and pos-
sesses an unusual capacity for imparting his knowl-
edge to others.
Professor Thaler owns a comfortable and attrac-
tive home on Third Avenue, South, which he built
in 1910, and also owns a splendid ranch of 640
acres, located about thirty miles northwest of Boze-
man.
Politically Professor Thaler is independent of
party lines, preferring to support the candidates
and policies which meet his approval. Religiously
he is a member of the Presbyterian Church, and
his fraternal relations are with Western Star Lodge
No. 4, Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He is a
fellow of the American Institute of Electrical En-
gineers, and also belongs to the Montana Engineers
Society, the Society for the Promotion of Engineer-
ing Education, and the National Educational As-
sociation.
In 1910 Professor Thaler was married to Mabel
Thorpe, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C. M. Thorpe,
of Bozeman, the father being a civil engineer and
surveyor by profession. Mrs. Thaler graduated
from the Montana State College with the degree of
Bachelor of Science, and subsequently received the
degree of Master of Science from Wooster Uni-
versity of Ohio. To Professor and Mrs. Thaler
have been born the following children: Joseph
Thorpe, born November 21, 191 1, and Gretchen
Adalaide, born August 31, 1913.
Personally Professor Thaler is affable and pop-
ular and stands ready at all times to encourage
and aid all laudable measures and enterprises for
the general good. By a life consistent in motive
and because of his fine qualities of head and heart
he has earned the sincere regard of a vast ac-
quaintance, and his success in his chosen field of
endeavor bespeaks for him the possession of superior
attributes.
William Reece Plew, B. S. The career of Wil-
liam Reece Plew, of Bozeman, is an illustration of
the possible control over limitations and the rewards
to be acquired through the accepting of ordinary
opportunities through the medium of determination
and industry backed by unswerving ambition.
Granted only a common school education in his
youth, he found himself able to secure advanced
instruction and training through his own efforts, and
in this way has risen to a place of marked prestige
among the educators of Montana, as professor of
civil and architectural engineering in the Montana
State College.
William R. Plew was born at Merom, Indiana,
October 31, 1878, a son of James and Ellen (Sales-
burv) Plew, and a grandson of Simon Plew, who
432
HISTORY OF MONTANA
came from Pennsjlvania as a pioneer to Indiana
and passed his life as a shoemaker, his death occur-
ring in Sullivan County, that state, prior to the
birth of his grandson. James Plew was born in
Sullivan County in 1828, and was there reared and
married. When still a young man he went to Merom,
Indiana, where he conducted a ferry on the Wabash
River, but later removed to Hutsonville, Crawford
County, Illinois, where he spent the remainder of
his career as a farmer and died in 1883. He was an
undeviating republican of the old school, and during
the Civil war served the Union in the capacity of
secret agent. Mr. Plew married Ellen Salesbury,
who was born in 1845 in Crawford County, Illinois,
and died at Hutsonville in 1890, and they became
the parents of six children; namely Charles, a rail-
road man of Flat Rock. Illinois ; Perry, who is en-
gaged in business at Kellogg, Idaho; James U., a
machinist of Rockport, Indiana; Miss Hester, of
Hutsonville. Illinois; Mary, the wife of Adolphus
Lawhead. of Kellogg, Idaho; and William Reece.
William Reece Plew was sent to the public schools
of Hutsonville. Illinois, and in the spring of 1898
was graduated from the high school there. During
that same year war was declared upon Spain by
the Lnited States, and Mr. Plew, who possessed
some musical talent, enlisted December 20, i8g8, in
the band of the Fourth Illinois Infantry, with which
he was sent to Savannah, Georgia, and then to
Havana, Cuba, where he saw several months of
service. Returning to the United States when peace
was declared, he was mustered out of the service
May 2, 1899. and then returned to Hutsonville, where
he secured employment in a drug store. After one
year he removed to Palestine. Illinois, where he be-
came the proprietor of a news and periodical stand,
and so firmly established himself in the confidence
of the people that he was elected town clerk and
subsequently city clerk. By 1903 he was ready to
continue his educational training, and at that time
went to Terre Haute, Indiana, and enrolled as a
student at Rose Polytechnic Institute. He was
graduated therefrom with the class of 1907, receiv-
ing the degree of Bachelor of Science in civil en-
girieering, and in the fall of the same vear was ap-
pointed instructor in civil engineering at' the institute,
a position which he filled during the regular winter
terms, while in the summers he worked for the
Pans Bridge Company of Paris. Illinois. In 1910
Mr. Plew resigned from his position at the Rose
Polytechnic and came to Missoula. Montana, as in-
structor m civil engineering in the State Univer-
sity. He was made assistant professor there in 1911,
and two years later was transferred to the School
of Engineering in Bozeman as assistant professor in
civil engineering. In 1914 he was advanced to pro-
fessor of structural engineering, and in 1916 was
elevated to professor of civil and architectural en-
gineering, positions which he holds at this time. His
offices are in the engineering building of the State
College, while he maintains his home in the Ever-
green Apartments. Mr. Plew is widely and favor-
ably known in his profession, and is a valued mem-
ber of the Montana Engineering Society and of the
Arnerican Society of Civil Engineers. As a voter he
maintains an independent stand, and his religious
faith is that of the Christian Church, while frater-
nally he is affiliated with Bozeman Lodge No. 18,
Ancient Free and .'Accepted Masons, and Terre Haute
Camp, Modern Woodmen of America.
In September. 1900. Mr. Plew was married at
Palestine. Illinois, to Miss Elizabeth Batey, daughter
of Thomas and Margaret CHulse) Batey, the latter
of whom survives at Palestine. Illinois, where Mr.
Batey, now deceased, was a farmer for many years.
Mr. and Mrs. Plew have one daughter, Maurine
Lucille, born December 19, 1901, and a graduate of
the Gallatin County High School. Miss Plew is
eligible to membership in the Daughters of the
American Revolution.
Col. Francis M. Malone, of Miles City, one of
the advisory editors of this publication, has been
a prominent factor in Montana's life and attairs for
over thirty-five years.
He located at Miles City in 1883 as representa-
tive of the livestock department of the Chicago, Mil-
waukee & St. Paul Railroad, which he had previously
served as traveling freight agent, with headquarters
at Indianapolis. For many years Colonel Malone
was general agent for the road over the territory
of the Northwest, with headquarters at Helena. In
March, 1907, he was retired on half pay and the
following year severed his connection with the rail-
way company and has since been active in looking
after his varied interests in Montana.
Colonel Malone was born at Toronto in \'ermilion
County, Indiana, July 31, 1838, son of William L.
and Nancy (Winn) Malone. His father was born
in Pennsylvania in 1803 and was a pioneer settler
on Government land in Vermilion County. Indiana.
He spent his life as a farmer and died there in
May, 187S. His wife was born in Ohio and died
at the age of thirty-five.
Colonel Malone grew up in western Indiana, had
a district school education and much training and
discipline on the home farm. At eighteen he was
working as a farm hand in Shelby County, Illinois.
He left the farm and on August 12, 1861. enlisted
in a local company, and not finding any assignment
with an Illinois regiment he was mustered in at
Quincy, Illinois, with other recruits for the First
Kansas Cavalry, which afterward became the
Seventh Kansas, known as the John Brown, Jr.
Regiment. At Fort Leavenworth the regiment was
organized as the First Kansas Cavalry, and Colonel
Malone became captain of Company F on September
14, 1861. His early duties were along the border,
but early in 1862 the regiment was ordered to Shiloh,
and became part of a brigade commanded by Col.
Philip Sheridan, in the Sixteenth Army Corps, com-
manded by Gen. A. J. Smith. Mr. Malone and his
comrades reenlisted as veterans on November 19,
1864. Captain Malone was promoted to major .\u-
gust 12, 1863, was made lieutenant-colonel November
17. 1864, and was commissioned colonel of the regi-
ment by Governor Crawford of Kansas, though
never mustered in with that rank by reason of the
regiment not attaining the required numerical
strength. After the Civil war Colonel Malone par-
ticipated in some of the Indian campaigns in the
West, and for a time was post commander at Fort
Kearney, Nebraska. He was mustered out at Fort
Leavenworth wMth his regiment September 29, 1865.
His army record shows that he was in the thick
of the lighting and frequently courting responsi-
bilities and dangers beyond the ordinary range of
duty. Some of the high lights in his military record
are the battles of Shiloh, Corinth, Tupelo, Holly
Springs, and many of the engagements making up
the history of the progress of the Union armies
through Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and Mis-
souri.
After the war Colonel Malone engaged in railroad
contracting in Illinois, also became interested in
lead mining in Kansas and near. Joplin. Missouri,
and in 1878-79 was in the gold and silver fields of
Leadville. Colorado. From there he returned to
Indiana and engaged in the livestock commission
business at Indianapolis, subsequently taking up his
HISTORY OF MONTANA
433
duties with the railroad as above noted. For a num-
ber of years he was extensively engaged in the sheep
business in Montana.
Colonel Malone has always distinguished himself
by real patriotism, and as an old soldier of the Civil
war he volunteered his services to the Government
at the beginning of the Spanish-American war. He
has been an active figure in the republican party
for over half a century. While living in Illinois he
was a state commissioner during the erection of the
State Insane Asylum at Anna, Illinois, and the State
Normal School at Carbondale. He was a presi-
dential elector from Montana in 1892 and was a
delegate to the national convention of the party
in 1908. He is a member of the military order of
the Loyal Legion, and is a Royal Arch and Knight
Templar Mason, a member of the Mystic Shrine
at Helena, and Miles City Lodge of the Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks.
March 8, i860. Colonel Malone married Miss Eliz-
abeth Casey. She was born in Shelby County,
Illinois, a daughter of Levi and Sarah Casey. Her
father was the first white child born in Bond County,
Illinois, and spent the greater part of his life as
an Illinois farmer. Mrs. Malone was with her hus-
band during the greater part of the war and spent
her time nursing sick and wounded soldiers. March
8, 1910, Colonel and Mrs. Malone celebrated their
golden wedding with a public reception at Miles
City.
Thorkel a. Vebien is a Big Timber business
man, member of the incorporated firm of Veblen
Brothers, hardware merchants, and has also be-
come extensively interested in the ranching industry
in southern Montana.
Mr. Veblen, who was born in Iowa City, Iowa,
December 9, 1889, is a member of a prominent
scholarly family, his father and one of his brothers
being distinguished American educators.
His father, Andrew Anderson Veblen, was born
in Ozaukee County, Wisconsin, September 24, 1848,
and is now living retired at East San Diego, Cali-
fornia. His parents were Thomas Anderson and
Kari (Bunde) Veblen. They were born in Valdris,
Norway. Thomas was a pioneer farmer in Wis-
consin and Minnesota. He died at Nerstrand in
the latter state. .Andrew -\nderson Veblen was
graduated A. B. from Carleton College in North-
field, Minnesota, in 1877, received the Master of
Arts degree from the same institution in 1880, and
was a graduate student at Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity at Baltimore in 1881-83. He was professor of
English and other branches at Luther College, De-
corah, Iowa, from 1877 to 1881. was instructor and
assistant professor of mathematics from 1883 to
1886, and assistant professor and professor of
physics from 1886 to 1905 in the State University of
Iowa at Iowa City. On retiring from educational
work in 1905 he moved to Stillwater, Minnesota,
where he lived on a farm and also edited Samband, a
magazine devoted to the Valdris people in the United
States. In 1912 he moved to Minneapolis and in 1917
moved to California. He was the chief organizer in
1901 and has since been president of the Valdris
Samband, a society composed of natives of Valdris,
Norway, and their descendants. July II, 1877, he mar-
ried Kirsti Hougen. of Goodhue County, Minnesota,
who was born in Hallingdal, Norway, and died at
Stillwater, Minnesota, in September, 1908. In 1912
Professor Veblen married Mrs. Elizabeth A. Ring-
stad. He is father of eight children. Oswald, the
oldest, born in 1880, has scholastic degrees from
the University of Iowa. Harvard University and
the University of Chicago, was teacher of mathe-
matics in the University of Chicago, and since 1910
has been professor of mathematics in Princeton
University. He served in the ordnance department
of the United States Army during the war, and
was discharged with the rank of major in 1919.
Agnes, the second child, has helped her brothers in
the hardware business at Big Timber. Gertrude is
librarian of the Engineering Library of the Uni-
versity of Minnesota. Signy is the wife of Henry
G. Walker, an attorney at Iowa City. Harold is
the other partner in Veblen Brothers at Big Tim-
ber. Thorkel is the sixth in age. Hilda is the
wife of Ralph Sims, a resident of Chicago, who
served in the camouflage department with the United
States Army. EUing, the youngest, is manager of
the Stillwater Hardware Company at Reed Point,
Montana. He enlisted in 1917, and served in the
Aviation Corps with the rank of second lieutenant.
Thorkel A. Veblen, who was born December 9,
1889, graduated from the Stillwater High School
in 1909, and at once engaged in the hardware busi-
ness. He spent five years with the Hackett, Gates;
Hurty Company at St. Paul, after which he was in
the retail hardware business at Valley City, North
Dakota, until he came to Big Timber in 1917. He
and his brother, equal partners, bought from H.
J. Kdozer the pioneer hardware store of Big Tim-
ber originally established by Harvey Bliss. Mr.
Veblen also owns about twenty-five hundred acres
of ranch lands in Musselshell and Yellowstone
counties. He has a modern home at Big Timber,
is a democrat, a member of the Lutheran Church,
and is afliliated with Big Timber Lodge of Masons,
and Vallev City Lodge, Knights of Pythias, in
North Dakota. He enlisted in 1918, and served
in the United States Marine Corps.
In 1910, at Stillwater, Minnesota, he married Miss
.Ainna Malloy, daughter of Robert and Nellie Malloy.
Her father was a lumberman and is now deceased.
Her mother resides in Stillwater. Mr. and Mrs.
Veblen have two children: Robert, born August
19, 1912; and Andrew, born May 27, 1914.
'B. A. Leonard. Throughout the country pro-
gressive educationalists are demanding of our pub-
lic schools a wider and deeper service. Intelligent
public opinion is dissatisfied with anything but the
best methods of popular education, and many grave
phenomena of our political, economic and social life
have to be considered in the schoolroom. We are
realizing more intelligently and keenly that not only
is education the foundation of our national hope
and the life blood of our progress, but also that
the purely literary education of the American tra-
ditional method is too narrow to meet the needs
of this generation. Vocational education and citi-
zenship training must be developed in the public
schools. Besides these broad considerations are new
problems of health regulations and the care of
backward children, the problem of vacation and
continuation schools, the development of schools^ as
civic and social centers, physical and pedagogical
and social problems of the most practical kind. With
such a situation before the people of America the
responsibility of selecting the proper educators be-
comes heavier with each year, and to the credit
of those entrusted with the matter be it said that
never before in the history of the public schools
have there been so many men and women of rare
character and scholarly attainments in the profes-
sion, whose broad-minded and alert actions and
quickness of appreciation of the needs of their
punils mark them as forceful factors in their field.
One of these educators who belong to the above
mentioned class is B. A. Leonard, principal of the
434
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Granite County High School, who is an educator
in the highest sense, a teacher of principles, a leader
of the spirit as well as of the mind— creating an
atmosphere of high ideals and self-respect among all
classes, so that his occupancy of his position is a
matter for civic pride and recognition. Mr. Leonard
was born at Wallingford. V'ermont, April 22, 1888,
a son of Byron H. Leonard, and grandson of Nathan
Leonard, born in Vermont in 1832, and who died
in that same state in 1912, having been engaged in
farming during all of his active years. He married
Emily Johnson, who died at Hartford, New York.
The Leonards came to the American colonies from
England in 1638. locating in Massachusetts, and
one of that name was the first foundryman in the
New World.
Byron H. Leonard was born in Vermont in 1859.
and after his marriage at Danby, Vermont, he moved
to Wallingford, Vermont, where he still resides,
being a carpenter by trade, and a contractor and
builder by occupation. Since casting his first vote
he has been a republican. The Congregational
Church holds his membership. Byron H. Leonard
married Elizabeth Quintal, born in Massachusetts
in 1870, who died at Wallingford, Vermont, in 191 5,
and their only child was Professor Leonard.
After being graduated from the Wallingford "High
School, B. A. Leonard became a student of the
Vermont Academy at Saxon's River, from which
he was graduated in 1909. He then entered Middle-
burg College at Middleburg, Vermont, and after
taking the regular course was graduated therefrom
in 1913, with the degree of Bachelor of Science,
and as a member of the Greek letter college fra-
ternity Kappa Delta Rho.
Following his graduation in 1913 Professor
Leonard came west to Chehalis, Washington, and
was instructor in science and athletics in the Che-
halis High School for two years, and then for
three years taught the same branches in the Aber-
deen, Washington, High School. For the subse-
quent year he was principal of the Sand Point,
Idaho, High School, and then in June, 1919, came
to Philipsburg to assume the duties pertaining Vo
the principalship of the Granite County High School.
He has eight teachers and 106 pupils under his super-
vision. Politically he is a republican. The Bap-
tist Church furnishes him a medium for the ex-
pression of his religious beliefs.
In 1913 Professor Leonard was married at
Wallingford, Vermont, to Miss Elizabeth Smith, a
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Walter Smith, of Clinton,
Massachusetts, the former of whom is now de-
ceased. Mr. and Mrs. Leonard have two children,
namely: Gladys Delta, who was born October 8,
1914; and Elizabeth Vera, who was born April 22,
1917.
There is no more urgent problem before the
country today than that of educational develop-
ment, and no man of his profession is more keenly
aware of this than Professor Leonard. He brings
to his work not only a trained intellect and broad
experience, but a love of his calling, an apprecia-
tion of the rights of his pupils and a winning per-
sonality which enables him to gain tlie confidence
and aflfection of his pupils and stimulate them to
I)Ut forth their best efforts.
MiCH.-\EL J. O'CoNNELL is proprietor and presi-
dent of the Gallatin Laundry Company at Bozeman.
He first saw the district comprising Bozeman when
a boy of four years, and has had experience as a
cowbov and in other lines, but for over twenty
years has been a laundryman. He has been the
means of making the Gallatin Laundry Company the
largest enterprise of its kind in volume of bu
and excellence in mechanical equipment and service
in Southern Montana.
Mr. O'Connell was born at Boston, Massachusetts.
November 2:>,, 1874. His father, John O'Connell, was
born in County Cork, Ireland, in 1842. and in 1870
came to America and settled at Boston, where he
married and where for several years he worked
as a teamster. In 1878 he arrived in Yellowstone
County on the site of the present City of Billings,
homesteading a claim, and when he reached there
only si.x other white families were in the valley.
In the spring of 1879 he moved to Bozeman and
continued as a farmer, rancher and stock man until
his death in 1884. He was a democrat and a
Catholic. John O'Connell married Catherine Lyon,
who was born in County Cork in 1850 and is still
living at Bozeman. She is the mother of four
children : James, a farmer and manager of the
Washoe Shoe Store at Belt, Montana; Michael J.;
John, a railroad man who died at Dillon, Montana,
in May, 191 1 : and Minnie, wife of H. J. Nelson,
of Bozeman, Mr. Nelson being a railroad man of
long experience, but is at present auditor for the
Copeland Lumber Company.
Michael J. O'Connell received his early education
in the public schools of Bozeman. leaving school at
the age of fifteen. Later he took a business course
through the International Correspondence School at
Scranton, Pennsylvania. For six years he was in
the employ of various cattle outfits as a cowboy
and range rider. For 2]/^ years he was a messenger
with the Northern Pacific Express Company, and
then for three years engaged in the- wood, coal and
drayage business at Bozeman'.
The Bozeman Steam Laundry was established in
1898. Mr. O'Connell drove one of its first wagons
for the collection and delivery of laundry and was
a wagon driver two years. He then acquired an
eighth interest in the plant but a j'ear later made
it a quarter interest. In 1905 he and John Hagen
bought out the business and in 1908 Mr. O'Connell
sold his interest to his partner and gave his un-
divided time to his candidacy for the office of
sheriff. He was not successful in the election and
in the spring of 1909 he again acquired the laundry
plant, his financial backer and partner being T. B.
Story, whose interests he has since acquired. The
Gallatin Laundry Company was incorporated in
191 1, and Mr. O'Connell is president and proprietor,
his wife, Mrs. O'Connell, being vice president, and
Justin Smith, secretary and treasurer. The laundry
plant was destroyed by fire in the fall of 1918 and
it has been replaced by a modern building and plant
with every mechanical appliance and facility for
prompt and high class work. The plant is at the
corner of Babcock Street and Bozeman Avenue, on
a site formerly occupied by the old Ed Fridley
stage barn, one of the interesting historic landmarks
of Gallatin County. The Gallatin Laundry's services
are by no means confined to Bozeman. It supplies
a territory to Whitehall on the west, to White Sul-
phur Springs on the north and Columbus on the east,
the business service, therefore, covering Gallatin.
Sweetgrass, Park, Broadwater, Madison, Jefferson
and Meagher counties.
Mr. O'Connell takes an active part in public
affairs at Bozeman. For the past four years he has
been a member of the City Council, and is presi-
dent of the council. He has charge of the Bozeman
City Waterworks and in 1908 was chief of the fire
department. He is a democrat in politics, a member
of the Catholic Church, is a third degree Knight ot
Columbus, being affiliated with Council No. 1413.
and is a member of Bozeman Lodge No. 4^3, Benev-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
435
olent and Protective Order of Elks. He is active in
the Chamber of Commerce and is president of its
Employers Association.
Mr. O'Connell and family reside at 22 West Story
Street, where he owns a modern home. He married
at Bozeman in November, 1898, Miss Ada Hagan,
daughter of Joseph and Mary F. (Kopp) Hagan.
Her father was a brewer and died at Astoria,
Oregon, while her mother died at Missoula, Montana,
in May, 1918. Mr. and Mrs. O'Connell have four
children: Clarence, born September 6, 1902, a grad-
uate of the Gallatin County High School, and a
student for two \-ears in the high school at Seattle,
Washington, now employed in his father's laundry ;
Kathryn born August 13, 1904, a sophomore in the
Gallatin County High School; Martin, born August
21, 1907, and Emmett, born March 4, 1910, both
students in the public schools at Bozeman.
Edward A. Cralle. An enumeration of the offi-
cials of Deer Lodge County shows that some of
the most substantial men of the state have been
elected to office in this region, and their records
are of such a character as to merit preservation
in a work of this high class. One of the men
representative of the best class of residents of Ana-
condn is Edward A. Cralle, county surveyor, who
aside from his work in the oifice has been largely
instrumental in developing this section, and is de-
serving of all the confidence reposed in him by his
fellow citizens. He was born in Greenbrier County,
Virginia, now included in West Virginia, June 4,
1854, a son of Richard K. Cralle, and a member of
one of the old American faimlies, representatives
of the Cralles having come to this country during
its colonial epoch from France and located in Vir-
ginia. On his mother's side of the house Edward
A. Cralle comes of English stock, and this family
also dates back to pre-Revolutionary times. One
of Mr. Cralle's ancestors, Robert Morris, was a
■ signer of the Declaration of Independence.
Richard K. Cralle was born in Lunenburg County,
Virginia, in 1799, and died at East Virginia in 1865,
having been reared in Lunenburg County. During
the time that John C. Calhoun was in Washington,
Mr. Cralle was his secretary, and continued his life-
long friend. It was his pleasure to write the
biography of Mr. Calhoun, and its many volumes
have come down to posterity as an evidence of one
man's appreciation of another, and as a document of
literary style. Mr. Cralle owned property in Green-
brier County, and lived there from the early '40s
until the outbreak of the Civil war. He also owned
property at Lynchburg, Virginia, including what was
called Cralle's Castle, which still stands and is used for
college purposes. Politically he was a whig, and
his fraternal connections were with the Masonic
order. Richard K. Cralle was married to Judith
Cabell, born at Lynchburg, Virginia, and they had
two children, namely: Mary, who died in 1894;
and Kenna, who was employed in the customs de-
partment at Washington, District of Columbia.
After the death of his first wife Richard K. Cralle
was married to Elizabeth Morris, born in Hanover
County, Virginia, in 1817, who died in Boulder, Jef-
ferson County, Montana, in 1896. Their children
were as follows: Alice, who married Rev. Thomas
Ward, a Presbyterian clergyman, is deceased, as
is her husband; Richard M., who was a surveyor,
came to Montana in 1881 as a civil engineer in the
employe of the Northern Pacific Railroad, died at
Boulder, Montana, in September, 1918; Floride, who
married John McKay, a contractor and general busi-
ness man, now deceased, resides at Minneapolis, Min-
nesota; Louise, who married Frank Showers, former
district judge of Jefferson County, is now engaged
in mining in Madison County, Montana ; Betty Eliza-
beth, who married William G. Williamson, a civil
engineer, now deceased, lives at Richmond, Vir-
ginia; Edward A., whose name heads this review;
and Charles K., who is an attorney living in Omaha,
Nebraska.
Edward A. Cralle was educated in the private
school conducted in Hanover County, Virginia, by
his uncle, Charles Morris, remaining there until
seventeen years of age, when he entered the em-
ploy of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, which
runs through West Virginia, and was later employed
in laying out the city of Huntington, West Vir-
ginia, during 1871 and 1872, doing the surveying for
that work. Following the completion of that con-
tract Mr. Cralle went to Chattanooga, Tennessee,
and was there engaged in the governmental survey
of the Tennessee River until 1880, for four years of
that period being engaged on the Mussell Shoals
Canal. In 1880 he came west to Omaha, Nebraska,
and for a brief period was occupied in survey work
for the Short Line Railroad in Idaho, but in the
winter of 1881 returned to Omaha. After being in
the office of the Missouri Pacific Railroad for a time
he was engaged in making surveys to Lincoln and
other points in Nebraska and in Government work
on the Missouri River. In the fall of 1882 Mr.
Cralle went with the Northern Pacific Railroad to
Montana, and made surveys for it as far as Billings,
continuing with the road until 1885, when he went
into th_e United States survey office at Helena, Mon-
tana, for a few months. Once more he engaged with
the Northern Pacific Railroad, and was connected
with it until 1888. In the meanwhile his work had
brought him in 1887 to Philipsburg, Montana, where
he resided from 1888 to 1907, and was engaged in a
general mining and civil engineering business. In
the latter year he came to Anaconda, continuing
here m the same line of business. He is a demo-
crat, and was elected county surveyor of Granite
Count}', Montana, several times, and was elected
county surveyor of Deer Lodge County in 1910, and
has since held that position. During 1907 and 1908
he was city engineer of Anaconda. For many years
he has been a member of the Episcopal Church. He
resides at No. 319 East Front Street, Anaconda.
Mr. Cralle is not married. A man experienced in
his profession, Mr. Cralle naturally commands con-'
fideiice, and his business has assumed large pro-
portions, and extends over a wide area.
James R. Goss is one of the oldest members of
the village bar, a Montana lawyer whose participa-
tion in his profession and in civic affairs covers a
period of nearly forty years.
He was born near New York City April 17, 1848,
but grew up in Lorain County, Ohio, where he was
primarily educated. He attended Oberlin College
and began the study of law in 1873. He graduated
from the law department of the University of
Michigan in 1876, and for five years practiced in
Jackson County, Michigan. In 1881 he removed to
Bismarck in Dakota Territory, and in 1882 came
to Montana Territory, locating at Billings. As a
lawyer he has been faithful to the most exalted ideals
of the profession, and his name and reputation are
matters of wide appreciation over the entire state.
He is a former county attorney and probate judge
of Yellowstone County, and was the first president
of the Yellowstone Bar Association. In 191 1 he
served as president of the Eastern Montana Pioneer
Association. Membership in that association was
restricted to residents of Montana prior to 1884.
Judge Goss has been the man looked to for leader-
436
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ship in many important movements at Billings. He
was a leader in the establishment and upbuilding of
the Billings Polytechnic Institute, and has been a
member of the board of directors of that institution
from the beginning. He also served as president
of the school board and a member of the building
committee, and was one of the first trustees of the
Parmly Billings Memorial Library, which was
erected in 1901. Judge Goss has taken an active and
influential part in many republican campaigns in his
home county and state. He is a veteran of the
Masonic fraternity. Judge Goss rnarried in Michi-
gan Miss Florence E. Lord, a native of that state.
They have one child, Marion, who is a graduate of
Oberlin College.
John F. Preston was born at Higginsville, Mis-
souri, on February 26, 1883, and is the son of William
Wallace and Virginia (Fulkerson) Preston. The
Prestons were established in this country in an early
day, the family having been identified with the
history of the Virginia colony during the days prior
to American independence. The subject's grand-
father, John Preston, was a native of Kentucky,
where he was reared. Later he moved to Missouri,
and at Dover, that state, he became a farmer, being
numbered among the pioneers of that locality. His
death occurred there sometime prior to the birth
of John F. Preston. William Wallace Preston was
born in 1836 at Booneville, Missouri, and died at
Higginsville, Missouri, in 1892. He was reared at
Dover, that state, and spent practically his entire
life in that vicinity, his last years being spent at
Higginsville. He was for many years a dealer in
hardware, and stood high in the esteem of his
fellow citizens. He was a democrat in his political
views, was a member of the Baptist Church and
of the Masonic fraternity. During the Civil war
he was a soldier on the side of the Confederacy
and was present at the surrender of Vicksburg.
William W. Preston was married to Virginia Ful-
kerson, who was born in 1854 in Virginia, now
West Virginia, and to them have been born the
following children : Lourana, who is the wife of
C. R. Benton, of Kansas City, Missouri, where he
is passenger agent for the Chicago & Alton Rail-
road; William F. is in the insurance, loan and real
estate business at Great Falls, Montana; John F.
• is the immediate subject of this review; Philip is
a farmer near Glasgow, Montana; Kittie died at
the age of two years.
John F. Preston was educated in the public schools
of Higginsville, Missouri, where he was graduated
from the high school in 1901. His first employment
was on farms in that vicinity, and for about a year
he was employed in the postoffice at Higginsville.
He then entered the University of Michigan, at
Ann Arbor, where he studied for five years. He
first pursued a general college course, and then two
years in forestry, which science he had decided to
make his life work. He was graduated in 1907,
with the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and in 1915
he received from his alma mater the degree of
Master of Science in Forestry. While in college he
became a member of the honorary scientific research
Greek letter society Sigma Psi. In 1907, immediately
after the completion of his studies, Mr. Preston en-
tered the Forestry Service of the United States Gov-
ernment, in the capacity of forest assistant. He
was first sent to the Pacific Coast, where, in the
Cascade Mountains in the state of Washington, he
spent two months in the study of red cedars. From
there he was sent to Neihart, Montana, where as
administrator of timber sales he remained until the
spring of 1908, being sent from there to Newport,
Washington, where he was assigned to the same
work for three months. He then became traveling
representative of the Washington office, in which
capacity he made many long trips, jumping from
Great Falls, Montana, to Washington, D. C, back
to Missoula, Montana, thence to various other places
in Montana until the spring of 1909, when he was
made deputy forest supervisor of the Bitter Root
National Forest, with headquarters at Missoula. On
July I, 1909, he went to Red Lodge, Montana, as
forest supervisor of the Bear Tooth National Forest,
where he remained until November i, 1910, whence
he went to Kalispell as forest supervisor of the
Blackfeet National Forest, retaining that position
until July I, 1911, when he returned to Missoula,
this time as assistant district forester in the office
of Operation. On July I, 1915, he became assistant
district forester in Silviculture at Missoula, and
has been retained in that office to the present time.
In this capacity Mr. Preston has general supervision
of timber sales and planting forest products and
silvicultural research. His office is in the Federal
Building, Missoula, where he has supervision over
an office force of twelve men.
Mr. Preston is nominally a republican, and is a
member of the Presbyterian Church and the Mis-
soula Chamber of Commerce.
On June 17, 1908, at Sedalia. Missouri, Mr. Pres-
ton was married to Maud Hunicke, the daughter
of Al. and Louise Hunicke, of Los Angeles, Cali-
fornia. For many years Mr. Hunicke was a master
painter for a railroad company at Sedalia, Missouri,
but is now retired. To Mr. and Mrs. Preston have
been born two children, Louise, born February 9,
191 1, and John F., Jr., born June 18, 1917.
David Dudley Richards. There is no positive
rule for achieving success, and yet in the life of
the successful man there are always lessons which
might well be followed. The man who gains pros-
perity is he who can see and utilize the opportunity
that came in his path. The essential conditions of
human life are ever the same, the surroundings
of individuals diflfering but slightly, and when one
man passes another on the highway of life to reach
the goal of success before others who perhaps
started out before him, it is because he has the
power to use advantages which probably encompass
the whole human race. Today among the promi-
nent citizens and successful men of Montana stands
David Dudley Richards, until March i, 1920, the
efficient and popular secretary of the Missoula Cham-
ber of Commerce, and now connected with H. O.
Bell & Compan}-, Ford agents in Missoula. The
qualities of keen discrimination, sound judgment and
executive abilitj' enter very largelj' into his make-up,
and have been contributing elements to the success
which has attended his efforts.
David Dudley Richards is the scion of sterling old
Welsh stock, he being of the first generation of his
family native to this country. His paternal grand-
father, John Richards, was a native of Wales who
in i860 brought his family to this country and set-
tled in Pennsylvania. In 1863 he moved to Bevier,
Missouri, where he homesteaded 160 acres of land,
to the improvement and cultivation of which he de-
voted himself during the remaining years of his
life. He was a pioneer of that locality and was
successful in his business affairs, eventually becom-
ing the owner of 740 acres of land, practically all of
which was either in cultivation or pasture. He
gave considerable attention to the raising of cattle,
and also raised many mules especially for the coal
mines. He was a republican in his political views,
and was active in his religious life, being a member
HISTORY OF MONTANA
437
of the Welsh Congregational Church. Fraternally
he was a member of the Free and Accepted
Masons and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
His third wife, Elizabeth, was a native of Wales and
died in 1908. Among their children was Thomas
Richards, who was born in 1848 in Landsdowne,
Wales, and' who died on October 21, 1914, at Mis-
soula, Montana. When he was twelve years of age
he accompanied the family on their immigration to
the United States. He was reared on the paternal
farmstead at Bevier, Missouri, and received his
educational training in the rural schools of Macon
County, Missouri. He engaged in farming and was
also in the mercantile business at Bevier until 1883,
when he moved to Kansas City, Missouri, and there
engaged in the coal business. On June 13, 1885, he
came to Butte, Montana, where he lived until April,
1914. He was a man of more than ordinary ability,
and his excellent qualities received substantial recog-
nition by his fellow citizens of Butte, who repeatedly
elected liim to public office. During the late eighties
he served two terms as deputy sheriff under Sheriff
John E. Lloyd, and he also served four years as
deputy county clerk and recorder. For the long
period of seventeen years he rendered efficient serv-
ice as secretary of the Butte School Board, and
during that period practically every large school
building in that city was erected. He resigned this
position in April, 1914, and came to Missoula to
make his home, having retired fro.m active life, and
there his death occurred in the following October.
Politically he was a staunch supporter of the repub-
lican party, and was an active member of the Welsh
Congregational Church. Fraternally he was a mem-
ber of tlie Masonic Lodge at Bevier, Missouri, of
which he was a past master, and of the Bevier lodge
of the hidependent Order of Odd Fellows, having
joined both of these time-honored orders at the
time he attained his majority.
Thomas Richards was married at Bevier, Missouri,
to Jennie Clauss Jones, who was born at Rutland,
Vermont, in 1854, and whose death occurred at Mis-
soula, Montana, in 1909. To this worthy couple
were born four children, namely: Annie E., who
is the wife of J. P. Rowe, professor in the Mon-
tana State University at Missoula; Ralph G., who
is a rancher at Wise River, Montana; John W., who
is connected with the Times Publishing Company,
at Los Angeles, California; David D.
David D. Richards was born at Butte, Montana,
on the i6th day of August, 1889, and was reared
there. He secured his elementary education in the
public schools of Butte, graduating from the high
school there in 1908. He then entered the State
University at Missoula, where he was graduated
with the class of 1912, with the degree of Bachelor
of Science. While at the university he had not
spent his vacations and odd hours in idleness, but
had been employed by the Hennessey Company and
the Butte Street Railway Company. .'Vfter his
graduation in 1912 Mr. Richards entered the employ
of the Missoulian Publishing Company as reporter
on the Missoulian and the Sentinel, maintaining this
relation until 1915. In that year he went to Great
Falls, where until April of the following year he
served as telegraph editor of the Great Falls Leader.
Then for about four months he was manager of
publicity and assistant secretary of the Great Falls
Commercial Club. On August I, 1916, Mr. Richards
came to Missoula as secretary of the Chamber of
Commerce, in which capacity he served until March
I. 1920. The officers of the Missoula Chamber of
Commerce were then as follows: President, H. O.
Bell; first vice president, F. A. Schlick; second vice-
president, E. S. Holmes; treasurer. Newell Gough :
secretary, D. D. Richards. Mr. Richards is regarded
as a good business man, an e-xcellent manager, a
man who possesses sound judgment and keen fore-
sight, and who believes in pressing forward, keep-
ing the wheels of the car of civilization ever moving
up the steeps. He enjoys the respect and esteem of
ail who know him for his friendly manner, business
ability, his interest in public affairs and upright
living, and is regarded as one of the worthy citizens
of Missoula.
Politically Mr. Richards is nominally a republican,
though he is decidedly independent when it comes
to selecting his candidates, for he firmly believes that
a man's fitness for office should supersede his party
affiliation. He is a member of the Presbyterian
Church at Butte. Fraternally he is a member of
Harmony Lodge No. 49, Ancient Free and Accepted .
Masons; Western Sun Chapter No. 11, Royal Arch
Masons ; Covenant Lodge No. 6, Independent Order
of Odd Fellows ; Hell Gate Lodge No. 383, Benevo-
lent and Protective Order of Elks. He is also sec-
retary of the Missoula Rotary Club; secretary of
Missoula Post No. 27, American Legion; he has
served as a director and secretary of the Missoula
Amusement Company; is a member of the Greek
letter college fraternities Sigma Chi and Theta Nu
Epsilon, and is president of the Alumni Chapter of
the former society at Missoula. Mr. Richards ren-
dered effective service during the early days of the
World War as district manager of the food con-
servation campaign up to the time of his enlist-
ment, and previous to that time he had also acted
as recruiting officer of the British recruiting office
at Missoula. He is a member of the executive com-
mittee of the Montana Association of Commercial
Club Secretaries and was secretary of this associa-
tion up to the time of his enlistment. In 1913 and
191S he was manager of the Missoulian Bureau dur-
ing the legislative sessions and did good service.
Not the least interesting experience of Mr. Rich-
ards' life was his brief military career. On May
13, 1918, he enlisted in the United States service
and was sent to Camp Hancock at Augusta, Georgia,
where for five months he was in active training.
He was then in the Field Artillery Officers' Train-
ing Camp at Camp Taylor, Louisville, Kentucky,
where as a private he finally received an honorable
discharge.
Personally Mr, Richards is a man of pleasing and
attractive manner, courteous in his dealings with all
classes, and he has, quietly and unobtrusively, won
for himself a warm place in the hearts of those
who have been associated with him. while all who
know of him and his work are loud in their praise
of him.
Peter J. Kelly is the present county assessor at
Butte. Mr. Kelly is thoroughly a man of the people
and as a boy worked in the mines around Butte,
and has made good in every place of responsibility
and service.
He was born at Marysville, Montana. June 26,
1883. His grandfather, Jeremiah Kelly, spent prac-
tically all his life on a farm in County Cork. Ire-
land. However, he came to the United States while
this country was engaged in the Civil war. and en-
listed as a Union soldier, serving during the last
year of the struggle. Soon afterward he returned
to Ireland. Jeremiah Kelly, father of Peter J.
Kelly, is an honored resident of Butte. He was
born in County Cork, Ireland, in 185.=;. and was
fifteen years of age when he came to this country.
He had some experience in the mines of Michigan,
was at Leadville, Colorado, during the high tide of
the gold diggings there, and in 1880, left Leadville
438
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and the following year settled at Marysville, Mon-
tana. He was a miner there until 1884, and has
since lived at Butte. For a time he was an employe
of the Butte & Boston Mining Company and is now
a veteran in the service of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, being retained on the pay rolls of
that great corporation as a watchman. He is a
democrat and a member of the Catholic Church.
Jeremiah Kelly married Annie Sullivan, who was
born in County Cork, Ireland, in 1856. Peter J. is
the oldest of their children. Rose is the wife of
James Graney, living at Helena, where Mr. Graney
operates the Helena Stamp Works. Michael lives
at Butte and is a sampler in the copper mines. Jere-
miah is an acetylene welder living at Butte. May i«
unmarried and lives with her parents at 221 North
Jackson Street.
Peter J. Kelly acquired his early education in the
public schools of Butte, attending high school and
graduating from the Butte Business College in 1901.
His first employment in the mines was as a tool
packer. Finally he was promoted to the duties of a
regular miner and followed that work four years.
For two years he was employed by A. B. Bryan's
general mercantile establishment at WalkerviUe.
After that he served four years as deputy county
treasurer under C. E. Meagher, and was a time-
keeper with the Anaconda Copper Mining Company
until 1916, when he was elected for his first term
as county assessor. Mr, Kelly is now in office as a
result of his re-election in 1918.
In a business way he is a co-partner with Al Mc-
Millan in the Velie Sales Company automobile
agency. He is a fourth degree Knight of Columbus,
being affiliated with Butte Council No. 668, and is
also a member of Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks, and Butte .-Verie No.
II, Fraternal Order of Eagles. He is a democrat
and a Catholic, and resides in the O'Rourke Apart-
ments on West Quartz Street.
In 1909, at Butte, Mr. Kelly married Miss Flory
Sewell, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. George Sewell.
Her mother is living in New Brunswick, Canada.
Her father, deceased, was a carpenter at Anaconda,
Montana. Mrs. Kelly died in February, 1914, leav-
ing one daughter, Florence, who was born December
29, 1913; On February 20, 1919, Mr. Kelly married
Miss Julia Lahiff, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas
Lahiff, of 620 West Quartz Street. Mr. Lahiff is a
Arthur C. Richie, head of the statistical depart-
ment of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company at
Anaconda, is recognized as a man well fitted for
the duties of his position through inclination and
ability. He was born at New Paris, Ohio, June
I, 1879, a son of John S. Richie, and grandson of
Samuel S. Richie, who was born near Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania, and died at New Paris, Ohio, in 1888,
when over eighty years of age. He was one of the
pioneers of Ohio, and developed into a farmer
upon an extensive scale near New Paris.
John S. Richie is now a resident of Scott's Mills,
Oregon, but he was born at Philadelphia, Pennsyl-
vania, in 1840. Until about 1857, he lived in Philadel-
phia, and then moved to New Paris, Ohio, and
engaged in farming, remaining in that location until
1882, when he came West to Ellendale, North
Dakota, there continuing his farming operations
until 1893, when he came to his present location
and is now practically retired. A republican by
conviction, he has been active in his party, and had
the honor of being a member of the Lower House
of the North Dakota Assembly at its first session,
and was also elected in 1904 to the Oregori As-
sembly, in both instances being on important com-
mittees. Born and reared a member of the Friends
Society, he has been steadfast in his support of
Quaker doctrines. The maiden name of his wife
was Mary Brown, and she was born in 1841. Their
children were as follows : Anna R., who married
Charles A. White, lives at Scott's Mills, Oregon,
where her husband died, having been a farmer and
saw-mill operator; Edward Russell, who died at
Ellendale in 1891 ; and Arthur C, whose name
heads this review.
Arthur C. Richie was reared in Dickey County,
North Dakota, and attended its schools, those of
Scott's Mills, Oregon, and the Pacific College at
Newburg, Oregon, being graduated from its aca-
demic course in 1894. In 1896 Mr. Richie came to
Montana, and was scale man for the Boston-Mon-
tana Company at Butte, from which position he rose
through various clerical positions to one of much
more importance, and remained with that concern
until April i, 1902, when he came to Anaconda to
enter the employ of the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company as statistical clerk. In September of that
year he was promoted to be assistant statistician,
and August 12, 1916, became head of the statistical
department, which position he still holds, and has
under him ten employes. This department accounts
for all ore receipts in the plants and the inter-
mediate products of all processes, keeping track of
all losses accruing in materials from the mines to the
finished product. His offices are in the Anaconda
Reduction Department two miles east of Anaconda.
Mr. Richie is independent in his political views.
Fraternally he belongs to Anaconda Camp No. 154,
Woodmen of the World. He owns a modern
residence at No. 700 Oak Street.
On September 2, 1903, Mr. Richie was married
at .'\naconda to Miss Edith P. Smith, a daughter
of Carroll and Samantha (Haining) Smith. Mr.
Smith is employed in Mr. Richie's department.
Mr. and Mrs. Richie have one daughter, Marjorie,
who was born October 13, 1909. Having risen to
his present responsible position through his own
efforts, Mr. Richie has every reason to be proud
of what he has accomplished, and is held in high
esteem by his superiors and is recognized as fair in
his judgments by those under him.
David J. Haviland has given thirty-five years of
his life to work in mercantile lines. His proficiency
and industry have been valued assets by concerns
in both the Middle West and Northwest. Mr. Havi-
land is department manager of the Missoula Mer-
cantile Company and is one of the successful busi-
ness men of that city. He is of English ancestry,
the Havilands having come from England and
settled at Flushing, Long Island, as early as 1647.
His father, David J. Haviland, Sr., was born in New
York State in 1819, and spent his active career as
a farmer at Glens Falls, New York, where he died
in August, 1868. He was a Quaker in religious
faith and voted first as a whig and later as a re-
publican. His wife was Phoebe Brown, who was
born in Warren County, New York, in 1838 and
died at South Charleston, Ohio, in 1914.
David J. Haviland was the only son of his parents
and was reared by his widowed mother. He spent
a number of years as a child and young man at
Battle Creek, Michigan. He attended public school
there and also the Kreuse Business College. Leav-
ing school at the age of seventeen, he worked
as clerk in a general store at Battle Creek, During
the next ten years he applied himself to the work
in hand, and not only earned his salary but laid
the foundation of his substantial business career
HISTORY OF MONTANA
439
After leaving Michigan he was in a department
store at Boulder, Colorado, twelve years, eventually
becoming head of the department and with a finan-
cial interest in the business. On leaving Colorado
Mr. Haviland came to Missoula, where he arrived
in May, 1909, and since then has been manager of
the house furnishings department of the Missoula
Mercantile Company. The Missoula Mercantile
Company is one of the largest and most complete
organizations of the kind in Montana, and the
house furnishings department has the reputation of
carrying the most complete stock of house furnish-
ing goods in the state.
Mr. Haviland regards Missoula as his permanent
home and he owns a modern residence at the
corner of University and Gerald avenues. He is
a member of the Chamber of Commerce, is a re-
publican and a member of the Episcopal Church.
He is prominent fraternally, being a life member of
Hell Gate Lodge No. 383 of the Elks, is a member
of Missoula Lodge No. 13, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, Western Sun Chapter No. 11, Royal
Arch Masons, is past commander of St. Omar Com-
mandery Knights Templar, at Missoula, a member
of .'Mgeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena,
and is a past chancellor commander of the Knights
of Pythias, an order which he first joined in Mich-
igan.
October 4, 1899, at Boulder, Colorado, Mr. Havi-
land married Miss Leta B. Wells, daughter of Wil-
liam B. and Delphine (Burton) Wells. Her par-
ents are now deceased. Her father for many years
was superintendent of the Water Works at Boulder.
Mrs. Haviland finished her education in the Uni-
versity of Colorado at Boulder. They have three
children : Doris, born in August, 1900, now in the
first year of the State University of Montana at
Missoula; Jean, born February 15, 1904, a junior in
the Missoula County High School ; and Leta Clair,
born February 10, 191 1.
Frank M. Pearson. During the ten years he has
lived in Missoula Frank M. Pearson has handled as
large a volume of real estate and insurance as any
other individual in Western Montana. He posses-
ses special qualifications for successful work in
this line.
Mr. Pearson was born on a farm four miles
from Ottawa, Kansas, July 24, 1878, but most of his
life before coming to Montana was spent in Ohio.
His great-grandfather came from England. His
grandfather was born at Moundsville, West Vir-
ginia, and was a millwright by trade and died at
Woodsfield in Eastern Ohio. Albert J. Pearson,
father of the Missoula business man, was born at
Bealsville, Ohio, in 1849. He spent most of his life
in his native state, and was prominent as an attorney
and in public affairs, practicing law at Woodsfield
for many years. As a democrat he was a leader in
his party, served two terms as county attorney of
Monroe County, and also two terms as probate
judge. He was a member of the State Senate of
Ohio one term and was twice elected to represent
his Ohio district in Congress. While in Congress
he was chairman of the committee on enrolled bills.
At that time W. J. Bryan was in Congress, and a
resolution introduced by Mr. Bryan and adopted
by the House conferred special thanks upon Mr.
Pearson for his painstaking and accurate work as
chairman of the committee. This was a very un-
usual honor. Albert J. Pearson was an active
Methodist, a Royal Arch Mason and Odd Fellow.
At the age of sixteen he enlisted in the Union army
and served during the last eight months of the war.
For many years he was affiliated with the Grand
Army of the Republic. He married Elizabeth A.
Alford, who was born in Ohio in 1850 and died at
Woodsfield in 1903. They were the parents of six
children : Charles A. L., who was an examiner in
the pension department of the Federal Government
at Washington, where he died at the age of thirty-
six; William, a tailor at Columbus, Ohio; Alvin
J., judge of the Common Pleas Court at Cleveland;
Frank M. ; Eloise M., who is the wife of a farmer
in Alberta, Canada ; and Lorena, who died at the
age of seventeen.
Frank M. Pearson attended public schools at
Woodsfield, Ohio, graduating from high school in
1899. The following three years he spent in a local
insurance and real estate office, and for two years
was cashier of the branch office of the Travelers
Insurance Company at Columbus and held a similar
position at Cleveland for one year. Then for a
short time he was special agent for that company,
following which until 1009 he was manager of the
O. M. Stafford & Goss Company, general insurance
agents, at Cleveland.
Thus when he came to Missoula in June, 1909,
Mr. Pearson was an expert in the insurance field.
For six months he was in the employ of the general
insurance and real estate firm of Stoddard & Price,
and then formed a partnership with C. L. Taylor
under the name Taylor & Pearson. On tlie death
of Mr. Taylor December 31, 1914, Mr. Pearson con-
tinued the business alone until 1916. In the mean-
time his interests acquired such a large scope that
he was obliged to take in another partner. With
Dennis Lee he formed the firm Pearson & Lee
Company, but in 1918 bought out Mr. Lee and has
since been at the head of one of the leading estab-
lishments of its kind in Western Montana. He
handles city property and ranches all over the
western part of the state. His offices are at 116
West Cedar Street.
Mr. Pearson is a democrat, is a Methodist, a
charter member of Harmony Lodge No. 49, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and a member of the
Chamber of Commerce. He resides in the Rozale
Apartments on South Sixth Street, West. On
January 9, 1906, at Woodsfield, Ohio, lie married
Miss Maude E. Winchell, a daughter of E. L. and
Dorothy (Lightner) Winchell, the latter now de-
ceased. Her father is a contractor and builder
living at Mountain Lake Park in Maryland. Mrs.
Pearson was born at Zanesville, Ohio, and at-
tended Hiram College in her native state and Kee
Mar College at Hagerstown, Maryland. Mr. an^
Mrs. Pearson have one son, Winchell E., born
August 5, 1908.
John L. Campbell is a law graduate of the
University of Minnesota, and during the eight years
he has lived at Missoula made rapid progress in
establishing a sound reputation as a lawyer and
is now serving his second term as city attorney.
Mr. Campbell was born at Wabasha, Minnesota,
December 18, 1890. In the paternal line he rep-
resents an old and prominent Southern family of
Scotch ancestry. His grandfather was for many
years a successful planter and slave holder in Mis-
sissippi, and was at one time lieutenant governor
of that state. He died in Mississippi. W. H.
Campbell, father of the Missoula lawyer, was born
on a plantation in Mississippi in 1836 and as a young
man joined the Confederate army at the outbreak
of the war between the states. He was in active
service until the battle of .'\ntietani in 1862. In
that battle he was shot through the ankle and
was incapacitated for further military duty. Not
long after the war he sought a new home on the
440
HISTORY OF MONTANA
prairies of Minnesota, became a merchant at Wabasha
and for fourteen years served as county auditor of
Wabasha County.' He had become a republican in
Minnesota. He was a member of the Episcopal
Church and was affiliated with the Masonic fratern-
ity. W. H. Campbell, who died at Wabasha in 1894,
married in Minnesota Miss Alma A. Downer, and
she is still a resident of Wabasha. She was born at
Upper Jay, New York, in 1851. She is the mother
of three children: Susie C, of Wabasha, widow of
C. H. Robinson, who was a dentist; W. D. Camp-
bell, a dentist at Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada ;
and John L.
John L. Campbell received his early education in
the public schools of Wabasha, and graduated from
high school there in 1908. Soon afterward he en-
tered the University of Minnesota Law School at
Minneapolis, and received his LL. B. degree in 191 1.
He is a member of the Delta Chi law fraternity. For
several months after graduation he remained at
Wabasha, and in December, 191 1, came to Missoula,
and here for a year or so he was in the law office
of A. L. Duncan, a prominent lawyer. When Mr.
Duncan went on the bench January i, 1913, as judge
of Department No. i of the Fourth Judicial Dis-
trict, Mr. Campbell opened a law office of his own
in the Duncan-Peterson Block, and in the past five
years has handled a large civil and criminal prac-
tice. He was first appointed city attorney May I,
1916, and was reappointed to that office in 1918.
He is a republican, a member of the Episcopal
Church, and affiliated with Missoula Lodge No. 13,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ; Western Sun
Chapter No. 11, Ro3'al Arch Masons, and Covenant
Lodge No. 6 of the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows. He also belongs to the County and State Bar
Associations and the Missoula Chamber of Com-
merce.
Mr. Campbell and family reside in a good modern
home at 820 South Fifth Street, West. He married
at Winona, Minnesota, April 23, 1913, Miss Mary
R. Tower. Her mother, Mrs. Laura R. Tower,
lives at Winona, where Mrs. Campbell was born.
She is a graduate of the Winona High School, and
for two years before her marriage was a kinder-
garten teacher in Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Camp-
bell have one son, John T., born January 28, 1918.
Mrs. Nellie Cronin Sullivan. One of the most
competent countv officials Butte has ever had is Mrs.
Nellie Cronin Sullivan, incumbent of the office of
county auditor.
Mrs. Sullivan was born at Jackson. Michigan, and
has spent most of her life in the Northwest. She
attended public school at Tacoma. Washington, and
at Butte, being a young girl when her parents came
to Butte. She is a member of the Knights and
Ladies of Security and resides at 4 South Montana
Street.
Her father, Daniel Cronin, was born at Queens-
town, County Cork, Ireland, in 1852. His father
was a coast guardsman at Queenstown, and late in
life he and his wife came to the United States and
hoth died at Jackson, Michigan. Daniel Cronin
ran away from home at the age of ten years and
as a stowaway crossed the Atlantic Ocean to New
York City. Though he became dependent upon his
own efforts he acquired a really excellent education
in New York, was married in that city, and from
there moved to Jackson, Michigan, where he fol-
lowed his trade as a steam and gas fitter. In 1888
he located at Tacoma. Washington, and about 1894
settled at Butte. He was one of the early men at
his trade in this city, and followed his profession
until his death in 1896. He was a democrat. Daniel
Cronin married Mary A. McMahon, who was born
at Newry in County Armagh, Ireland, and was a
small child when her father died. She is still living,
a resident of Butte. She was educated in Glasgow]
Scotland, and came to New York City with her
brother Frank McMahon, living in the East until
after her marriage. She had three children. Mrs.
Sullivan bemg second in age. Frank, the oldest,
an employe of the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany, finished his education in Butte, and resides
at 413 North Main Street. Dan Cronin, the youngest
of the family, is a foreman with the -Anaconda
Copper Mining Company and lives at 832 Waukesha
Street in Butte.
Mrs. Sullivan has two talented children. John
F.. born December I, igoo, graduated from the Butte
High School in 1918 and is now employed in the
office with his mother as deputy county auditor.
The daughter, Florence G., born July 21, 1902, and
a pupil in a young ladies' seminary at Los Angeles,
is studying for the moving picture profession, and
her talents have secured for her much favorable
attention in that field.
Major Hugo H. Swanberg, of Missoula, has the
distinction of having served in two American wars,
having been in the Philippines twenty years ago,
and held the rank of major in the World war.
Major Swanberg, who is one of the most loyal
and patriotic Americans, is a native of Sweden and
spent his youth in that country and was back there
after his service in the Philippines. Major Swan-
berg, who has a prosperous real estate and insurance
business at Missoula, was born at Helsingborg,
Sweden, March 22, 1882. He was educated in the
public schools and University of Lund and came
to the United States in 1898. He had hardly landed
on these shores when he enlisted with his brother
Charles Swanberg for service in the Spanish-Amer-
ican war. His brother was all through that war and
also through the World war, and was one of the
few optical e.xperts in the United States Navy dur-
ing the struggle with Germany. Charles Swanberg
is still an officer in the service of the Government
in the navy. Hugo H. Swanberg joined the Twenty-
Second Infantry in the Eighth Army Corps, and was
in the Philippines under General Fred Funston. He
saw some of the sharp fighting against the Filipino
insurgents under Aguinaldo, and was with Funston
when that great Filipino chieftain was captured.
He held the grade of sergeant at that time. After
his release from the army Mr. Swanberg returned to
Sweden in 1902, and while in his native country grad-
uated from the Bendtz Business College at Malmo.
In 1904 he was again on United States soil, and soon
afterward enlisted in the regular army. He was at
Fort Crook, Nebraska, Fort Benjamin Harrison, In-
diana, and was assigned to duty as a general recruit-
ing officer. This work required much travel all over
the country. In that capacity he arrived in Mon-
tana in 191 1, and soon afterward leaving the army,
engaged in the real estate and insurance business at
Missoula.
In 1917 Mr. Swanberg entered the Officers Train-
ing Camp at the Presidio in California and was com-
missioned captain. He was assigned to duty with
the Ninety-First Division, assisting in organizing
that unit. He was promoted to the rank of major
commanding a battalion which included some of the
first drafted men of Montana. He commanded this
battalion at Camp Lewis and afterward was made an
instructor of replacement troops, being on duty at
Camp Meade, Maryland, and Camp Pike, .A.rkansas,
where he commanded a battalion of replacement
troops. Major Swanberg received his honorable
HISTORY OF MONTANA
441
discharge March 27, 1919, and has since resumed his
real estate business at Missoula. His offices are at
129 Higgins Avenue.
Major Swanberg, who is unmarried, is a republi-
can, is affiliated with the Lutheran Church, and is
a member of Missoula Lodge No. 13, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, Indianapolis Chapter No. 5,
Royal Arch Masons, Pike Consistory of the Scottish
Rite at Little Rock, Arkansas, and also of Alamin
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Little Rock. He
formerly belonged to Lodge 183, Independent Order
of Odd Fellows, at Omaha, and is member of Hell
Gate Lodge No. 383, Order of Elks, at Missoula.
As an old soldier he is affiliated with the Spanish-
American War Veterans, Veterans of Foreign Wars,
and the American Legion. He is individually owner
of much real estate both in and around Missoula.
Thomas Allen Fitzgerald, M. D., came to Mis-
soula in 1892. His work as a physician and surgeon
has been continued for more than a quarter of a
century in that community and has brought him pres-
tige among the front rank of Montana physicians.
Doctor Fitzgerald was born in the Province of
Ontario, Canada, January 29, 1868. His grandfather,
James Fitzgerald, was born in County Kildare, Ire-
land, in 1809, and was a pioneer farmer and merchant
in Ontario, where he died in 1854. He married Miss
Fisher, who was born in Ireland in 181 1 and died in
Ontario in 1887. Their son James Fitzgerald was
born in Ontario in 1837, and spent his life in that
Province as a merchant. He died at Toronto in
1901. Politically he was a Conservative, was a mem-
ber of the Church of England, and the Masonic
fraternity. He married Anna Carson, born in New
York City in 1844, and is still living in Ontario.
They had a large family of children: J. C. ; Sidney,
a retired resident of Ontario; J. H., living retired
at Missoula; Doctor Fitzgerald; Lottie, wife of J.
A. V. Preston, a county official living at Orangeville,
Ontario ; George, a surveyor, living in Toronto ; Ger-
trude, living with her mother in Ontario; J. Howard,
who is connected with the meat packing concern of
Libby, McNeil & Libby at Portland, Oregon ; and
Perry Edgar, a traveling salesman with headquarters
at New York City.
Thomas Allen Fitzgerald was educated in the
rural schools of his native province, attended high
school at Port Hope, and then entered Trinity Col-
lege at Toronto, where he was graduated with the
Doctor of Medicine degree in 1888. During the first
four years of his professional career he practiced
in the western part of Kansas a year and for two
years was located at South Niagara Falls. He came
to Missoula when it was a young and growing town,
and has few associates who have been in practice at
Missoula for a longer period than himself. He
was county physician in the early days, and at pres-
ent again occupies that office. Doctor Fitzgerald is
a member of the Western Montana, the State and the
American Medical associations. His offices are in
the Montana Building, and his modern home is at
301 South Fifth Street, West.
Doctor Fitzgerald is an independent in politics and
is a vestryman of the Episcopal Church at Missoula.
He is a charter member of Hell Gate Lodge No.
383 of the Elks.
In 1900. at Missoula, he married Mrs. Mary Ethel
(McGruder) Metzrodt. She was born at Cheyenne,
Wyoming. Her father, a rising young attorney,
was killed in Wyoming by the_ cattle rustlers, whose
enmity he had incurred by his vigorous stand for
law and order. Doctor and Mrs. Fitzgerald had two
daughters: Florence, who died at the age of six
years; and Nora, born September 14, 1912.
John J. Tobinski, M. D., a well known physician
and surgeon of Missoula, had only fairly begun his
professional career here when he was commissioned
an officer in the Medical Reserve Corps and was
on duty in several American training camps during
the late war.
Doctor Tobinski was born at Calumet, Michigan,
September 3, 1892. The family originally came from
Poland. His grandfather is still living at Calumet,
Michigan, where he was an early settler. Frank To-
binski, father of Doctor Tobinski, was born at Cal-
umet in 1869, was a miner there in early life and aft-
erward manager of a department in a grocery store.
On coming west he spent a few months in Arizona,
and in 1912 located at Butte, Montana, where he is
manager of the hardware department of T. J. Ben-
nett's store. He held several local offices while in
Calumet, is a republican, and a member of the Catho-
lic Church. Frank Tobinski married Margaret Sulli-
van, who was born in Calumet in 1870. Agnes, the
oldest of their children, is the wife of Windfall
G. Haines, who served in France about a year, being
in the St. Mihiel and Argonne battles, and was re-
cently mustered out and has resumed his residence
at Butte; Alary, twin sister of Agnes, is the wife
of Daniel Palfryman, buyer for the Lutey chain of
stores at Butte; Dr. John J.; and Basil, who was
born February 8, 1901 and is a student in the Butte
High School.
Doctor Tobinski graduated from the high school
at Calumet in 191 1, spent two years in the medical
department of Marquette University in Milwaukee,
and completed his professional education in the Chi-
cago College of Medicine and Surgery, graduating
in May, 1915. He is a Phi Beta Phi. From July,
1915, to January, 1916, Doctor Tobinski was an in-
terne in the Northern Pacific Hospital at Missoula.
Since then he has engaged in a general medical prac-
tice. His offices are in the Montana Building and his
home is at 544 South Third Street, West.
October 8, 1917, Doctor Tobinski was commis-
sioned a first lieutenant in the Medical Reserve Corps,
was'trained at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, from there
was sent to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, thence to Fort Lo-
gan, Colorado, back to Fort Sill and during the in-
fluenza epidemic was on duty with the Student
Army Training Corps at Oklahoma University at
Norman. He was then at Fort Sill until mustered
out February 13, 1919.
Doctor Tobinski is present county physician of
Missoula County. He is independent in polictics.
During 1917-18 he served as secretary and treasurer
of the Western Montana Medical Association, and is
also a member of the State and American Medical
associations. He is phj'sician for Missoula Aerie No.
32 of the Fraternal Order of Eagles, is a third degree
Knight of Columbus, is affiliated with Missoula Coun-
cil No. 1021, and is a member of Hell Gate Lodge No.
383 of the Elks. February ii, 1918, at Lawton. Okla-
homa, he married Miss Edmee Deschamps, daughter
of Gaspard and Denise (Cyr) Deschamps, now resi-
dents of Missoula. Her father owns extensive ranch
lands, and was one of the early day ranchers in Mon-
tana. Mrs. Tobinski is a graduate of St. Mary's
at Notre Dame, Indiana. They have one son, John
Francis, born February 27, 1919.
John Mills Orvis is president of the Orvis Music
Company. Incorporated, the leading business han-
dling musical instruments and musical merchandise
in Missoula county.
Mr. Orvis, who has been a resident of Montana
for over twenty years, was born in Kenosha county,
Wisconsin, January 5. 1858. His paternal ancestors
were Welsh and settled in the New England colonies
442
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in 1642. He therefore can claim an ancestry of
more than two centuries of sterling Americans. His
grandfather, John M. Orvis, was born in Vermont
in 1791, for manv vears had a blacksmith's shop at
Brattleboro, ^>rmont, and on coming west spent
some time in Cleveland and in 1844 settled in Keno-
sha county in what was then Wisconsin territory.
He had served as a soldier in the War of 1812. He
died at Salem, Wisconsin, in 1863. John M. Orvis
married Anna Larabee, who was born in Vermont
in 1792 and died at Salem, Wisconsin, in 1884.
Charles W. Orvis, father of the Missoula mer-
chant, was born at Brattleboro, Vermont, in 1816
and went to Wisconsin the same year as his father,
in 1844. He was also a blacksmith by trade, and
he and his father conducted one of the first shops in
Kenosha county. The greater part of his life, how-
ever, he spent as a farmer. Charles W. Orvis went
to California in 1850, and spent four years among
the placer mines, with a fair degree of profit. The
records of Salem township in Kenosha county, Wis-
consin, make note of his name as one of the Cali-
fornia gold seekers of 1850. He died in Kenosha
county in 1882. He was a democrat in politics, a
Universalist in religious belief, and a member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Charles W.
Orvis married Bethia Selleck. She was born at
Brockville, Ontario, Canada, in 1825, but was reared
in St. Lawrence county. New York, her people hav-
ing been colonial settlers in New York. She died
in Kenosha county, Wisconsin, in 1915. John Mills
is the oldest of her children. Adelaide is the wife
of Hugh Cooper, whose people were Wisconsin
pioneers. He was a retired farmer at Waterford,
in Racine county, until his death in January, 1920.
Flora, who has never married, was for some years
a school teacher and gave her undivided attention to
her mother for forty years, and is still living at
Salem in Kenosha county. Charles Seymour is a
retired resident of Hamilton, Montana, where he
was in the musical merchandise business for many
years, until he sold out his store to his brother John
in January, 1919. Harry F. is a carpenter and
builder and also conducts a summer resort at Camp
Lake, Kenosha county. Levi C. is a retired farmer
at Salem, Wisconsin, while Justin K., the youngest
of the family, is a successful Chicago lawyer and
lives in ,\ustin, Chicago.
John Mills Orvis acquired his early advantages
in the rural schools of Kenosha county, and attended
the State Normal School at Whitewater through the
junior year. He had worked on his father's farm,
and after finishing his education he taught school
in Kenosha county nearly every winter for ten years.
The rest of the year he spent in farming. After
leaving the school room he was a merchant at Tre-
vor in Kenosha county until he came to Montana.
Mr. Orvis first visited Montana in 1896. bringing
his wife here for her health. He located in the
state permanently in 1897. His home for two years
was at Helena, where he was in the employ of A.
P. Curtin, a piano dealer, and also with the Singer
Sewing Machine Company. In 1902 Mr. Orvis
opened his music store at Missoula, and the business
is now in point of continuous existence the oldest
establishment of its kind in that city. He began in
a small way on North Higgins Avenue, but a year
later located at 115 West Cedar Street, where his
splendid establishment is located today. Since early
in 1919, as above noted, he has also operated the
former store of his brother at Hamilton. Mr. Orvis
handles pianos, phonographs and all kinds of musi-
cal merchandise, and also has a sewing machine
department. He owns considerable real estate in
Missoula, including his own modern home at 320
South Sixth Street, West.
He took considerable interest in politics back in
his home county in Wisconsin, where he served as
town clerk, town treasurer and assessor in Salem
Township. He is an independent voter and forty-
two years ago he joined Salem Lodge No. 42 of th.e
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He still has
his affiliations there. At Missoula he is afiiliated
with Hell Gate Lodge No. 383 of the Elks and
Camp No. 5329 of the Modern Woodmen of .Amer-
ica. He is also a member of the Missoula Chamber
of Commerce.
In 1887, at Fairfield in Rock County, Wisconsin,
Mr. Orvis married Margaret Clowes, daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Charles Clowes, both now deceased.
Her father was a pioneer blacksmith in Wisconsin.
Mr. and Mrs. Orvis have three children: Ethel, born
Marcli 4, 1888, is a graduate of the Missoula High
School and finished her education in Nortlnvestcrn
University at Evanston, Illinois, and the State Uni-
versity of Montana at Missoula. She is the wife of
J. G. Reinhard, who is connected with the Orvis
Music Company at Missoula. Helen, born .4pril 23,
1894, is a graduate of Brunot Hall at Spokane,
Washington, and married Albert Arnett, a cattle
man and rancher at Shell, Wyoming. John M., Jr.,
born April 24, 1899, is a student in the University of
Montana, and also assists his father in business.
Joseph E. Llafet since coming to Montana in 1913
has rapidly promoted himself in the line of mer-
chandising and is now manager of one of the largest
branch stores in Montana of the merchandise cor-
poration J. C. Penney & Company of New York.
Mr. Llafet, whose home and activities are at Mis-
soula, was born at Richmond. Missouri, June 6, 1879.
He is of French ancestry. The original spelling of
the name is d' Lafayette, and the stock was the same
as that from which General Lafayette descended.
The Llafets were colonial settlers in Georgia.
Mr. Llafet's grandfather, Thomas B. Llafet, was a
native of Georgia and a pioneer farmer near Rich-
mond, Missouri. He was a southerner and entered
the Civil war on the Confederate side. He was
killed in the battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas. He
married Sarah Boone, who was born in Missouri in
1828 and died at Milton, Oregon, in 1888. Their
children were : Lawrence ; Eva, a resident of Mil-
ton, Oregon, w^here her husband, the late Willis A.
Bannister, was a banker : Anne married James P.
Gant, a farmer near Richmond, Missouri, and both
are now deceased ; Sarah lives in Mississippi, widow
of George W. Warring, who was a carpenter and
builder.
Lawrence Llafet was born November 3, 1847. at
Richmond, Missouri, in the same house in which his
son Joseph E. also first saw the light of day. He
was reared and married at Richmond, was a farmer
in that locality for many years, and since 191 1 has
lived retired at St. Joseph, Missouri. He entered
the Civil war in 1864 on the Union side, and served
during the last months of hostilities. He is a demo-
crat and a member of the Odd Fellows. Lawrence
Llafet married Ruth Lee, who was born near Rich-
mend, Missouri, January 14, 1852. Their family
consists of the following children : Walter L., a
carpenter and builder at Kansas City, Kansas: Wil-
liam, a resident of St. Joseph; Joseph E. ; Estella,
wife of E. E. Curtis, a traveling salesman with home
at Denver, Colorado: Samuel, an employe of the
Santa Fe Railway offices at Kansas City, Missouri ;
and Mamie, unmarried.
Joseph E. Llafet attended public schools at Rich-
mond, graduating from high school in 1898. For
HISTORY OF MONTANA
443
one year he was in the grocery business at V'ibbard,
Missouri, and then sold out and established a gen-
eral stock of merchandise in the same community,
where he spent four years. After that he was con-
nected with a general store in a clerical capacity at
Kingston, Missouri, until the spring of 1913.
On coming to Montana Mr. Llafet entered the
service of the J. C. Penney & Company, Incorpo-
rated, at Great Falls, beginning as a salesman. At
the end of one year his abilities had gained him such
favor that he was promoted to assistant manager.
In March, 1915, he was transferred to Missoula and
opened the large department store of that corpora-
tion on April roth. He has been manager from the
beginning. The J. C. Penney & Company, Incorpo-
rated, has headquarters in New York City, and main-
tains IC/ stores in twenty-five states. The Missoula
business is at 123-125 East Main .Street.
Mr. Llafet is also a member of the Missoula
Chamlier of Commerce, is a democrat, a deacon in
the Christian church, and was twice chosen noble
grand of the Lodge of Odd Fellows at Kingston,
Missouri. He resides at 226 South Fourth Street,
West.
December i, 1903, at Vibbard, Missouri, he mar-
ried Miss Mabel Jones, a daughter of William B.
and Dora (Williams) Jones. Her father was a
miller and died at Missouri, and the mother resides
at Milan, that state. Mrs. Llafet is also a graduate
of the high school at Richmond. Missouri. Mr. and
Mrs. Llafet have had four children: Maurice E.,
born in February, 1905, and died in May, 1917;
Carrie L.. born December 24, 1907 ; Helen M., born
February 12, 191 1, and Marion, born November 25,
1916.
John K. O'Rourke enjoys a distinctive position
among the public officials of Silver Bow County.
He is now serving in his fourth term as sheriff of
the county, and is the only sheriff who has enjoyed
more than two terms from the people of that county
Mr. O'Rourke has been a resident of Mcntana
more than a quarter of a century, and for a number
of years was connected with the mining interests
around Butte. He comes of a prominent Irish
family of County Limerick, where he was bori,
March 31, 1867. H's father. Michael O'Rourke, was
born in County Tipperary, Ireland, in 1819. and
spent all his life in tliat country. He died in County
Limerick in 1904. He was liberally educated, at-
tending the noted college at Thuries, County Tip-
perary. and was a class mate of the late Michael
Cudahy, founder of the Cudahy Packing Company
in this country. Michael O'Rourke was a farmer
and an auctioneer in County Limerick, also served as
clerk of court, and enjoyed a place of great in-
fluence and prominence in the affairs of Southern
Ireland. His influence in politics was due to his
substantial business character and his genial per-
sonality. He had a liberal education and in his
younger life was prominent as an athlete, being the
champion broad jumper of County Limerick- He
married Catherine Kennedy, who was born in
County Limerick in 1824 and died there in 1894.
They had a large family of children, most of whom
came to America : Thomas, for many years an em-
ploye of the Street Railways of Chicago, died in
that city in 1899; Elizabeth, who died in Chicago in
igoi, leaving nine children, was the wife of John
Collopy. a retired resident of that city, but for many
years boss of the longshoremen on the Chicago
waterfront ; Mary and Margaret, both living at
Chicago; Bridget, deceased; Hannah, a Dominican
Sister at Evanston, Illinois; John K., who is seventh
in the family; .'Vnnie, a Dominican Sister teadiing
at .'Anaconda. Montana; Josephine and Michael, de-
ceased; Kathleen, unmarried, and living at Chicago;
and Edward, who was an engineer at the smelters
at Butte and died of influenza in 1918.
John K. O'Rourke acquired his early education in
the National schools of County Limerick. He was
twenty-one years of age when he came to the
United States in 1888, and at once moved to Chi-
cago. In 1889 he went south to Louisiana, and con-
ducted a stock farm for thirteen months at Pon-
chatoula. That was a profitable enterprise, but he
was aflSicted with the fever and ague prevalent in
those low countries, and in jSgi had to return
north. T"or a time he worked as baggageman with
the Chicago & Western Indiana Railway, and was
promoted to storage clerk. Then for several years
in Chicago he was employed in the O. B. Green ship
yard, and in 1895 came to Montana. Mr. O'Rourke
worked at loading copper at the old upper works of
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, was pro-
moted to timekeeper in 1897, and in 1899 began seven
years of service as timekeeper for the Mountain
Consolidated mine at Butte. He left the mines to
become proprietor of the Mullins House at Center-
ville, and remained there for two years, until he was
elected for his first term as sheriff in the fall of
1909. Mr. O'Rourke served as sheriff of Silver Bow
County from 1909 to 1913, being re-elected in 1910.
On retiring from office he resumed the hotel busi-
ness as proprietor of the Northern Hotel on Front
Street. In the fall of 1916 the people again called
him to the oflSce of sheriff, paying thereby a special
tribute to the efficiency of his administration. He
was re-elected in the fall of 1918.
Mr. O'Rourke has been a leader in the demo-
cratic party in Silver Bow County for a number of
years. He is a life member of Butte Lodge No. 40.
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, is a third
degree Knight of Columbus, affiliated with Butte
Council No. 668, is a member of the Ancient Order
of Hibernians, the R. E. L. A., Butte Aerie No. 11,
Fraternal Order of Eagles, and is a member of the
Catholic Order of Foresters. Sheriff O'Rourke has
his home and offices at the courthouse. He mar-
ried at Anaconda in 1899 Catherine O'Rourke, a dis-
tant relative. Her parents were Mr. and Mrs.
Patrick O'Rourke. Her father was a Union soldier
during the Civil war and afterwards as a member
of the regular army fought against the Indians in
the West under Gen. Thomas F. Meagher. For a
number of years he was a dry goods merchant at
Denver where he died.
George D. Lyon. Efficiency is the watchword of
the hour. In industry and business, in work and
play, in the administration of public and private
affairs, in education and training, in philanthropy
and religion, no trait is so important in these strenu-
ous days as efficiency. This is demanded of the indi-
vidual who would succeed. It is borne in upon the
boy or girl at school, who is thereby incited to make
schooling a direct preparation for success in the
occupation to which he or she aspires. It tests the
apprentice in entering and completing apprenticeship.
It is more and more the condition of getting and
keeping a job. Both in the skilled trades and the
learned professions, good general qualifications
must be supplemented by technical expertness. Even
in philanthropy and religion, where the test of effi-
ciency has been applied last and least, it is coming
to be seen to be good is not enough to fit one to do
well. We must be better than good to do good. In
business circles the need for efficiency is so para-
mount that without this qualification no man today
can hope for promotion, and the fact that he has
444
HISTORY OF MONTANA
risen above liis associates is proof positive that he
has learned how to make every action, each thought
even, work out to produce the most effective resuUs.
George D. Lyon, manager of the Clifton, Applegate
& Toole Company, is one of the live young men of
Anaconda who is recognized as a living exponent of
efficiency raised to the highest degree.
George D. Lyon is a native son of Montana, hav-
ing been born at Drummond, this state, January 9,
1883, a son of George D. Lyon, and member of one
of the old colonial families of New England, whose
roots strike back into the soil of old England. The
elder George D. Lyon was born at Greenwich, Con-
necticut, and died at Drummond, Montana, in 1885.
Coming west in young manhood, he spent some time
at Corinne. LTtah. and then in 1872 became a pioneer
rancher of Drummond. Montana, his ranch still
being in the family and owned by his widow and
son William, it comprising 3,000 acres of land, on
which they carry on cattle raising upon an extensive
scale. In politics George D. Lyon, Sr., was a repub-
lican, and his namesake son inherits his views in
this respect. His widow, who bore the maiden name
of Ella F. Smith, was born at North Scituate, Rhode
Lsland, in 1854. Their children were ,as follows :
William, who is living on the homestead ranch ;
Arthur R.. who is an emplove of the Continental
Oil Company of Missoula, Montana ; and George
D.. who is the youngest.
Growing up in Granite County, Montana, George
D. Lyon attended its schools and the Phillipsburg
High School, and then took a three-years' course at
the State University at Missoula, Montana, and was
graduated from the Northern Indiana Commercial
College of Valparaiso, Indiana, in 1902. For the
subsequent two years he was in the employ of the
W. B. Conkey Company of Hammond. Indiana, as a
clerk, following which he was car clerk for the
Northern Pacific Railroad Company at Trout Creek,
^fontana. for a year. For six months he served as
brakeman on this same railroad, working out of
Missoula, and for another six months was in the
mines of the Coeur d'.Mene district at Mace. Idaho.
Hi? next employment was with Winston Brothers,
who had a contract on the construction work of the
Chicago. Milwaukee and St. Paul Railroad, with
headquarters at Missoula, and he remained with this
firm for two and one-half years on this contract,
and then for six months more was with them at
Chehalis, Washington. In 1910 he engaged with the
Clifton. Applegate & Toole Company at Bonner,
Montana, as bookkeeper, and remained there until
IQI2 occupied with the construction of the Big
Blackfoot Railroad. In that year the company, one
of the biggest railroad construction firms in the
West, came to .Anaconda, and Mr. Lyon came with
them and assisted in building the Georgetown exten-
sion of the Butte. .Anaconda & Pacific Railroad,
being the office manager of the company since that
date. The offices of this company are on North
Cedar Street. .Anaconda. Mr. Lyon lives at No. 115
W"st Seventh Street.
In 1908 Mr. Lyon was married at Missoula to
Miss Ethel V. Perro. a daughter of John and Akkie
("Hoft'man) Perro. Mr. Perro was a carpenter who
died at Drummond. Montana. Mrs. Perro survives
and makes her home with Mr. and Mrs. Lyon. The
one child in the Lyon family is Kathryn. who was
born October 16. 191 1. Mr. Lyon has brought to
his position deep knowledge oit railroad construc-
tion, wide practical experience in railroad work, and
a sound, personal judgment which, combined with
his efficient methods, have enabled him to so conduct
the affairs of his office as to make him a model after
which others are urged to pattern.
Albert Newlon Whitlock came to Montana from
the East, after graduating from Harvard University
Law School, to accept a post in the newly organized
law school of the University of Montana. He is
still a professor in the law school, until recently was
dean of the school, and at the same time has built
up and maintained a busy general practice, and is
widely known among the lawyers of the state.
Mr. Whitlock was born at Richmond, Madison
County, Kentucky, September i, 1887. His paternal
ancestors were English and colonial settlers in Vir-
ginia, and from there the family was transplanted
across the mountains into Kentucky early in the
nineteenth century. His maternal ancestry includes
the Bakers, also of colonial .American stock. His
grandparents were Albert and Adeline Whitlock,
both native Kentuckians. where they spent all their
lives. Albert Whitlock was born in 1823 and died
in Madison County in 1898. He was a farmer. He
and his wife had two sons, John, a farmer who was
born in Madison County in 1848 and died there about
1898, and J. V. Whitlock.
J. V. Whitlock was born in Madison County,
Kentucky, in 1852 and has spent all his active career
there as a successful farmer. He now lives at Rich-
mond. He is a democrat and for many years has
been a faithful member of the Christian Church.
He married Alice Baker, who was born in Madison
County, Kentucky, in 1857. Albert N. Whitlock was
the second of three children. His vounger sister.
Hazel, died at the age of, nineteen. The other sister,
-Alma, is the wife of G. C. Stocker, a prominent
farmer at Richmond. Kentucky.
.Albert Newlon Whitlock attended rural schools in
his native county and after a four years' course
graduated from the Richmond High School with the
class of 1902. He took the regular literary and clas-
sical course in the LTniversity of Kentucky at Lex-
ington, graduating A. B. in 1906. He is a member
of the Sigma Chi fraternity. In 1906 he returned
to the Richmond High School as its principal,
remaining for one year. For two years he was an
instructor in the University of Kentucky and in iQoS
received the degree Master of Arts from that insti-
tution. The same year he enrolled as a student in
the law school of Harvard University, and remained
until completing his course and receiving his LL. B.
degree in ion. In the meantime he had been admit-
ted to the Kentucky bar in 1909. For a few months
in 191 1 Mr. Whitlock was in the law oflices of
Stover & Hall at 60 Wall Street. New York City.
He came to Montana to take un his duties as
assistant professor of law at the State University
in September, 191 1. He was one of the first instruc-
tors in the Law Department, and in 1012 was chosen
professor of law and still fills that chair, being the
senior professor of the Law School. From 1913
until June, 1919, he was also dean of the Law
School, but resigned at the latter date. In private
practice he formed a partnership in 1912 with
Charles H. Hall, and their relationship was con-
tinued until 1917. Since then Mr. Whitlock has been
a member of the law firm of Murphy & Whitlock.
with offices in the Montana Building. The senior
member of the firm is W. L. Murphy.
Mr. Whitlock is also a member of the State Board
of Law Examiners, an ofifice he has held since the
board was created by the Legislature in 1917.
Politically be is a democrat, is a member of the
Christian Church, belongs to the Missoula Chamber
of Commerce and is a stockholder in the Missoula
Trust and Savings Bank. His home is at 415 Con-
nell .Avenue.
.August 29, 1912, Mr. Whitlock married at Cam-
bridge. Massachusetts, Miss Charlotte Reed Thurs-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ton, daughter of J. M. and Nellie F. (Reed) Thurs-
ton. Her mother still lives at Cambridge and her
father, who died there, was a Danker.
Charles H. Marsh is a Montanan of thirty-five
years' experience and residence. He brought no
capital with him to the territory. However, he knew
how to work and as a ranch hand and teamster he
earned his first money in Montana. For a number
of years he was a locomotive engineer and for over
twenty years has been a business man of Missoula,
where he has developed the largest undertaking
establishment in the county.
He was born in Gallatin County, Kentucky, Feb-
ruary 27, 1861, son of William B. and Maria (Hil-
ton) Marsh. His paternal grandparents were pi-
oneers in Kentucky from the State of Virginia.
William Marsh married in his native state Maria
Hilton, who was born at Litchfield. Illinois, and when
a small child was taken to St. Louis, where her par-
ents died of cholera and she was reared by an uncle
in Kentucky. William Marsh and wife enjoyed an
ideal companionship and were well fitted for the
strenuous experiences of pioneering. In 1872 they
moved to Independence in Western Missouri, where
they spent the rest of their lives as farmers. Wil-
liam Marsh died at the ripe age of eighty-two and
his wife at the same age in 1908, having survived
her husband si.x years.
Charles H. Marsh was eleven years of age when
his parents moved to Western Missouri. He finished
his education in local schools and also attended the
Kansas City Commercial College. In 1884, at the
age of twenty-three, he came to Helena, Montana,
and soon afterwards went to work on a ranch in
the Prickly Pear Valley. His next experience was
in the placer mines of Jefiferson County, where he
drove a four-horse team hauling charcoal. Later in
the same year he was given work in the engine shops
of the Northern Pacific Railway, and remained
with that corporation fifteen years. He became a
. fireman, and for twelve years was locomotive en-
gineer. Even yet he retains his card of membership
in the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers. Hav-
ing married and established a home and with several
children growing up, Mr. Marsh left railroading and
in 1899 bought a half interest in the livery and un-
dertaking business of Hays & Haverfield at Missoula.
In 1901 he became sole proprietor and soon after-
ward took in his brother Walton Marsh as a partner.
In 1903 he again became sole proprietor and in 1908
sold the livery business and has since concentrated
his time upon the undertaking department. Mr.
Marsh was elected coroner of Missoula County in
1904 and served four terms. He is a republican in
politics, is a member of Missoula Lodge No. 13. An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons, Western Sun Chap-
ter No. II of Missoula, St. Omer Commandery No. 9
of Missoula, Eastern Montana Consistory No. i and
Algeria Temple Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of
the Mystic Shrine. He is also an Odd Fellow, Elk,
Eagle and a member of the Royal Highlanders.
In February, 1891. Mr. Marsh went back to Missouri
to claim as a bride the girl who had been the inspira-
tion of his early efforts and enterprise in the West.
She was Miss May Douglas, daughter of James Doug-
las, a prominent citizen of Buckner. Missouri, and
a Confederate veteran. James Douglas was a Cali-
fornia forty-niner, and after returning from the
coast married Henrietta Dixon, of Virginia. For
nearly thirty years Mr. and Mrs. Marsh have had
their home in Missoula. Their first child, Hilda
Frances, was born in November. 1891, and their
son Walton was born in 1893. Their youngest child
was Douglas G., who was born January 10, 1894.
He enlisted in the United States Marine Corps in
Washington, District of Columbia, November, 1917,
and received his training at Paris Island and Quan-
tico and sailed for France March 12, 1918. On the
morning of June loth he was killed in action at
Chateau Thierry in Belleau Woods. He fell when
within a few yards of the first line trenches. He is
buried in France.
Fred R. Angevine, for the past seven years has
been a Missoula lawyer whose work has attracted to
him a large clientage and who has made a most cred-
itable record in connection with several offices of
trust. He is a lecturer in the Law Department of the
State University.
Mr. Angevine was born at Missoula February 14,
1889. He is of English ancestry. His father is R.
W. Angevine, a prominent resident of Missoula and
Montana. R. W. Angevine was born near Halifax,
Nova Scotia, in 1857, spent his boyhood there, and
was married at Duluth, Minnesota, where he lived
for several years and was connected with the police
department. He came to Montana about i886 as
foreman of bridges and buildings of the Rocky
Mountain Division of the Northern Pacific Railway.
That work required much travel, but he made his
headquarters and home in Missoula and has re-
garded Missoula as his chief residence for over thirty
years. After retiring from railroading he served
as chief of police of Missoula for ten years, for
two terms was county auditor of Missoula County,
and is still a business man, being a rancher and con-
tractor. He has a hay, grain and stock ranch of
450 acres at Clinton, and has a home on the ranch
as well as in Missoula. He is affiliated with the Bap-
tist Church and is a member of the Missoula Lodge,
No. 13, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Western
Sun Chapter No. ii. Royal Arch Masons, Covenant
Lodge No. 6, Independent Order of Odd Fellows,
and Missoula Aerie No. 32. Fraternal Order of
Eagles. R. W. Angevine married Etta Jones. She
was also -a native of Nova Scotia, born at Pug Wash
Junction, near Halifax, in 1863. Fred R. Angevine
is the older of two sons, his brother Eugene being a
registered pharmacist at Missoula.
Fred R. Angevine graduated from the Missoula
County High School in 1907. He then spent five
years in the Literary and Law departments of the
University of Washington at Seattle, graduating
LL. B, in'1912 and being admitted to the Washington
bar in that year. He is a member of the Sigma
Chi and the, Phi Delta Phi college fraternities. Re-
turning to Missoula in 1912, Mr. Angevine entered at
once upon his business and profession as a_ lawyer
and handles a large practice both in the civil and
criminal branches. He gives part of his time to
his duties as special lecturer on criminal law and
practice in the State University Law School at
Missoula.
Mr. Angevine has served two terms as public ad-
ministrator, was county attorney from 1916 to 1918,
and for a few months served with the colors during
the World war. He went to Camp Pike, Arkansas,
-August I. 1918. and after a period of training was
commissioned second lieutenant of infantry. He
was mustered out December 4, 1918.
Mr. Angevine is secretary of the Missoula Amuse-
ment Company and is also interested in the ranch
with his father. He is a democrat in politics, a mem-
ber of the Methodist Church, belongs to the Missoula
Chamber of Commerce and is affiliated with Missoula
Lodge No. n Ancient Free and .Accented Masons,
and Hell Gate Lodge No. 383 of the Elks. On Oc-
tober 7. loio. at Seattle, he married Miss Bernice
Modcrie, daughter of IVIr. and Mrs. Paul Moderie.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Her father is connected with the Heron Lumber
Company at Missoula. Mr. and Mrs. Angevine re-
side at 222 West Spruce Street.
William B. Daly has had a phenomenal rise
to prominence in miningf circles in Montana. About
twenty years ago he abandoned a promising law
practice to come to Butte and learn mining. He
worked as a common laborer for a time, and neg-
lected no opportunity to acquire a fundamental and
practical knowledge of mining in every detail. For
several years past he has held one of the important
executive positions in the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company, and is now assistant general manager of
the corporation, witli supervision over an army of
12,000 employes.
Mr. Daly was born at Smartsville, California.
January 4, 1873. His father, Lawrence Daly, born
at Dundalk, Ireland, in 1834, came to the United
States about 1848, and in the following year drove
a bull team of oxen attached to a prairie schooner
across the plains and over the mountains to Cali-
fornia. For many years he was a successful hy-
draulic miner in California and died at Smartsville
m 1892. He was a democrat and a Catholic.
Lawrence Daly married -Ann Barry who was born
in County Cork. Ireland, in 1834 and died at San
Francisco in 1906. A brief record of their children
is as follows: Mary, who is living at Oakland,
California, unmarried; Kate married Hugh O'Don-
nell, a coal dealer, and both died at San Francisco:
Ella, wife of Joseph Hamm, who has charge of the
California Wire Cloth Company at Oakland; Ce-
cilia, who died in infancy; John J., who was a resi-
dent of Butte and many will recall the tragedy of
November 8, 1898, a general election day, when he
was killed at Butte while protecting the sanctity of
the ballot; Lawrence, a machinist helper for the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company living at Butte ;
William B. ; and Thomas and Matthew, both of
whom died young.
William B. Daly was educated in the public schools
of Smartsville and after passing a teacher's ex-
amination taught school for two years. He studied
law at San Francisco, was admitted to the bar before
the Supreme Court of California January 8, 1894,
and for five years was a hard working young lawyer
with every promise of success in his profession.
In April, 1899, he arrived at Butte, possessed with
the ambition to make a name and career for himself
in mining. The first year he worked as timekeeper
at the Neversweat Mine, and then in order to learn
every phase of the business became an underground
miner. He was promoted to cost clerk under John
P. O'Neil, then to chief time keeper for the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company, and in March. 1907,
became foreman of the East Grav Rock Mine.
Later he was also foreman of the West Grav Rock
Mine, the Bell, the Diamond and the East Gray
Rock mines. From September, 1912, to December,
1913. Mr. Daly served as superintendent of the
employment department of the .'\naconda Copper
Mining Company. His next promotion was to effi-
ciency engineer, an office he held from December,
1913. to June, 1914. From June, 1914, to June, 1918,
Mr. Daly was general supe'rintendent and since the
latter date has been assistant general manager, with
offices in the Hennessey Building at Butte.
He is a member of the Montana Society of Min-
ing Engineers and the .American Institute of Mining
Engineers. Politically he is an independent demo-
crat, and at one time took considerable part in local
affairs. He was elected clerk and recorder of Silver
Bow County in 1904, but was counted out by his
opponent. He is a Catholic, a fourth degree Knight
of Columbus, affiliated with Butte Council No. 668,
member of the Silver Bow Club, Silver Bow Good
Roads Association and the Butte Chamber of Com-
merce.
Mr. Daly and family reside at 808 West Galena
Street. June 28, 1905, he married Mary E. \evin.
daughter of Edward and Ellen Nevin, both now de-
ceased. Her father was a miner in Virginia City,
Nevada, having been a pioneer there. Mrs. Daly
received her education in the schools of Virginia
City and is a graduate of the parochial high school.
W. J. Babington came to Montana in 1890, and
in a business way was identified with mining, ranch-
ing and the lumber industry for many years. For
the past ten years he has been a figure in the official
affairs of Missoula County, being the present county
clerk and recorder.
Mr. Babington was born near St. John, New
Brunswick, Canada, July 9, 1865. His family is
Scotch-Irish. His grandfather, William Babington,
was a native of England and spent his active life
as a farmer in County Fermanagh, Ireland. James
Babington, father of W. J. Babington, was born in
County Fermanagh in 1828, and at the age of twen-
ty-one came to America and settled at St. John, New
Brunswick. He was liberally educated and in addi-
tion to farming also practiced law. He was a Con-
servative in politics and spent many years as post-
master of his home city in Canada. He was a
member of the Episcopal Church. James Babington,
who died in St. John in 1903, married Susannah
Coyle, who was born in Ireland in 1828 and died near
St. John in 1892. W. J. Babington is the oldest of
their children. Beresford is a farmer near St. John;
.\nnie S., is the wife of George Robinson, a farmer,
merchant and saw mill operator near St. John ; Rob-
ert C, a farmer near St. John ; and John C, who
was born in 1872 and died near St. John in 1901.
W. J. Babington was educated in the rural schools
of Queens County, New Brunswick, and in 1885
graduated from the Normal School at Frederickton.
For five years he was a school teacher and school
principal in New Brunswick, and coming to Mon-
tana in 1890 went to work in the Curlew Mine at
Victor in Ravalli County. For two years he was
employed as a mucker and then for another two
years was bookkeeper and office superintendent. On
leaving the mine he followed saw milling and ranch-
ing until 1910. in which year he was elected county
auditor of Missoula County. That office he filled
with efficiency for two years and in 1912 was elected
county clerk and recorder. He served in that ca-
pacity for eight years, through re-elections in 1914,
1916 and 1918.
Mr. Babington is a democrat in politics, a member
of the Episcopal Church, and in Masonry is affiliated
with Missoula Lodge No. 13, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons. Western Sun Chapter No. 11, Royal
.^rch Masons, Tyrean Council No. 3, Royal and Se-
lect Masters, St, Omer Commandery No. 9, Knights
Templar, all at Missoula, and Algeria Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is also a member of
Laurel Lodge No. ri. Knights of Pythias, Hell Gate
Lodge No. 383 of the Elks, Missoula Aerie No. 32,
Fraternal Order of Eagles, Missoula Lodge No. 556,
Loyal Order of Moose, and Missoula Camp No. 5329.
Modern Woodmen of America. He is an active
worker in the Missoula Chamber of Commerce. Mr.
Babington served as secretary of the Missoula Coun-
ty Draft Board during the late war.
July 3. 1899, he married Mrs. Kate (Campion)
Wolfkill. Her father was the late Matthew Campion
of Owego, New York, a veteran railroad man.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Edward Francis Conyngham, M. D. The active
life of Dr. Edward Francis Conyngham has been
connected with the most important period in the de-
velopment of Missoula County, Montana, and is
linked with the developments which have stimulated
the advancement and progress of the profession of
medicine and surgery in the state. He was born at
Westport, Missouri, May 8, 1865, a son of Edward
J. and Katherine Marie (Andrews) Conynham, and
on the paternal side comes of an old Anglo-Saxon
family, which originated in Sussex (South Saxon),
England, the name then being spelled and pronounced
Koenigheim. On the Norman invasion (1066) the
family was driven north, where Doctor Conyngham's
branch of the family became identified with the
Clan Douglas. During the Crusades, Kenneth
Conyngham saved the life of Edward of England
from an assassin, and for this a serpent was added
to the family crest. Later, Edward, or Eamon, saved
the Bruce from his pursuers by hiding him in a
hayfield, hence the family coat-of-arms and motto.
During the Commonwealth, and even after 1745, the
Conynghams were adherents of the Stuarts, and
almost all their Christian names are of Stuart origin.
It was a Conyngham who brought to Queen Victoria
the news of her accession to the throne of Eng-
land.
Edward J. Conyngham was born at Annandale,
Scotland, December 25, 1833, and early became a
captain of Fusileers, B. E. I., but resigned his com-
mission in i860. Coming to the United States, he
first settled in Georgia, and during the Civil war
was a captain of infantry in the Confederate army.
His death occurred at Salt Lake City, Utah, De-
cember 17, 1899. His wife, who was born at Castle
Andrews, County Kildare, Ireland, April 16, 1845,
died at Minneapolis, Minnesota, February 17, 1889.
Edward Francis Conyngham received his early
education in England and Ireland, and was graduated
from Trinity College with the class of 1882, receiv-
ing the degree of Bachelor of .\rts. He took his
medical degree at the Minneapolis College of Physi-
cians and Surgeons, in 1886, and was graduated from*
the University of Minnesota in the following year,
after which he did post-graduate work at Edin-
burgh, Berlin, Leipsic and Vienna, during 1893 and
1894. Since locating at Missoula he has built up a
large and representative practice and is not only
known for his skill and ability in his profession,
but because of the invention of several ingenious
and valuable surgical instruments. Doctor Conyng-
ham has had varied military experience, having been
a volunteer in No. 2 (Students) Battery, First Edin-
burgh City Artillery, during his student days, and a
surgeon in the ".'Vrmy of Liberty," Mexico, in 1910.
An expert shot, he has been president of the Missou-
la Rifle Association (N. R. A.) since 1916. Formerly
Doctor Conyngham was United States pension ex-
amining surgeon, but resigned in 1903, In 1917 he
was named as a draft physician and continued to
contribute his services in that capacity during the
greater period of the great World war. His politi-
cal tendencies make him a republican, and his re-
ligious faith is that of the Episcopal Church. As a
fraternalist he is past master of Ruby Lodge No.
36, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and a mem-
ber of Harmony Lodge No. 49, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, and Western Sun Chapter No. II,
Royal Arch Masons, both of Montana.
On April 16, 1905. Doctor Conyngham was united
in marriage at Lewiston, Idaho, with Harriet Sylvia
Berkley, daughter of Hugh Berkley, a veteran of the
Civil war and the first settler at what is now Pom-
eroy, Washington. To this union there have come
Vol. 11—29
two children : Edward Francis, born December 14,
1906; and Katherine Stuart, born July 26, 1915.
George Michael Jennings, M. D. It is not al-
ways easy to discover and define the hidden forces
that move a life of ceaseless activity and large pro-
fessional success ; little more can be done than to
note their manifestation in the career of the indi-
vidual under consideration. Doctor Jennings has
long held distinctive prestige in a calling which re-
quires for its basis sound mentality and rigid pro-
fessional training and thorough mastery of tech-
nical knowledge with the skill to apply the same,
without which one cannot hope to rise above the
mediocre in administering to human ills.
George Michael Jennings was born in Pembina,
North Dakota, on August 13, 1880, and is a son of
Patrick F. and Bridget (Glynn) Jennings. Pat-
rick F. Jennings was born in County Cork, Ireland,
in 1852, and was reared and educated. In 1870
when about eighteen years of age, he came to the
United States and made permanent location in Ohio.
In 1878 he moved to Pembina, North Dakota, where
he follovved his trade, that of a plasterer, and also
did considerable contracting. In 1891 he went to
Cavalier, North Dakota, where he became the owner
of a hotel, to the operation of which he devoted
himself until his death, which occurred in 1915.
Politically Mr. Jennings was a democrat, and he
was a faithful member of the Roman Catholic
Church.
Patrick F. Jennings was married to Bridget Glynn,
who was born in 1851 in County Mayo, Ireland, and
who died at Cavalier, North Dakota, in 1903. To
this worthy couple were born the following children :
Agnes, who is the wife of Fred I. Harris, a miller
at Cavalier, North Dakota; Elizabeth, who is the
wife of Frank T. Hall, who is in railroad work at
Los Molinos, California; George M., the immediate
subject of this review; James G., who is a druggist at
Upham, North Dakota; Ethel G., the wife of Paul
A. Remington, chief surgeon at the Tacoma Hos-
pital, Tacoma, Washington.
George M. Jennings received his elementary edu-
cation in the public schools at Cavalier, North Da-
kota, including the high school. He then pursued
preparatory studies in the University of North Da-
kota, graduating from that institution in 1903, with
the degree of Bachelor of Arts. Having determined
to make the practice of medicine his life work, he
then matriculated in the medical department of the
University of Minnesota, at Alinneapolis, where he
was graduated with the class of 1907, receiving the
degree of Doctor of Medicine. While in medical
school he was a member of the Greek-letter fra-
ternity Alpha Kappa Kappa. In 1907 Doctor Jen-
nings came to Missoula as interne for the Northern
Pacific Beneficial Association Hospital, in which -
capacity he served for one year, at the end of that
time being appointed assistant surgeon. Doctor
Jennings early demonstrated his ability as a physi-
cian and his possession of unusual skill as an oper-
ating surgeon, so that by 1912 he has richly earned
the appointment which came to him as chief surgeon
of the hospital, in which responsible position he is
still serving. The hospital is a large modern brick
structure, conveniently arranged and eligibly situ-
ated, being remarkably well adapted to the require-
ments of hospital uses. It has accommodations for
ninety patients and there are thirty-five employes
under Doctor Jennings' supervision. Doctor Jen-
nings possesses a mind well disciplined by severe
professional training, which together with a natural
aptitude for investigation and research, have pe-
culiarly fitted him for the noble calling in which he
448
HISTORY OF MONTANA
is engaged. He is a careful reader of the best pro-
fessional literature and keeps himself in touch with
the age in the latest discoveries pertaining to the
healing art.
Politically Doctor Jennings gives his support to
the republican party, and is a member of the Ro-
man Catholic Church. He is a member of Missoula
Council No. 1021, Knights of Columbus, and is also
identified with the Missoula Rotary Club and the
Chamber of Commerce. He is a member of the
Missoula County Medical Society, the Montana
State Medical Society and the American Medical
Association, as well as the American College of
Surgeons.
In 1910, at Minneapolis, Minnesota, XJoctor Jen-
nings was married to Sabra Swenson, the daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. Harold Swenson, the former of
whom is a merchant at New London, Minnesota.
The mother is deceased. Mrs. Jennings possesses a
splendid education, having completed her elementary
studies in the East Side High School at Minneapolis,
and then attending and graduating at the University
of Minnesota with the degree of Bachelor of Arts.
To Doctor and Mrs. Jennings have been born the
following children: Eileen, born in 191 1 ; Donald, in
1913; Katherine in 1915; and George Carroll, born
on pecember 19, 1918.
Personally Doctor Jennings is a man of generous
nature and kindly impulses, who has won a host of
warm and loyal friends since coming to Montana.
Widely recognized as a leader in his profession, he
is also appreciated because of his suport of all
movements looking to the advancement of the com-
munity along all legitimate lines.
C. J. FoRBis. The gentleman to a review of \vhose
life the following lines are devoted is recognized as
one of the able and energetic young business men of
the western part of Montana, being now engaged as
an architect in the City of Missoula. Though com-
paratively young in years, Mr. Forbis has already at-
tained a gratifying success in his chosen vocation
and enjoys the confidence and good will of those
with whom he has been associated either in a business
or social way.
C. J. Forbis is a native son of the great Treasure
State, having been born at Butte, Montana, on
October 27, 1888, and is the son of William P. and
Lenora B. (Jenks) Forbis. William P. Forbis was
born in Missouri in 1852, and his death occurred at
Missoula, Montana, in 1898. He was a genuine
pioneer of Montanaj having come to this state in the
early '60s, during the Civil war. He first settled in
Virginia City, where he gave his attention to pros-
pecting and mining, later following the same pur-
suits at Helena and Butte, reaching the latter place
in 1868. He worked entirely on his own account
and was fairly successful in his efforts. He became
a prominent citizen of Butte, and stood high in the
esteem of the people of the community. He was a
democrat in politics and at one time served as col-
lector of internal revenue for one term. He was a
faithful member of the Presbyterian Church. He
was married to Lenora B. Jenks, who was born in
i860 in Iowa, but who now resides in Missoula. To
this worthy couple were born the following chil-
dren : H. T., who is specifically mentioned elsewhere
in this work, is engaged in the real estate and loan
business in Missoula; C. J., the immediate subject of
this sketch: Leona Belle is the wife of A. E. Drew,
of Missoula, who has charge of insurance of the
Forbis-Toole Company, of which corporation he is
secretary.
C. J. Forbis received his elementary education in
the public schools of Butte and Missoula, graduat-
ing from the high school in the latter place in 1905.
He then attended Michigan University, at Ann Ar-
bor, for one year, and became a student in the Mon-
tana State University at Missoula, where he was
graduated in 1912. Mr. Forbis then took up the
study of architecture in the University of Minne-
sota at Minneapolis, where he attended during 1914-
15-16. Returning to Missoula, he opened offices and
entered upon the active practice of his profession.
He has already received wide recognition as an
architect of original ideas and practical knowledge
of the standard forms of construction. He has
designed several of the best schoolhouscs in Missou-
la County, as well as many fine residences, business
houses and other buildings. He has entered into a
professional partnership with Henry Howell, under
the firm name of Howell & Forbis, Mr. Howell
having charge of the branch office which the firm
maintains at Butte.
Politically Mr. Forbis is independent, preferring
to give his support to the men and measures which
most nearly meet his approval, regardless of party
lines. Religiously he is a member of the Presbyte-
rian Church. He is also identified with the Rotary
Club and the Chamber of Commerce, both of Mis-
soula.
On December 15, 1916, at Kalispell, Montana, Mr.
Forbis was married to Josephine Hunt, the daughter
of G. W. and Harriet (Cratchet) Hunt, of Kalispell,
where Mr. Hunt is engaged in the lumber business.
Mr. and Mrs. Forbis have one child, William Hunt.
A whole-souled gentleman and public-spirited cit-
izen, Mr. Forbis is ready at all times to use his means
and influence for the promotion of public improve-
ments and the advancement of any measures looking
to the welfare of the people generally. He has been
successful because of his industry and his close ob-
servation of everything having a bearing on his pro-
fession. Genial and approachable, Mr. Forbis enjoys
a well-deserved popularity in this community.
Warrington Richarhs is the president and active
Jiead of Joseph Richards. Incorporated, the oldest
and largest undertaking business at Butte. The
business was established nearly thirty years ago by
Joseph Richards, and today it represents the acme
of complete equipment and service, and in those re-
spects would bear favorable comparison with any
institution of its kind in the country.
Warrington Richards, who has been a resident of
Butte over twenty years, has become known as a
substantial community builder, a man of thorough
public spirit, and generally popular and deservedly
so. He was born at Goldsithney, England, October
4. 1878. His grandfather, Joseph Richards, spent all
his life in England, was a carpenter and wheelwright
and died at Goldsithney in 1882. The father of
Warrington Richards afso bears the name Joseph.
He was born in England in 1838. acquired his
father's trade of carpenter and wheelwright, and
for a number of years lived in .\merica. He came
to this country in 1890, followed the trade of car-
penter and builder at Central City, Colorado, and in
1895 moved to Butte, where he continued work at
his trade until 1904. In that year he returned to
England and is now living retired at l^eignmouth.
During his American residence and citizenship he
was a republican voter. He is a member of the
Episcopal Church. His wife bore the maiden narne
of Jecoliah Dabb. She was born in England in
November. 1839. and is now making her home with
her daughter Mrs. W. J. Willey at Butte. The chil-
dren were nine in number : Joseph : Samuel, who is
connected with a grocery store at Denver, Colo-
rado; Martin, who died at the age of tv/elve years;
HISTORY OF MONTANA
449
Lillie, wife of W. J. Willey, a machinist's helper at
Butte; Rosie, wife of John Dimler. of Denver;
Grosvenor, who died in Butte at the age of twenty-
one; Ada. who died in Butte in 1916, and her hus-
band, Andrew Johnson, a miner, is also deceased;
Warrington, who was eighth in order of age; and
Agatha, wife of E. D. Pue, a coal merchant at
Butte.
The oldest son, Joseph Richards, founder of the
business known as Joseph Richards, Incorporated,
was born at Goldsithney, England, in February, 1865.
He was reared and educated in his native country
and in 1892 located at Butte and established the
business known as Richards, the Butte Undertaker.
All his competitors of that time have since gone
out of business, leaving his establishment undis-
puted in point of time, and also in efficiency and
character. Joseph Richards continued active in the
business until 1912, when he sold out and is now
•living retired at San Jose, California. He is remem-
bered as one of the prominent business men of
Butte, and at one time was president of the Moun-
tain View Cemetery Association. He was a re-
publican, and served as coroner of Silverbow
County in 1895-96. He is a Royal Arch Mason and
Shriner, a member of the Episcopal Church, and
while in Butte had affiliations with twenty-three fra-
ternal organizations, including the Sons of St.
George, the Red Men, Moose, Modern Woodmen,
Woodmen of the World, Degree of Honor, the Fra-
ternal Brotherhood, Odd Fellows, Eagles and the
Elks. He is also a member of the Butte Auto Club
and the Silver Bow Club. Joseph Richards married
Miss Anna Zweifel in February, 1899.
Warrington Richards was twelve years of age
when his parents came to the United States. Up to
that time he had attended school at Goldsithney,
and he also attended school at Central City, Colo-
rado, after 1890. On coming to Butte in 1895 he was
employed as clerk in a local store until the fall of
1897, at which date he became associated with his
brother in the undertaking business. In 1912 the
business was incorporated as Joseph Richards, In-
corporated. The parlors are at 15-19 South Montana
Avenue, and the facilities include motor hearses
and every other improved equipment, besides an ex-
pert personal staff. Besides Warrington Richards as
president of the business the secretary and treasurer
is George T. Wade. Mr. Richards is a republican,
is affiliated with Butte Lodge No. 22, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, Shoshone Tribe No. I Im-
proved Order of Red Men, Sons of St. George.
Silver Bow Camp No. 5805, Modern Woodmen of
America.
He married at Butte Claire A. Rand, daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Ernest A. Rand, the latter now de-
ceased. Her father is a farmer at Edmonton,
-Mberta, Canada. Mr. and Mrs. Richards have two
children: Anita, born March 6, 1903; and War-
rington Jr., born June 6, 1917.
Robert D. Pugsley came to Alissoula in 1901, a
voung man of good education and sound business
experience, acquired in Eastern Canada. He has
been continuously connected with Missoula's oldest
and best known business house, the Missoula Mer-
cantile Company, and has risen from a clerkship to
the management of its wholesale grocery depart-
ment.
Robert Daniel Pugsley was born at Penobsquis in
New Brunswick, Canada, July 22, 1877. Two broth-
ers left England and were colonial settlers in Amer-
ica, and as Loyalists one branch moved to Canada.
Mr. Pugsley's grandfather, Daniel Pugsley, was one
of the first settlers at Penobsquis in New Brunswick.
He died there at the age of eighty-five. Robert
Pugsley, fatiier of the Missoula busmess man, was
born at Penobsquis in 1824 and spent his life there
as a farmer. He died in 1896. He was a conserva-
tive in politics. His wife was Miss Agnes Morton,
also a lifelong resident of Penobsquis. .\melia, the
oldest of their children, died at Penobsquis at the
age of sixty-two. wife of Thomas Morton, now a
retired harness dealer at Penobsquis ; Sanford, a
dentist at Woodstock, New Brunswick, Canada;
Henrietta, wife of Edgar Wallace, a farmer at
Penobsquis ; Albert, proprietor of a hotel at Monc-
ton. New Brunswick; Isabelle, a trained nurse whose
home is at Cromwell, Connecticut; Augusta, un-
married, and living with her sister Henrietta.
Robert Daniel Pugsley, the eleventh and youngest
child, was educated in the public schools of his
native village, graduated in 1896 from the Academy
at Wolfville, Nova Scotia, and also took the fresh-
man year in Wolfville College. He attended Kerr's
Business College at St. John, New Brunswick, and
following that for three years was employed by the
Sussex Mercantile Company at Sussex, New Bruns-
wick.
In 1901, when he came to Missoula, he was made
a clerk in the grocery department of the Missoula
Mercantile Company. In 1909 he was promoted to
the responsibilities of manager of the retail depart-
ment, and since February 26, 1919, he has been
manager of the wholesale grocery department of
this concern.
Mr. Pugsley is a republican voter, is a vestryman
in the Missoula Episcopal Church, and is a member
of the Chamber of Commerce. In 1919 he sold his
fine residence at 601 Daily .Avenue and is now living
at 202 South Fourth Street.
In 1899, at Penobsquis. Mr. Pugsley married Miss
Annie Freeze, daughter of Byron and Matilda
(Hall) Freeze, both now deceased. Her father was
a farmer. Mrs. Pugsley is a graduate of the .\cadia
Seminary at Wolfville, Nova Scotia. To their mar-
riage were born two sons : Edwin Albert, born .April
4, 1900, now a clerk in the hardware department of
the Missoula Mercantile Company; and Robert
Byron, born November 9, 1910, a student in the Mis-
soula public schools.
Hugh B. Campbell came to ^Montana when a very
j'oung man, and his e.xtensive business experiences
have made him a leading citizen at Missoula, w'hich
has been his home for the greater part of the time
he has spent in this state.
Mr. Campbell, who is president of the Independent
Oil Company, was born at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,
December 29, 186S, and started earning his own
living when only nine years of age. His grand-
father, Hugh Campbell, was a native of Ireland,
brought his family to .America and established a
home at Pittsburgh, where he spent his last years.
He was a bricklayer and contractor. His wife was
Mary Trainor, a native of Ireland, who died in
Pittsburgh. Their son Bartley Campbell was born
in Ireland in 1832, and was a small boy when his
parents settled in Pittsburgh. He grew up and
married there, and for a number of years followed
the business of contractor and builder. He died at
Pittsburgh in 1874. During the Civil war he was a
Union soldier and was in all the battles and cam-
paigns of his command. He was a Catholic and a
democrat in politics. Bartley Campbell married
Mary Lavev, who was born in Ireland in 1834 and
died at Mis'soula, Montana, in 1910. Thomas Fran-
cis, the oldest of their children, was drowned at
Pittsburgh at the age of eleven years. Mary is the
wife of Frank Stinger, a contractor and builder, and
450
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a well known citizen of Missoula. The third is
Hugh B. James D. is a molder at Missoula, and
Alice is the wife of a locomotive engineer, Mr.
Shaw, and lives near Spokane, Washington.
Hugh B. Campbell received his early education in
the public schools of Pittsburgh. At the age oji
nine he became a boy helper in a glass factory,
attending school when not otherwise employed. On
leaving Pittsburgh and coming to Montana young
Campbell located at Missoula, where he soon became
a member of the firm of Stinger & Campbell in the
transfer business. They organized the Missoula
Transfer Company, the pioneer business of its kind
at Missoula. Mr. Campbell was actively associated
with this business until 1909. For five years he was
also a partner in the Western Montana Liquor Com-
pany. In the meantime, in 1914, he established the
Independent Oil Company, and has made this the
leading wholesale oil business of Missoula. The
company maintains a plant on the tracks of the Chi-
cago, St. Paul and Milwaukee Railway and has
extensive facilities for serving the needs of their
trade.
Mr. Campbell has also been an influential figure in
political affairs. For four years he was an alder-
man of Missoula, and for two years was sheriff of
Missoula County. He is a democrat in politics, a
member of the Missoula Chamber of Commerce,
and is affiliated with Hell Gate Lodge No. 383 of
the Elks.
His home is at 202 West Spruce Street. He mar-
ried at Missoula in 1891 Miss Mary Kelley, a daugli-
ter of Patrick and Hannah (Gallagher) Kelley, the
latter now deceased. Her father is a retired Mon-
tana rancher and makes his home with Mr. and
Mrs. Campbell. The latter have five children:
Frank L., vice president of the Independent Oil
Company of Missoula ; Hugh, a student in the State
University of Montana; Ursula, a graduate of the
Missoula High School and now a teacher at Target
Range in Missoula County; May, a senior in the
parochial high school at Missoula ; and Hall, a
student in the parochial schools.
Paul D. Wilcox. Though a recent addition to the
citizenship of Missoula, Mr. Wilcox has spent prac-
tically all his life in the northwestern and Pacific
states. For several years he has been connected
with the Bissinger Company, one of the largest firms
in the West dealing in hides and wool. Mr. Wilcox
is manager of the Missoula branch of this company.
He was born at Little Rock, Arkansas, November
16, 1873. His grandfather was Timothy M. Wilcox,
and he was born at Ashtabula, Ohio, in 1814. He
was a physician by profession, and practiced in a
number of localities in the Middle West and North-
west. During the Civil war he served four years,
being captain of Company C of the Third Missouri
Infantry. After the war he moved to Little Rock,
Arkansas, later came out to Portland, Oregon, and
in these various localities practiced medicine. In
1883 he was called to Washington, District of Co-
lumbia, as a witness in the famous Star Route trial,
involving some of the most extensive frauds ever
uncovered in the national postal service. After his
duty was discharged as a witness he remained in
Washington and served in a position in the Pension
Bureau. He died at Washington in 1886. His wife
was Mary Randall, who died at Portland. Oregon.
Frank R. Wilcox, the only surviving child of Dr.
Timothy M. Wilcox, was born at Galena, Illinois,
in 1849, and died at Portland. Oregon, in May, 1912.
He spent his boyhood at Galena and was a graduate '
of the classical course from the University of Mich-
igan. He lived at Little Rock. Arkansas, three years.
and during that time married. He was in the real
estate business in Arkansas. In 1875 he went to Port-
land, Oregon, was engaged as an expert accountant
for a time and later as a hardware merchant. In
politics he was a republican, was a member of the
Unitarian Church and affiliated with the Knights
of Pythias and Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
Frank R. Wilcox married Helen Morey, who was
born in Arkansas in 1851, and died at Portland, Ore-
gon, in 1875. She was the mother of three children :
Guy R., a steam fitter at Portland, Oregon ; Paul D. ;
and Mary E., wife of William Bradley, who from
18S2 until 1909 was a railroad man with the North-
ern Pacific and is now living retired at Spokane,
Washington.
Paul D. Wilcox was about two years old when his
parents moved to Portland, and about the same time
he was left motherless. He was educated in the
Portland public schools, but at the age of twelve
he went to Washington, District of Columbia, to'
live with his grandfather. Doctor Wilcox. While
there he learned the core maker's trade. Returning
West to Spokane in 1888, he served a three years' ap-
prenticeship at the plumber's trade. For a number
of years Mr. Wilcox followed mining at Rossland
in British Columbia. While there he became ac-
quainted with Gen. Charles S. Warren of Butte,
and a warm friendship has always existed between
them. In 1904 Mr. Wilcox located at Sand Point,
Idaho, was in railroad work there one year, and for
four years held the office of under sheriff of Bonner
County. He made a race for the office dt sheriff on
the republican ticket, but that was an off year for the
republicans and he was defeated. In 1910 he be-
came construction foreman with the Oregon Power
Company at Eugene, remaining there 2j^ years.
On returning to Spokane he entered the service
of the Bissinger Company, and since July I, 1919,
has had charge of their Missoula branch, located at
905-909 South First Street, West. The headquarters
of the Bissinger Company are at San Francisco, and
the corporation maintains branch houses in all the
large cities of every state west of the Mississippi.
During his residence in Bonner County, Idaho,
Mr. Wilcox for one year was superintendent of the
County Poor Farm. He is a member of the Chris-
tian Church, is affiliated with Sand Point Lodge of
Knights of Pythias, Hell Gate Lodge No. 383, Benev-
olent and Protective Order of Elks, the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, and the Modern Woodmen of
America, all at Sand Point, Idaho. He is an active
worker in the Chamber of Commerce at Missoula.
Mr. Wilcox owns a modern home at 1038 South
Third Street, West. He married at Oroville, Wash-
ington,-February 19, 1893, Miss Clara Ward, daugh-
ter of N. H. and Elizabeth (Vaughn) Ward, both
now deceased. Her father was a minister of the
Baptist Church. Mr. and Mrs. Wilcox have three
daughters: Helen Elizabeth, born April 2, 1896, is
the wife of N. H. Baldwin, a mechanic in the shops
of the Northern Pacific Railway at Spokane, Wash-
ington ; May Eleanor, born July 4, 1899, is the wife
of Ward Munson, who is connected with the firm
of Tull & Gibbs, furniture merchants at Spokane.
The youngest is Juanita Ora. born February 19, 1912,
now attending school at Missoula.
Hubert H. Gwinn is proprietor of Gwinn's ga-
rage at Missoula. He is a progressive young business
man, has wide experience in motor mechanics, and
fortified himself for his work as a garage proprietor
by one year in one of the leading technical schools
of the country.
Mr. Gwinn was born at Stevensville, Montana,
April 9, 1892. He is the son of Dr. Russell Gwinn,
Jr:™yc^c^ L'^ii^p^v^l^vt^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
451
a prominent Missoula physician. Doctor Gwinn was
born in Missouri in 1862, was reared and married in
that state, and has lived in Montana since 1886. He
practiced for a number of years at Stevensville and
since 1915 has enjoyed a high standing and pro-
fessional success at Missoula. He is a democrat in
political affiliations. Doctor Gwinn married Miss
Anna Payne, who was born in Missouri in 1867.
Hubert is their only son. Their daughter, Grace,
is doing advanced studies in violin at Portland,
Oregon.
Hubert H. Gwinn was educated in the public
schools of Missoula, graduating from the County
High School in 191 1. He spent two years in the
University of Montana at Missoula, and for one
year specialized in mechanical engineering in the
Armour Institute of Technology in Chicago. He
returned to Missoula to open the Motor Inn Garage,
which he has since renamed Gvvinn's Garage. This
is a very popular and largely patronized business,
located at the corner of South Third and Orange
streets. The building is owned by Doctor Gwinn.
Mr. Gwinn is a republican, member of the Episco-
pal Church and resides at 507 South Third Street,
West. October 12, 1916, at Tulsa, Oklahoma, he
married Miss Edith Merrifield, daughter of O. G.
and Lillie Merrifield, residents of Tulsa. Mrs.
Gwinn is a graduate of the Lake View High School
at Chicago.. To their marriage were born two chil-
dren : James, on October 30, 1917, and Alan, on
October 30, 1918.
Jacob Osenbruc, president of the Home Baking
Company of Butte, is one of the efficient business
men of this region, who, having come to the United
States from foreign shores, has inade a success of
his undertakings and at the same time established .
himself in the confidence of the public. He was
born in the City of Stade, near Hamburg, Germany,
on January 28, i860, a son of Clause Osenbrug,
whose birth took place in the vicinity of Hamburg,
Germany, in 1805, and his death at Stade, Germany,
in 1877. During his younger days he was a shoe-
maker, but after his marriage became a general
merchant, and he spent all of his life in and about
Stade. All of his mature years he was a consistent
member of the Lutheran Church. Elizabeth Stock-
mann, born in the vicinity of Hamburg, Germany,
in 1815, became his second wife, and she, too. died
at Stade, in the same year as her husband. Their
children were as follows: Annie, who married Fred
Klusmann, an employe of the Washoe Reduction
Works of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company
at Anaconda, Montana; Jacob, whose name heads
this review ; and John, who is a carpenter and
builder, lives at Kansas City, Missouri.
Growing up in his native place, Jacob Osenbrug
attended both public and private schools and re-
ceived the equivalent of our high school course, al-
though but fourteen years of age when he left
school to begin learning the trade of a baker. He
followed his trade in Germany until 1877, when he
went to London, England, and spent six months
in a bakery there, and then, in the spring of 1878,
came to the United States. For the first few months
after reaching this country Mr. Osenbrug was en-
gaged in farm work in Lafayette County, Missouri,
but being stricken down with malaria he went to
St. Louis, Missouri, and there found work at his
trade, continuing to make that city his home until
June, 1879, when he came to Butte, Montana.
Upon his arrival at Butte Mr. Osenbrug found it
necessary at first to do whatever came to hand,
including work in the woods, operating a threshing
machine in the Deerlodge Valley and other pioneer
jobs, but in 1880 was able to carry out his plans
and establish a bakery which lasted through the
v/inter, and in the spring he resumed his varied
occupations. During the winter of 1881, however,
be was able to establish himself permanently in a
bakery business in a small way, building his own
oven and making his own tools. From these primi-
tive beginnings Mr. Osenbrug has had the satis-
faction of developing his present fine establishment,
which is the largest in Montana, he now operating
under the caption of the Home Baking Company.
His bakerj', offices and warehouse are at No. 1904
Olympia Street. The selling territory comprises
Butte and the outlying districts for a radius of loo
miles, and heavy shipments are made into Idaho.
In 1904 the company was incorporated, with Mr.
Osenbrug as president; Rudolph Osenbrug as vice
president and secretary; and Edwin Thomas as
treasurer. The plant today is one of the .best
equipped in the country, and is supplied with every
rnodern appliance and all kinds of machinery to fa-
cilitate the production of bakery goods in the most
sanitary manner. The equipment includes four con-
tinuous patented baking ovens and modern electric
motors for operating the machinery. The doughs
and flour are never touched by hand, and every
process is conducted with the greatest care for
cleanliness. Visitors from all over the country are
impressed with this bakery and the people of Butte
are naturally proud of it and the enterprise which
has brought it into existence and maintained it.
The company operates five large auto trucks for
delivery purposes, all of the business being strictly
v.^holesale, this being the only concern in the state
which does no retail business. The leading brands
of bread produced by this company are known all
over Western Montana and into Idaho, they being
the "Holsum" and "Betsey Ross."
Mr. Osenbrug is a republican. He affiliated with
the Christian Science Church. A Mason, he belongs
to Butte Lodge No. 22, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, and Deerlodge Chapter No. 3, Royal Arch
Masons. He is also a member of Butte Lodge,
Knights of the Maccabees. The Butte Chamber
of Commerce and the Rotary Club also benefit by
his aggressive membership, and he can be depended
upon to give his hearty co-operation to all measures
looking toward a further development of the city.
Mr. Osenbrug owns his modern residence at No.
825 West Broadway and a business block at Nos.
15-17 East Granite Street. The company owns the
bakery, offices and warehouse.
The first marriage of Mr. Osenbrug took place
at^ Butte, Montana, in 1883, when he was united
with Miss Mary M. Hembockel, who died in Oc-
tober, igoo, having borne him the following chil-
dren : Henry J., who died in 1913 at Butte, was re-
ceiving teller of the First National Bank at Butte;
Elizabeth, who married Ira Peters, a mining en-
gineer, is a resident of Butte; Rudolph, who is
vice president of the Home Baking Company, is
a resident of Butte ; Edward P., who is a wanderer ;
Albert, who died in infancy; and Albert M., who
lives at Washington, District of Columbia, was
graduated from the Montana State Agricultural Col-
lege of Bozeman. and is now in the Government
service. In igoi Mr. Osenbrug was married second
at New York City, New York, to Mrs. Annie
(Heinbockel) Kroeger, his sister-in-law, and she
died in 1913 at Los Angeles, California. By her first
marriage she had a son, William P. Kroeger. who
was graduated from the Penn College of Philadel-
phia, Pennsj-lvania, with the degree of Doctor of
Medicine, and he is now a physician and surgeon.
Mr. Osenbrug was married in 1914 to Mrs. Katrina
452
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Miller, a native of Ohio, no issue. Mrs. Osenbrug
had two children bv her first marriage, namely:
Charles Miller, who is an employe of the Montana
Power Company, is a resident of Butte ; and Harry,
who is in the automobile business, lives m the State
of Washington.
The sons of Mr. Osenbrug who served m the
World war are Edward P., Albert M., William P.
and Charles P. Edward P. enlisted but a short
time prior to the signing of the armistice so had no
opportunity of seeing active service.
Albert M. Osenbrug enlisted in 1918 and served
for eighteen months at Camp Omaha in the balloon
battalion, and owing to his knowledge of this branch
of the service was kept on this side as an instructor
to drill new recruits.
William P. Kroeger, a stepson, enlisted in 1917
in the hospital as a medical student.
Charles P. Miller, another stepson, enlisted in
1918 and was overseas in France for eighteen
months, participating in the first battle of Soissons,
in which he received seven machine gun bullets in
the groin which incapacitated him for further serv-
ice. He was in a machine gun battalion.
Glen Albert Smith received his early business
training in the employ of some of Montana's lumber
firms, and the knowledge he acquired of lumbering,
supplemented by an ardent interest in the timber re-
sources of the country, led him into the service of
the Government in the forestry department, with
which he has been identified for the past twelve or
fifteen years.
Mr. Smith who is now assistant district forester
at Missoula, was born in Bates County, Missouri,
September 15, 1879, son of Albert M. and Lucinda
(Pepper) Smith. Albert M. Smith was born at
Frederick in Schuyler County, Illinois, in 1842, and
died at Columbia Falls, Montana, April 20, 1918. As
a young man he served in Company K of the Thirty-
Seventh Illinois Infantry from the beginning of the
Civil war. In 1876 he moved from Illinois to Bates
County, Missouri, and was a farmer there until
1903, when he came to Montana and located at Kalis-
pell. He was a republican and a member of the
Grand Army of the Republic. His wife, Lucinda
Pepper, was born in Ohio in 1842 and died at Rich
Hill, Missouri, May 20, 1898. They have the fol-
lowing children : H. K., who was a store keeper for
the Pacific Bell Telephone Company, and died at
Portland, Oregan, in November, 1917 ; Lou, wife of
E. G. Swarans, a farmer at Rich Hill, Missouri;
Helen, wife of R. N. Erwin, of Yakima, Washington,
Mr. Erwih being a lumberman ; Glen A. ; and Garfield
who is in the postal service at Seattle.
Glen Albert Smith acquired a public school educa-
tion in Missouri, and after completing a course in
the Kalispell Business College went to work for the
O'Neil Lumber Company, acquiring a thorough
knowledge of the Company's business both in the
office and in the yards. For a time he was also
superintendent of the outside interests and sales
manager for the Northwestern Lumber Company
of Kalispell.
January i, 1907, Mr. Smith entered the Forestry
Bureau at Libby, Montana, and in November, 1908,
was transferred to the Custer National Forest at
Ashland as forest superivisor. In December, 1910,
he was sent to Billings as forest supervisor of the
Bear Tooth Forest. In 1914 he became supervisor
of the Kootenai Forest, with headquarters at Libby,
remaining at that post of duty until July, 1918, when
he came to Missoula as assistant district forester in
charge of the branch of operation. Mr. Smith is
regarded as one of the most resourceful men in the
employ of the Government Forestry Bureau. His re-
sponsibility were especially exacting during the well
remembered summer of 1919, which surpassed all
other seasons for drought in Montana. He was in
charge of the biggest campaign ever waged against
forest fires in the history of the service. When the
situation was at the crisis some 6,000 men were em-
ployed as fire fighters in the district supervised by
Mr. Smith. At one time there were 1,700 fires in
progress in the forest.
Mr. Smith is affiliated with Libby Lodge No. 85,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. November
16. 1904. at Fort Benton, he married Miss Cressie R.
Rowe, daughter of James and Catherine (Ivey)
Rowe. Her mother is still living at Libby. Her
father, who died at Fort Benton in 1899, was an
early settlers in Montana, locating near Fort Benton
in 1877. He was a successful rancher and stock
raiser and at one time was assessor of Choteau
County, when that county contained the area now
divided among half a dozen counties. Mr. and Mrs.
Smith have three children : Ivey L., born December
28, 1907; Glenna, born March 20, 1912; and Charlotte,
born July 18, 1913.
Frederick R. Bartles is a graduate civil engineer
from an eastern university, began his career as a
rod man with the Pennsylvania Railroad, and has
spent the last thirteen years with the Western Pa-
cific Railway Company, and is now superintendent
of the Rocky Mountain Division, with headquarters
at Missoula.
Mr. Bartles was born at Williamsport, Pennsyl-
vania, February 28, 1875. Mr. Bartles' ancestors
were Colonial settlers from Germany, locating at
Flemington, New Jersey. The grandfather of the
Montana railroad man was Charles Bartles, who was
born at Flemington, New Jersey, in 1801 spent all
his life there as a banker, attorney and a prominent
factor in civic affairs. He died at Flemington in
1883.
Charles Bartles, father of Frederick R. Bartles,
was born at Flemington, New Jersey, in 1843. ^ He is
a graduate from the law school of Harvard Univer-
sity, and has spent his active life as a lawyer at
Williamsport, Pennsylvania, and is still looking
after a large practice though past seventy-five years
of age. He is a republican, a member of the Epis-
copal Church and a Mason. At Williamsport he
married Mary E. Bell, who was born at Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania' in 1846. Charles, the oldest of their
children, is a railroad man in the State of Wash-
ington; Lottie is the wife of H. Crocker, manager
of the telephone company at Williamsport, Pennsyl-
vania ; Frederick R. is third : and Marie, the young-
est, is the wife of R. E. Smead. a varnish broker at
Cleveland. Ohio.
Frederick R. Bartles attended public school at Wil-
liamsport, and is a graduate of Lehigh University of
Pennsvlvania, taking his degree Civil Engineer in
1896. "He is a member of the Chi Psi college fra-
ternity. On graduating he found work as a rodman
with the engineering department of the Pennsyl-
vania Railway. He was promoted to transit man and
from 1899 to 1905 was superivisor of tracks for the
New York Central Railway. Mr. Bartles had an
interesting experience in the service of the govern-
ment between 1905 and August, 1907. as assistant
engineer for the Isthmian Canal Commission at
Panama. Since his work in the Canal Zone he has
been continuously with the Northern Pacific Rail-
way Company.
For three months he was inspector at Brainerd,
Minnesota, was supervisor of bridges and building,
and superintendent of construction until 1911 ; was
HISTORY OF MONTANA
trainmaster at Pasco, Washington, until 1914; super-
intendent of the Fargo Division until 191S; was
superintendent of the Minnesota Division, with head-
quarters at Staples, Minnesota, until November, 1917;
and at the latter date was appointed superintendent
of the Rock}' Mountain Division with headquarters
at Missoula. His division jurisdiction takes in all
the Northern Pacific from Helena and Butte west
to Paradise, Montana, and includes the Coeur
d'Alene branch to Wallace, Idaho, the Bitter Root
branch, the Flathead Valley line, the Philipsburg
branch, and the lines running to Marysville and Re-
mini. Thirty-six hundred employes look to him as
their superintendent. His offices are in the Passenger
Station Building at Missoula.
For nearly a year Mr. Bartles was away from dtity
as a contribution of American railroads to the win-
ning of the great war in France. He was a major
in the Thirty-Ninth Railroad Engineers, one of the
finest body of men and one of the units doing most
effective service in maintaining transportation serv-
ice in France. He went overseas in August, 1918,
and did not return until June, 1919.
Major Bartles is a republican, a member of the
Episcopal Church, and is affiliated with Lodge No.
44 of the Masonic order at Buffalo, North Dakota.
In Missoula he has bought a modern residence at
606 Woodford Avenue. Major Bartles married at
Clearfield, Pennsylvania, in 190J, Miss Alice Mc-
Quown, daughter of Senator M. L. and \'irginia
(Flegal) McQuown, of Clearfield. Her father is
editor of the Raftsman Journal, the second oldest
newspaper in Pennsylvania. Mrs. Bartles is a grad-
uate of Wilson College at Wilson, Pennsylvania.
They have two daughters : Mary Virginia, born July
15, 1904; and Alice, born July 30, 1912.
Ralph L. Arnold graduated with his law diploma
from the University of Nebraska in 1910, and in the
same year came to Missoula to begin his career as a
lawyer. His work has been attended with growing
success and prestige, and his services have been req-
uisitioned for the handling of many important cases
and interests.
Mr. Arnold grew up in Nebraska but was born at
Mount Pulaski, Illinois, December 4. 1886. His
grandfather, John Arnold, was born in Wurtemberg,
Germany, in 1S23, came to America when a young
man and served as a Union soldier during the Civil
war. He spent his active life as a farmer at Mount
Pulaski, Illinois, where he married and where he
died in 1888. His son F. C. Arnold was born at
Mount Pulaski in 1859, grew up and lived there
■ until his marriage, and in 1890 moved to the vicinity
of Lincoln. Nebraska, where he continued farming
until he retired. Since 1917 his home has been in
the City of Lincoln. He is a republican, an active
member of the Methodist Church, and by his mar-
riage to Mary E. Birtell. who was born at Milton,
Pennsylvania, in 1863. had a family of eight chil-
dren, noted briefly as follows : Laura Pearl, wife of
H. F. Capwell. a farmer at Elmwood. Nebraska ;
Ralph L. ; Clarence F., a farmer at Hawley, Minne-
sota; John, also a farmer at Hawley; Harry, a farm-
er at Elmwood, Nebraska ; Harriet, a graduate nurse
living with her parents ; Marie, wife of Wayne Drj'S-
dale, a farmer at Roswell, New Mexico: and Rich-
ard, a junior in the Lincoln High School.
Ralph L. .Arnold was educated in the public schools
of Tobias. Nebraska, graduating from high school in
1905. For two years he carried mail on a rural route
in Saline County. Nebraska, then spent one year
in the Nebraska Wesle.van University at University
Place, following which he was a student of law at
the University of Nebraska at Lincoln for three
years. He received his LL. B. degree in 1910, and
was admitted to the bar of his home state before
coming to Missoula. His work as a lawyer has been
diversified between civil and criminal practice. He
served as public administrator at Missoula in 1917-
18. Mr. .Arnold's offices are in the Higgins Block at
Missoula.
He is a democrat, a member of the Methodist
Church and affiliated with Missoula Lodge No. 13,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. His modern
home is at 517 Cleveland Street. On October 14,
1914. at Missoula, he married Miss Marjorie Mason,
a native of Belle Plaine, Iowa, and a graduate with
the A. B. degree from the State University of Mon-
tana at Missoula. Her mother is Mrs. M. Mason,
of Missoula. Mr. and Mrs. Arnold have one daugh-
'ter, Marjorie Ruth, born January 12, 1919.
H. T. FoRBis. The subject of this sketch has
spent the major portion of his life within the borders
of Missoula County, where he still resides in the
city of that name, and his persistent and commend-
able efforts have benefitted alike himself and the
community, for he has always had deeply at heart the
well being and improvement of the county, using his
influence whenever possible for the promotion of
enterprises calculated to be of lasting benefit to
his fellow men. besides taking a leading part in all
movements for the advancement of the community
along social, intellectual and moral lines. He is the
scion of an excellent old Montana family and pos-
sesses a justifiable pride in the old Treasure state,
with which his life history is identified.
H. T. Forbis was born at Butte. Montana, on
January 19. 1886, and is the son of William P. and
Lenora B. (Jenks) Forbis. William P. Forbis was
born in the State of Missouri in 1852, and his death
occurred in 1898 at Missoula, Montana. He was
numbered among the real pioneers of the Treasure
State, having come here in the early '60s, during the
progress of the great war between the states. He
first located in Virginia City, where he gave his
attention to prospecting and mining, later following
the same pursuits at Helena and Butte, reaching
the latter place in 1868. He worked entirely on his
own account and was successful in his efforts. He
made his permanent home in Butte, where he at-
tained to considerable local prominence, standing
high in the esteem of the people of the community.
He was a democrat in politics, and served one term
as collector of internal revenue. He was a faithful
member of the Presbj-terian Church. He was mar-
ried to Leonora B. Jenks. who was born in i860 in
Iowa, but who now resides in Missouri. To this
worthy couple were born the following children :
H. T.. the immediate subject of this sketch; C. J.,
the well-known architect of Missoula, who is specific-
ally mentioned elsewhere in this work ; Leona Belle
is "the wife of A. E. Drew, of Missoula, secretary of
the Forbis-Toole Company and in charge of the
corporation insurance.
H. T. Forbis secured his elementary education in
the public schools of Butte and Missoula, graduat-
ing from the high school in the latter city in 1905.
He then attended the University of Michigan, at Ann
Arbor, for one year, after which he was a student
in the State University of Montana, at Missoula,
where he was graduated in 191 1. He then entered
the Western Montana Bank at Missoula, startmg m
a minor capacity, but was soon promoted to the
position of bookeeper. He remained with this bank
for four vears, at the end of which time he organized
the Forbis-Toole Companv, a partnership betw^een
H. T. Forbis, J. H. Toole and A. E. Drew. The
business was prosperous from the beginning and in
454
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1919 was incorporated, its present title being the
Forbis-Toole Company, Incorporated. The official
personnel of the company is as follows: President,
H. T. Forbis; vice president, J. H. Toole; secre-
tary and treasurer, A. E. Drew. The Forbis-Toole
Company is the largest company of its kind in Mis-
soula County, and is mainly an investment company,
handling farm loan, mortgages, district irrigation
bonds, city bonds, improvement district bonds, in con-
nection with which they also have a department for
the handling of loans, real estate and insurance.
During the period of four years since this company
was organized it has handled a large amount of this
investment paper and has also handled some of the
largest real estate transfers in this county. They
have earned a wide reputation because of their re-
liability, promptness and care in every transaction
directed by them, and the company is rated high
among sim'ilar concerns in Montana. A large part of
the success of the Forbis-Toole Company is directly
attributable to Mr. Forbis, whose personalit:^ has
been in evidence in the entire history of the com-
pany.
In addition to his other interests, Mr. Forbis is
secretary and treasurer of the Forbis Brothers
Poultry Ranch Company, the plant of which is lo-
cated four miles southwest of Missoula. They are
extensive breeders of white leghorn chickens, having
at the present time about 2,000 laying hens, and the
firm has gained more than a state-wide reputation
because of the high grade of the stock which they
have put on the market.
In matters political Mr. Forbis is not bound by
party lines, preferring to give his support to those
men and measures which most nearly meet his ap-
proval. He has no aspiration for public office, pre-
ferring as a private citizen to do his humble share in
directing public affairs from the ballot box. Relig-
iously he is a member of the Presbj^efian Church.
Fraternally he is a member of Harmony Lodge
No. 49, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. He is
also a member of the Rotary Club and of the Cham-
ber of Commerce, and president and a director of the
Missoula Amusement Company.
In 1912, at Missoula, Mr. Forbis was married to
Hazel N. Tietjen, the daughter of Mrs. A. P. Tiet-
jen, of Missoula. Mrs. Forbis is a skilled musician
in both vocal and instrumental, being a graduate of
the New England Conservatory of Music, at Boston,
Massachusetts. To Mr. and Mrs. Forbis have been
born two children, Bettie Lee, born December 9,
1915, and Berthene, born in May, 1919.
In every avenue of life's activities in which he has
engaged, Mr. Forbis has been true to every trust,
and as a result of his fine personal qualities of char-
acter he enjoys to an eminent degree of the con-
fidence and regard of the people.
F. Rice. In the educational circles of
Silver Bow County no name shines with more bril-
liant lustre than that of Alonzo F. Rice, who is as
well fitted by natural gifts and temperament as by
mental training and untiring industry for the promi-
nent position he holds as president of the Butte
Business College, the most important institution of
the kind in the entire Northwest, and, according to
Government reports, the seventh largest private
school in the United States. A son of the late Frank
Rice, he was born July 30, 1867. at Chilhowee, Mis-
souri, of Irish descent, that branch of the Rice fam-
ily to which he belongs having originated in Ireland,
from whence the immigrant ancestor came to this
country in colonial times locating in Virginia.
Born in Nashville. Tennessee, in 1838. Frank Rice
was there reared and married. He served as a
Union soldier throughout the Civil war, taking an
active part in many of its battles. Moving to Chil-
howee, Missouri, soon after his marriage, he was
there successfully engaged in agricultural pursuits
until his death in 1879. He was a republican in
politics, and a devout member of the Baptist Church.
He married Mary Sanders, who was born in Nash-
ville, Tennessee, in 1841, and died on the home farm
in Chilhowee, Missouri, in 1887. Ten children were
born of their union, as follows : Henry, an employe
of the Butte Electric Railway Company, died in
Butte in 1913; John died at the age of twenty-one
years ; Marshall died when but nineteen years old ;
Thomas Benton, in charge of a Presbyterian Church
at Marshall. Missouri, was graduated from a uni-
versity at Nashville, Tennessee, with the degree of
Doctor of Laws; Tennie married William Brown,
a farmer, and neither of them are now living;
Alonzo F., with whom this sketch is principally
concerned ; George, who died in Butte in 1909, was
connected with the Hecla Mine ; J. Lee, secretary
and treasurer of the Butte Business College, was
graduated from both the Kansas City, Missouri,
High School, and the Gem City Business College, of
Quincy, Illinois, and has received the degree of
C. P. A. from the State University of Montana, at
Missoula, and from the American Institute of Ac-
countants in New York City ; Elizabeth lived but
seventeen years ; and Robert died in infancy.
Acquiring the rudiments of his education in Chil-
howee, Missouri, Alonzo F. Rice was graduated from
its high school, after which he attended the Mis-
souri State Normal School at Warrensburg a year.
In 1889 he was graduated from the Sedalia Business
College in Sedalia, Missouri, and immediately after
located at Hecla, Montana, where for six months he
was bookkeeper for the Hecla Mining Company, and
also superintended a night school, teaching pen-
manship and bookkeeping. In September, 1890, Mr.
Rice established the Butte Business College, open-
ing it with but six students, a number that has in-
creased from term to term, there being now, in 1920,
700 earnest students. This live, wide-awake school,
under the able supervision of Mr. Rice, has graded
departments, an accredited high school department,
and in addition to the regular business courses gives
special instruction in steam engineering and me-
chanical drawing. The college occupies the entire
fifth floor of the Owsley Building, its floor space
of 14,000 feet being crowded to the limit. It is
located in the heart of the business district of the
city, at the corner of Park and Main streets, the
busiest point of the busiest city in the great North-
west. Teaching what is useful, practical and most
profitable along the lines of progressive business,
the students enrolled in this college may advance as
rapidly as ability and application will allow, the
methods used in teaching the various branches re-
quired in a business education being nowhere ex-
celled.
Mr. Rice is a stanch republican in his political
views. He is a prominent member of the State
Teachers' Association ; of the Commercial Teachers'
Association of the United States; of the Butte
Country Club; and of the Silver Bow Club of Butte.
Fraternally he belongs to Butte Lodge No. 240, Be-
nevolent and Protective Order of Elks. He is likewise
a member of the Butte Chamber of Commerce, and
owns an attractive home at 814 West Park Street.
Mr. Rice married in 1909, in Butte, Miss Mollie
O'Leary, a daughter of John C. and Alice (Vernon)
O'Leary, residents of Big Timber. Montana. Her
father, now a venerable and respected man of eighty-
six years, came to Montana in pioneer days, and
owns a ranch just outside of Billings. Mr. and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mrs. Rice have two children, namely : Frank Vernon,
born December 23, 191 1 ; and John Robert, born July
14, 1914.
Ernest Samuel Holmes. By a life consistent in
motive and action and because of his many com-
mendable personal qualities, Ernest S. Holmes, of
Missoula, has earned the sincere regard of all who
know him. He came from an ancestry that dis-
tinguished itself in the pioneer days of this state,
having in them that Anglo-Saxon unrest that drives
the race ever Westward on its great adventure.
He is what he is from natural endowment and self-
culture, having attained his present standing solely
through the impelling force of his own nature,
and because of his consistent efforts to assist in
the advancement of the community's best interests
he is deserving of the present enviable standing
which he enjoys.
Ernest Samuel Holmes was born in Minneapolis,
Minnesota, on November 2, 1885, and is the son of
E. and Catherine (Grady) Holmes. E. Holmes
was a native of England, born in 1846, and his
death occurred in Wendover, Wyoming, in 1888.
He was reared and educated in England, and there
he learned the trade of a baker. In London he
owned and operated a large bakery for some time,
but in 1866 he came to the United States. Soon
after arriving in this country he made the trip
to Montana, of which he became one of the real
pioneers, and he played an important part in the
arduous work incident to the lives of the early
residents of this section. When the Northern
Pacific Railroad was being constructed through this
locality he had charge of the boarding cars for
the company. He afterward located at Wendover,
Wyoming, where he engaged in the mercantile
business and also became proprietor of the hotel of
that place. He was appointed postmaster of Wend-
over and in various ways became a man of im-
portance to the community. He was a republican
in his political views, and was a member of the
Protestant Episcopal Church. Soon after coming
to this state Mr. Holmes met Catherine Eugene
Grady near Helena, and they were married there.
She was born in 1856 in Green Isle, Minnesota,
and to this union the following children were born :
Ernest S., the immediate subject of this sketch;
Dolores Martha, who remains unmarried and now
lives with her mother, is a trained nurse and during
the World war she enlisted as a nurse in the service
of the Red Cross, and was sent to a base hospital
in France, where she remained one year. Sometime
after the death of her first husband Catherine
Holmes became the wife of Allen Laughlin, who
owns a ranch at Glendo, Wyoming, and to them
have been born the following children: Ora M.,
who remains unmarried, is chief clerk in the state
charity office at Cheyenne, Wyoming. Eda, who was
the wife of John Peryman, died of influenza at
Denver, Colorado, in December, 1918. Mr. Peryman,
who now resides in California, was in service in
France as a member of the United States Engineers,
being recently mustered out. Eda was a student in
the Montana State University for one year and
then attended and graduated from the University
of Wyoming. Roy is a printer by trade and resides
at Cheyenne, Wyoming. Allen, Jr., who is now
a truck driver for the Government at Sheridan,
Wyoming, enlisted in the United States army arid
was sent to France, where he had an active part in
some of the famous drives that very materially
helped to win the war.
Ernest S. Holmes received but limited school
education in his youth, for at the early age of twelve
years he left home and went to work on a ranch
in Wyoming, where he remained three years, and
also worked at other labor which he could find to
do. In the meantime he attended, as far as was
possible, the winter terms of school and also em-
braced every opportunity to improve himself by
private study. At the age of fifteen years he learned
telegraphy at Orion Junction, Wyoming, and then
was hired as operator by the Northwestern Railroad
at Central City, South Dakota, where he remained
about one and a half years. He then became operator
at Horse Creek, Wyoming, for the Colorado South-
ern Railroad, with whom he remained for six months,
going at the end of that time to Sunrise, Wyoming,
where for two and a half years he was in the
employ of the Colorado & Wyoming Railroad. He
then found himself in a position to carry out a plan
which had long before been formulated in his mind,
and he entered Notre Dame University, at Notre
Dame, Indiana, where he pursued the commercial
course. Upon completing his studies in the uni-
versity Mr. Holmes went to Mancos, Colorado,
where for nine months he served as agent for the
Rio Grande Southern Railroad. He then went to
Spokane, Washington, where he '■emained for a
short time, but in September, 1907, he came to
Missoula, Montana. For one year he served as
cashier of the Northern Express Company, and
then entered the employ of John R. Daily as cashier
and bookkeeper. In 1910 the business was incorpa-
rated as the John R. Daily Company and Mr. Holmes
was selected as secretary and treasurer of the new
organization. He still retains these official posi-
tions, and is one of the most active and efficient
members of the official personnel of that company.
Politically Mr. Holmes gives his support to the
republican party, and his religious membership is
with the Roman Catholic Church. Fraternajly, he
is a member of Missoula Council No. 1023, Knights
of Columbus, and is a life member of Hell Gate
Lodge No. 383, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks. He is also a member of the Rotary Club
and the Chamber of Commerce of Missoula.
On October 6, 1909, at Hamilton, Montana, Mr.
Holmes was married to Kathryn Jenkins, the daugh-
ter of C. P. and Celeste (Byrne) Jenkins. The
father, who was a retired rancher, died in 1919 at
Missoula, and his widow now resides in that city.
To Mr. and Mrs. Holmes have been born three
children, namely: William Cornelius, born July
28, 1910; Ernest Samuel. Jr.. born June 18, 1912,
and Kathleen Dolores, born November 9, 1916.
Mr. Holmes' record demonstrates that where
there is a will there is a way and that obstacles
to success may be overcome by courage and self-
reliance. His life has been very intimately asso-
ciated with the growth and prosperity of this local-
ity during the years that he has lived here, and he
has always been found on the right side of questions
looking to the development of the community in
any way. Genial and unassuming, he has won a host
of warm friends, who esteem him for his genuine
worth.
Dale Hodson. It is by no means an easy task
to describe within the limits of this review a man
who has led an active life and by his own exertions
reached a position of honor and respect in the line
of work with which his interests are allied. But
biography finds justification, nevertheless, in tracing
and recording such a life history, as the public
claims certain property interest in the career of every
individual and the time invariably arrives when it
becomes advisable to give the right publicity. It
is then with a certain degree of satisfaction that
456
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the chronicler essays the task of touching briefly
upon such a record as has been that of Mr. Hodson,
a business man of influence and high standing in
Missoula County, who ranks with the leading men
in his special line of work in Western Montana.
Dale Hodson was born at Sterling, Kansas, on
May 21, 1882. and is the son of Harvey and Ella
(Durham) Hodsrn. Harvey H. Hodson was born
in the State of Indiana in 1851, and his death oc-
curred in Bozeman, Montana, in 1905. Kc was
reared and edui-ated in Indiana, Iowa, and in young
manhood .went to Kansas, where he setrled as a
pioneer. He established a marble yard at Sterling,
which he maintained there for a number of years,
and in 1884 he came to Bozeman, Montana, of which
also he was a pioneer, and there also he estab-
lished a marble yard, which he operated until 1899,
when he sold out, and then lived retired until his
death, which occurred about six j'ears later. In
his political views Mr. Hodson was a republican
and became a prominent citizen of Bozeman, serv-
ing a number of years as alderman. He was a
member of the Knights of Pythias. He was mar-
ried to Ella Durham, who was born in Kansas in
i860, and who now resides in Missoula. To Mr. and
Mrs. Hodson were born three children, namely:
Dale, the immediate subject of this review; Paul,
who lives with his mother, is a salesman for the
Missoula Tombstone Company; and Lysle, who also
lives with his mother, is a student in the Montana
State University at Missoula.
Dale Hodson received his educational training in
the public schools of Bozeman, graduating from the
high school there in 1900. He learned the trade
of a marble and granite cutter, completing his ap-
prenticeship in Butte in 1903. He then worked at
his trade in Livingston, Billings, Bozeman and
Butte, until 1907, when he came to Missoula as a
stockholder and representative of the Butte Tomb-
stone Company, and here established the Missoula
Tombstone Company. The business was very flatter-
ing from the beginning, and a short time after it
was established Mr. Hodson and his brother Paul
bought the plant and are still the sole owners of
it. It is now the largest marble cutting plant in
Western Montana, aside from Butte, and many fine
and e.xpensive pieces of work have been produced
at this shop. Mr. Hodson has thorough technical
knowledge of the business, being one of the best
marble and granite cutters in the state, and with
this he combines a highly developed artistic sense,
qualities which have enabled him to please the most
exacting demands of his patrons.
In his political views Mr. Hodson is a socialist
and keeps in close touch with the general trend of
public events. He served one term as police com-
missioner of Missoula. Fraternally he is a member
of Missoula Lodge No. 13, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons; Western Sun Chapter No. 11, Roval
Arch Masons; Livingston Consistory, Scottish Rite
(thirty-second degree), and Algeria Temple, An-
cient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mvstic Shrine, at
Helena, the Woodmen of the World, and Cove-
nant Lodge No. 6, Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows.
In 1912, at Bozeman, Montana, Mr. Hodson was
married to May Busch, the daughter of A. J. and
Louise Busch, of Bozeman. Mr. Busch is superin-
tendent of the Gallatin Valley Railroad. Mrs. Hod-
son is a graduate of the State Normal School at
Dillon, Montana, and was a teacher in the public
school of Bozeman for four years prior to her
marriage. To Mr. and Mrs. Hodson have been
born two children, Edna, born .A.ugust 31. 1913, and
Ella, born on July 16, 1918. Mr. Hodson is a man
of fine personal qualities, and has so ordered his
life that he has won and retains the universal con-
fidence and good will of the people generally.
DwiGHT N. M.\soN. A busy lawyer, Dwight N.
Mason has been called to many important public
services since locating in Montana. He is present
county attorney of Missoula Count}-, is a former
member of the Legislature, and being a young man
his friends regard his career as only fairly started,
with a prospect for the best honors and rewards
of an able lawyer and leader in public affairs.
Mr. Mason was born at Cannelton, Indiana, March
24, 1884. The Masons are of English ancestry and
were colonial settlers in Virginia. One member of
the family in an earlier generation was Jeremiah
Mason, a law partner of Daniel Webster. Mr. Ma-
son's_ grandfather. John E. Mason, was a native
of Kentucky, and was in the coal mining business
for a number of years in that state. He lived at
Owensboro, Kentucky, and afterward moved to
Cannelton, Indiana, where he spent his last days.
Floyd Mason, father of the Missoula lawyer, was
born in Kentucky in 1829, and as a young man
settled at Cannelton, Indiana, where he married
and where he followed farming for many years.
He died at Cannelton in 1903. He exercised a great
deal of influence in poltics and civic affairs in his
home locality of Indiana, was a democrat, and
served a term as county treasurer. He was a Meth-
odist, was a past master of his Masonic lodge, and
his long life brought him the constant esteem of all
who knew him. He married Kate A. CuUey, who
was born at Brandenberg, Kentucky, in 1854. She
died at Omaha, Nebraska, in 1912. Her children
were: William, a banker in Loup City. Nebraska ;
Oliver, a hardware merchant at Loup City; Lydia,
wife of Lawrence A. AIcTurnon, a teacher in the
public schools of Los .'\ngeles ; Dwight N. ; Ada,
wife of Harry Dill, owner and publisher of the
Indiana Sentinel at Indiana Harbor, Indiana ; Kath-
ryn, wife of Cyrus Whitehead, clerk in a whole-
sale house at Louisville, Kentucky; and Laura, wife
of Clyde Buttorf, a railway employe at New Albany,
Indiana.
Dwight N. Mason attended the public schools of
Cannelton, and in 1903 graduated from the Central
Normal College at Danville, Indiana. He took his
law course in the Indiana State University at Bloom-
ington. As soon as he had his law diploma Mr. Ma-
son sought a new home in the Northwest, and was
engaged in the practice of law at Spokane, Wash-
ington, until the spring of 1910. After that he had
his home and office at Ronan, Montana, until March,
1917. He moved to Missoula to accept appointment
as deputv county attorney under Fred R. .Angevine.
In the fall of I'giS he was elected county attorney,
and is now enjoying the honors and responsibilities
of that office for a term of two years.
He was elected a member of the Legislature in
the fall of 1914, representing Missoula County. He
was in the fourteenth session and was re-elected
in 1916 for tlie fifteenth session and also served in
the extra session of the spring of 1918. During the
fifteenth session he was chairman of the judiciary
committee. He was also a member of the bank-
ing, rules, special committee on elections and other
committees. Mr. Mason is credited with one of
the most progressive pieces of legislation enacted
l)y Montana in recent years, the "Mothers Pension
B'ill," which he drew up and introduced, and success-
fully guided through the House.
Mr. Mason is a loyal democrat in politics. He is
a Methodist, and is' affiliated with Danville Lodge
of Masons in his native state, and also belongs to
HISTORY OF MONTANA
457
the Royal Arch Chapter at Danville. At Alissoula
he is a member of the Loyal Order of Moose.
In December, 1908, at Spokane, Washington, Mr.
Mason married Miss Lillian R. Metz, daughter of
C. H. and Lillian (Logan) Metz. Her parents reside
at Spokane, where her father is manager of the
branch house of the G. L Case & Company, im-
plement and agricultural machinery manufacturers.
Mrs. Mason was educated in the Spokane High
School, and attended the State Normal College of
Washington. Mr. and Mrs. Mason are the parents
of six children : Kathryn and June, twins, born
August 6, 1912; Mary Lou, born July 6. 1914;
Dwight N., Jr.; born February 2, 1916; Charles,
born July 2. 1917; and Dorothy, born Felsruary 26,
1919-
Hugh Kelly, who grew up in Montana and ab-
sorbed the atmosphere and the typical characteristics
of_ the West, is well known in the state, but his
chief distinction is due to his founding the Kelly
Auto Stage Line between Missoula and Poison.
This line, established by Mr. Kelly in 1919, has
become the really popular route and means of trans-
portation between Missoula and the National Gla-
cier Park. Its facilities comprise two White pas-
senger cars, each carrying twelve passengers, and
in th^ past two years the service has the distinc-
tion of never having missed a trip a single day
nor failed to connect on time with trains at Mis-
soula and the Klondike steamer on Flathead Lake.
Travelers from far and near have given a great
deal of praise to this service, and credit for all is
due Mr. Kelly, who as proprietor gives his personal
supervision to every detail.
Hugo Kelly was born at Providence, Rhode Is-
land, but was only eight years of age when his
parents. Patrick H. Kelly and wife, came to Mon-
tana. He lived in their home in lilissoula, but at
the age of thirteen ran away and has since taken
life on his own responsibility. For nineteen years
he was employed on different stock ranches in Gran-
ite County. For four years he served as deputy
sheriff of Missoula County. While in that office
he had some exciting experiences. One time he
took a prisoner to Salem, Oregon. After perform-
ing his duties he spent a day looking about the
city of Seattle. While thus engaged a deputy sheriff
arrested him as a suspicious character. Mr. Kelly
made no eff'ort to explain his identity, but in order
to see the thing through properly he resisted ar-
rest, and was given the usual rough handling. He
was carried to the police station in a patrol wagon,
and when searched his deputy's star was discovered
on his suspenders. The officer who arrested Kelly
asked, "why didn't you tell me you were an of-
ficer?" Kelly replied, "You didn't give me time.
You assumed too much, and that is why the bodies
of such fellows as you decorate the back alleys."
A general laugh followed and his superior officer
ordered his crestfallen subordinate to order a car
and show Kelly the courtesies of the city, and after
that nothing was too good for Kelly.
!Mr. Kelly supports the democratic party and has
been quite active in local politics. He and his wife
are members of the Catholic Cliurcli. Like typical
westerners. Mr. Kelly is thoroughly public spirited
and a man generous to the core.
He married Miss Lilly M. Dooley, a native of
Granite County. Montana, and a daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. Michael Dooley. Mr. and Mrs. Kelly
have two sons, who do them credit. Thomas and
James, both of whom were educated in the Mis-
soula High School. Thomas enlisted in the Ma-
rines at the age of eighteen, and for fourteen
months was in the service of his country in France.
He was one of the first Marines to return from
overseas to this country. The son James is an ex-
pert automobile mechanic.
George Nels Olson. The study of the life and
accomplishments of a successful man is full of edu-
cational value, especially when such a man has-
achieved tangible and practical results, and has raised
the standard and set the example which go to form
the real bulwarks of Americanism. A comprehen-
sive knowledge of such a man brings an apprecia-
tion of him and of his motives ; and when his efforts
have resulted in the organization and maintenance
of a sound financial institution all of the above
gains added force, for upon the bankers of any
community depends the stability of all business.
One of the dependable men of Meagher County
who most assuredly belongs to this class is George
Nels Olson, cashier of the Martinsdale State Bank
and vice president of the Ringling State Bank.
George Nels Olson was born in Atwater, Minne-
sota, June 22, 1884, a son of Martin Olson and
grandson of Ole Myhren, surnames changing in
Norway. The latter was a native of Norway, and
he died on a ranch near Irving, Minnesota, where
he had been a pioneer rancher. Upon coming to
Minnesota he homeSteaded 160 acres of land, proved
it up, and kept on adding to his acreage until he
was one of the most extensive land owners in his
part of the state.
Martin Olson, father of George Nels Olson, is
a native of Norway, where he was born in 1849,
and where he lived until he was seventeen vears
old. In 1866 he came to the United States and lo-
cated at Atwater, Minnesota, his present place of
residence, where ever since his advent he has been
the city's leadmg merchant. Going to that district in
its pioneer days, he has been closely associated with
its growth and development, and that of the sur-
roiinding country. A strong republican, he has been
a leader in his party and a prime mover in civic
affairs. The Norwegian Lutheran Church of At-
water holds his membership. He is a Mason.
Martin Olson was united in marriage with Gun-
nild Sivertson, born in Norway in 1858, and they
became acquainted on board the boat which brought
them to the United States. Their children are as
follows: Ruby, who is unmarried, lives at Leper,
Michigan, has been an instructor in music and draw-
ing and is now an employe of the state institution
at Leper; Marcus M., who is a merchant of Medi-
cine Lake, Montana ; George Nels, whose name
heads this review; Newell R., who is vice president
of the State Bank of Martinsdale; Darwin S., who
IS cashier of the Ringling State Bank; and Ruth
Margaret, who is now Mrs. Harry Himmelman and
lives with her husband, who is a merchant, at Man-
kato, Minnesota. They were married August 19,
1920.
George Nels Olson attended the public schools of
Atwater, Minnesota, and was graduated from its
high school course in 1901, following which he
matriculated at the University of Minnesota, and
studied law at night for nine months, following
which he attended the Minnesota Business College
and was graduated in the complete business course
in 1903. In September, 1903, Mr. Olson entered
the State Bank of Atwater as bookkeeper and rose
through various positions to be assistant cashier of
that institution, leaving it on September 10, 1907, to
come West to Bismarck, North Dakota, to take the
position of deputy insurance commissioner for the
State of North Dakota, and held that responsible
458
HISTORY OF MONTANA
office until October, 1909. He then went to York,
North Dakota, and was cashier of the State Bank
of York from October, 1909, until November i, 1910.
On that date he went to Portland, Oregon, and be-
came bookkeeper for the United States National
Bank of that city, and held that position until June,
191 1, when he returned to Atwater, Minnesota, for
a few months' visit with his family. He then ac-
cepted a position with the Northern Rock Island
Machine Company, with headquarters at Lewistown,
Montana, and held it from the latter part of Au-
gust, 191 1, until June, 1912, when he entered the
employ of H. E. Marshall, a merchant of Harlow-
town. In the fall of 1913 Mr. Olson bought this
business and incorporated the Marshall Busy Store,
of which he still continues to be president. After
he had placed this enterprise on a firm foundation
he turned his attention in another direction, coming
to Martinsdale on September I, 1915, as cashier of
the Martinsdale State Bank, which had been estab-
lished on August 9, 1909. The present officials of
this bank are G. K. Robertson, president; N. R.
Olson, vice president; Andrew Hoyem, of Lennep,
Montana, vice president; and George N. Olson,
cashier. This bank was organized with a capital
of $20,000 and a surplus of $4,000. Today it has
a capital of $20,000, a surplus of $20,000, and de-
posits of $200,000. The bank is located on Main
Street, and the modern bank building occupied by
this bank was erected by the stockholders at a cost
of $15,000. Each year dividends ranging from 10
to 30 per cent have been paid the stockholders in
addition to the accumulation of the surplus of
$20,000.
Mr. Olson bought the Ringling State Bank, of
which he is vice president, and he and his brothers,
N. R. Olson and D. S. Olson, control the two
banks. He also owns a modern residence on Grand
Avenue, Martinsdale; a ranch of 930 acres near
Copper, Montana, on which he is raising 170 head
of cattle, principally of the Hereford strain; and
in addition to this is a member of a company own-
ing 1,000 acres of land in the vicinity.
In 1915 Mr. Olson was married at Wabasha, Minne-
sota, to Miss Maude Elizabeth Hurd, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Frank Hurd, residents of Wabasha,
where Mr. Hurd is engaged in mercantile pursuits.
Mrs. Olson is a graduate of the Wabasha High
School and of the Saint Cloud Normal School of
Saint Cloud, Minnesota. Mv. and Mrs. Olson have
two children, namely: George Hurd, who was born
on October 21, 1917; and Philip Bloise, who was
born on January 2, 1919. Mr. Olson is a repub-
lican, but has never been an office seeker. A Mason,
he belongs to Musselshell Lodge No. 69, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and formerly belonged
to the lodge at Atwater, Minnesota, where he was
made a Master Mason when only twenty-one years
of age. He also belongs to Leads Chapter No. 20,
Royal Arch Masons, at Leads, North Dakota, to
Harlowton Commandery, and to Algeria Temple,
at Helena, Montana.
It is not difficult to get at the source of Mr. Olson's
success, for it lies within himself, in his earnest-
ness, sincerity and ability. Steadily he has risen,
faithfully discharging the duties of each position and
reaching out to learn those of the one above him,
so that when a promotion was given him he was
ready for it. In his civic life he is equally depend-
able, and is always found on the side of law and
order, and favoring those improvements which have
for their object the securing of permanent develop-
ment and not the extravagant expenditure of the
money of the taxpayers.
Wallace P. Smith is widely known over the
State of Montana, not only as a lawyer but chiefly
through his long tenure of the office of United
States Commissioner at Missoula.
Judge Smith was born in Marshall County, Iowa,
February 10, 1862, son of Piatt A. and Lovira P.
(Carpenter) Smith. His parents were natives of
New York, lived for several years in Michigan,
and in 1853 moved to Iowa, where they took up
government land and improved a farm. Their last
years were spent in the State of Washington. Piatt
Smith served sVi years as a member of the Second
Iowa Cavalry during the Civil war. Of their two
sons one is still living in Iowa.
Wallace P. Smith was well educated in his native
state, and in 1890 came to Montana and located in
Missoula, where after reading law he was admitted
to the bar in 1891. While he has practiced law
many years, he was appointed a United States com-
missioner in 1894, and has been repeatedly chosen
for that office. He is a lifelong republican in poli-
tics. January 24, 1893, he married Loretta M. Bel-
lew. They are the parents of two sons, Wallace
B., who was a member of the Expeditionary Forces
to France and died there of pneumonia on October
12, 1918, and George R., who resides at home. Mr.
Smith is a member of the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows and of the Baptist Church.
Charles H. Hall has been engaged in the gen-
eral practice of law at Missoula nearly a quarter
of a century, and is a grandson of the late distin-
guished Montana jurist. Judge Charles S. Marshall
of Missoula.
Mr. Hall was born in Ballard Countj', Kentucky,
August 12. 1869, son of A. P. and Susan A. (Mar-
shall) Hall. His mother spent her last years in
Montana. His father, who died in Florida, served
as a captain in the Confederate army under General
Forrest, and for many years was a Kentucky mer-
chant.
Charles H. Hall was reared in Kentucky, at-
tended the public schools and Clinton College there,
and in 1886, at the age of seventeen, came to Mon-
tana and joined his grandfather, Judge Marshall.
Judge Marshall later became the first judge of the
District Bench of Missoula, and Mr. Hall was made
deputy clerk of court. He pursued the active study
of law under his grandfather in 1892, and in 1895
was admitted to the bar and began practice the
following year. He left his practice in 1898 to go
as a volunteer for the Spanish-American war, serv-
ing as second lieutenant in the Third United States
Cavalry. After five months he was mustered out
and resumed his law business. Mr. Hall was elected
county attorney in 1900, serving two terms or four
years. In 1910 he became a member of the State
Board of Education in Montana, and filled that post
a number of years.
In 1890 he married Harriet W. Moore, of Ken-
tucky. They are the parents of three daughters.
Right Reverend John Patrick Carroll, D. D.,
second Bishop of Helena, was born at Dubuque,
Iowa, February 22, 1864, of Martin Carroll and
Catherine O'Farrell. His primary education was
received at St. Raphael's parochial school of his
native town. At the age of thirteen he entered
St. Joseph's College, Dubuque, where he remained
until 1883, when he was graduated from the clas-
sical department with the highest honors of his
class. The one ambition of this gifted young man
was to consecrate himself to the service of God
in the priesthood. With a view to preparing him-
self for his lifework, he entered the Grand Semi-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
459
nary of Montreal, Canada. And there, during six
years, he pursued the courses of philosophy and
theology, graduating in June, 1889, with the degree
of Doctor of Divinity. On July 7th of the same
year he was ordained to the priesthood, and imme-
diately appointed to the chair of mental philosophy
in his alma mater, St. Joseph's College, Dubuque.
He entered upon his new duties September 12,
1889, and for five years devoted himself with un-
tiring energy to the cause of Christian education
and the upbuilding of the College. So successful
were his efforts that the Archbishop of Dubuque,
the Most Reverend John Hennessy, resolved to
place the College under his control, and on Sep-
tember 12, 1894, he was proclaimed president of
St. Joseph's — a position he continued to hold dur-
ing the next decade of years. His presidency was
eminently successful. The number of students in-
creased with surprising rapidity from year to year.
An earnest student himself, Dr. Carroll strove to
gather around himself a faculty of scholarly pro-
fessors. In this, too, he was successful, and to
such an extent that the fame of St. Joseph's Col-
lege spread throughout the middle western states.
The present status of the College gives ample proof
of Dr. Carroll's foresight in planning and his re-
markable force of character in overcoming every
obstacle to the execution of his designs.
In 1903 the See of Helena was left vacant by
the death of Right Reverend John B. Brondel.
Rome cast about for a "strong man" to take charge
of this important See. It chose, September 12,
1904, the Very Reverend Dr. Carroll. And the
wisdom of its choice has been abundantly approved
by all the subsequent history of the Diocese of
Helena. The newly appointed bishop was conse-
crated in St. Raphael's Cathedral, Dubuque, De-
cember 21, 1904, and installed as second Bishop of
Helena at the Sacred Heart Cathedral, January
31. 1905.
Bishop Carroll came to Helena well equipped for
his diocesan work. As president of St. Joseph's
College he had come into personal contact with all
the priests of the Diocese of Dubuque. This ac-
quaintance gave him an insight into the needs of
a diocese as no other position could have given him.
As a member of the board of diocesan consultors
during a period extending over eight years he had
become familiar with matters and methods of dio-
cesan administration. Last, but not least, his po-
sition as president of the highest educational in-
stitution of the Dubuque Archdiocese had fitted him
admirably to preside over the destinies of an am-
bitious j'oung diocese now looking for someone to
lead it onward and upward in its educational work.
It is needless to add that Bishop Carroll's appoint-
ment was highly appreciated throughout the diocese
of Helena, and that he was enthusiastically received
by the priests, the religious communities and the
people of western Montana.
In an age afflicted with an insatiable thirst for
rights, he came to his people with the inspired
words, "In Sanctitate et Justitia," as his motto, to
teach them that man has not only rights to demand,
but also duties to fulfill — duties towards God, "In
Sanctitate," and duties toward his neighbor, "In
Justitia." For this reason he was doubly welcome.
His motto became the text of his inaugural address
at the High Mass on the Sunday following his in-
stallation, and has been the inspiration of all his
work since his advent to Helena.
Like the industrious Montana husbandman, he
believes in the intensive cultivation of the Lord's
vineyard. Beginning with his clergy — the laborers
in the vineyard, he said to them and kept saying.
"Let him that is holy become holier still," and "If
you wish to sanctify others, first sanctify your-
selves." Realizing the necessity of sanctity of life
among the clergy, he decreed that retreats for
them should be given every year instead of every
two years, as had been the case. And he required
that all priests laboring in the diocese should at-
tend them. To make these retreats at once effi-
cient and attractive, he invited to preach to them
the most prominent speakers among the bishops
and priests of the country. Each of these retreats
he has attended in person, and has given confer-
ences at all of them. In 1909 he conducted all the
exercises of the retreat himself, urging his clergy
with accents of deepest conviction to give them-
selves without reserve to the work of the Master.
One of the first things to attract Bishop Car-
roll's attention upon takipg up his work in Mon-
tana was the fact that the number of clergy was
wholly inadequate to meet the spiritual needs of
the rapidly growing Catholic population. He found
but twenty-four priests in his vast diocese. He
was not long in remedying this condition, and now
his clergy number ninety-three.
_ His pastoral solicitude was next given to the re-
ligious communities of Sisters. These he has guided
in their work at all times, advising them in their
doubts, encouraging them in their difficulties, and
urging them on whenever prudence would permit
it to undertake new works or to put forth more
strenuous efforts. Since his advent to Montana
five more Sisterhoods have entered the diocese, the
Sisters of Charity, B. V. M., the Sisters of St.
Dominic, the Sisters of Mercy, the Hospital Sisters
of St. Joseph and the Sisters of St, Francis.
With his people his voice has been but the echo
of the voice of Pius X, whose motto was "to re-
store all things in Christ." In conformity with the
decrees of the Holy Father, he has insisted that
the priests should give to the people regularly plain
and solid instructions on Christian doctrine, and
should urge upon them a return to the practice of
frequent and even daily communion. Firmly be-
lieving that, in the religious world, the twentieth
century is destined to be the "century of the lay-
man," he has joyfully lent his aid to the promotion
of religious and fraternal organizations of Catholic
laymen. For the young men of his episcopal city
he has provided a club fully equipped with all that
could be desired for social and athletic entertain-
ment. He has been for years an enthusiastic mem-
ber of the Knights of Columbus. In the national
convention of the Ancient Order of Hibernians held
in Portland, Oregon, July, 1910, he was unanimously
requested to accept the office of national chaplain,
and the Chicago national convention of the Order
held in July, 1912, insisted that he continue to be
their spiritual guide. In all his addresses to Cath-
olic laymen he has urged upon them the grandeur
of their mission and the absolute necessity, if they
would accomplish this mission, of living lives that
square with the spirit and practices of their Catholic
faith. To aid them in the work of their personal
sanctification he inaugurated in his diocese the prac-
tice of laymen's retreats, he himself preaching the
first of these retreats, held at Mount St. Charles
College, June, 1912.
With Bishop Carroll education ranks next to re-
ligion— the school must follow in the wake of the
church. To increase the efficiency of the Catholic
educational system of his diocese he directed that
a strong campaign be undertaken by parish priests
and teachers to secure the attendance of all Catholic
children at parochial schools; he ordered improve-
ments and additions for the schools already built;
HISTORY OF :\IOXTANA
and in several parishes had new schools erected.
He has even succeeded in establishing high schools
in the larger cities of his diocese. This is but what
could be expected of him, who, whilst president
of St. Joseph's College, had. in the yearly college
conferences held in the east, led the fight for the
extension of our Catholic high school system. To
advance and unify his diocesan school system and
render it more efficient, he directed that the prac-
tice of holding summer schools be made general
among the sisterhoods of the diocese, and he sup-
plemented the work of the summer school by the
annual teachers' institute, which the parish priests
and teachers must attend.
Bishop Carroll's zeal for the cause of Catholic
education will best be understood when one con-
siders that before undertaking any other work of
importance he set about building the St. Helena
parochial school, which is how generally conceded to
be the most perfect school building in the United
States, not only from an architectural point of view,
but from a pedagogical and hygienic point of view-
as well. Besides the ordinary school accommo-
dations, it has thoroughly modern club rooms for
the young men of the city. That the educational
policy of the Right Reverend Bishop has already
borne abundant fruit is evident from the enviable
record that the Catholic school children have made
in the state examinations. To complete his diocesan
educational system Bishop Carroll has built Mount
St. Charles College, a boarding and day college for
young men. The building occupies a conspicuous
height known for over a quarter of a century in
Helena as Capitol Hill. The course of studies he
has outlined for the College has received the warm-
est encomiums frorfi the press. Its staff of profes-
sors would do credit to older institutions of learn-
ing. The College is incorporated under the laws of
the state of Montana with pcAver to grant degrees.
The high school department was admitted to the
North Central Association of Colleges and Second-
ary Schools March 21, 1919, and it is expected that
the college department will be admitted very shortly.
In the year 1918 a new gymnasium was added to the
group of college buildings. It is conceded to be the
finest structure of its kind in the northwest. At
the same time a science hall was built, containing
laboratories v/ith the most up to date equipment
for the study of chemistry, physics, biology and
botany. The growth of the College has made it
imperative to provide more extensive accommoda-
tions. A new wing, fully as large as the main build-
ing, is being erected to receive the increasing num-
ber of students of high school and collegiate grades,
whilst a separate building, also under construction.
will serve as a preparatory college for the younger
students. With these new buildings the College
will be able to accommodate five hundred students.
Bishop Carroll co-operated with the government in
establishing a unit of the Students Army Training
Corps in the fall of 1918 and placed the facilities
of the College at its disposal. He established a
Central High School in 1908 for the boys and girls
of Butte, and is now preparing to erect a second
high school, an institution exclusively for boys, in
the same city.
But Bishop Carroll has not confined his activities
to religion and education. He has identified him-
self with the great civic movements of the day.
The diocese of Helena knows his devotion to the
cause of temperance. In his confirmation tours
he never fails to point out the dangers of alcohol-
ism, and to invite boys and girls to pledge them-
selves to total abstinence from into.xicating drinks
until the age of twenty-five, or for life. This prac-
tice is without doubt the most efficient factor pres-
ently working in the state for the cause of temper-
ance. When the midnight closing movement was
being agitated in Helena, Bishop Carroll was instru-
mental in having a citizens' meeting held at the
Auditorium. It was his soul-stirring address on
this occasion that moulded public opinion and com-
pelled the unwilling aldermen to vote a midnight
closing ordinance. And it is a matter of history
how the midnight closing idea spread from Helena
to other parts of the state. Through his addresses
and written articles the Bishop exerted a great in-
fluence in securing the passage of the state prohibi-
tion law.
A true friend of the laboring man, Bishop Car-
roll has fearlessly warned him in public addresses
against the fallacies and dangers of Socialism, a
movement that is injurious not only to the work-
ingmen themselves, but to church and to state at
large. The Socialistic press has fiercely attacked
him for these discourses. But the editors of saner
journalism throughout the country have praised
their depth and wisdom. It may be noted here that
Bishop Carroll was probably the first Catholic bishop
in the United States to establish special Labor Day
services in the churches of his diocese and the first
to address a national convention of the American
Federation of Labor, which he did in Seattle, Wash-
ington, November 12, 1913. In that address he de-
clared that the Church endorses the essentials of
Unionism and he asked that the Unions demand
Sunday rest.
A third movement that has actively enlisted the
co-operation of the Bishop is the colonization of
Montana. His keen eye saw from the beginning the
agricultural possibilities of this state and his patri-
otic sentiments induced him to take a hand in the
promising work. In proof of this it may be said
that he had not spent six months in his diocese when
he asked Pope Piux X to bless his colonization
work in Montana. Soon his ideas took definite
shape. Three of his priests have been actively en-
gaged in colonizing work with a view to bringing
colonists to the Belgian Colony on the Valier Irri-
gation Project, to St. Charles in the Smith River
Vallev, to the vicinity of Deer Lodge, and to the
Helena Valley.
The fame of the Right Reverend Bishop soon
passed over the borders of Montana, as is evident
from the fact that he has been much in demand as
a speaker at civic, as well as at ecclesiastical, cele-
brations both east and west. To give but a few
instances : He was asked to deliver the chief ad-
dress at the Washington celebration in Portland ;
at the dedication of the cathedrals of Seattle and
of Cheyenne ; and at that of the Church of Our
Lady of Lourdes, Spokane ; at the national con-
vention of the Ancient Order of Hibernians in Port-
land and Chicago; at the Catholic Day of the
Alaska- Yukon-Pacific Exposition in Seattle ; and
the entire Lenten course of 191 1 at St. Patrick's
Church, Montreal, was confided to him ; on Sep-
tember 21, 1919, he preached the sermon at the pon-
tificial high Mass in the Cathedral of Baltimore,
in which Cardinal Mercier and Cardinal Gibbons
participated. His public addresses ring true with
love for America, her laws, her constitution,, and
her institutions. He is a fervent advocate of civil
liberty and religious tolerance, just as he is the
uncompromising foe of oppression and persecution.
In mass meetings held in Helena and Butte he fear-
lessly attacked the infamous policy of spoliation
and confiscation practiced by the French govern-
ment. The weight of his influence in public dis-
cussion induced the Hon. Edwin L. Norris, gov-
rpr[K77<^a^^'Z
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ernor of Montana, to appoint him to represent the
state at the peace conference held in Washington
for the purpose of advancing the cause of interna-
tional arbitration. The high regard in which Bishop
Carroll is held by his colleagues in the hierarchy is
plainly shown by the fact that he lias been asked
by His Eminence, Cardinal Gibbons, by various
archbishops and bishops throughout the Union to
preach retreats to their clergy. Further manifesta-
tions of this esteem are seen in the fact that he
has been solicited for the offices of co-adjutor of
the Archbishop of San Francisco, rector of the
Catholic University at Washington, D. C, and
Archbishop of Dubuque, Iowa. Nothing but his
own conception and presentation of the importance
of the work he had undertaken in Montana has
prevented his appointment to one or other of these
high positions.
This sketch would be incomplete if mention were
not made of the St. Helena Cathedral, now in course
of erection at Helena. This sacred edifice is mod-
eled after the Votive Church in Vienna, Austria,
the most perfect structure of Gothic architecture
extant. The width of the new cathedral is seventy-
two in the nave and aisles and one hundred and
twenty feet in the transepts ; its length is two hun-
dred feet : its ceiling is sixty-five feet high, and its
roof rises one hundred feet ; while above the en-
tire mass of building rise the twin spires to the
height of two hundred and thirty feet. It is in-
deed a magnificent temple in the purest of the four-
teenth century Gothic. It is graceful in all its lines
and, like its type — the Votive Church of Vienna, is
considered perfect in its proportions. But its proud-
est boast is that it is the church of all the people of
Helena, because the citizens of Helena, irrespective
of creed or nationality, have contributed to its erec-
tion. On the occasion of the laying of the corner-
stone of the cathedral. Bishop Carroll told the peo-
ple of Helena assembled at the Auditorium that he
regarded them as his sheep and asked them to re-
gard his cathedral as their church.
Judge Frederick C. Webster, who for a dozen
years was a judge of the District Court at Missoula,
is one of the oldest members of the Montana bar
still in active service. He handled his first cases
at Butte some five years before Montana was ad-
mitted to the Union.
Judge Webster is of an old New England family
and was born at Litchfield, Connecticut. He is a
graduate with the class of 187,^ from Yale Uni-
versity, and studied law under Judge Seymour of
Litchfield. He was admitted to the Connecticut
bar in 1874. and after a period of private practice
moved to Minneapolis, where he was a partner with
Judge Atwater in the firm of Atwater and W'eb-
ster. Judge Webster lived for a time in Colorado
and from there came to Montana in 1884. His first
home was at Butte, but since 1887 he has lived in
Missoula and practiced law. He was associated
with Judge Woody for some years, was elected and
served as county attorney four years, was mayor
four years, and in 1900 succeeded Judge W'oody on
the bench of the District Court. By re-election he
remained on the bench, giving his duties the benefit
of all his wide experience and learning for twelve
years. After retiring he again served as county
attorney for two years, and in igij was appointed
receiver of the Bitter Root Valley Irrigation Com-
pany. Judge Webster has been a life-long republi-
can, and is a past grand master of the Masonic Or-
der of Montana.
June I, 1889, at Missoula, he married Miss Anna
C. Bye, a native of Iowa. They have three children.
One son, Charles Norman, early in the war joined
the Ninth Artillery ' Regiment and was trained at
Fort Sill, Oklahoma. The son Fred B. is a young
lawyer and associated with his father in practice.
Judge Theodore Lektz, who in 1014 was elected
judge of the District Court at Missoula, has been
a Montana lawyer for fifteen years, and his work
and character have gained him a broad apprecia-
tion and the esteem due his learning, his industry
and his uhqualified integrity.
Judge Lentz was born in Williamson County, Illi-
nois, October 28, 1874, son of Eli and Lydia j.
(Hare) Lentz. His parents were Southerners, the
father a native of North Carolina and his mother
of Tennessee. They spent their active lives in
Illinois. Eli Lentz for four years was a Union
soldier in Company H of the One Hundred and
Ninth Illinois Infantry. In all that service he
never lost a day from sickness or wounds, and
fought in some of the greatest battles of the war.
Judge Lentz was reared and educated in Illinois,
and graduated from Valparaiso University in In-
diana in 1895. In 1899 he entered the law depart-
ment of the University of Michigan, and later re-
sumed his studies there' during 1903-04. Judge Lentz
came to Montana in 1904, practiced law at Glen-
dive, and served one term as county attorney. His
home has been at Missoula since 1909, and a large
general practice absorbed his time and talents until
he was elected to succeed Judge Patterson in 1914
and re-elected to the bench in igi6.
Judge Lentz is a leading republican and a thirty-
second degree Scottish Rite Mason. He married
at Glendive Ruth Hunter, of Watertown, South
Dakota. They have three children, one son and
two daughters.
Hon. John W. Tattan. Standing out distinctly
as one of the central figures of the judiciary of the
great Treasure State is the name of the Hon. John
W. Tattan, the able and popular judge of the
Twelfth Judicial District. Prominent in legal circles
and equally so in public matters beyond the confines
of his own jurisdiction, with a reputation in one of
the most exacting of professions that has won him a
name for distinguished service second to none of
his contemporaries, there is today no more prom-
inent or influential man in the district which he has
long honored by his citizenship. Wearing the judi-
cial ermine with becoming dignity and bringing to
every case submitted to him a clearness of percep-
tion and ready power of analysis characteristic of
the learned jurist, his name and work for years
has earned him recognition as one of the distin-
guished citizens of his locality.
John W. Tattan was born in Midleton, County
Cork, Ireland, on May 2-j, 1847, and was the second
child in order of birth of the five children born to
John and Mary (Walsh) Tattan, both of whom were
natives of the Emerald Isle. They are both now
deceased, the father passing away in 1889, when
seventy-eight years of age, and the mother in 1888,
at the age of seventy years. John Tattan, the father,
was a mail contractor for over twenty years, being
engaged in the transportation of Government mail,
and he was also a hotel keeper for many years.
John W. Tattan received a good education in his
native land, his studies including a thorough course
in civil engineering. When eighteen years of age, de-
siring larger opportunities for the exercise of the
energies and talents which were his, the lad immi-
grated to the United States, taking passage on the
old steamship the Citv of Paris, which landed him at
New York City on April 16, 1865. He at once came
462
HISTORY OF MONTANA
west, locating in the iron mining country in Minne-
sota, where he followed his profession as a civil
engineer up to 1870. On June 5th of that year Mr.
Tattan went to Chicago and enlisted in the United
States army. In July he was attached to the Sev-
enth Regiment, United States Infantry, at Fort
Shaw, Montana Territory. He came to Fort Ben-
ton in January, 1872, remaining there until June 5.
1875, when he received his honorable discharge from
the service, with the rank of sergeant.
Remaining in Fort Benton, Mr. Tattan was in
August, 1875, elected to the office of probate judge
of Chouteau County. So satisfactory was his dis-
charge of the duties of that office that he was sev-
eral times elected to succeed himself, holding the
office continuously, with the exception of a period
of two years, up to 1889. Mr. Tattan had applied
himself closely to the study of law and took the
examination for admission to the bar in 1877. In
1889 he was elected county attorney for Chouteau
County, serving for three years. He was then em-
ployed as attorney for the Northern Roundup Asso-
ciation, and it is noteworthy that during his con-
nection with that organization they were successful
in ridding Northern Montana of practically all of its
"bad men." In 1900 Mr. Tattan was appointed
judge of the Tenth Judicial District, and in igoi
he was appointed judge of the Twelfth Judicial Dis-
trict. He has been continuously elected to succeed
himself in this office and is the present incumbent
of the district bench.
Judge Tattan's qualifications for the office of
judge are unquestionable. First of all, he has in-
tegrity of character. He possesses the natural abil-
ity and the essential requirements, the acumen of
the judicial temperament. He is able to divest him-
self of prejudice or favoritism and consider only
the legal aspects of a question submitted. No labor
is too great, however onerous ; no application too
exacting, however severe, if necessary to the com-
plete understanding and correct determination of a
question. These are, indeed, words of high praise,
but the encomium is justified in every particular,
for the judge has proved himself a distinct rnan,
in all the term implies, and its implication is wide.
Politically Judge Tattan gives his support to the
democratic party. In the November, 1920 primaries,
although Judge Tattan failed to receive the demo-
cratic nomination for the first time because of the
non-partisans and radical laborites, over 400 repub-
licans wrote his name on their ticket and he thus
became the republican nominee after being a demo-
crat over fifty years. He was re-elected, leading
the nominee for governor by several hundred.
Judge Tattan's term will expire in 1925. He takes
a live interest in everything aflfecting the general
interests of the community, giving his active sup-
port to all worthy movements. In 1867 J. M. Ar-
noux built a log house in Fort Benton and, partly
from a sentimental viewpoint, Judge Tattan bought
the old cabin and it has been incorporated into his
present home, it being the present sitting room.
On April 11, 1876, Judge Tattan was married to
Alice Seifred, a native of the State of Iowa, and to
them have been born two children. John J., the
eldest, married Carrie E. Arenberg, and they have
four children, their home being in Glasgow, Mon-
tana. Mary E. Tattan became the wife of C. W.
Morrison, a merchant in Fort Benton, and they
have two children.
Albert John Foss is manager of the Beaverhead
Milling and Elevator Company at Dillon, the only
grain elevator in Beaverhead County, and has been
in the grain business as a buyer and dealer the
greater part of his life. He was born in the Pine
Tree State, in the extreme northeastern part of
the United States, but has lived his life chiefly in
Minnesota, the Dakotas and Montana.
He was born at Bangor, Maine, August 4, 1862.
His great-grandfather Foss brought the family
from Eneland in pioneer times. Through his mother
one of his great-grandfathers was also named Foss.
This is a family that has long been prominent in
New England, and one line includes ex-Governor
and Senator Foss of Massachusetts. Samuel Foss,
father of the Dillon grain merchant, was born in
Maine in 1828, and spent many years there as a
lumberman in Aroostook and other counties. In
1867, as a lumberman, he went to Wisconsin, and
was foreman of a firm that operated four or five
mills in the heaviest forests of that state. He was
a prominent man in his time in Wisconsin, and had
the supervision of the work by which the Sturgeon
Bay and Lake Michigan Canal was lowered to water
level. In 1874 Samuel Foss moved to Minnesota,
and as a farmer, blacksmith and cooper was a lead-
ing man in the citizenship and financial life of New
Auburn. In 1882 he went to Frederick, South Da-
kota, and was engaged in farming there the rest
of his life. He died in 1899. He held some town
office almost continuously, was an active republican
in politics, and a member of the Masonic fraternit>'.
Samuel Foss married Esther Johnston, who was
born in Maine in 1834 and is now living with her
daughter, Mrs. Carrie Armstrong in the Province
of Alberta, Canada. Their children were as fol-
lows : A. G., a land agent at St. Paul, Minnesota ;
Emily, wife of Edward Chilton, died in 1891 ;
Bertha, living at Hudson, Wisconsin, widow of H.
Strickland, who died in 1919 and was a grain buyer;
Albert John ; May, wife of O. H. Poppleton, a
farmer and carpenter living near Baker, Montana ;
Edith, widow of Doctor Pettingill of Frederick,
South Dakota; Charles is a farmer and contractor
at Didsbury in Alberta, Canada; D. H. is a rancher
near Baker, Montana; and Carrie is the wife of
Alfred Armstrong, a banker in Saskatchewan, Can-
ada.
Albert John Foss was five years of age when his
father moved to Wisconsin. He attended schools
in that state, also at New Auburn, Minnesota, and
Brownton, Minnesota, graduating from the high
school of the latter place. At the age of seventeen
he became a telegraph operator with the Chicago,
Milwaukee and St. Paul, and after working for
some time in Minnesota he became a grain buyer
at Barnesville in that state. Beginning in 1884, he
was at Barnesville three years, then spent three
years as a grain buyer at Winthrop, Minnesota,
and in 1890 returned to Brownton and continued
in the grain buying business until 1901. Following
that he spent about a year at Bath, South Dakota,
three years at Litchfield, Minnesota, one year at
Pipestone, and after that gave up the grain busi-
ness to become manager of the Foss-.\rmstrong
Hardware Company in their branch store at Hud-
son, Wisconsin. He remained there four years,
moved his home to Eau Claire, Wisconsin, and
was traveling representative for the Foss- Armstrong
Hardware Compan}'. For three years his travels
covered the greater part of the state. He then
resumed the management of the branch store at
Hudson.
On August 14, 1912, Mr; Foss came to Montana
and located at Wibaux, where he resumed his for-
mer business as a grain buyer. On January i, 1919,
he took the management of the Beaverhead Mill
and Elevator Company at Dillon. Through this
HISTORY OF MONTANA
elevator is marketed practically all the grain raised
in Beaverhead County. The mill and elevator are
located along the tracks of the Oregon Short Line
Railroad. The mills have a capacity of lOO bar-
rels of flour per day, while the elevator's capacity
is 40,000 bushels. Mr. Foss is a stockholder 'in this
important local business of Dillon.
He owns a residence at Wibaux and makes his
home in Dillon, at 3SS South Idaho Street. During
his residence, at Brownton, Minnesota, he served
as an alderman. He is a republican, is affiliated
with Wibaux Lodge No. 81, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, being master of the Lodge for 1919,
is affiliated with Glendive Chapter No. 5, Royal
Arch Masons, and is a Scottish Rite Mason and
Odd Fellow.
In 1886, at Crookston, Minnesota, Mr. Foss mar-
ried Miss Nina E. Smith, a daughter of Parker
and Marie (Howland) Smith, the latter a resident
of Los Angeles. Her father, who died in Minne-
apolis, was a grain merchant. Mrs. Foss is a grad-
uate of the high school of Green Bay, Wisconsin.
To their marriage have been born three children.
Floyd S. P. is a graduate of the Law School of
the University of Southern California with the
LL. B. degree and is now practicing at Glendive,
Montana. Fern, at home, is a graduate of the high
school at Eau Claire, Wisconsin, the Valley City
Normal College in North Dakota, the Superior Nor-
mal in Wisconsin, and for four years was a suc-
cessful teacher in Wibaux, Montana. Nina Alberta
is now a student in the Beaverhead County High
School at Dillon.
George Melville Crabb, M. D. District surgeon
for the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway
at Deer Lodge, Doctor Crabb has earned a place
of genuine distinction in the medical profession at
Montana.
His Scotch ancestors settled in Pennsylvania in
colonial times. His grandfather was a native of
that state, was a minister of the Presbyterian
Church, and died at Bryan, Ohio, at the age of
fifty-five. John M. Crabb, father of Doctor Crabb,
was born at Bryan, Ohio, in 1842, and from that
community as a youth of nineteen he enlisted in
the Thirty-third Ohio Regiment, and for four years
was a soldier of the Union. He rose to the rank
of first lieutenant. He was with Sherman on the
march to the sea, and at one time during the war
was stationed at Galveston, Texas. He married in
Ohio, lived on a farm near Bryan for several years,
and then moved to Greenfield, Iowa, where he was
a farmer until he retired in 1904. His last years
were spent at Parsons, Kansas, where he died in
igio. Though a Union soldier, he was a democrat
in politics. He was an elder of the Presbyterian
Church, belonged to the Grand Army of the Republic
and affiliated with the Ancient Order of United
Workmen. John M. Crabb married Rachel Craver,
born near Bryan, Ohio, in 1842, and died at Parsons,
Kansas, in 1910, the same year as her husband. Of
their five children Dr. George M. is the youngest.
C. E. Crabb, the oldest, is manager of the Willard-
Crabb Farms Company at Deer Lodge. James M.
was a graduate of Rush Medical College at Chicago,
and practiced medicine in that city until his death
in 1905. David E. is a teacher in a boys' school in
China, being maintained there by the Presbyterian
Foreign Mission Board. Bertha E., the only daugh--
ter, is the wife of Arthur Newbro, a foreman in the
shops of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway
Company at Parsons, Kansas.
George Melville Crabb was born at Greenfield,
Vol. 11—30
Iowa, October 16, 1882, spent his early life on his
father's farm, attended the rural schools of Adair
County, an academy at West Plains, Iowa, and is a
graduate of Grinnell College, Iowa, receiving his
Bachelor of Science degree in 1906. He then entered
Rush Medical College, the affiliated medical school
of the University of Chicago, and received his M. D.
degree in 1910. Doctor Crabb is a member of the
medical fraternity Phi Beta Pi. His record in col-
lege earned him the privileges of an interneship in
the Cook County Hospital at Chicago, receiving
his appointment after a competitive examination.
He served with that institution a year and a half,
and thus equipped and trained he came to Montana
and settled at Deer Lodge in 1912. He became
associated with Dr. H. G. Willard, then district
surgeon of the Milwaukee Railway, and in 1915
succeeded Doctor Willard in that office. In addition
he also looks after a large general medical and
surgical practice. His offices are in the new Masonic
Building on Main Street. Doctor Crabb served as
county physician in 1919, and was the state delegate
from Montana to the National Convention of the
American Medical Association at Atlantic City in
1919. He is a Fellow of the American Medical
Association and is a member of the Silver Bow
County Medical Society, the State Medical Associa-
tion, and is chairman of the Board of Councillors of
the latter. Doctor Crabb casts an independent ballot
in politics. He is an elder in the Presbyterian
Church, and is affiliated with Lodge No. 14. Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, at Deer Lodge, Valley
Chapter No. 4, Royal Arch Masons, Ivanhoe Com-
mandery No. 16, Knights Templar, and Bagdad
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Butte. He is also
a member of the Deer Lodge Chamber of Commerce.
Doctor Crabb is a half owner in the Willard-Crabb
Farms Company. This corporation owns 1,600
acres five miles' southeast of Deer Lodge. Their
land has complete water rights, and the ranch is
noted for its wheat crops and for its fine herd of
Shorthorn cattle.
Doctor Crabb and family reside at 812 Missouri
Avenue. He married at Marshalltown, Iowa, in
1911, Miss Pauline Andrews, daughter of George L.
and Clara (Arnold) Andrews, residents of Mar-
shalltown. Her father has been a grocery merchant
there for thirty-five years. Mrs. Crabb is also a
graduate of Grinnell College, Iowa, receiving the
A. B. degree. She is also a Phi Beta Kappa, the
honorary scholarship fraternity. Doctor and Mrs.
Crabb have three children : Ruth, born September 3,
1912; Doris, born April 3, 1914; and John, born
December 8, 1917.
Gilbert Arnold Ketcham. Western Montana
numbers among its citizens many skillful physicians,
lawyers of state repute, well-known manufacturers
and business men of more than local reputation and,
while proud of them, she is not lacking in others
who have achieved distinction in callings requiring
intellectual abilities of a high order. Among the
latter, Mr. Gilbert A. Ketcham, the popular and
efficient principal of the Missoula County High
School, occupies a deservedly conspicuous place.
No one is more entitled to the thoughtful considera-
tion of a free and enlightened people than he who
shapes and directs the minds of the young, adds to
the value of their intellectual treasures and moulds
their characters. This is pre-eminently the mission
of the faithful and conscientious educator, and to
such noble work is the life of the subject of this
sketch devoted.
Gilbert Arnold Ketcham is descended from ster-
464
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ling old Scotch-Irish ancestry, li
cestors having come to this country from the north
of Ireland about the middle of the eighteenth cen-
tury and settled on Long Island. The subject's
father, R. G. Ketcham, was born in 1829 at Pat-
chog, Long Island, and died at Geneva, Ohio, in
1902. He was reared and educated in his native
town. In 1843 he accompanied his parents on their
removal to Minnesota, locating on farming land
near where Chatfield now stands. On attaining
mature years he engaged in the hardware business
at Chatfield, but in 1879 he went to Ohio, making
his home at Geneva, from which place he went out
as a traveling salesman over Ohio. He died at
Geneva in 1902. Originally a republican in his po-
litical views, he later became a supporter of the
prohibition party and was active in its behalf. He
was a very active and devoted member of the Con-
gregational Church. In 1874, at Rome, Ohio, Mr.
Ketcham was married to Laura Arnold, who was
born there irr 1847 and whose death occurred there
in 1879. Gilbert A. is the only child born to this
; born at Chatfield, Min-
nesota, on September 27, 1875, but was reared and
attended the public schools at Geneva, Ohio, whither
his father had removed when he was about eight
years of age. He graduated from the Geneva High
School in 1894, and during the following year he
taught school at Rome, Ohio. He then entered
Oberlin College, at Oberlin, Ohio, where he w-as
graduated in 1899, with the degree of Bachelor of
Arts. He was then engaged as principal of the
high school at Geneseo, Illinois, where he remained
for two years, and the following year he served as
principal of the high school at St. Cloud, Minnesota.
Mr. Ketcham came to Montana in 1902, and from
that year until 191 1 he rendered efficient service
as principal of the Flathead County High School
at Kalispell, resigning that position to accept that
of deputy superintendent of public instruction of
the State of Montana, in which position he served
one year. In the fall of 1912 he came to Missoula
as principal of the Missoula County High School,
of which position he is still the incumbent. Under
his supervision there are twenty-eight teachers and
650 pupils. The building' is a splendid type of the
most approved style of modern school buildings,
having every facility required to promote the effi-
ciency of the work done there. Under his direc-
tion the school has made remarkable progress and
stands today among the leaders of the. high schools
of the state. Mr. Ketcham is a man of scholarly
tastes and studious habits, keeps abreast of the
times in advanced educational methods, and his gen-
eral knowledge is broad and comprehensive. Years
of conscientious work have brought with them not
only an increase in reputation, but also that growth
in educational ability the possession of which con-
stitutes marked excellence in the profession.
On December 26, 1901, at Geneseo, Illinois, Mr.
Ketcham was married to Priscilla Schnabele, the
daughter of P. S. and Amalia Schnabele, of Gen;
eseo, where the former is a successful banker.
Politically Mr. Ketcham gives his support to the
republican party, while his religious affiliation is
with the Presbyterian Church, in which he is an
elder. He is a member of the Rotary Club and of
the Chamber of Commerce, both at Missoula. He
is deservedly popular in the community, and his
friends are in number as his acquaintances. His
life affords a splendid example of what an Ameri-
can youth, plentifully endowed with good common
sense, energy and determination, may accomplish
when directed and controlled by earnest moral prin-
ciples.
HerbeIit T. Wilkinson has been a resident of
Missoula, Montana, since 1889, the year of state-
hood, -and has long been prominent in the affairs
of his home city, serving as mayor and in other of-
ficial capacities.
He was born in London, England, May 15, 1864,
son of Charles R. and Jane E. Wilkinson. His
father died in England and his mother is living at
the advanced age of eighty-eight in Missoula. Mr.
Wilkinson was reared in England, had a common
school education, and after coming to the United
States spent several years in Wyoming before locat-
ing at Missoula in .•\ugust, 1889.
For the first three years, from August, 1889, to
December, 1892, he was chief clerk to the superin-
tendent of the Northern Pacific Railway Company.
From January, 1893, to December, 1898, he was
deputy county clerk and treasurer and from Jan-
uary, 1899, to December, 1902, county clerk and
recorder. After leaving office he took up the real
estate and mining business and was successfully
engaged therein from January, 1903, to .'\pril, 1916.
Mr. Wilkinson is the present mayor of Missoula,
having been elected in May, 1916, under the com-
mission form of government, and devotes practi-
cally all his time to the administration of municipal
affairs. He is a director of the Missoula Building
and Loan Association, vice president of the Rotary
Club, has served on the executive committee of the
Red Cross, and is a member of the Elks and Wood-
men of the World. Politically he is a democrat and
is a member of the Episcopal Church.
Mr. Wilkinson has three daughters and one son ;
Ethel, born in 1899, now Mrs. A. E. Leech, of Va-
lier, Montana ; Holroyd, born in 1893 ; Dorothy,
born in 1897; and Marjorie, born in 1903.
Judge John E. Patterson, former judge of the
District Court at Missoula, has been an able mem-
ber of his profession a quarter of a century, and
came to Missoula from Chicago, where he had prac-
ticed law several years.
Judge Patterson was born in Floyd County, low'a,
at Charles City, in 1866, son of John G. and Hester
(Quiggle) Patterson. His parents were natives
of Pennsylvania and went to Iowa from Ohio.
Judge Patterson grew up in Iowa, had a public
school education there, and graduated from the
Iowa State University with the class of 1889. In
l8gi he entered the Chicago College of Law, where
he spent two years. He was admitted to the Illi-
nois bar, and practiced in Chicago until 1900, when
he came to Missoula and became associated with
Charles Hall. Judge Patterson was called from his
large general practice to the office of district judge
in 1912. and since leaving the bench has again taken
his place among the lawyers of Missoula. In 1916
Judge Patterson was nominated by the democratic
party for chief justice of the Supreme Court of
^Montana, but failed of election bv a small majority.
^Ir. Patterson is a democrat in politics.
At Chicago in 1894 he married Carolina S. Paxton,
also a native of Iowa. They have three sons and
one daughter. The son John left the University
of Montana during his senior year to enlist in the
National army, and became a member of the
..Twentieth Regiment of Engineers aild saw active
service for thirteen months in France.
Fred W. H.\ndel is senior member of Handel
Brothers, the oldest and largest business firm of
J?^^-A VsTilA^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
465
Musselshell. The brothers have been in business
there for over thirty years, and their interests touch
every phase of local life and affairs. They are gen-
eral merchants, grain dealers, and have thousands
of acres devoted to live stock and farming.
Fred W. Handel was born at Meriden, Connecti-
cut, September 26, 1862. His grandfather, Philip
Handel, was born in Wuertemberg, Germany, and
about i860 brought his family to the United States
and settled on a farm at Hartford, Connecticut.
Jacob Handel, father of the Handel brothers, was
born in Wuertemberg in 1S40 and was about 20
years of age when he accompanied other members
of the family to the United States. At Glastonbury,
Connecticut, he was employed in a factory a short
time and then removed to Meriden, where he was
connected with the Charles Parker Company, hard-
ware manufacturers. He was killed accidentally
while visiting his father at East Hartford in the
fall of 1875. Jacob Handel was a democratic voter
a member of the Lutheran Church. He mar-
ried Catherine Wuterich, who was born in Wuer-
temberg in 1842 and is now living at Webster City,
Iowa. Fred W. is the oldest of her children. Philip
J. was a manufacturer and died at Meriden, Con-
necticut, in 1914. George W., junior member of
Handel Brothers, lives at Musselshell and was born
in Connecticut in 1868. Emma H., the youngest of
the family, is the wife of Dr. Franklin J. Drake,
a physician and surgeon at Webster City, Iowa.
Fred W. Handel acquired a public school educa-
tion at Meriden, but at the early age of fourteen ac-
cepted an opportunity for regular employment as
clerk in a grocery store at Meriden. He remained for
six years in one store and acquired a thorough busi-
ness training while there. Then, associated with
George W. Ives, he established a grocery store at
Meriden, and they conducted it until February 15,
1885. . Selling out, the partners came to Montana,
acquired some land and in April, 1885, went into
business at Musselshell Crossing under the name
Ives & Handel. Mr. Ives was active in the firm
until he met with an accident in the fall of 1886
and was taken back to Meriden, Connecticut, where
he died three years later. The Ives interests were
then acquired by George W. Handel, who came to
Montana at the time, and this gave origin to the
firm of Handel Brothers in 1889.
The history of this business is therefore coincident
with the history of the State of Montana. Thirty
years ago they had a small store, while now thev
conduct the largest mercantile business in Mussel-
shell County. The small store has grown to a large
department store, with distinct departments for
shoes, dry goods, groceries, hardware and drugs,
also furniture and undertaking, and they do a large
business in lumber and grain. They have a branch
store at Carpenter Creek. The mercantile stores
are on Main Street, the lumber yard is at First
Street east of Main, and the elevator is along the
tracks of the Milwaukee Railway. They also own
an elevator at Delphia, Montana.
Besides these extensive commercial holdings at
Musselshell the brothers own more than 10,000
acres of ranch land in Musselshell County. Their
ranches are the home of some particularly fine stock,
blooded cattle, pure bred sheep and horses, and they
are among the leading producers of good livestock
in this section of the state.
Fred W. Handel is also president of the Bankers
Loan and Mortgage Company at Billings. He
served fourteen years as postmaster of Musselshell,
and in 1902 became L^nited States commissioner for
his section of the state. A man of undoubted
probity and of the best business judgment, he has
frequently been called upon to adjust and admin-
ister private estates. Mr. Handel is a republican,
an active member of the Congregational Church, is
secretary of Victory Lodge No. 124, .\ncient Free
and Accepted Masons, at Musselshell, is affiliated
with Livingston Consistory No. i of the Scottish
Rite and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine, also
with Peace Chapter of the Eastern Star at Mussel-
shell, Musselshell Camp, Modern Woodmen of
America, and Musselshell Commercial Club.
The Handel brothers married sisters, the wife of
Fred being Miss Mae Stockwell, who was born in
Illinois and is a graduate of the Davenport Business
College. They were married at Davenport March
14, 1893. Mr. and Mrs. Handel have one son, Fred
W., Jr., born October 26, 1906, and now attending
high school at Musselshell.
George W. Handel married Miss Daisy I. Stock-
well, and they have two children, George W., Jr.,
who served in the late war and reached France just
before the signing of the armistice, and Philip, now
attending high school.
William L. Murphy has been prominent among
the lawyers of Missoula for twenty years, and with
the exception of a term as assistant attorney gen-
eral has devoted himself with singular energies
and unequivocal success to general practice.
Mr. Murphy was born at Phillipsburg, Montana,
January 4, 1877, a son of Cornelius and Mary
(Quaile) Murphy. His father was born in County
Tipperary, Ireland, and his mother in St. Louis,
Missouri. Cornelius Murphy was prominent in the
early annals of Montana. He became identified with
the Alder Gulch community near Virginia City, in
1863, and was at different times in nearly all the
placer diggings, including Cedar Creek. He finally
located at Butte, and died October 14, 1887, his
wife having passed away in 1883.
William L. Murphy was reared in Missoula, at-
tended the public schools, graduated from the Uni-
versity of Montana in 1897, and then entered the law
department of Columbia University of New York,
graduating in 1900. He has been admitted to the
bars of New York and Montana, and began his
professional career at Missoula as a member of
the firm Dixon and Murphy. He is now a member
of the firm Murphy and Whitlock. Early in his
practice he was appointed city attorney and clerk,
and for three years served as assistant attorney
general under Albert Galen. Mr. Murphy is a re-
publican, carrying a large weight of influence in
his party. He is affiliated with the Elks and in re-
ligious faith is a Catholic. In 1909 he married
Edith Bickford, daughter of the distinguished Judge
Bickford, formerly of Missoula and later of Butte.
George C. Rice. Perhaps no one agency in all
the world has done so much for public progress as
the press, and an enterprising, well-edited journal
is a most important factor in promoting the welfare
and prosperity of any community. It adds to the
intelligence of the people through its transmission
of foreign and domestic news and through its dis-
cussion of the leading questions and issues of the
day. More than that, it makes the town or city
which it represents known outside of the immediate
locality, as it is sent into other districts, carrying
with it an account of the advancement and progress
there being made and the advantages which it offers
to its residents along moral, educational, commer-
cial and social lines. Western Montana is certainly
indebted to its wide-awake journals in no small de-
gree, and one of the men who are doing a com-
mendable work in the local newspaper field is George
C. Rice, president of the Missoualian Publishing
466
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Company, at Missoula. He has long been connected
with journalistic work, and his power as a writer
and editor, as well as a business man, is widely
acknowledged among contemporary newspaper men
and the public in general.
George C. Rice is descended from sterling old
Welsh stock, his paternal grandfather, Roderick
Rice, having been a native of that rock-ribbed lit-
tle countrj'. He came to the United States in 1846,
and settled in Waukesha County, Wisconsin, of
which locality he was a pioneer settler, and there
he applied himself to farming during the remainder
of his life, his death occurring there in 1882. He
was a member of the Presbyterian Church, and
was held in high esteem in the community. He
was married to Mary Griffiths, who also was a
native of Wales and whose death occurred in Wau-
kesha County in 1892. Among their children was
T. J. Rice, father of the subject of this review.
He was born in Wales in 1833 and was brought by
his parents to the United States in 1846. He was
reared amid the pioneer conditions which sur-
rounded their early home in Wisconsin, but was
given every educational advantage possible. After
attending the district schools he attended and gradu-
ated from Carroll College at Waukesha, and then
became a minister of the Welsh Presbyterian
Church, in which capacity he preached at many
points, mainly in Wisconsin. He was a republican
in politics. He married Anna Owen, who was
born in Wales in 1832, and who died in Waukesha
County, Wisconsin, in 1914. They became the par-
ents of four children, namely : E. O., who is a
rancher at Prosser, Washington ; G. R., who is sec-
retary and manager of the Milwaukee Milk and
Cream Shippers Association at Milwaukee, Wiscon-
sin: J. H., who is in the work of the Young Men's
Christian Association and resides in Chicago;
George C, the immediate subject of this sketch.
The father of these children died in Portage, Wis-
consin, in 1901
George C. Rice was born in Waukesha County,
Wisconsin, on November 23, 1870. He was reared
at home and was given excellent educational op-
portunities. After completing the studies in the
public schools of Portage, Columbia County, Wis-
consin, including the high school, he attended the
academy of Carroll College for one year, and then
spent two years in Lake Forest Academy at Lake
Forest, Illinois, followed by a similar period in
Lake Forest College. Mr. Rice had a natural pre-
dilection for journalistic work, which found its
expression during his college life as a correspond-
ent for Chicago newspapers. Upon leaving college
he followed the path thus opened up before him
and threw himself with enthusiasm into newspaper
work. And it was of a most strenuous type, for
as a metropolitan reporter he found experience of
the most varied sort and, at the same time, the
most exacting. He first joined the staff of the
Chicago News, with which he was connected for
ten years, at the end of that period going to the
Chicago Journal, where he rernained eight years.
He had devoted himself indefatigably to his work,
which was of such character as to win him promo-
tions, so that at the time he resigned from the
Journal he was at the head of one of the editorial
departments.
In 1917 Mr. Rice came to Missoula, Montana, and
purchased the printing and newspaper plant owned
by the Missoulian Publishing Company and which
had formerly been the property of Senator Dixon.
Mr. Rice is now president of the company, which
was incorporated in 1917. The plant is a long es-
tablished one, its publication having been one of
the oldest republican newspapers in Montana. The
newspapers published by this company arc The Daily
Missoulian, a morning paper, and The Sentinel,
published every evening except Sunday. These pa-
pers are ably edited and are of unusual mechanical
excellence, enjoying a wide circulation throughout
Western Alontana. The printing plant is thoroughly
up-to-date in every respect and does commercial
printing of a high order. Mr. Rice is throwing into
this enterprise the fruits of his years of experience
and his efforts are appreciated, as is evident by
the large and constantly increasing circulation of
the papers issued under his management and direc-
tion.
Politically Mr. Rice is a 'stanch supporter of the
republican party, in the success of which he has
shown an active interest, and he has efficiently held
several local offices. Religiously he is a member
of the Presbyterian Church. Fraternally he be-
longs to Edgewater Lodge, Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, of Chicago; Western Sun Chapter No. 11,
Royal Arch Masons, at Missoula ; St. Omer Com-
mandery. Knights Templar, Missoula, and Lake
Forest Lodge, Knights of Pythias, at Lake Forest,
Illinois. He is president of the Missoula Chamber
of Commerce.
In 1904, at Platteville, Wisconsin, Mr. Rice was
married to Sarah Williams, daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. D. H. Williams of Argyle, New York, both
of whom are now deceased. Mr. Williams was a
mining operator in Illinois. Mrs. Rice is a graduate
of Lake Forest College and of the State Normal
School at Albany, New York, and prior to her mar-
riage had taught school at Polo, Illinois. Mr. Rice's
life has become an essential part of the current
history of this section and he has exerted a bene-
ficial influnce in the city honored by his residence.
His chief characteristics seem to be fidelity of pur-
pose, keenness of perception, unswerving integrity
and sound common sense, which have earned for him
the confidence and esteem of the entire community.
H. W. Rutherford is connected with the con-
struction department of the Anaconda Copper Min-
ing Company.
He is a native of the United States, having been
born in Minneapolis of parents who were also born
in the United States.
He is a citizen of good standing who places the
Constitution of the United States above all creeds
and societies.
Elmer E. Hershey came to Montana in 1886, and
was admitted to the bar in 1891, though he had prac-
ticed in justice courts prior to that date.
He was born on his father's farm at Fremont,
Ohio, in 1862. The Hersheys have been in America
over two centuries, and his grandfather was a sol-
dier in the War of 1812:
Elmer E. Hershey attended the public schools at
Ada, Ohio, also the Ohio Normal School in that
city, graduating in 1884. For two years he taught
in his home state, and after coming to Montana
taught in the Bitter Root Valley at Stevensville and
Skalkaho. He had entered the office of Judge Bick-
ford at Missoula in 1889, and remained with him
until 1898. He served a term in the Montana Legis-
lature in 1895-96, was a member of several important
committees and helped formulate the codes of the
state. In 1898 President McKinley appointed him
register of the Land Office, and he served four
years. Since then he has given his undivided time
and attention to his law practice.
(Jplu^^j^ ^r^&i^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr. Hershey is a Mason, a republican, and with
his family is active in the Christian Church, which
he served a long period as an elder.
Mr. Hershey is a son-in-law of the late ilaj. J. B.
Catlin. He married in 1895 Belle C. Catlin, who
was born in the Bitter Root Valley of Montana.
Their two daughters are Elizabeth, born in the
spring of 1896, and Alice born November 22, 1901.
Maj. John B. Catlin, who died July 30, 1917, at
the age of eighty years, was distinguished among
the pioneers of Montana, coming here shortly after
three years of service as a private soldier and of-
ficer of the Union army during the Civil war. He
was a gallant Indian fighter, a miner, rancher, pub-
lic official, and few men came in closer touch with
the realities of Montana history than the late Major
Catlin.
He was born at Cleveland, Ohio, June 21, 1837,
son of Sprague and Mary (Babcock) Catlin, his
father a native of New York and his mother of
Vermont. Sprague Catlin moved to Ohio in 1834,
and five years later settled at Laporte, Indiana, and
died in Southern Michigan in 1870. He was sur-
vived by his widow many years.
John B. Catlin grew up on an Indiana farm, had
a district school education, and left the farm to en-
list on August 4, 1862, as a private in Company H
of the Eighty-seventh Indiana Infantry. He re-
mained on active duty as a soldier until July, 1865.
He was in the Army of the Cumberland, partici-
pated in one of the early Kentucky campaigns, was
in the battles of Chickamauga and Missionary Ridge,
many of the battles of the Atlanta campaign, the
march to the sea, and the movements of Sherman's
army through the Carolinas. In the fall of 1862
he was made fourth sergeant, and after the battle
of Missionary Ridge was made cominissary ser-
geant, and at Atlanta was promoted to captain of
his original company, the official post he retained
during the remainder of his service.
Captain Catlin remained at home in Indiana but
a short time, and in the spring of 1866 started for
the Northwest, crossing the plains to Nebraska and
making the trip by the Platte River and the Boze-
man route. At Fort Reno after an encounter with
the Sioux Indians his party joined John Nelson
Story of Bozeman, and from the time they left
Fort Kearney until they reached Virginia City,
Montana, in December, 1866, almost every day v^as
marked by some encounter with hostile foes. Major
Catlin with several companions built his first cabin
at the mouth of Divide Creek in Deer Lodge
County and was successfully engaged in mining in
Silver Bow County and elsewhere, and in June, 1868,
located in Missoula County. After his early ven-
tures in mining he gave most of his time to farm-
ing and stock growing in the Bitter Root Valley
and for eight or nine years conducted a hotel and
livery business at Stevensville, Ravalli County. In
1889 he was appointed Indian agent at the Black-
foot reservation, but resigned after eighteen months.
In 1891 he became receiver of the Land Office at
Missoula, which he held four years. In 1897 he
was appointed United States land commissioner,
and served two years. For many years Major Cat-
lin was successively engaged in the real estate busi-
ness at Missoula.
Major Catlin had a prominent part as leader of
a volunteer company assisting the regulars under
General Gibbons in the Nez Perce Indian uprising
of 1877. This campaign culminated in the battle
of Big Hole,_ the last important Indian fight on
Montana soil, 'and Major Catlin's account of that
battle has always been considered one of the most
trustworthy and authoritative and has been fre-
quently published.
Major Catlin was a republican, was afliliated with
the Grand .Army Post at Missoula, and was a mem-
ber of the Ancient Order of United Workmen. At
Waterloo, Iowa, December 6, 1871, he married Miss
Elizabeth Taylor, a native of Indiana, and a
daughter of William B. Taylor. Their only
daughter is the wife of Elmer E. Hershey of Mis-
soula. The late Major Catlin was a member of
the Christian Church and the Western Montana
Pioneer Society.
Merritt Flanj\gan. There could be no more
comprehensive history written of a city, or even of
a state and its people, than that which deals with
the life work of those who, by their own endeavor
and indomitable energy, have placed themselves
where they well deserve the title of "prominent and
progressive," and in this sketch will be found the
record of one who has by his personal force of char-
acter and his faithfulness in every position in which
he has been placed earned the sincere regard and
esteem of the people.
Merritt Flanagan was born on his father's farm
in Carroll County. Missouri, on January 5, 1862,
and is the son of "Bryant and Phoeby (Ruth) Flana-
gan. Bryant Flanagan, who was a native of Ken-
tucky, died in 1862, at the comparatively early age
of thirty-three years. The subject's mother, who was
born in Illinois, is still living at the age of seventy-
nine years. In 1879 she became the wife of H. S.
Jewell, and they now live in Missouri. The subject
of this sketch was the youngest of the four
children, all sons, born to his parents. Bryant
Flanagan was taken from Kentucky to Mis-
souri by his parents when he was a small
child, and his education was secured in the
schools of the latter state. LTpon attaining mature
years he engaged in farming on his own account in
Carroll County, Missouri. .At the breaking out of
the Civil war he enlisted in the Union army, was
severely wounded in battle and was taken to a hos-
pital, where he died. Politically he gave his sup-
port to the republican party. He was a man of fine
impulses and took a deep interest in religious mat-
ters, being a member of church, in which he did
much preaching of the gospel.
Merritt Flanagan was but two years of age when
brought by his mother to Montana, and in the
schools of this state he secured his education. Their
first location in this state was in Deer Lodge Val-
ley, where besides their own immediate family Wil-
liam Flanagan, an uncle, was with them, it being the
latter who brought them, by o.x team, to this sec-
tion of the country. In 1879 they came to Chestnut
Valley, the mother returning to Missouri, where she
again married, and is now residing in Unionville.
At the age of fourteen years the subject became as-
sociated with his uncle in the cattle and horse busi-
ness in Chestnut Valley, continuing the business
there until l88g, when they removed to the Judith
Basin in Meagher County, now Fergus County. In
1889 _ Mr. Flanagan removed to Chouteau County,
locating in what is now Blaine County, where he
continued in the cattle and horse business until 1908,
when he moved to Fort Benton. In the meantime he
had disposed of his interest in the cattle business,
though he still continued the horse business. In 1892
Mr. Flanagan was appointed stock inspector by the
Montana Stock Association, serving until 1896, when
he was appointed a United States mounted inspector
of customs, filling the position up to 1902. From 1904
to 1908 Mr. Flanagan served as under sherifT and
from 1914 to 1918 was city marshal of Fort Benton.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In November. 1918, he was elected sheriff of Chou-
teau County, and is the present incumbent of that
office. Mr." Flanagan has thus been placed in many
important and responsible positions, and it is the
consensus of opinion that in every position he has
performed his duty faithfully and well, thus earn-
ing the confidence of the people, which he now
enjoys.
On Mav 20. 1897, occurred the marriage of Mr.
Flanagan 'to Ida M. Murray, who was a native of
Michigan, and whose death occurred in 1908. They
became the parents of two children, Katherine,
who is the wife of Louis Miller, and Violet. Politi-
cally Mr. Flanagan is a stanch supporter of the re-
publican party and has been an effective worker in
the party ranks. Fraternally he is a member of the
Loyal Order of Moose. Genial and generous in his
personal makeup, Mr. Flanagan has long enjoyed a
large acquaintance throughout this section of the
state, and those who know him best are his warmest
friends and admirers.
John R. Daily, who has been a resident of Mon-
tana over thirty years, at the inception of his career
as a Missoula business man bought a retail meat
market. With that as a beginning he has developed
a large and perfect organization for the killing, re-
frigeration, packing and distribution of meats and
meat products throughout the trade district of Mis-
soula.
Mr. Daily was born at Madison, Indiana, in 1867,
son of Martin H. and Julia A. (Nichols) Daily.
His parents were early settlers in Indiana and spent
the rest of their lives there. His father served as
a first lieutenant in an Indiana regiment in the
Civil war. John R. Daily grew to manhood in his
native state, and left there with a fair education
and with a determination to win his way in the
Far West.
On coming to Montana in 1889 he worked as a
ranch hand, but in the fall of i8go bought an in-
terest in the old Union Market in Missoula. Thirty
years have brought a remarkable development to
that modest business. He now operates four mar-
kets in Missoula, and a few years ago established
the finest market in the entire West, conducted as
a model in system, equipment, and sanitary con-
venience. In addition he operates a large cold stor-
age plant, and does a wholesale business with small
stores and outlying mines and mining camps. The
business was incorporated in 1910, with ^Ir. Daily
as president. In late years the average kill has
been between 1,500 and 2,000 cattle, 3,000 hogs and
about 1,500 sheep.
Mr. Daily is also a director of the Missoula Trust
and Savings Bank. He is widely known over the
West as a fancier and breeder of fine horses for
the track, principally pacers and trotters. For
several years he has had charge of the racing pro-
gram of the Missoula County Fair, of which he is
one of the officers and directors. He is an Elk
and Knight of Prthias.
In 1892 Mr, Daily married Caroline Jameson, a
daughter of J. C. Jameson, of ]\Iissoula. Mrs
Daily died in 1911, and in 1912 Mr. Daily married
Alice Brewer, a daughter of W. L. Brewer, of
Missoula.
Edward C. Mulroxey took his place among the
practicing lawyers of Missoula twenty years ago,
and is now senior partner of the law firm of Mul-
roney and Mulroney, and with a reputation as a
lawyer that has extended to most of the counties
of "the state.
Mr. Mulroney was born in Webster County, Iowa,
July 18, 1877, son of an Iowa merchant. He was
reared in Iowa, where he attended high school,
spent some time in Wabash College in Indiana, and
in 1896 entered the University of Michigan. He
took both the literary and law courses at Michigan
University, graduating in 1900 and was admitted
to the Michigan bar and to that of Montana the
same year. He began practice at Missoula with
Mr. Joyce, and in 1905 was elected a member of the
Low'er House of the Legislature. In 1909 he was
elected county attorney, and filled that office four
years.
He was joined in practice in 1914 by his brother,
Robert E. Mulroney, who had completed his edu-
cation in the University at Georgetown, D. C. Early
in the World war Robert Mulroney left his prac-
tice and entered the Great Lakes Naval Training
School at Chicago. In 1898 Edward C. Mulroney
enlisted in Company G of the Fifty-second Iowa
Regiment during the Spanish-American war, and
served until the end of the war.
On April 28, 1910, Mr. Mulroney married Mary
C. O'Leary, a daughter of D. J. O'Leary, of Des
Moines, Iowa. They are the parents of one son,
Thomas, born January 5, 1914. Mr. Mulroney is a
member of Hell Gate Lodge of Missoula, Benevo-
lent Protective Order of Elks, the Fraternal Order
of Eagles, Knights of Columbus and the Spanish-
.^merican War Veterans.
G. W. Day. As education along certain lines
is essential to industr5', to efficiency, to comfort,
to tolerable existence, the modern world cannot
produce, distribute or e.xchange without schools.
The best cure for misery is abundance, and abun-
dance means skill and science in production and
distribution. Economic problems have their social
and political aspects, and we cannot make men ef-
ficient in industry without teaching them something
additional. The mechanical progress of humanity
is the result of education. But to train the mind
and hand is not. necessarily to train the whole man,
to educate him morally and emotionally. This was
perceived long ago, and true philosophers have em-
phasized the necessity of building character, of mak-
ing good citizens and good neighbors by means of
education. What ails the world is insufficient edu-
cation of the right kind. Education is power, in-
dependence, penetration and ability, and the lack
of it naturally brings about a reverse condition.
With all of these arguments in favor of better and
higher education in mind it is not difficult to com-
prehend why such stress is laid upon the proper
selection of educators, for it is through them that
the rising .generation gains its bias, and receives
its instruction. The United States has the best
public schools in the world, and this much to be
desired condition is largely the legitimate outgrowth
of the faithful and intelligent work of the men and
women placed in charge of them. One of these
educators who is enjoying a wide-spread popularity,
which he has certainly earned, is G. W. Day, super-
intendent of the city schools of Philipsburg.
G. W. Day was born at Gaithersburg, Maryland,
September 25, 1883, a son of George W. Day, and
grandson of Jacob Day, born at Gaithersburg, Mary-
land, in 1816, his father having come to the United
States from Ireland to Maryland at an early day.
Jacob Day was a contractor and builder who passed
his life in his native city, where he died in 1893.
George W. Day was also born at Gaithersburg,
Maryland, in 1849, and he is still a resident of that
city, having spent his entire life in that neighbor-
hood. A man of action, he owns extensive farm-
ing interests in the vicinity, and is possessed of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
469
considerable means. In politics he is a democrat,
and in religious faith a Methodist. He married
Johanna Reid, who was born at Gaithers])urg in
1859. Their children are as follows : Walter, who
is a merchant of Washington, D. C. : G. W., whose
name heads this review ; William, who is a whole-
sale merchant of New York City, New York;
Charles, who served in France and Germany dur-
ing the Great war, was recently mustered out of
the army; Ernest, who is also a veteran of this
war, served overseas in the Eighty-second Division
as corporal, was wounded and gassed and received
a shell shock, but is now convalescing, having been
recently mustered out of the army; Slyrtle, who is
the widow of William Hammond, has lived with
her parents since Mr. Hammond's death in 1918;
Elbert, who is in the railroad business, lives at
Washington, D. C, where he is serving as bag-
gagemaster at the Union Station ; Elsie, who is
the twin sister of Elbert, married a Mr. Mosberg,
a merchant of Washington, D. C. ; Lillian, who
married William Mills, a contractor and builder
of Gaithersburg, Maryland ; and Jesse, who is at-
tending the Gaithersburg High School, lives with
his parents.
Professor Day attended the public schools of
Gaithersburg, Maryland, and was graduated from
the Montgomery County High School at Rock-
ville, Maryland, in 1905, following which he took
a one year's course at Tanner's Business College at
Washington, D. C. In the fall of 1906 he entered
the Randolph-Macon College at Ashland, V'irginia,
from which he was graduated in 1910 with the de-
gree of Bachelor of Arts. For the subsequent year
he was coach and instructor in history and science
in the Grand River Institute at Austinburg, Ohio,
when he was made principal of the Calleo, Virginia,
High School, and held that position for two years,
and for the next three years he was superintend-
ent of schools of Belfield, North Dakota. In 1917
he came to Montana as principal of the Joliet
schools, and a year later returned to North Dakota
and was principal of the school at Bottineau, one
of the largest of its kind in the state. In 1919 the
school board of Philipsburg succeeded in securing
his services as superintendent of the city schools,
and he is already proving that their choice was a
wise one. He has twelve teachers and 320 pupils
under his charge, and is giving a personal attention
to details which is proving very effective. In 1914
Professor Day homesteaded ,^2o acres of land be-
tween Red Lodge and Billings at Shane Ridge. He
is independent in politics. The Methodist Episco-
pal Church holds his membership.
In 1912 Professor Day was married at Canton,
Ohio, to Miss Ruth Spangler, a daughter of Mr.
and Mrs. George Spangler, both of whom are now
deceased. Mr. Spangler was a merchant of Canton,
Ohio. Professor and Mrs. Day have no children.
They are very popular and are gathering about
them a delightful social circle, as they have in other
communities in which they liave resided. Although
in the very prime of life. Professor Day has at-
tained to considerable prominence in his profes-
sion, and as he is a close student, is continually
adding to his store of knowledge, while his various
experiences are proving of value to him in his
work. Of a pleasant personality. Professor Day
possesses the ability to impart knowledge easily,
and to win the confidence and respect of his pupils,
being their friend as well as instructor. While he
places a proper value on scholarship, he is not satis-
fied to rest content with merely teaching the words
of the text, but opens up new fields of study in awak-
ening the interest of his charges so that they of their
own accord are anxious to read and study to a
much further extent. Such men as Professor Day
render a great service to their communities, and
cannot be over-praised for their self-sacrifice and
earnest efTorts.
John M. Keith has been identified with Mis-
soula nearly forty years, and nearly all of that
time in the capacity of a bank executive. Mr.
Keith, who is president of the Missoula Trust and
Savings Bank, was born in New Brunswick, Can-
ada, June 5, 1859, son of Lewis and Rebecca
(Blakely) Keith. His parents spent all their lives
in New Brunswick.
John M, Keith grew up on his father's farm and
acquired an education sufficient for each day's re-
curring responsibilities. He had some mercantile
training in his home town, and with that as his
chief recommendation came to Missoula in 1881.
Missoula was then one ol the pioneer centers of
trade and commerce in the territory of Montana.
Its chief firm was the Eddy-Hammond Company,
the predecessor of the Missoula Mercantile Com-
pany. Mr. Keith remained with the Eddy-Hammond_
Company as clerk and later as office manager, and'
left the concern in 1888 to Ijecome cashier of the
Missoula National Bank. He was with that in-
stitution over twenty years, and when it was reor-
ganized as the First National Bank he became its
vice president and the chief executive in charge
of its aft'airs. In February, 1910,' Mr. Keith became
the first president of the reorganized institution
now known as the Missoula Trust & Savings Bank,
and the wisdom and discretion with which he has
guided that institution is well indicated in its mag-
nificent assets and the great influence it wields in
the commerce of Eastern Montana. Mr. Keith is
also president of the First National Bank at Plains,
has some business interests at Spokane, and is a
member of the Hammond Lumber Company of San
Francisco.
As a successful business man and banker his
tastes have never run in political channels, and his
public service has been rendered as a matter of
conscientious duty. He served three terms as mayor
of Missoula, being elected without opposition on
a citizens ticket and giving an administration com-
pletely free from partisan bias. He has also been
a member of the school board and library board.
Fraternally he is a member of the Masons, Knights
of Pythias and the Elks. In 1890 Mr. Keith mar-
ried Miss Harriet Beckwith, also a native of New
Brunswick, and daughter of Charles and Saraji
Beckwith. Mrs. Keith is now deceased, and her
only daughter, Jennie, died at the age of four
years.
Charles H. McLeod. One of the oldest and larg-
est mercantile enterprises in Montana is the Mis-
soula Mercantile Company, which has not only en-
joyed many years of prosperous business, but has
represented an imposing aggregate of personal abil-
ities and resources in the men who were its founders
and have been its chief officials. One of these is
Charles H. McLeod, who became identified with
the business at its organization forty years ago.
Mr. McLeod has in recent years turned over many
of his active responsibilities to his son Walter H.
McLeod, as noted on other pages.
Charles H. McLeod was born in New Brunswick,
Canada, February 14, 1859, and is of Scotch an-
cestry. His father was a farmer and blacksmith
who died in 1871.
C. H. McLeod attended public school to the age of
fourteen, and spent his early life on a farm. He
470
HISTORY OF MONTANA
learned business hy working as clerk and in other
capacities in small stores. He came to Montana
in 1880, and from that time to the present has been
identified with the busine.'s fortunes of Missoula.
He was a clerk with the old firm of Hammond and
Eddy. This firm was the outgrowth of a pioneer
store conducted by Bonner ; nd Welsh. The partner-
ship was also designated eS Eddy. Hammond and
Bonner, and from 1875 to -885 as Eddy, Hammond
and Company. In 1885 ." . B. Hammond, R. A.
Eddy and E. L. Bonner, were the chief partners in
organizing the Missoula Mercantile Company. The
business was capitalized at $300,000. Mr. Hammond
being the first president and Mr. McLeod vice presi-
dent and general manager.
Mr. McLeod has also been interested in the Mis-
soula Water Company, the Missoula Light and
Power Company, and the First National Bank of
Missoula. In 1886 he married Miss Clara L. Beck-
with, a native of New Brunswick. Their two chil-
dren are Walter H. and Helen B.
Thomas Hill Pridh,\m. Since establishing his
home at Chouteau in 1912 Air. Pridham has been
quietly and busily engaged in reaping the fruits of
a large professional business as a lawyer. His pro-
fessional success has been well earned. For a num-
ber of years he had a varied and eventful expe-
rience, and by personal ability earned every step of
his promotion.
Mr. Pridham was born in Essex County, England,
January 24, 1871, and as a boy elected to make his
own way in the world. His parents were George
and Elizabeth Frances (Harvey) Pridham, both
now deceased. He was the seventh in a family of
eight children who reached mature years and six
of whom are still living. George Pridham was a
noted missionary and educator. He began his
career as a missionary in 1850. From 1855 to 1868
he was head master of St. Paul's College at Cal-
cutta, India. From 1868 to 1871 he was vicar of
East Tilbury, Essex, England, and then entered
upon his duties as vicar of West Harptree, a post
of responsibility he held for thirty-one years, from
1871 to 1902. He died September 23, 1902.
Thomas Hill Pridham was educated in local Eng-
lish schools and at the age of 14 left home and came
to America. His first experiences were in Mani-
toba. During 1885 he worked on a farm near St.
Charles, Minnesota, and attended school in winter.
For several years he worked for his board and
clothing while getting his education. For a time he
was an employe of Governor Job A. Cooper in Col-
orado. In 1888 he returned to St. Charles, Minne-
sota, and resumed his work in the high school there,
from which he graduated. Later he completed the
course of the Minneapolis High School, working for
his living as a bookkeeper while in school. He also
was employed as a street car conductor for one or
two summers, and was with the civil engineering
staflf which built the first interurban lines between St.
Paul and Minneapolis. He was also a freight brake-
man with the Great Northern Railway. During this
time he was making progress in his law studies in
the University of Minnesota, attending night school.
Later he entered the railway mail service, working
in the office of the superintendent at St. Paul, while
attending night law college. Mr. Pridham grad-
uated from the law department of the University
of Minnesota in 1897, and in the same year was ad-
mitted to the Minnesota bar. He continued in the
mail service until 1899. In that year he was dele-
gated by the United States Government to go to
Alaska and establish mail service in the mining dis-
tricts. His official title was chief clerk at large. On
the beach at Nome there were only seven tents when
he first arrived there, and his headquarters were at
Circle City on the Yukon River.
Having completed his work in the far North Mr.
Pridham returned in July, 1900, to St. Paul, and
after his marriage opened a law office at Austin,
Minnesota, where he remained until 1910. In that
year he was appointed by James A. Tawney of Min-
nesota as special agent in Montana. He remained
in this work at Helena from July, 1910, until No-
vember, 1912, when he moved to Choteau and en-
gaged in the general practice which now comprises
the bulk of his activities and interests.
In October, 1900, Mr. Pridham married Miss
Frances M. Cosgrove, a native of Cork, Ireland.
They had six children : Dorothy, Jane Marion, Phyl-
lis and Daniel, twins, Frances Lois and Kathleen
Janice.
JoHX Elliott, while a native of Pennsylvania has
spent most of his life in Montana, and his con-
nections are with the pioneer stock in this state. Of
a family of miners, he has had considerable mining
experience on his own account, but for the past
several years has attended to a growing and large
practice as a lawyer in the City of Butte.
Mr. Elliott was born in Freeland, Luzerne County,
Pennsylvania, August 9, 1883. His people came from
the Province of Ulster, Ireland, and were Protes-
tants. His grandfather David Elliott, was born in
Ulster, was an Irish farmer, and came to the United
States about 1873, living the rest of his life retired
at Freeland, Pennsylvania. He married Margaret
Lawn, also a native of Ulster, who died at Free-
land. Hugh Elliott, father of John Elliott, was born
in Ulster in 1853, and lived there to the age of
eighteen. On coming to the United States he found
employment in the mines at Freeland, Pennsylvania,
and also conducted a meat market and was pro-
prietor of an old-fashioned inn. In 1888 he came to
Montana, was one of the early settlers at Butte, and
after one year of employment as a painter and
paper hanger w^ent to Cokedale and worked in the
coal mines six months. He was a miner at Granite
for seven years, following which he located and
developed a coal mine at Drummond. In 1897 he
removed to Norris, Montana, where for five years
he was an employe of the Revenue Mine, and two
jears of that time was mine foreman. In 1901 he
located and developed a gold mining claim at Wash-
ington Bar, and has given most of his attention to
that property since. His mining operations have
been attended with considerable success. He is a
member of the Episcopal Church, a republican, and
is an active Mason, being affiliated with Bagdad
Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Butte. Hugh Elliott
married Catherine Jones, who was born in Wales
in 1859. They are the parents of nine children:
Thomas, a partner with his father in the gold mine
and a resident of Norris; John; Anna, who died at
Davenport, Iowa, in November, 1919, the wife of
J. S. West, a blacksmith living at Norris ; Alexander,
associated with his father in business at Norris;
Joseph Orr, a miner at Butte ; Hugh, Jr., at home ;
David, a miner living in the State of Washington;
Jenkin and Charles, still at home.
John Elliott acquired his education in the public
schools at Granite, Montana, but left school at the
age of fourteen and for several years earned a liv-
ing in the mines at Norris and Drummond. Dur-
ing 1908-09 he attended the Detroit College of Law
in Michigan, graduating with the LL. B. degree in
1909. On returning to Norris in 1909 instead of
engaging in practice he took charge of the mine
and handled its operations until October, 1913. He
HISTORY OF MONTANA
471
then came to Butte, and after reviewing his law
studies with I. G. Denny was admitted to the bar
in June, 1914, and since that date has been in
active general practice. For -four years he was
associated with James E. Murray but 'since 1918 has
been in an office of his own in the Phoenix Building.
Mr. Elliott is a member of the Silver Bow Bar
Association, is a republican, is affiliated with the
Episcopal Church, and is a member of Virginia
City Lodge No. 390, Benevolent Protective Order
of Elks, and Butte Aerie No, ii of the Fraternal.
Order of Eagles. His home is at 305 South Wash-
ington Street. In June, 1910, at Butte, he married
Emma Margaret McCall, daughter of David and
Nettie (Foster) McCall, who reside in Jefferson
Valley, Montana. Mrs. Elliott is a member of a
very interesting pioneer family of Montana. Her
mother. Nettie Foster, was the first white girl born
in the state, being a ^daughter of Z. D. Foster, who
settled on a ranch in Jefferson Valley in the early
sixties, and is still living, a resident'of Whitehall.
Mrs. Elliott is a graduate of the parochial high
school at Butte. They have one child, Genevieve,
born in 1914,
Dan T. Malloy. In the six years since he began
his practice at Butte Mr. Malloy has gained a
good business as a lawyer and has commendably
identified himself with the best interests of the com-
munity. He was in an officers training camp during
the World war, and for a time was deputy county
attorney.
A native of Montana, he was born in the City of
Helena July 7, i8go. His father is P. F. Malloy,
who was born in County Donegal, Ireland, in 1843.
He is a real pioneer of the Northwest. Coming to
the United States about 1861, he located at St. Paul,
Minnesota, and was connected with some of the
pioneer freighting outfits from St. Paul westward.
He made his first acquaintance with Montana in
1869. He was connected with a surveying party
engaged in the preliminary survey of the route for
the Northern .Pacific Railway. These surveyors
were under the protection of United States troops
commanded by the lamented General Custer. Not
long afterward P. F. Malloy settled at Bismarck,
North Dakota, and became prominently connected
with business affairs in that city, being in the freight-
ing and general transportation business, a hotel
proprietor and grain buyer and shipper. In 1887
he located at Helena, Montana, and was in the
service of the Northern Pacific Railway there and
after 1897 lived at Butte. He retired from rail-
roading and since 1914 has lived on his ranch at
Hesper, Montana. He is a democrat and a
Catholic. His wife was Mary Catherine Taggart,
who was born in Wisconsin in 1855. Of their four
children Dan is the youngest. Minnie, the oldest,
is the widow of B. E. Predmore, who was a jeweler
at San Diego, California. James P. was a shoe
merchant at Butte, where he died at the age of
thirty-five in 1918, a victim of the influenza epidemic.
Emmett E. is a civil and mining engineer at Butte.
Dan T. Malloy graduated from the Butte High
School in 1908. The following year he earned his
own living, and in 1909 entered the University of
Michigan Law School. He remained there until
graduating with the LL. B. degree in 1913. He is
a member of the college fraternity Kappa Beta
Psi. Mr. Malloy began practice at Butte in 1913,
and for a year and a half was associated with H. A.
Frank. From 1915 to 1917 he served as deputy
county attorney, and since then has conducted a
general civil and criminal practice with offices in the
Hennessy Building. He also has some mining in-
terests, is interested in tl^e home ranch at Hesper,
and has some valuable real estate, including several
dwellings in Butte and a modern home of his own
at 636 West Silver Street.
In August, 1918, he entered the service of his
country and was in the training camp at Boulder,
Colorado, for a time and afterward was in the
officers training camp in the artillery branch at
Louisville, Kentucky. He was mustered out Decem-
ber 16, 1918.
Mr. Malloy is unmarried, is a democrat, member
of the Catholic Church, is a fourth degree Knight
of Columbus, being affiliated with Council No. 668
at Butte, and is a member of Butte Lodge No. 240
of the Elks. He belongs to the County and State
Bar associations and is a member of Silver Bow
Club at Butte.
John H. Durston. manager of the Butte Daily
Post, has been actively identified with Montana
journalism for over thirty years. He is well known
in Montana, and his reputation is based upon a
career as a practical newspaper man, teacher and
scholar, with attendance in universities both at home
and abroad and with many honors as teacher and
student.
He was born at Syracuse, New York, February
19, 1848. His father, John Durston, was a native
of Bristol, England, and came to this country a
young man. He was a shipwright and built many
boats for operation on the Erie Canal. He died at
Syracuse in 1863. He was a republican and an
active member and supporter of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. His wife, Sarah Hurst, was born
near Dublin, Ireland, and died at Syracuse in igoi.
Her father, Thomas Hurst, also a native of Ire-
land, came to the United States about 1830 and
settled at Syracuse, where he was a building con-
tractor. He died at Syracuse in 1857, when over
seventy years of age. Thomas Hurst married Mar-
garet Morris, a native of Ireland, who also died at
Syracuse. John Durston and wife had four chil-
dren : J. F., a business man of Syracuse ; Thomas
W., who lives at Newark, New Jersey, and is a re-
tired merchant; John H. ; and George W., who was
a Syracuse merchant and died at the age of sixty.
John H. Durston after graduating from ' high
school attended Yale University until his junior
year in the class of 1869. He is a member of the
Delta Kappa Epsilon Greek letter fraternity. After
leaving Yale he continued his studies abroad
at Heidelberg University in Germany and received
on examination, the degree of Doctor of Philosophy
from that institution in 1870. On returning to this
country he became a member of the faculty of the
Syracuse University and enjoyed the dignities of a
college professor until 1880. In the meantime he
had spent one year in Paris, studying and specializ-
ing in civics.
Mr. Durston has been a newspaper editor since
1880, when he became editor of the Syracuse
Standard. In 1887 he came to Montana, and in 1889
established the Anaconda Standard and was editor
of that paper until 1912. In 1913 he established the
Butte Daily Post as the successor of the Butte Inter
Mountain. Mr. Durston is a republican in politics,
a member of the Episcopal Church and of the Ana-
conda and Silver Bow clubs. He has his home on
a farm near Bozeman.
In 1871, at Syracuse, he married Miss Mary Har-
wood, daughter of George W. and Martha (Watson)
Harwood, both of whom are now deceased. Her
father was a Syracuse business man. Mrs. Durston
was a graduate of the Syracuse Higli School. They
are the parents of two children : Martha H. D. is
HISTORY OF AIOXTANA
the wife of F. W. Peckover, in the real estate and
coal business at Anaconda; and Laura, wife of
John Maxey, a coal dealer with home at Bozeman.
Arthur W. Merkle is one of the most prominent
insurance men in Montana, and his work in that
line has well earned him the responsibilities as state
manager for Montana of the Prudential Insurance
Company.
Mr. Merkle has lived practically all his life withm
sight of the Rocky Mountains, and is a member of
a pioneer western family. He was born at Virginia
City, Nevada, December 23, 1882. His father,
Thomas Merkle, was born in Kentucky in 183 1, and
was a California forty-niner. A butcher by trade,
he was employed by several of the California not-
ables of the earlv days, including J. A. Mackey,
James Fair and Mr. O'Brien. He followed his
trade at Virginia City, Nevada, where he married
and lived until he removed to Butte, Montana. In
that city he was one of the early butchers, and was
actively engaged in business until he retired in
1918. He is still living at Butte, an honored pioneer.
He is a stanch republican, a member of the Ancient
Order of United Workmen, and while a resident
of Virginia City was chief of the volunteer fire de-
partment. Thomas Merkle married Mary Dempsey,
who was born in Ireland in 1840 and died at Butte
in 1913. Thev had a large family of children.
Nellie, the oldest, is the wife of W. W. Blood, a
business man and property owner at San Francisco ;
Louise is the wife of Judge F. P. Langan, of
Virginia City, Nevada, who as a district judge has
presided over several trials of national prominence.
Katy is unmarried and a trained nurse at Butte.
Thomas P. is assistant foreman for the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company at Butte. George W. is a
prominent citizen of Belt, Montana, where he owns
coal mines and is proprietor of a general store.
Susie died at Butte in 1907, unmarried. Horace J.
is state manager of the Prudential Insurance Com-
pany for Colorado and Wyoming. Arthur W. is
next in age, while the youngest is Christine, living
with her father.
Arthur W. Merkle was educated in the public
schools of. Virginia City, Nevada, and graduated
from the Butte Business College in 1905. Not so
much in schools as in business life he has acquired
a thorough education. In 1905 he went to work for
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company at Butte as
a clerk. Besides his other work he also had charge
of the athletic department of the corporation and
developed a championship team in baseball for
three years and also a championship bowling team.
The bowling team became known all over the
United States, entering some of the biggest bowling
meets in the country. In 1913 Mr. Merkle was
called to the management of the Butte baseball
team in the Union Association, and during that year
this team finished third in the first division.
Mr. Merkle left the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company in the fall of 1915 to become district
manager of the Prudential Insurance Company. On
January i, 1919, he and his brother H. J. Merkle
formed the firm of Merkle Brothers, state managers
for Montana. During 1918, realizing the importance
of the business he represented, Mr. Merkle .con-
ceived and carried out the plan of forming the in-
surance federation of Montana, which has already
justified its organization and has accomplished
benefits beyond the sanguine expectations of its pro-
moters. Mr. Merkle is president of the local
division of the Federation. His business offices are
in the Hennessy Building.
Mr. Merkle, like other insurance men, gave much
of his time and his special abilities to the success
of the various Liberty Loan and other war cam-
paigns and also took an active part in convertmg
government insurance for the returned soldiers. He
is an independent democrat in politics, and is a
devout believer in the universal brotherhood of man-
kind. He is a member of the Silver Bow Club. He
resides in the Mueller Apartments on West Granite
Street.
September 8, 1909, at Butte, Mr. Merkle marriea
.Miss Grace Noyes, daughter of William F. and
Sarah Noyes, residents of Butte. Her father is
secretary of the Masonic fraternity at Butte. Mrs.
Merkle is widely known and admired for her great
personal beauty and her accomplishments as a
finished musician. She is a graduate of the Boston
Conservatory of Music, both in vocal and instru-
mental, and for a number of years has been regarded
as indispensable to the success of many musical pro-
grams in churches and at other occasions in Mon-
tana. Mr. and Mrs. Merkle have one daughter,
Grace Evelyn, born September 17, 1910.
James Gibson, who died at his home in Choteau
December 23, 1918, was appropriately described as a
pioneer, frontiersman, pathfinder, scout, soldier,
cattleman and loyal citizen of Montana. History
regards him as the first permanent white settler in
what is now Teton County. He fought for three
years as a Union soldier during the Civil war, and
immediately after the close of that great conflict
started for ]\Iontana.
He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, June
9, 1846, son of John and Sarah Gibson. His father
was a native of Ireland and his mother of Phila-
delphia. John Gibson came to this country when a
young man, and for a number of years was a Phila-
delphia grocer. He died there in 1874.
The late James Gibson accepted only meager
privileges in the Philadelphia public schools. At
the age of ten he was making his living as a canal
boat workman. He also did some farming. He was
not yet fifteen when the Civil war broke out, and the
following year became one of the youngest volun-
teers in the One Hundred and Sixty-Second Penn-
sylvania Infantry. During the next two years there
was no braver soldier than young Gibson. He was
under the command of General Banks, and followed
Sheridan in the most brilliant operations in the
Shenandoah Valley.
He was only nineteen when discharged as a vet-
eran soldier. His search for adventure not yet
quenched, he went to Atchison, Kansas, and there
joined a party of 200 emigrants, mostly discharged
soldiers, bound for the most remote sections of the
far West. For six months they were on the way,
almost daily confronted by hostile Indians and the
dangers of the wilderness. They were the first
party to make the trip over the Big Horn route,
and aiitumn had come before they reached Vir-
ginia City, Montana. James Gibson made some
eiiforts at mining, and early in 1867 went to Helena,
where he worked in the mines and also clerked in
a local department store. He was a resident of
Helena for six years. He then extended his travels
and explorations north into the Blackfoot Indian
Reservation, which then extended from the Sun
River to British Columbia. James Gibsofi was an
employe of some of the large cattle outfits then
operating in that section.
In 1873 he filed a homestead along the Teton
River just north of the present site of Choteau. He
was the first white man to make good a claim in
that country and develop it and live on it. In the
early days his home was isolated, and exposed to
HISTORY OF MONTANA
473
Indian attack on every side. He had many adven-
tures with the Indians, and one time it is said that
only through the interference of a chief was his
life spared. He established the nucleus of a herd
of cattle, and developed and made famous the Fly-
ing U brand. At one time his cattle ranged all the
way from the Sun River to the Canadian border,
and among the old time ranchers still living who
operated in that section of Montana the name and
achievements of James Gibson stand out conspic-
uously. He lived in Teton County for forty-five
years, and he witnessed the breaking up of the orig-
inal unlimited cattle domain, the growth and settle-
ment, and the creation of a number of counties
from the original Chouteau County. He gave the
name to many streams and coulees and buttes with-
in the vast region, and some of them bear his name.
Like the scouts of old he endured the privations
that belonged to the frontiersman that he might
help to settle a wild territory and make it safe for
white men to live in peace and happiness.
In the words of the editor of the Choteau
Acantha: "In the death of James Gibson, Montana
loses a pioneer, an early settler who helped to blaze
the way for civilization and progress. He served
the county in the capacity of clerk of the district
court for eight years, and during the long trial of
war took keen interest in the doings of his country.
When he could no longer read the paper on account
of his failing eyesight his wife would read the news
to him. He" was a life-long member of the repub-
lican party, and never missed an opportunity to cast
his ballot on election day. The state, the county,
the great Northwest owes a lasting debt of gratitude
to this brave, stout heart, who had the distinction
of having been the first white settler in the region
embraced within the area that lies north of Sun
River crossing, extending toward the Canadian
border."
In his twenty-first year Mr. Gibson became a
member of the Masonic Order, and for many years
was affiliated with Royal Arch Chapter No. 2, and
Sheridan Post No. 18 of the Grand Army at Great
Falls. He was also a member of the Pioneer So-
ciety of Montana and the Old Timers' Society of
Choteau. ,
On May 3, 1885, he married Miss Jennie Fleet-
wood. Mrs. Gibson, who resides at Choteau, is a
native of Illinois and was the only child of James
Weslev and Lucy Ellen (March) Fleetwood. Her
father was a native of Indiana and her mother of
hiwa. Her fatlier was a farmer and spent his last
days in Oregon, whence he came in 1864. He was
killed by accident.
Mrs. Fleetwood married for her second husband
.'Mvin Stocker of Iowa, they coming to Montana and
settling in Cascade, later going to Idaho, where both
passed away. Eight children were born to this
union, five of whom are living. Edward Wallace,
Julia Margaret, who married Samuel Kelly; Ernest
Toel Fanton, Josepli Henry and Lillian Eldora, who
married Henry Hartley. All are living in Oregon
with the exception of Mrs. Kelly.
.Archie McTaggart. Possessing in a large measure
those qualities that inevitably bring success in any
line of endeavor, Archie McTaggart. of Butte, owes
but little to what is termed good fortune, every aa-
vancing step of his active career having been ttie
result of his industry, energy and wise management.
A native of New England, he was born, February
21 1884. in Fitchburg. Massachusetts, a son ol
Robert McTaggart. His grandfather McTaggart
was born in Scotland in 1820, and died in Springheld,
Tklassachusetts, in 1899.
Robert McTaggart was born in Edinburgh,
Scotland, in 1854, and during the following year
was brought by his parents to the United States, and
was reared and educated in Massachusetts. In 1B70,
during the excitement following the discovery ol
rich mines in Nevada, he followed the pioneers trail
to Virginia City, where, instead of mining. He en-
gaged in ranching on the near-by Truckey Meadows.
In 1882. having previously taken unto nimseil a wiie,
he returned to Fitchburg, Massachusetts, and there
embarked in the dairy business. Going with his
family to Pennsylvania in l8go, he worked six
years for Stoddard & Company, wholesale grocers
of Wilkes-Barre. Coming to Montana in 1897, he
was a pioneer settler of Anaconda, where he ran
a milk route for two years. Locating in Missoula,
Montana, in 1899, he carried on an extensive and
successful teaming business for eighteen years, and
then, in 1917, settled in Butte, where he has since
been employed as a carpenter at the Never Sweat
Mine, one of the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany's properties, his home being at No. 616 West
Broadway. Politically he is a stanch republican.
Robert McTaggart married in Virginia City,
Nevada, Amelia Baker, who was born in Hunting-
don, Pennsylvania, a daughter of Frank Baker. Be-
ing left an orphan in childhood, she and her sister,
Mrs. S. Kent, now residing in Los Angeles, Cali-
fornia, came with an uncle to Montana in the fall
of 1863. being, it is thought, the second and third
white women to locate in the state. She died in
Missoula, of spotted fever, in 1907, leaving four
children, as follows: Archie, the special subject of
this brief sketch; Florence, wife of C. T. Siefert,
of Tacoma, Washington, a walking delegate for the
Clerk's Union; Mabel, wife of H. Baker, proprietor
of a barber's shop at Edmonton. Alberta. Canada ;
and Olive, the oldest child, wife of J. W. Kelley, a
well-known oculist of Missoula, Montana.
Having obtained a practical education in the public
schools of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Archie Mc-
Taggart began his career as a wage earner at the
age of thirteen years, working as a silk weaver
several months in' Wilkes-Barre. Entering then the
employ of the Northern Pacific Railway Company as
surveyor, he came to Montana in 1897, and con-
tinued thus employed until 1900. having his head-
quarters in Missoula. The following two years Mr.
McTaggart was employed as a teamster in the
logging camps of Missoula County. Changing his
occupation, he became a grocery clerk in Missoula,
working first for Walker & .\lby. and then for that
firm's successors. Hathaway & Buford, who pro-
moted him to salesman.
In 1905 Mr. McTaggart was elected deputy clerk
and recorder of Missoula County, and at the same
time served as secretary of the Democratic Central
Committee of that county, filling those positions
two years. Locating in Butte in 1907. he was with
the Hennessy Mercantile Company one year, md the
ensuing two years had charge of tli; <liiiiiM'n!i; and
wholesale department of the Bro]ili.\ 1,1.1.. r> Com-
pany. He was subsequently for tw.i \iar-, city em-
ployment agent of Butte, serving in that capacity
under Mayor Charles P. Nevin, and was afterward
with Swift & Company as salesman for two years.
In 1914 Mr. McTaggart organized and established
the McTaggart & White Company, which carried on
a wholesale business as dealers in meats, flour and
produce until October i.S. 1919. when the firm dis-
banded. Since that date Mr. McTaggart has been
the active manager for the State of Montana of the
Ogden Packing and Provision Company, whose
offices and branch house are located at 700 Utah
474
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Avenue, and he is filling the responsible position ably
and to the eminent satisfaction of all concerned.
Mr. McTaggart married, in 1917. in Missoula,
Grace Perkins, a daughter of one of the early
settlers of Dillon. Montana, and later pioneers of
Rochester, Montana, where her father opened the
first mercantile establishment. In his political
affiliations Mr. McTaggart is a steadfast democrat.
Fraternally he is a member of Butte Lodge No. 240,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, his mem-
bership therein being for life. Successful in business
aflfairs, he has acquired valuable real estate in
Butte, and has a pleasant home at 402 South Da-
kota Street, where he and Mrs. McTaggart gladly
welcome their many friends.
William Charles Austin has had his home for
the past twenty years in Montana and has been
chiefly interested in mining and business. For
seventeen years he has been secretary of what is
now the Butte Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Austin was born in the Province of Quebec,
Canada, June 13, 1862, son of Thomas and Emily
(Rogers) Austin. His father was born and reared
in England and for twenty-one years was in the
British army and for twenty-three years was con-
nected with the British War Office. As an English
officer he was ordered to Canada in 1861 and spent
eight years in the Dominion. In his sixtieth year
he retired from active service, and died in London
four years later, in 1904. His wife was born at
Dover, Eng:land, in 1834, and died at Charlton, Kent,
England, in 1917. There were five children :
Walter, a state agent living at Hale Hall in Liver-
pool, England ; William Charles ; Arthur, who for
the past thirty years has been connected with the
Goldsmiths and Silversmiths Company of London,
and is bookkeeper for that noted firm ; Clare, wife
of R. H. Holder, a resident of Charlton, Kent, Eng-
land: and Frank, who died in London in 1918.
When William Charles Austin was seven years
o'f age he returned to England, and received a liberal
education chiefly in military schools. He is a
musician, both vocal and instrumental, and as a boy
was a member of the famous Winchester Cathedral
Choir. He studied law in the offices of Taylor &
Gale at Winchester, and for seven years was in the
offices of the old law firm of Meynell & Pemberton
in London. In 1888 he returned to Canada and for
twelve years was associated with a prominent law
firm at Montreal. He came to the United States in
1900 and for several years was manager of the Red
Bluff Gold Mining Company, a large Canadian cor-
poration. He remained at Norris until 1904. when
he became assistant secretary of the Merchants' Asso-
ciation of Butte, which in 1913 became the Chamber
of Commerce. Mr. .'\ustin is a republican in politics
and is an active member of the Protestant Episcopal
Church. He is intensely interested in out-of-donr
sports and has kept up that interest since coming to
Montana. In Masonry Mr. Austin is member of
Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, being past master ; is scribe of
Deer Lodge Chapter No. 3, Royal Arch Masons ; is
senior warden of Montana Commandery No. 3,
Knights Templar; is past illustrious master of Za-
bud Council No. 2, Royal and Select Masters, and is
past grand master of the State of Montana. He'is
a charter member of Bagdad Temple and has been
musical director of the Temple. He is a member of
the Scottish Rite bodies of Masonry, including the
fourteenth degree at Butte. He is a member of the
Royal Arcanum, of the Silver Bow Club, and is
secretary of the Rotary Club since November 12,
1914, the Club having been organized on the 7th
of May. Mr. .Austin has offices in the Butte Water
Company Building and resides in the Napton Apart-
ments. On August 28, 1886, he married at London,
England, Miss Edith Hammond, daughter of Hamil-
ton and Elizabeth (Ross) Hammond. Their only
son, Claud Charles Austin, was born in London
July 4, 1887, was liberally educated, spending two
years in the State College at Bozeman, and later
graduating in the International Correspondence
School at Scranton. He received his mechanical
training in the offices of the British Westinghouse
Company and with the Ford Motor Company at
Manchester, England. He is now a machinist at
Butte. He married Miss Annie Burns of Man-
chester, England, and they have one child, Edith,
born September 11, 1916.
William Norris Turnbull is general manager
of the Montana Mattress & Furniture Company at
Butte. This is the only manufacturing concern of
its kind in the State of Montana, and its output of
bedding and other household supplies goes all over
Montana and adjoining states. Mr. Turnbull has
had a long and thorough experience in this line of
business, and has had an active commercial career
since he was a boy.
He was born at Prairie City, Iowa, July 8, 1875.
His father is Andrew J. Turnbull, now living at
Nashua, Iowa. Born in Scotland in 1845, he came
to the United States with his parents in 1852, and
was reared and married at Galesburg, Illinois. Dur-
ing the Civil war he enlisted and served in the
Union army, and for several years was a farmer.
Later he studied law, was admitted to the Iowa
bar, and for many years practiced law at Newton,
Iowa. He was at one time closely affiliated with
the greenback party, which had much of its
strength in the State of Iowa. He is now a
republican, and during the World war he was on
duty with the Government for three years as a
postal inspector, his duties requiring his presence in
New York City during that time, .■\ndrew J. Turn-
bull married Abbie M. Dodd. who was born in
Illinois in 1847. Her father, Norris Dodd, was a
native of Vermont and lost his life while a Union
soldier in the Civil war. Norris Dodd married
Nancy Darling, also of Vermont, and of early
colonial ancestry. The oldest child of Andrew J.
Turnbull is Melvin M., telegraph editor for the Min-
neapolis Tribune at Minneapolis. William N. is .
the second in age. Fred is a farmer at Charles City,
Iowa. Louise is the wife of George Schlutz, a
chemist and inventor living at Salt Lake City, Utah.
Jennie is the wife of Harry W. Farr, a merchant
at Waterloo, Iowa.
William N. Turnbull attended the public schools
of Nashua, Iowa, for a few terms. He was only
ten years of age when he earned his first wages as
a farm hand. When he was sixteen he became clerk
and general helper in a furniture store at Nashua,
and from that time to the present there has been
no interruption to his work and progress in com-
mercial lines. In 1895 he removed to Superior,
Wisconsin, clerked in a furniture store there, and
in 1903 bought an interest in the business and con-
tinued to be identified with that enterprise until
1912. In that year he removed to Minneapolis, where
for five years he was manager of the New England
Furniture & Carpet Company, and on March 31,
1917, came to Butte as manager of the Montana
Mattress & Furniture Company. The plant and
offices of this business are at Harrison avenue and
Front street. It is a strictly wholesale concern, and
in its own plant manufactures the greater part of
the mattresses, bedding and other furniture supplies
uj^^p^M
HISTORY OF MONTANA
475
which is shipped to retail merchants as far south
as Casper, Wyoming, and throughout the states of
Montana and Idaho. The officers of the company
are: H. W. Turner, president; G. B. Perier, vice
president; O. H. Shoch, secretary and treasurer;
and William N. Turnbull. manager.
While he had little opportunity as a boy to get
much schooling, Mr. Turnbull has always been a
reader of good books and other literature and has
picked up a substantial education in the course of
his active career. He is much interested in educa-
tional matters, and while living in Superior served
five years as a member of the Board of Education
and the last year was president of the Ijoard, resign-
ing that office when he went to iVIinneapolis. He
was also an alderman by appointment and member
of the Police and Fire Commission at Superior.
Mr. Turnbull is a republican and is affiliated with
Superior Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Superior Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, Superior
Commandery, Knights Templar, Milwaukee Con-
sistory of the Scottish Rite, Tripoli Temple of the
Mj'stic Shrine at Milwaukee, and is also past ex-
alted ruler of the Superior Lodge of Elks. He is
a member of the Butte Rotary Club and of the
Silver Bow Club.
In 1902, at Superior, Mr, Turnbull married Miss
Alta M. Johnson, daughter of George H. and Car-
rie M. Johnson, now residents of Duluth. Her
father is a stationary engineer. Mr. and Mrs. Turn-
bull have one child, William N., Jr., born October
2, 1913, at Minneapolis. The family reside in a
modern home at 1747 Whitman Avenue.
James S. Kemp, Jr.. is the chief official in the
traffic department of the Northern Pacific Railway
at Butte, being city freight and passenger agent.
Mr. Kemp is one of the oldest men in the service
of the Northern Pacific Railway in Montana, hav-
ing begun work for that corporation as an office
boy thirty-five years ago. He has made himself
useful in various capacities, and his hard work,
fidelity and efficiency have earned him much esteem
from higher officials.
Mr. Kemp was born at Port Dalhousie, Ontario,
Canada, January 5, 1867, but has lived in Montana
since early youth. His grandfather, Robert H.
Kemp, was born in England in 1820, and in 1855
took his family to Ontario. He was a miller hy
trade, and worked in that line in Ontario until his
death at Beamsville in 1878. He married an Eng-
lish woman named Hart. Four of their children
are still living: Edward A., owner of a plumbing
and heating business at Edmonton, Alberta, Can-
ada ; Robert H., formerly a carriage builder but now
a retired fruit farmer at Grimsby, Ontario; C. C.
Kemp, an Episcopal clergyman at Bad Axe, Mich-
igan: and Eliza, wife of Jonathan Book, owner of
a large fruit ranch of 150 acres and much farming
land besides, a resident of Grimsby, Ontario.
James S. Kemp, Sr., was born at West Thur-
rock, Suffolk County, England, in 1841, and was
fourteen years of age when his parents settled at
Beamsville, Ontario. He was reared there, was
married at Lewiston, New York, and spent many
years at or near Port Dalhousie, working at his
trade as a miller. On account of ill health he came
west and was a pioneer settler at Missoula in 1885.
He homesteaded a ranch four miles from Mis-
soula, and in later years became prominent in city
politics, serving as city treasurer a number of years
and at the time of his death, which occurred in
November, igog, was city clerk of Missoula. He
was a republican, a member of the Episcopal Church,
and was a past noble grand of Missoula Lodge of
Odd Fellows, also past grand of the Montana State
Lodge, and a member of the Rebekahs. As a young
man in Canada he was a Canadian volunteer in the
Fenian rebellion. James S. Kemp, Sr., married
Anna Florence Barrett, who was born at St. Cath-
erines, Ontario, January i, 1845, and died at Mis-
soula September 28, 1919. They had a family of
si.x children : Robert, who was grand secretary of
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows for the
State of Montana;. James S., Jr.; Armenia Wini-
fred, wife of George F. Likes, living on the old
Kemp ranch four miles from Missoula; May Flor-
ence, unmarried and a resident of Missoula; Thomas
E., an employe in the shipyards at Seattle, Wash-
ington; and F. C, owner of a farm near Challis,
Idaho, and also connected with a mining company.
James S. Kemp, Jr., acquired his early education
in the public schools of Ontario, receiving the
equivalent of a high school training. He was
eighteen years old when his parents settled at Mis-
soula, and on December 9, 1885, he went to work
in the offices of the Northern Pacific Railway as
an office boy. Since that date his service with that
company has' been continuous. He was promoted
through various grades of responsibility, eventually
becoming agent at Miss,oula. In 1903 he was trans-
ferred to Helena as chief clerk to the general agent,
and in 1905 came to Butte as chief clerk to the
division freight and passenger agent. He is now
city freight and passenger agent, and as such is
the official highest in rank in the traffic department
of the road at Butte. His offices are in the Mantle
Block.
Mr. Kemp, who has never married, is a resident
in the Kenwood Block. He is a republican, a mem-
ber of the Episcopal Church, and is affiliated with
Missoula Lodge No. 13, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, is past high priest of Western Sun Chapter
No. II, Royal Arch Masons, and 'is also a member
of the Royal Arcanum.
William H. Webb, present county auditor of
Teton County, first came to this section of Mon-
tana thirty years ago. He has been honored with
several official posts, was in business for a number
of years as a building contractor, and his business
experience ranges from his native State of Illinois
to the Pacific Coast.
He was born in Bureau County, Illinois, February
I, 1869, son of Stephen M. and Margaret (McFar-
lin) Webb. His father was born in New York
State, and when a boy was taken to Illinois by his
parents, Gilbert and JJulia (Ingals) Webb. Stephen
Webb was educated in New York and spent some
of his early years in Marshalltown and Osage,
Iowa. He was a wheelwright by trade. He enlisted
as a Union* soldier in the Fourth Iowa Cavalry and
served a little less than a year. He then located at
the Village of Dover in Bureau County, Illinois, and
lived there the rest of his life. He died in 1904. at
the age of sixty-three. His wife was a native of
Ohio and died in 1910, aged sixty-two. They were
married at Osage, Iowa. Their eleven children con-
sisted of six sons and five daughters, and three sons
and four daughters are still living, William H. be-
ing the fourth child. His father was a member of
the Grand Army of the Republic and a republican
voter.
William H. Webb acquired his education in the
public schools of Dover, Illinois. He learned the
wheelwright trade from his father, and in 1890
came to Montana and at Choteau found work as a
draftsman for a civil engineer, .^fter about two
vears he was appointed first deputy county treasurer
of Teton County in 189-', and held that post three
476
HISTORY OF MONTANA
years. For one year he worked in the Post Traders
Store on the Blackfoot Reservation, and for about
six years followed various occupations in Spokane
and other sections of Washington. Returning to
Choteau, he was bookkeeper for a local firm, and at
the death of his father went back to Illinois and
lived fhere six years, working as a carpenter. In
191 1 he returned to Choteau, Montana, and engaged
in building contracting. In April, .1917, Mr. Webb
was appointed deputy county ayditor and in 1918
was elected as chief of that office, beginning with
his official term in 1919.
He is a republican in politics, a member of the
Methodist Church, and is affiliated with Choteau
Lodge No. 44, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
and the Knights of Pythias.
March 2, 1910, he married Miss Permelia Stewart.
She was born at Kasbeer, Illinois, and died Novem-
ber 30, 1913. She left two children, Marion and
Stephen E.
Lester Ralph Polgl.\si;, a native of Butte and
son of a Montana pioneer, in a comparatively brief
career has made himself useful and influential in
his native community. Mr. Polglase is deputy clerk
of the United States Court at Butte.
He was born at Butte Marth 10. 1894. His father,
Emanuel Polglase, was born in Cornwall, England,
in 1843, was reared and educated there, and on conv
ing to the United States about 1868 sought his for-
tune in the mining district of the West. He lived
for several years at Ruby Hill, Nevada, where he
married and where he followed mining. He was
also connected with the mines of Grass Valley,
California, and in 1884 settled at Butte. The rest
of his active life he spent with the Anaconda Cop-
per Mining Company, first as a miner and finally
as a watchman. He died in their service at Butte
in March, 1915. Politically he was a standpat re-
publican, and was an active member and supporter
of the Episcopal Church. He was affiliated with
Fidelity Lodge No. 8, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, and also with the .\ncient Order of United
Workmen. He married Annie Bauer. She was
born near Frankfort, Germany, in 1852, and is still
living at Butte. She was reared and educated in
her native land and at the age of twenty, with two
sisters, came to the United States. Both sisters
are now deceased. One of them, Elizabeth, died
in San Francisco. Annie Bauer lived for some
time at San Francisco and afterward went to Ruby
Hill, Nevada, where she married, Emanuel Pol-
glase and wife had six children : Harry, a book-
keeper at Richmond. California: William, an iron
molder at McGill, Nevada: Edward, an iron molder
at Redondo, California : John, who died at the age
of four years : Roy, who died at the age of eighteen
months : and Lester R.. the yoimgest.
Lester R. Polglase received a public school edu-
cation at Butte and graduated from the Butte Busi-
ness College in 191 1. having specialized in book-
keeping. A year later he went with the Finlen
Hotel, the leading hotel of Butte, and was in its
service as a clerk for five years. He then took up
his present duties as deputy clerk of the United
States Court, his offices being in Room 252 of the
Federal Building.
Mr. Polglase is an independent republican and
is affiliated with the Episcopal Church. July 14,
1916, at Butte, he married Catherine Madigan, a
native of California. They have one dau.ghter,
Elizabeth Mary, born July 11, 1918.
Edgar M. Andrieux is manager and proprietor of
the Home Independent Messenger Company of Butte.
This is a business that has been developed along
original lines largely by Mr. Andrieux, and repre-
sents a system that is deserving of much wider
application than it has received so far as a means of
solving the extensive problem of local delivery and
transportation in towns and cities.
Mr. Andrieux came to this business after several
years of experience in public offices in Butte, where
he and his family have long been favorably known.
He was born in Chicago, Illinois, September 7, 1882,
but has spent most of his life in Butte.
His father was Charles J. Andrieux. at one
time a trusted associate and friend of such promi-
nent leaders in Butte as Gen. Charles S. Warren,
W. A. Clark, Marcus Daly, Jim Murray and other
old timers who laid the foundation of the city.
Charles J. Andrieux was a native of Paris, France,
descended from a prominent French family, and had
attained the rank of colonel in the French army be-
fore coming to America. In this country he lo-
cated at Chicago, where he married, and where for
several years he was actively interested in demo-
cratic politics. He made his first trip to Butte
about 1879, and for several years was associated in
the real estate business with John H. Curtis. Their
office was in a log cabin where the Curtis Block
now stands on West Park Street. He was employed
to look after mining interests and other properties
for some of the men noted above, and about 1885
he left Butte on a business mission of this kind,
going east, and there his record abruptly ends. His
family and friends have always believed that he
was a victim of foul play. He was a democrat in
politics and a member of the Catholic Church.
Charles J. Andrieux married Celia De Mers. who
was born in Montreal, Canada, in i8?o and is still
living at, Butte. There were five children, Edgar
M. being the voungest. Celia, the oldest, is the wife
of T, J. Collins, an engineer with the W. J. Clark
interests and a resident of Butte: Charles J., who
lives with his mother and is an abstractor for the
.Anaconda Copper Mining Company: Louis, who died
at Butte at the age of forty in 1918, was manager
of the Home Messenger Company: Oscar E. was
manager of the Brown & Flannigan Company of
Butte and died at Silver City, New Mexico, in 1913.
Edgar M, Andrieux attended the parochial schools
of Butte, graduating in 1899, and from 1905 to 1909
served as deputy county treasurer for two terms and
for one year was deputy county assessor. For four
years he was cashier of the M. J. Medin Company
of Butte, and in 1914 became associated with the
Home Independent Messenger Company, of which
he is manager and owner. This is one of the best
developed organizations of its kind in the country,
supplying ' a general delivery service throughout
Silver Bow County and particularly in Butte. The
offices are at i East Broadway.
Mr. Andrieux, like his father, takes an active in-
terest in democratic politics and for the past eight
years has been treasurer of the County Democratic
Central Committee. He is a Catholic, a former mem-
ber of the Knights of Columbus and is affiliated with
Butte Aerie No. 11, Fraternal Order of Eagles. He
and his family reside in a modern home at 123 West
Aluminum Street. He married at St. Paul, Min-
nesota, in 1913, Miss Mary La Riviere. Mrs, An-
drieux was born at Mason City, Iowa.
J. D. Wallace. Inheriting in no small measure
the sagacity, forethought and the habits of industry
and thrift characteristic of his honored Scotch an-
cestors, J. D. Wallace, of Butte, is prominently asso-
ciated with the transportation interests of the city
as general agent of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific
<
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Railway, a position for which he is amply qualified
by knowledge and experience, and which he is ably
filling. A son of William Wallace, he was born in
Newberry, South Carolina, October i6. 1876, and
educated in Florida. He comes of distinguished
ancestry on both sides of the house, his great-grand-
father, Andrew Wallace, the immigrant, having
been of Scotch birth, while his great-grandfather on
his mother's side was a cousin of Francis Scott
Key, author of our national song, "The Star
Spangled Banner."
Born in Edinburgh. Scotland, Andrew Wallace
immigrated as a young man to the United States,
locating in Virginia, where he married an attractive
Southern girl, a Miss Patrick. Moving to Charles-
ton, South Carolina, he embarked in mercantile
pursuits, and through good management, thrift, and
wise investments amassed a large fortune, owning
aside from his mercantile property several valuable
South Carolina plantations. His son William Wal-
lace. Sr., was the next in line of descent.
William Wallace, Sr., was born in Columbia,
South Carolina, in 1825. and died in that city in
1905. He was an attorney-at-law by profession, and
quite successful. A veteran of the Confederacy,
he served throughout the war, attaining the rank
of colonel, and after he returned to Columbia, dur-
ing the first administration of Grover Cleveland as
President, he served as postmaster.
William Wallace, Jr.. was born in 1854. in Colum-
bia, South Carolina, where he lived until after his
marriage, being engaged in the saw mill business.
Moving from there to Newberry, South Carolina, he
owned and operated a cotton plantation until 1878,
when he removed with his family to Jacksonville,
Florida. There as owner and manager of a saw
mill, he accumulated a large property, and since
1904 has been living retired from business cares.
He married Mrs. Lena (Murdock) Adams, who
was born in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1849.
Her first husband. William Adams, of Jacksonville,
Florida, was killed in a train wreck, leaving her with
two children, William .'Kdams, of Jacksonville, an
employe of the Florida East Coast Railway, and
Emma, wife of James P. Dodge of Saint Augustine,
Florida, a jeweler. Mr. and Mrs. William Wallace
have four children, J. D., the subject of this sketch;
Elise and Madge, teachers in the Jacksonville pub-
lic schools and who live with their parents; and
Helen, wife of W. W. Ware, of Washington, District
of Columbia, a railroad employe.
Educated in the public schools of Florida, J. D.
Wallace was graduated from the New Smyrna High
School in 1894, and soon after entered the employ
of the Florida East Coast Railroad Company, begin-
ning as station baggage master, and after learning
telegraphy was promoted in 1895 to station agent.
From igoo until 1903 he worked for the Jacksonville
Terminal Company as train despatcher. Going then
to Palmer Lake. Colorado. Mr. Wallace was tele-
graph operator for the Denver & Rio Grande Rail-
way Company until the big coal strike, when one-
half of the operators were laid off. he being one
of them. Going directly to Salt Lake City, he was
employed at the Lucin C«t-off of the Southern Pa-
cific Railroad until May. 1904. Locating in Butte
on the first day of June, 1904. Mr. Wallace secured
a position as telegrapher and clerk for the Northern
Pacific Railroad Company, and was afterward pro-
moted to rate clerk. In March, 1908, he was offered
a more remunerative position as rate clerk in Ana-
conda for the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railway,
and was subsequently made chief clerk and later
promoted to the cashiership. In 191 1 Mr. Wallace
was advanced in position, the company transferring
him to Butte, in March of that year, and making
him cashier. In November. 191 1, he was again pro-
moted, being appointed general agent of the road,
succeeding the late J. W. Naugle. Mr. Wallace, who
is the only oflScial representative of the company
in Butte, has his ofiices in the freight depot of the
Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railroad, on Utah
Avenue, and under his supervision has twenty em-
ployes.
Mr. Wallace married, in 1907, in Butte, Miss Lot-
tie Williams, a finely educated young woman, who
was graduated from the Butte High School and
from the Butte Business College. Her father, for
many years engaged in mining in Nevada, died in
Butte, and her mother, whose name before marriage
was Bessie Argall, is living in Butte, at 833 South
Main Street. Mr. and Mrs. Wallace have one child,
Bessie, born June 8, igo8. Mr. and Mrs. Wallace
are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Fraternally Mr. Wallace is a member of Summit
Valley Lodge No. 123, Ancient Free and Accepted
Order of Masons, and of Deer Lodge Chapter No. 3,
Royal Arch Masons. He and his family reside in
a modernly built house at 909 South Main Street.
Frederick Stokes Decker, Jr., president and
manager of Decker Brothers, general merchandise
brokers of Butte, is one of the most aggressive and
capable business men of the city, and through his
efficiency his house has been developed into one of
the leading ones of its kind in the Northwest. He
was born at New Orleans, Louisiana, on December
26, 1875, a son of Frederick Stokes Decker and
grandson of Allen M. Decker, born in North Caro-
lina, where the Deckers settled upon coming to the
American colonies prior to the Revolution. Allen
M. Decker moved to New Orleans at a very early
day and had there large steamboat interests. He
died in that city prior to the birth of his grandson.
Frederick Stokes Decker was born at New Or-
leans on June 13, 1851, and he died in that city on
March 22, 1915, having spent his life in and about
that city, where during his mature years he was as-
sociated with the railroad development, and for a
number of years served as general passenger agent
of the Southern Pacific Railroad. In politics he
was a democrat, and in religious belief, an Episco-
palian. He married Mary Grace Harris, born on
March 22, 1851, and she survives him and makes
her home at New Orleans. Their children, all of
whom were born in New Orleans, were as follows ;
Frederick Stokes, whose name heads this review ;
Grace, who was tjorn on July 14, 1877, was married
on April 12, 1916, to Norman Smith, a naval stores
operator, and they live at Tampa. Florida; Allen M.,
who was born on January 31, 1879. is a merchant
of Billings, Montana; Ethel, who was born No-
vember 26, 1880, was married on September 15,
1919, to Griff C. Rogan, a real estate operator of
Lakeland, Florida ; Beverly H., who was born
December 25, 1882, is a broker of New Orleans ;
Alice E., who was born September 10. 1884. is liv-
ing with her mother; Alma, who was born April
5, 1886, died on September 2. 1897; Hazel, who
was born January 3, 1888, lives with her mother ;
Walton, who was born October 19, 1891, is a broker
of Great Falls, Montana.
Frederick Stokes Decker. Jr.. was educated in the
public schools of New Orleans, and was graduated
from one of its high schools in 1892. He then en-
tered the employ of the Illinois Central Railroad at
New Orleans as a messenger boy. and was promoted
and then went with the Southern Pacific Railroad
as bill of lading clerk. Still later this road traiis-
ferred him to Algiers, Louisiana, as assistant cashier
478
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of their office at that point, and he remained there
from 1896 until 1S98.
With the outbreak of the Spanish-American war
Mr. Decker enlisted in the Fourth Louisiana Bat-
talion and went to Mobile, Alabama, and from there
to Miami, Florida, and still later to Jacksonville,
Florida. He was stricken down with typhoid fever
and was incapacitated from further service, and was
mustered out in August, 1S90, having been a quar-
termaster sergeant during the period of his service.
Returning to the Southern Pacific Railroad, Mr.
Decker was made a purser on their passenger steam-
ers plying between New Orleans and Havana, and
held that position for three years, leaving it to go
into the freight forwarding business with Alfred
H. Clement as a partner at New Orleans. He main-
tained his interests in this concern until he came to
Montana in June, 1912. joining his brother, B. H.
Decker at Butte, to which city he had come in July,
1908, and established the Northwestern Brokerage
Company, to which business Frederick S. Decker,
Jr., succeeded in 1916. At that time the name was
still the original one, but on January i, 1917, it was
changed to the present one of Decker Brothers, of
which Mr. Decker is president and manager; Allen
M. Decker is vice president; and Walton Decker is
secretary and treasurer. This business has been in-
corporated since July 3, 1908. The company carries
on a general merchandise brokerage business, act-
ing as agent for manufacturers and shippers of food
supplies. The territory embraces the entire State
of Montana, and this is one of the leading concerns
of its kind in the Northwest, headquarters being
maintained at Butte, with offices at No. 602 Utah
Avenue, and branch offices at Great Falls and Bill-
ings, Montana.
Mr. Decker is a democrat. He is a Mason and
belongs to Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and Deer Lodge Chap-
ter No. 3, Royal Arch Masons. The Silver Bow Club
of Butte holds his membership and interest. Mr.
Decker is unmarried, and resides at No. 602 Utah
Avenue, Butte.
George W. Magee, of Choteau, has well earned a
high place among Montana's lawyers. He was
trained to the law back East before coming to Mon-
tana. For a number of years few except his inti-
mate friends knew that he was qualified for law
practice. His time and energies were taken up with
ranching and the newspaper business for many
years.
Mr. Magee was born at East Douglas in Worces-
ter County, Massachusetts, December 2, 1858, son
of Thomas Nathaniel and Mary A. (Buffum)
Magee. His mother was born in Massachusetts and
died in 1863, at the age of thirty-one. Thomas N.
Magee was a native of Vermont, and at the out-
break of the Civil war enlisted in the Third Rhode
Island Cavalry. He served part of the time under
General Burnside, until severely wounded by a
grape shot, which passed through his body. On re-
covering he was granted a furlough and then re-
enlisted, serving part of the time as recruiting offi-
cer. While on his way to Washington to be mus-
tered out in December, 1864, he was one of those
who lost their lives on the North America, a Fed-
eral transport, off Roanoke, Virginia. He and sev-
eral hundred of his companions went down to a
watery grave. Of his seven children five reached
mature years, four sons and one daughter.
George W. Magee, fourth among his parents' chil-
dren, was a small boy when he was orphaned, and
he early learned the lessons of independence and
self reliance. He acquired his education in Massa-
chusetts and Rhode Island, and studied law in
Worcester, Massachusetts, with the firm Bacon,
Hopkins & Bacon. The rq,oney necessary to com-
plete his legal education he earned by teaching
school. He taught his first term in Massachusetts
at the age of sixteen. In 1880 Mr. Magee moved
to Iowa and in 1881 came up the Missouri
River on the steamer Helena to Fort Benton.
SoiTie five or six years . he spent in the
freighting business, and then went on a
cattle and horse ranch on Birch Creek.
That was the scene of his operations as a rancher
until the spring of 1899. Mr. Magee bought the
Dupuyer Acantha, a weekly newspaper published
at Dupuyer. He published that journal and did
much to improve and promote its influence for
about five years. In the meantime, in October, 1899,
he was appointed United States Commissioner and
held that office for eight years. He sold his paper
in 1904 and bought 300 acres of land adjoining the
Town of Dupuyer. This land is well supplied with
water from an irrigation canal, and is a highly val-
uable and productive property. Mr. Magee rents it.
and for the past fifteen years has given much of his
time to his profession as a lawyer. He has served
as justice of the peace and in the fall of 1898 was
elected a member of the State Legislature, serving
one term. In December, 1917. he was appointed
county attorney of Teton County, succeeding Capt.
Walter Verge. In November, 1918, he was regu-
larly elected to that office. He is affiliated with the
Woodmen of the World and in politics is a repub-
lican.
In 1900 Mr. Magee married Catherine Laudin. He
has two sons and one daughter, Harold, George and
Marion. In December, 1915, Mr. Magee married
Emma Longfellow, of Indiana.
Paul C. Gaethke, proprietor of the Rocky Moun-
tain Coal Company, is one of the substantial men
and representative citizens of Butte, where he has
been located since 1900. He was born at Staven-
hagen, Germany, on September i, 1862, and that city
was also the birthplace of his father, Frederick
Gaethke, and his grandfather, also Frederick
Gaethke, a schoolteacher and a very learned man
who died in the vicinity of Stavenhagen many years
ago. The younger Frederick Gaethke was born in
1830 and died near the place of his birth in 1916,
having spent his entire life in that vicinity. Like
his father he was a very well educated man, having
fitted himself for the same calling, but did not fol-
low it, as he was made manager of the estate of
Count von Plessen, which position he held until his
death. He served in the German army during the
rebellion of 1848. A Mason and a Lutheran, he
lived up to the highest ideals of both organizations
and was a most excellent man, and one who com-
manded universal respect. He married Emma
Stoerzer, born in Denmark and died at Stavenhagen,
Germany, in 1918. Their children were as follows :
Helena, who married Francis Pistorius, a colonel
in the German army during the Great war and a
customs official, who died in 1918, his widow now
making her home at Berlin ; Paul C, whose narne ,,|
heads this review : Ulrich, who is a professor in J
the University of Tuebinzan, Germany; and Gustav, ~
who was a merchant, died at Berlin in 1915.
Paul C. Gaethke attended the University of Berlin
for two years and the University of Goettingen
for one year. He then became a student of the
University of Zurich, Switzerland, from which he
was graduated in 1884 with the degree of Doctor
of Philosophy. Mr. Gaethke then came to the
United States and located at Bathgate, North Da-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
479
kota, was engaged in an ice business there until
1900, and then came to Butte and established the
Rocky Mountain Coal Company, of which he i»
the sole proprietor, and which he has built up until
it is one of the leading ones of its kind in Butte.
The offices of the company are at No, 745 South
Arizona Street, and he has yards adjacent to the
offices and also along the Northern Pacific tracks.
Mr. Gaethke owns a modern residence at No, 103S
South Arizona Street, as well as his office prop-
erty and real estate at Seattle, Washington. In
politics he is an independent. He belongs to the
Mystic Toilers of Des Moines, Iowa, and the Sons
of Hermann.
In 1891 Mr. Gaethke was married at Pierz, Min-
nesota, to Miss Mary Schommer, a daughter of
Peter and Kathryn Schommer. Mr. Schommer was
a pioneer farmer of Rich Prairie, Minnesota, and
was killed when a tree he was cutting down fell on
him. His widow survives him and makes her home
at Rich Prairie. Mr. and Mrs. Gaethke became the
parents of the following children: Frederick, who
was born in 1893, graduated from the School of
Mines at Butte, Montana, with the degree of Min-
ing Engineer and is efficiency engineer for the East
Colusa Mine of the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany; Annie, who was born in 1896 at Pierz. Min-
nesota, was graduated from the Butte High School,
and is now the wife of John B. McNulty, who is
in the automobile business in San Francisco, Cali-
fornia, where they now reside ; Frank, who was
born in 1897, is a junior in the University of Michi-
gan at Ann Arbor, Michigan ; and George, who was
born in 1899, is a sophomore in the medical depart-
ment of the State University at Seattle, Washing-
ton. Mr. Gaethke is one of the best business men
of Butte, and is a -very highly educated man, who
takes a pride in keeping well informed upon all
matters of interest.
Robert E. Pond, manager of the Butte branch of
the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, is one of
the reliable young business men of Silver Bow
County. He was born at Granville, Ohio, on July
26, 1884, a son of Warner J. Pond, born at the
same place as his son in 1838. He spent his life
at Granville, and died there on October 2, 1914.
In young manhood Warner J. Pond learned the
coopering trade, but later went into a hardware
business and so expanded his operations as to in-
clude a general line of merchandise and developed
into one of the leading merchants of Granville, but
retired from active pursuits about 1909. He was a
stanch republican and served as mayor of Gran-
ville, was treasurer of the city, a member of the
city council, and always took a very active part in
local politics. In addition to his other interests
Mr. Pond was a director of the Farmers Bank of
Granville and president of the Granville .Building &
Loan Association. The Presbyterian Church had in
him a conscientious member and active and gen-
erous supporter, and he was equally faithful in liv-
ing up to the highest conceptions of Masonry and
of the order of Odd Fellows. Warner J. Pond was
married to Anna Eager, born at Alexandria, Ohio,
in 1848, who survives him and makes her home at
Santa Barbara, California. Their children were as
follows : Henry W., who is a druggist of Chicago,
Illinois ; Robert E., who was the second in order
of birth.
The paternal grandfather of Robert E. Pond was
Aaron Pond, who was also born at Granville, Ohio,
and died there before the birth of his grandson, hav-
ing been a merchant all of his mature years. The
Pond family is of Scotch-English descent, repre-
sentatives of it coming to the Massachusetts Colony
long before the American Revolution, and helping
in the establishment of Granville, Massachusetts.
When some of them went to Ohio, they named their
new place of settlement Granville, in lionor of their
old home.
Robert E. Pond was reared and educated in the
public schools of Granville, and was graduated from
its high school in 1901, following which he attended
Denison University at Granville until he completed
the sophomore year. He then took a two years'
course in the Ohio State University at Columbus,
Ohio, from which he, was graduated with the class
of 1906, with the degree of Baclielor of Science.
Mr. Pond is a member of the Greek Letter Col-
lege Fraternity Phi Gamma Delta.
In igo6 Mr. Pond engaged as a civil engineer with
the Pennsylvania Railroad at Pittsburgh, Pennsyl-
vania, and held that position until 1910, when he
went to Chicago, Illinois, and was in the advertis-
ing business until 1915. During the latter year his
services were secured by the Goodyear Tire & Rub-
ber Company as a salesman for their Chicago branch,
and he was connected with that branch for two
years, when he was transferred to the factory at
Akron, Ohio, as a stafl man to the department
manager on truck tires. After two years Mr. Pond
received further promotion and was sent on June I,
1919, to Denver, Colorado, to take charge of the
service department of his company in that city, and
on November i, 1919, came to Butte as manager of
the local branch of the company. This branch is
located on the corner of Iron Street and Nevada
Avenue. Mr. Pond has under his supervision thirty-
three employes. He is an independent republican.
In his religious faith he is a Presbyterian. His
social connections are those he maintains as a mem-
ber of the Rotary Club, the Silver Bow Club and
the Butte Country Club. He maintains his residence
in the Goldberg Apartments.
On January 9, 1913, Mr. Pond was married at Chi-
cago, Illinois, to Miss Josephine L. Dolman, a daugh-
ter of William L. and Armildia (Dunkle) Dolman,
residents of Pasadena, California. Mr. Dolman is
a retired banker. Mrs. Pond was graduated from
the Loring School for Girls at Chicago, and from
the Hillside School for Girls at Madison, Wiscon-
sin. Mr. and Mrs. Pond have two daughters,
namely: Jane Elizabeth, who was born on April 13,
1915; and Barbara Dolman, who was born on Oc-
tober 20, 1917.
Mr. Pond is a young man of great initiative and
executive ability, and understands how to handle
men. His long connection with his present company
has resulted in his promotion to increasing respon-
sibilities and added prestige, and although he has
not long been a resident, of Butte, he has already
made himself felt in the life of the city, and is
recognized as a valuable addition to the community.
William E. Curry. It is not given to every man
to develop not only keen business instincts and put
them to practical use, but also to turn to remun-
erative uses inventive talents, and yet that is just
what William E. Curry, vice president and manager
of the Mountaineer Welders Supply Company of
Butte, Montana, is doing. He has invented, patented,
and his company is using generating cells that pro-
duce both oxygen and hydrogen gasse* of unusual
purity, and he is also conducting the affairs of the
concern of which he is vice president in so efficient
a manner as to make it one of the sound financial
institutions of this part of the state, and one of
the leaders in its line of industry.
William E. Curry was born at Chippewa Falls,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Wisconsin, on March l6, 1886, a son of William
Curry. The Currv family is of Scotch-Irish descent,
the founders of it in the American colonies locat-
ing first in New England, from whence they later
migrated into Canada, and it was in that dominion,
Province of Ontario, City of Pembroke, that Wil-
liam Curry was born in the year 1841. He grew up
at Pembroke and became a very highly educated
man, going through a number of well known semi-
naries, but at the same time he was of a practical
turn of mind and learned the carpenter trade, not
caring to depend wholly upon his educational at-
tainments for support. How%ver, it was through
the exercise of his mental faculties rather than
by physical labor that he justified his existence and
made a name for himself as an earnest, self-sacri-
ficing Christian. Mr. Curry went into Northern
Michigan as a missionary of the Congregational
Church to the Indians, and remained there until
1878, laboring among them, not only teaching them
the gospel, but endeavoring to awaken in them a
desire to be useful members of their tribe. In 1878
he was transferred to Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin,
and while living there acquired ownership to a farm,
which he operated. Still later his services were
sought as agent hy a railway company, and he was
stationed at Spring Valley, Wisconsin, until IQ04,
when he returned to Chippewa Falls to look after
his agricultural interests in its vicinity. It was while
living there that this excellent man was stricken
down with paralysis in 1908, which necessitated his
abandonment of any kind of strenuous life, and in
1913 he came to Butte to make his home with his
son, and died in this city during 1917. In politics
he was an independent republican and was chosen
as a justice of the peace for two terms while he
was a resident of Spring Valley, Wisconsin. A very
earnest member of the Congregational Church, he
organized the society at Spring Valley, to which he
oftentimes ministered as a lay preacher. His wife
bore the maiden name of Delana Aiken Curry, but
as far as the family history could be traced no re-
lationship could be discovered between the two fam-
ilies. She was born in the Province of Ontario,
Canada, in 1841, and died at Chippewa Falls, Wis-
consin, in February, 1918. Their children were as
follows : James, who is a farmer of Duluth, Min-
nesota; Bertha married Samuel Mars, a farmer of
the neighborhood of Elk Mound, Wisconsin, and
she died in 1900, at Spring Valley, Wisconsin ; Frank,
who is a barber by trade, has charge of the gov-
ernment-owned elevator at Duluth, Minnesota ; Wil-
helmina, who married Lawrence McKay, foreman of
the stamp mill of Anyox, British Columbia, Can-
ada; Duncan Ellsworth Howard, who is a mining
engineer of Duquesne, Arizona; William E., whose
name heads this review ; Walter H., who is em-
ployed in the Timber Butte Mills as assistant super-
intendent, is a resident of Butte, Montana; and Mar-
garet Eloise, who is unmarried, is a teacher of do-
mestic economy in a select school at Astoria, Oregon.
William E. Curry was reared and educated in the
public schools at Spring Valley, later attending the
Chippewa Falls High School, from which he was
graduated in 1906. During the summer subsequent
to his graduation he was employed in a grocery
store at Chippewa Falls, and in the late fall of that
year came to Butte, Montana, his arrival here dat-
ing from November 9, 1906. For the next five years
he was employed by the Brophy Grocery Company,
which started him as a clerk in the order depart-
ment, and then promoted him until he became fore-
man of his department.
In 1910 he returned to Wisconsin to visit his par-
ents, and while there learned about the oxy-acety-
lene welding and steel cutting business which was
at that time practically in its infancy. The possi-
bilities of this business so attracted him that he
went to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and learned its de-
tails, and returning to Butte that same year was
successful in interesting A. H. Schaal in his ideas.
Having secured some capital, Mr. Curry returned
to Minneapolis to go into the matter more ex-
tensively, and when he felt he had mastered the busi-
ness he came back to Butte, and on February 16,
191 1, opened a little shop and began what was then
really an experiment. In 1917 Mr. Curry bought
his partner's interest, the business in the meanwhile
having, during 1914, been incorporated as the Moun-
taineer Welders Supply Company. At that time an
electrolytic oxygen and hydrogen gas manufactur-
ing plant was added. The generating cells used in
this plant are of Mr. Curry's own design, and pro-
duce both oxygen and hydrogen gas, ranging from
90.6 per cent to 99.8 per cent pure. This gas is
stored in cylinders and shipped all over Montana
and neighboring states. It is placed in the cylinders
at a pressure of 1,800 pounds to the square inch.
When the welding plant was established in 1911 it
was the only one of its kind in the whole state, but
since then of course many others have sprung into
existence, especially after Mr. Curry had passed
through the experimental period and demonstrated
the practicality and efficiency of this method. As
the other feature of manufacturing oxygen and
hydrogen was developed the original plant was sold,
and the company now devotes itself to the produc-
tion of the gasses, in this being the original and
only plant of its kind in the state, and in the handling
of oxy-acteylene welding and all welders' supplies
being the supply station for the welding plants of
Butte and its vicinity. The plant and offices are lo-
cated at No. 408 South Main Street, Butte. The
officers of the company are as follows: James H.
Brown, president; William E. Curry, vice president
and manager; and H. L. Winchester, secretary and
Mr. Curry organized the original company with
a capital stock of $4,500, and now the costly equip-
ment of the plant alone represents an investment
of $3.^.000, and this expansion has come very largely
throug:h Mr. Curry's own efforts and his convincing
faith in the future of his undertaking, which won
confidence and secured capital at a time when an-
other man might not have been able to get financial
backing for his enterprise no matter what its ulti-
mate prospects might have been.
Mr. Curry was married at Prairie Farm, Wis-
consin, in 1913 to Miss Anna Marie Teigen, a daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. H. O. Teigen, now residents
of Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Mr. Teigen is
engaged in harnessmaking. Mrs. Curry was gradu-
ated from the Superior Normal School at Superior,
Wisconsin, .and was engaged in teaching school at
Prairie Farm at the time of her marriage. Mr. and
Mrs. Curry have one son, Hugh Donald, who was
born November 17, 1916.
Preferring to cast his vote according to his per-
sonal estimate of the candidates, Mr. Curry has con-
tinued to be independent in politics. The Methodist
Episcopal Church holds his membership. He owns
a comfortable modern residence at No. 1143 West
Platinum Street, Butte, where he maintains his
home. A man of broad vision, Mr. Curry has justi-
fied every confidence placed in him and his under-
taking and now ranks among the truly successful
men of his state and generation.
Albert 'Charles Wilhelm, one of the leading
florists of Butte, and a man of high business stand-
X«.-T<,^ ^ O^uuuSl
HISTORY OF MONTANA
481
ards and good citizenship, was born at Cleveland,
Ohio, .on June 13, 1882, a son of Charles Wilhelm
and grandson of Charles Wilhelm. The Wilhelm
family came from Germany to the United States at
a very early day, becoming pioneers of Cleveland,
Ohio. It was in this city that Charles Wilhelm
was born, and he died there in 1885, having been the
first cooper of the city. During the war between
the states he served as a soldier in the Union army.
Charles Wilhelm, the younger, was also born at
Cleveland, Ohio, in 1848, and he is a resident of
that city today. There he was reared, educated and
married, and became one of the early mechanical
engineers of Cleveland, but is now retired. In his
political faith he is a strong republican, and fra-
ternally he belongs to the Knights of Pythias. His
wife bore the maiden name of Mary Hackwit, born
at Berlin, Germany, in 1851, a daughter of Albert
Hackwit, born in Germany about 18^5. He came to
Cleveland in 1866, but had been a resident of the
United States from 1853. His death occurred at
Cleveland, Ohio, in 1900. For many years he was
engaged in the manufacture of paper. Like the
elder Charles Wilhelm, he served in the Union army
during the war between the states. Mrs. Charles
Wilhelm was reared and educated in Cleveland.
The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Charles Wil-
helm were as follows : May, who is unmarried, is a
florist and resides with her parents ; Albert Charles,
who is the second in order of birth ; George, who
is assistant city engineer, lives at Cleveland, Ohio;
Gertrude, who is married, lives at Cleveland; Anna,
who is also married, is a resident of Cleveland;
Lillian, who is married, is also a resident of Cleve-
land; Harold, who is a resident of Cleveland, served
in the United States Navy during the World war
as a mechanic on the "West Virginia," and has been
in the service for the past ten years ; Oliver, who
died at Cleveland in 1918, was a mechanic; Melville,
who is attending a Cleveland high school; and an
unnamed daughter who died in infancy.
Albert Charles Wilhelm grew up at Cleveland
and was there graduated from the high school course
in 1900. He began work as a florist with the J. M.
Gasser Company of Cleveland, and learned his trade
in their employ. In 1901 he came to Butte, and
for seventeen years was connected with the Butte
Floral Company, leaving it as manager. Mr. Wil-
helm then, in 1918, opened his own establishment at
No. 47 West Broadway, operating under the name
of the Columbia Floral Company, which is incor-
porated and has the following officers : A. C. Wil-
nelm, president and manager; C. R. Leonard, vice
president; and N. F. Leonard, secretary and treas-
urer. Although this is a new company, Mr. Wil-
helm has so expanded it that it is now one of the
leaders in its line in Western Montana, and con-
trols an immense trade. This company handles all
of the output of the Columbia Gardens, the "beauty
spot" of the state.
Mr. Wilhelm is a republican. He belongs to
Putte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and Protective Or-
der of Elks; Butte Aerie No. 11, Fraternal Order of
Eagles ; Butte Lodge of Moose ; the Silver Bow
Club; the Silver Bow Country Club; the Butte
Business Men's Club; the Butte Advertising Club;
the Florists Telegraph Delivery Association, and
the Society of American Florists, the last two named
being national organizations.
In 1909 Mr. Wilhelm was married at Butte to
Miss Viola Frost, a daughter of Mrs. Mary Frost,
who is now a resident of Seattle. Washington. Mr.
and Mrs. Wilhelm have no children. They reside
in the Mueller Apartments on West Granite Street,
Butte. Mr. Wilhelm not only thoroughly under-
stands his trade, but is an excellent business man,
and as a citizen he has won the respect of his asso-
ciates by his interest in forwarding civic improve-
ments and bringing about general reforms. His
standing is unquestioned and he deserves the pros-
perity which he now enjoys, for it has come through
his own, unaided efforts and untiring industry. He
is one of the men who has centered upon one line
of industry and not scattered his energies over
a diversified territory. Having a love for flowers, he
enjoys his work and is a recognized expert in grow-
ing and handling plants and blossoms.
William T. Sweet, Sr., was one of the very first
settlers at Boulder, conducted its first store, and in
many ways was a notable Montana pioneer.
He was born at Portsmouth, Ohio, in 1838, son
of a Baptist minister, and of an ancestry that came
originally from Wales and became established in
America during the very early colonial period.
William T. Sweet, Sr., was reared and educated in
Southern Ohio, and May 28, 1862, enlisted as a
private in Company B of the Eighty-Seventh Ohio
Infantry. He was taken prisoner and paroled Sep-
tember 28, 1862. Afterwards he served eighteen
months in the navy on the gunboat Gazelle and
eventually enlisted in Company F of the One Hun-
dred and Ninety-Second Ohio Regiment and re-
mained with that command until the close of the war.
He proved a brave and gallant soldier and was in
the battle of Gettysburg and many other historic
campaigns of the war.
As is usually the case after any great conflict he
with so many others was not content with the re-
stricted conditions of his former life and sought
adventure in the then Far West. He started for
Montana in 1866, coming by way of St. Louis and
up the Missouri River, being six weeks making the
trip from St. Louis to Fort Benton. For the first
six months in Montana Territory he worked for
Col. Charles Broadwater, driving a bull team from
Fort Benton to Helena. In 1867 he opened a general
store at the old Town of Boulder under the firm
name of Sweet & Higley. He owned the land where
the Town of Boulder now stands, and platted and
laid out the original townsite. He kept a station
for stages and trading outfits, and his was the
leading business concern of the place for a number
of years. Subsequently he embarked in the stock
raising industry and became a rancher on an ex-
tensive scale. His various occupations made him a
prominent figure and he was instrumental in or-
ganizing the Old Settlers' Club, of which he re-
mained a member until his death. A democrat in
politics, he was elected on his party ticket county
treasurer, clerk of the District Court, and for a
number of years was also a justice of the peace.
He died in Boulder in 1917, having lived retired
for several years. Both as a Mason and as a mem-
ber of the Episcopal Church he lived up to high
ideals and was a very fine man in every respect.
At Boulder, in 1868, he married Emily lola Cook,
who was born at Kalamazoo, Michigan, in 1840, and
died at Boulder, Montana, in 1897. Her parents,
Capt. and Mrs. Hiram Cook, were also pioneers
who came to Montana after the close of the Civil
War by way of St. Louis and the river route to Fort
Benton.
Eight children were born to William T. Sweet
and wife: Nellie, who married Frank Bernatz, a
farmer and postmaster of Dixon, Montana, where
she died in 1910; Chester W., who lives at Bozeman
and is manager of the Montana Flour Mills Com-
pany and mayor of that city ; Ralph W., who is a
mining engineer at Tonopah, Nevada; Blanche E.,
who died at Boulder in 1905, the wife of B. F. Beck-
482
HISTORY OF MONTANA
with, now a salesman for the National Wholesale
Grocery Company, living at Seattle, Washington;
Mary, who married P. P. Roberts, a contractor and
builder at Butte; William T., Jr., whose record
follows; Shelby C, associated with his brother m
the wholesale fruit and produce business at Butte;
and Catherine, who married E. J. Finnerty, fore-
man of the Jones Fruit Company at Butte.
William T. Sweet. Many of the business houses
of Butte have extended the field of their opera-
tions until it spreads out over a goodly portion of
the state, and one of these is the wholesale fruit
and produce concern conducted under the name of
Sweet & Lewis, of whom William T. Sweet of this
notice is the senior member. Mr. Sweet belongs to
one of the pioneer families of this region and is a
man widely and favorably known all over Western
Montana.
William T. Sweet was born at Boulder, Montana,
on August 13, 1886, a son of William T. Sweet,
Sr., whose story as a Montana pioneer is given above.
William T. Sweet, the younger, was educated in
the public schools of Boulder, Montana, being grad-
uated from its high school in 1903, following which
event he began working for the Great Northern
Railroad Company as stenographer at Havre. Mon-
tana, and held that position for a year, when he
went to Great Falls, Montana, and held the same
position with the same company for another year.
In 1906 Mr. Sweet came to Butte and v/as employed
by Ryan & Virden Company as cashier for ten
years, rising to be secretary of the company. In
1916 Mr. Sweet went with the Jones Fruit Com-
pany as a salesman, and soon thereafter was ad-
vanced to be its manager, and held that position
until January i, 1919, when he assisted in organiz-
ing the firm of Sweet & Lewis. The warehouses
and offices of the company are located at No. 726
South Arizona Street, and they do a wholesale busi-
ness in fruits and produce, having already become
the leading concern of their kind in Western Mon-
tana. The members of the firm are William T.
Sweet, S. C. Sweet and F. C. Lewis.
Mr. Sweet is a democrat and an Episcopalian, like
his estimable father, in whose footsteps he is proud
to follow. He owns a ranch at Wilder, Montana,
and maintains a summer residence there, his winter
home being at No. 721^ Wyoming Street, Butte.
One of the features of his ranch is its fine fish
hatchery.
On September 19, 1909, Mr. Sweet was united in
marriage at Boulder, Montana, to Miss Lula Thomp-
son, a daughter of C. L. and Susan Thompson, the
former of whom is deceased, having been in life a
pioneer rancher and successful man of Boulder,
Montana, where his widow still resides. Mrs. Sweet
was graduated from the Jefferson County High
School of Boulder. There are no children of this
marriage. Mr. and Mrs. Sweet both belong to the
Sons and Daughters of the Pioneers of Montana,
and enjoy their association with this organization.
Mr. Sweet is recognized as one of the alert, ag-
gressive young business men of this region, and he
and his associates in the firm of Sweet & Lewis
are making commercial history in their conduct of
this concern. All of them are experienced men in
their line, and they have made no mistakes, but.
being guided bv their thorough knowledge of the
possibilities and' opportunities of their trade, have
built up connections which are of the utmost value
and which insure a continuance of the prosperity
which has attended their efforts from the first. Not
only is this success a personal gratification to the
members of the firm, but it is a decided asset to
the business life of Butte and a source of pride to
its citizens.
J. F. Lhotk.\, M. D. The great Galen boasted "I
have done as much to medicine as Trajan did to
the Roman Empire in making bridges and roads
throughout Italy.' thus emphasizing with the great-
est then known marvels of accomplishment his own
benefactions to humanity. And yet, in the light of
modern medical science, how little Galen did and
how radically incorrect, remarkable as they were,
proved many of his conclusions. To the medical
profession the early teachers will ever continue great,
but a physician or surgeon of the present day whose
professional knowledge is not vastly broader, higher
and deeper, could not hope to compete with his
fellow practitioners.
Dr. J. F. Lhotka, of Butte, holds prestige in the
ranks of his profession by reason of superior nat-
ural ability, aided by a thorough training, wide ex-
perience, an acute comprehension of human nature
and broad sympathy, and he is firmly established
in the confidence of the people of his community.
Although engaged in practice here only since 1914,
Doctor Lhotka has shown himself sucli a thorough
master of his calling that he has been able to build
up an excellent professional business, while as a
citizen he has shown himself ready to do more than
his share in behalf of the public weal.
Doctor Lhotka was born in Lukavec. Bohemia,
Europe, on May 20, 1884, a son of John Lhotka, born
in Bohemia in 1834. John Lhotka was a victim
of military oppression during the great w^ar, and
was a martyr to his convictions, being courtmar-
tialed for being on the side of the .\llies. and lost
his life on November 20. 1917. He had had an
honorable record as a soldier, having served as cap-
tain in the Austrian army during the war between
.\ustria and Prussia in 1866. and also during the
Franco-Prussian war in 1870-71. His life outside
of his military service was spent in Bohemia, and
he was in the employ of the Duke of Lichtenstein.
His widow, who bore the maiden name of Bar-
bara Jelinek, survives, and still makes her home in-
Lukavec, Bohemia, where she was born in 1839.
She and her husband had the following children:
Joseph, who is a priest of the Roman Catholic
Church, stationed in South Africa; Rudolph, who
died during the great war while in the service of
the Allied armies; Karel, who also lost his life in
the same service ; Frank, who, serving in the .Allied
armies, also made the supreme sacrifice for what
he believed was right; Doctor Lhotka; Mary and
.\nnie. both of whom are residents of the United
States ; and Amelia, who is still in Bohemia.
Doctor Lhotka first attended the schools of his
native city, following which he became a student of
the Gymnasium at Tabor, Bohemia, and there com-
pleted his collegiate training. In 1902 he came to
the United States and for the first two years he
earned his living principalh- as a musician. He then
returned to Bohemia and, entering the Bohemian
University at Prague, took the regular medical
course and was graduated therefrom in 1909 with
the degree of Doctor of Medicine. On account of
his political opinions, which were contrary to those
of the reigning house of .Austria, he was compelled
to flee, and chose the United States as a place of
refuge. Upon his arrival in this country Doctor
Lhotka made his way to Chicago. Illinois, and for
a year was a teacher of Latin, Greek and other
languages until 1910, when he matriculated in the
medical department of the Valparaiso University at
\'alparaiso, Indiana, from which he was graduated
in 1913. In the meanwhile, during 1912 and 1913,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
483
he was resident physician of Saint Margaret's Hos-
pital at Hammond, Indiana. In 1913 he began the
practice of medicine at Chicago, Illinois, and re-
mained in that city a year, leaving there in 1914
for Butte, Montana, where he has since been en-
gaged in a general medical and surgical practice.
His offices are at Nos. 19 and 20 Owsley Block, and
he maintains his residence in the same building.
Doctor Lhotka has never married. He is inde-
pendent in his political views. High in Masonry,' he
belongs to Silver Bow Lodge No. 48, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons ; Bagdad, Temple Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of Butte;
and Butte Consistory No. 2, in which he has been
made a Thirty-second Degree Mason. He belongs
to the Silver Bow Medical Society, the Montana
State Medical Society, the Cook County Illinois
Neurological Society and the Society for the Study
of Crime of Chicago, Illinois.
The success of Doctor Lhotka is not the result
of any happy chance ; luck has played no part in
his advancement. At the beginning of his career
he was compelled to meet and overcome obstacles
few men meet with, but these, however, succumbed
to his determination and indomitable persistence
and the force of his ability well applied, and he
may today take a pardonable degree of pride in the
fact that he owes his present position and pros-
perity solely to his own industry and efifort.
J.'MnEs Hugh Brown, president of the Moun-
taineer Welders Supply Company, is one of the
aggressive young business men of Butte and a native
son of the city, he having been born at No. loil
South Wyoming Street on November 5, 1885. His
father, James Brown, was one of the earliest settlers
of Montana, and a man well known in the pioneer
history of Butte. James Brown was born in Penn-
sylvania during 1837, snd was reared in his native
state, where he remained until he reached the age
of eighteen years, but then went to Dubuque, Iowa,
and for a time attended school in that city, com-
pleting the educational training he had begun in
Pennsylvania.
After completing his schooldays, James Brown
began working as a teamster for Hugh Kirkendall,
a government supply contractor, during the war be-
tween the states, and Mr. Brown remained with him
during this war. At the close of the war Mr. Brown
went into Kansas and spent a year, but owing to a
plague of grasshoppers was not successful in his
farming operations which he had undertaken. In
the meanwhile his former employer had come to
Montana and was engaged in contracting and team-
ing, and he induced Mr. Brown to join him, and
they did a big freighting business, running between
Corinne, Utah, and Helena, Montana. Within two
years Mr. Brown was taken into the business, the
firm becoming Kirkendall & Brown, and it was main-
tained until 1893. with headquarters at Butte, Mon-
tana. Mr. Brown was also interested in handling
grain, coal, fuel and wagons upon an extensive scale.
He owned and operated one of the pioneer mercan-
tile establishments at Butte, and assisted in build-
ing the Great Northern and Northern Pacific rail-
roads, holding some very important contracts with
them. His business interests kept on expanding and
he included in his operations the freighting of ore
from the various mines, among his routes being that
from the Champion Mines to the mills located at
Deer Lodge, Montana, and from the Clark proper-
ties out of Dillon, Montana. In short James Brown
was one of the most effective and extensive builders
of the prosperity of this part of Montana, and his
firm controlled one of the largest freighting busi-
nesses in the whole northwest. As this part of the
country became settled, however, Mr. Brown became
dissatisfied, for he is essentially a pioneer, and so
he went to Nome, Alaska, and is now largely in-
terested in placer mining for gold. He is an inde-
pendent republican, and was a candidate for sheriff
of Silver Bow County during its early history.
James Brown was married to Ida Cooper, who is
now living with her son, James Hugh Brown. She
was born in Iowa in February. 1857, but was reared
and educated in Missouri, Her father was born in
Pennsylvania in 1822, and died at Memphis,
Missouri, in 1890. He was a school teacher and
went as a pioneer into Scotland County, Missouri,
and was elected a judge of the District Court, serv-
ing for many years in that capacity, and at the
same time he acquired extensive agricultural in-
terests, becoming one of the most successful men
of that region. He reared ten children, and among
them were the following: O. G. Cooper, who died
at Anaconda, Montana, in 1915, but was a resident
of Great Falls, Montana, and had been one of the
extensive sheep growers during the pioneer days
of that industry in the state, and he also carried
on a large teaming business between Fort Benton
and Helena; Milton, who came to Montana with
the second party who traversed the Bozeman trail
into the state, settled at Choteau, and became an
extensive sheep grower and freighter, but now
resides at San Diego, California: Edward, who was
also one of the pioneers of Montana, was associated
with James Brown for a number of years as a
solicitor of his many interests, and is now one of
the prominent physicians and surgeons of Chicago,
Illinois; Frank, who twenty years ago was one of
the heaviest sheep growers in Montana, later lived
at Glasgow, Montana, but is now retired and is a
resident of San Diego, California; and Charles,
who came as a pioneer into Montana and was asso-
ciated with James Brown for a time, later going
to Choteau, still later to Glasgow, having heavy
sheep interests in the vicinity of both cities, but
finally sold out and retired and is now making his
home at Los Angeles, California. The Cooper
family is credited with having a representative on
the historic "Mayflower." The Browns, originally
of Scotch-Irish stock, were founded in this country
during Colonial days, settlement being first made in
the New England Colonies.
James Brown and his wife had the following
children born of their marriage ; James Hugh,
whose name heads this review ; and Marie Hannah,
who is an architect of unusual ability, and makes
her home with her mother and brother.
After completing the courses of the common
schools of Butte, James H. Brown entered its high
school and remained until the close of the junior
year, leaving school to serve an apprenticeship as a
patternmaker at the Montana Iron Works of Butte,
where he remained from 1903 until 1907. Following
that Mr. Brown was occupied with carrying on a
cement contracting business from 1907 until 1912,
and during that period was in charge of the Chicago,
Milwaukee & Saint Paul Railroad's cement work,
and constructed the large culverts and the tunnel
known as the Pipe Stone tunnel, twelve miles south
of Butte. He was the first superintendent of the
Montana Concrete Company at Logan, and also
had charge of the cement construction work of the
Three Forks Portland Cement Company's plant at
Trident, Montana, for seven months. In 1912 Mr.
Brown became assistant engineer at the plant of
the Butte-Duluth Mining Company east of Butte,
and was promoted to plant manager, remaining in
that position until the mine went into the hands of
484
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a receiver on March i6, 1915, and he was then made
custodian of the property, with Charles Everett as
receiver, and Mr. Brown was occupied with these
duties until in May. 1916, when he went to Alaska
and was associated with his father during that sum-
mer. He returned to Butte in the spring of 1917
and bought the welding department of the Moun-
taineer Welding Company and organized the Butte
Welding Company, which he sold in 1918, and in
February of that year bought an interest in the
Mountaineer Welders Supply Company, of which he
is now president and manager of the sales depart-
ment, his associates in the business being W. E.
Curry, who is vice president and general manager,
and H. L. Winchester, who is secretary and
treasurer.
The plant and offices of this company are at No.
408 South Main Street, Butte. The company was
incorporated in 1914, and its business is now con-
fined to the manufacture of oxygen and hydrogen
gasses, it being the only plant in Montana producing
them, and the handling of oxy-acetylene welding and
cutting apparatus and all welders' supplies, it being
the supply station for the welders of Butte and its
vicinity. This plant is thoroughly equipped with the
modern machinery necessary for a successful con-
duct of the business, and represents an expenditure
of $33,000. The gasses are forced into cylinders at
a pressure of 1,800 pounds to the square inch, and
these cylinders are shipped to all parts of Montana
and into neighboring states.
Mr. Brown is not married, his mother and sister
living with him in his modern residence at No. ion
South Wyoming Street, Butte. In his political con-
victions "he is a republican. He belongs to the
Presbyterian Church. Although the son of a rich
man, Mr. Brown has made his own way, and his
prosperity is the result of individual efforts directed
by a superior intelligence. He is a practical man
who understands his business and attends to it
personally. Too energetic to be willing to delegate
his responsibilities to others, he so arranges his
affairs as to be able to handle the problems presented
to him promptly and efficiently, ana, under his ca-
pable care, his department is showing very gratifying
advances with each season. As a citizen Mr. Brown
can always be depended upon to do his full duty
by his community, which has a special claim upon
him as it is also his birthplace, and he is living up
to the standards of business achievement raised by
his father and uncles, whose prosperity is recorded
in the annals of pioneer Montana.
Leslie R. M.^rgetts. The men who are prominent
in promoting the industrial prosperity of Montana
and in advancing the mining interests of Butte are
invariably men of much ability and strength of
character and in the front rank of that class stands
Leslie R. Margetts, who is actively associated with
the operations of the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company as superintendent of the Washoe Sam-
pler, a position which he is ably filling. A son of
Philip Margetts, Jr., he was born October 31, 1881,
in Salt Lake City, Utah, of English ancestrv. His
grandfather, Philip Margetts, Sr., was horn and
reared in England, and there married a Miss Bate-
man. Soon after that important event he immi-
grated to the United States, settling as a merchant
in Salt Lake City, where both he and his wife spent
their remaining days, his death occurring in 1913,
at the age of four score years.
Philip Margetts, Jr.. a native of Utah, has spent
the greater part of his life in that state, although
he is at the present writing a resident of Preston,
Idaho. He married Henrietta Richards, a life-long
resident of Salt Lake City, her birth occurring
there in 1855, and her death in 1909. Four children
were born of their marriage, as follows : Henry,
who died at the age of nineteen years; May, wife
of Harry Ostler, a candy manufacturer of Salt
Lake City; Nelson E., a colonel in the United
States Army; and Leslie R., of whom we write.
Colonel Nelson E. Margetts served in the World's
war, having on account of his knowledge of the
French language been appointed as an aid to Gen-
eral Pershing. For a year and a half he was with
the French Army as military observer, and was
afterward sent back to the United States to organize
a regiment of field artillery, which he took to
France and was on the way to the trenches when
the armistice was signed. Colonel Margetts, who
has seen service on the Mexican border as well as
in France, is now in charge of the Army of Occu-
pation at Coblentz on the Rhine.
Leslie R. Margetts was educated in Salt Lake
City, attending the grade and high schools, and at
the age of twenty-one years being graduated from
its business college. Beginning work as a stenog-
rapher, he was in the employ of the Utah Consoli-
dated Mining Company until 1903, when he came
to Butte, Montana. Immediately accepting a position
as clerk with Taylor & Brunton, a firm which was
operating a sampler which has since been taken over
by the Anaconda Copper Mining Company and is
known as the Washoe Sampler, Mr. Margetts has
continued with the company until the present time.
Proving himself capable and highly efficient, he has
received several well merited promotions, and is now
superintendent of the plant, which, with its offices,
is between the tracks of the Chicago, Milwaukee
& St. Paul Railroad and the Butte, Anaconda &
Pacific Railroad, a most favorable location, it being
on South Montana Street. He has thirty-five em-
ployes under his supervision and is performing the
duties of his responsible position with ability and
fidelity.
Mr. Margetts married in 1912, . in Butte, Miss
Anne Boone, who was educated at a seminary for
girls in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Her father,
Charles Boone, a retired railroad man, lives in
Grand Rapids, but her mother, whose maiden name
was Jane Geaves, died at a comparatively early age.
Mr. and Mrs. Margetts have no children. Political-
ly Mr. Margetts is independent, voting for what he
deems the best men and measures. He belongs to
the Butte Chamber of Commerce, and is a member
of the Silver Bow Club. His home, a modernly
built residence at 1040 West Platinum Street, is a
center of social activity.
Edward F. O'Flynn. Bringing to the practice of
his profession great zeal, a well-trained mind, and
the habits of industry characteristic of his Irish
ancestors, Edward F. O'Flynn occupies a noteworthy
position among the successful attorneys of Butte,
where in partnership with his brother James, he has
built up a substantial and lucrative patronage. He
was born Mav 9, 1886, in Saratoga, New York, a
son of P. H. O'Flynn.
Born in County Waterford, Ireland, in 1859, P.
H. O'Flynn remained in his native country until
after reaching man's estate. Coming to the United
States in 1881, he spent a short time in New York
City, from there going to Saratoga, New York,
which was his home for a few years. Migrating
with his family to Laramie. Wyoming, in 1886, he
followed the trade of a blacksmith in that vicinity
for eight years. Coming to Butte. Montana, in 1894,
he has since been engaged in mining, being in the
employ of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.
JACOB SCHMIDT
MRS. MARGARET SCHMIDT
HISTORY OF MONTANA
485
He is an uncompromising democrat in politics, and
a faithful member of the Roman Catholic Church.
He married in New York State. Mary Ellen Bald-
win, a native of Tramore, County Waterford, Ire-
land, and into their household five children have
been born, as follows : Edward F., the special sub-
ject of this brief personal narrative; James, of
Butte, in partnership with his brother Edward;
Mary, wife of E. B. McLaughlin, of Seattle, Wash-
ington, feature writer for the "Seattle Times" ;
Patricia, librarian at the Public Library of Seattle,
Washington ; and Margaret, a student in the Central
High School of Butte.
Gleaning his preliminary knowledge of books in
the parochial schools of Butte, Edward F. O'Flynn
completed the course of study in the local high
school, after which he worked for two years in a
store of general merchandise. Entering then the
University of Notre Dame, at Notre Dame, Indiana,
he was graduated there in 1907 with the degree of
Bachelor of Arts. The following year he con-
tinued in the law department of the same university,
after which he read law for a year in the office
of Anderson, Parker & Crabill in South Bend,
Indiana. Being admitted to the bar in 1909, Mr.
O'Flynn opened an office in Butte, and has since here
established a general civil and criminal law practice,
and has gained by reason of his professional
knowledge and skill a place of prominence in the
legal world. He is attorney for the Montana Power
Company, and in addition to also representing the
Mueller estates has an extensive probate practice,
his offices being on the third floor of the Hirbour
Building.
An active and influential member of the demo-
cratic party, Mr. O'Flynn represented Silver Bow
County in the twelfth session of the Montana Legis-
lature, and served on various committees of im-
portance, having been chairman of the insurance
committee and a member of the judiciary and edu-
cational committees. He introduced the bill, which
became a law, stabilizing the insurance business of
the state of Montana, and was father of the bill
regulating the rate of interest for Montana, thus
preventing usury. Possessing unquestioned busi-
ness ability and judgment, Mr. O'Flynn has -ac-
quired valuable mining interests, and owns not only
a fine residence at 414 South Washington Street,
Butte, but has title to a farm of 200 acres near
Portland, Oregon. Religiously he is a member of
the Roman Catholic Church and socially he belongs
to the Silver Bow Club of Butte and to the Butte
Country Club. Fraternally he is a member of Butte
Council, No. 668, Knights of Columbus, being a third
degree Knight.
At Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1910, Mr. O'Flynn
was united in marriage with Miss Elsa Habing, a
daughter of B. G. Habing, a prominent business man
of Indianapolis, being associated with the mercan-
tile agency of that city. His wife, Elizabeth (Brum-
mall) Habing, died in 191 1. Of the union of Mr.
and Mrs. O'Flynn four children have been born,
namely: Mary Edna, born April 6, 1911 ; Elsie
Marie, born January 16, 1915; Edward F., Jr., born
March 6, 1917; and Patrick, born December 29,
1919.
John W. Kerr is one of the leading ranchers of
Teton County and has been a resident of Montana
and one of its progressive citizens over a quarter
of a century.
He was born in New York State February 2, i860,
fifth among the twelve children, eight of whom are
still living, born to H. W. and Mary (Willis) Kerr.
His father was a native of Scotland and died in
igr6, at the age of eighty-three. The widowed
mother passed away at the age of eighty. H. W.
Kerr was a carpenter by trade. From New York
State he moved with his family to Owen Sound,
Canada, and lived there the rest of his life.
John W. Kerr acquired his education in the public
schools of Owen Sound and earned his first money
there driving a butcher's cart. In 1884, at the age
of fifteen, he went to Winnipeg, Manitoba, clerked
in a grocery store about four years, and then found
employment during the construction of the Canadian
Pacific Railway at Rat Portage in Western Canada.
After some other experiences in the western
provinces Mr. Kerr came to Montana in 1892. For
several years he rode the range as a cowboy with
the S. T. Cattle Company, when that business was
owned by the firm of Sands & Taylor. Gradually
he accumulated the capital necessary for ranching
on his own account, and his progressive endeavors
have given him a fine holding in Teton County near
Farmington. He owns 1,280 acres, all of it irrigated
land, with a fine home and every convenience and
facility for modern stock raising. Mr. Kerr still
has a large number of horses and has been breeding
horses for a number of years. On account of the
widespread drought in Montana during 1919 he
sold in March of that year 600 head of promising
cattle for $90 apiece.
Mr. Kerr is affiliated with Choteau Lodge No. 44,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Choteau Chap-
ter, Royal Arch Masons, is a member of the Shrine,
Algeria Temple of Helena, and he and his wife
are both members of the Eastern Star. Politically
he is a democrat.
April 19, 1897, Mr. Kerr married Miss Jennie
Schmidt. She was born near Ford Creek, Mon-
tana, and is a daughter of the late Jacob Schmidt,
whose career as a Montana pioneer is recounted in
the following sketch.
Jacob Schmidt, who died in 1907, was one of the
earliest of Montana pioneers and was intimately
associated with many of the historic characters in
the settlement of the territory and state.
He was born near Heidelberg, Germany, August
8, 1832, and acquired a limited education, attending
a factory school in his home community for two
hours a day. He served a four years' apprentice-
ship at the tailor's trade, and worked his way across
the Atlantic, reaching New York City in 1853. A
few weeks later he was at St. Louis, and there he
embarked on a steamboat en route for Fort Benton,
then one of the few scattered outposts in the great
Northwest country, which as yet hardly had a name
except the vague description of "the Oregon coun-
try." Neither the territory of Idaho nor of Mon-
tana had yet been created. He reached Fort Benton
in the spring of 1854. He was probably the pioneer
tailor in Montana, and was employed by James
Dawson until 1863. In that year he located at Deer
Lodge and in the spring of 1864 opened a grocery
store at Silver City in Lewis and Clark County.
The county seat of Lewis and Clark County had its
official home in his store. This was due to the fact
that the late Col. W. F. Sanders as the chief official
of the county carried the county seat around with
him, and deposited the few books of record in Mr.
Schmidt's establishment. In 1865 Mr. Schmidt re-
moved to Helena and increased his store by the
addition of a bakery. A year later he built the Over-
land Hotel at Fort Benton, then returned to Silver
City, and in 1867 was at Old Mission near the pres-
ent location of the Ulm station on the Great North-
ern Railway. For two years he engaged in the
stock business there, and from 1869 until 1874 he
HISTORY OF MONTANA
had his ranch at St. Peter's Mission, twelve miles
from Cascade. His next home was at Haystack
Butte upon the south fork of the Sun River. Jacob
Schmidt laid the foundation of his prosperity as a
merchant, but his larger accumulations were through
his enterprise as a farmer and cattleman. He ac-
quired extensive ranching and property interest at
Choteau in Teton County, and with his patented
lands and leases was for a number of years one of
the dominant factors in that locality.
He was the esteemed friend of many prominent
pioneers and made his own influence and example
an element in the establishment of law and order
in the earlv territorv. He was a democrat in poli-
tics and affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and
at one time was a member of the Grand Lodge of
that order. „ . ■,
At Fort Benton on December 25, 1856, Jacob
Schmidt and Miss Margaret Miller were married
by Father Joseph. This was one of the earliest
marriages recorded in the Montana country. Mar-
garet Miller was a daughter of Jack Miller, a wideb
known pioneer of the West. Mrs. Margaret Schmidt
died in 1917, and at that time was one of the oldest
women pioneers of Montana. To their marriage
were born twelve children, four of whom are still
living: Julia, wife of Thomas Harris; Carroll, who
married Clara Huntesberger ; George, who married
Rose Uphman; and Mrs. John W. Kerr.
SoREN Nelson. Standing prominent among the
representative citizens of Butte is Soren Nelson,
president and general manager of the Motor & Tire
Sales Company, Incorporated, who began life on
his own account with less than two dollars in his
pockets, and has since by persevering industry, keen
foresight and wise investments accumulated a hand-
some property and gained a position of influence in
the business life of the city. A native of Iowa, he
was born, Mav 15. 1885, in Clinton, where the birth
of his father; Thomas Christian Nelson, occurred
in 18,18.
When he was a boy of four years the parents of
Thomas Christian Nelson went to Denmark, locating
in Aalborg in 1843, where he grew to man's estate
and was educated. Returning in 1861 to Clinton,
Iowa, he married, and was afterward engaged in
general farming for upwards of a quarter of a
century. Going back to Denmark in 1887 he con-
tinued his residence in Aalborg until his death in
1910. Active and prominent in civic and political
affairs, he served as sheriff of Clinton County, being
elected to the office on the democratic ticket, which
he invariably supported. He served as a soldier
in the war between Denmark and Prussia. He was
a member of the Danish Lutheran Church, and be-
longed to both the Ancient Free and Accepted Order
of Masons and to the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.
Thomas Christian Nelson married in Clinton,
Iowa, Ingar Marie Matson, who was born at Colling,
Denmark, in 1846, and now resides in .Aalborg, that
country. Ten children blessed their union, as fol-
lows : Ingar Marie, wife of Jens Christian Jensen,
a contractor and builder in Nurre Sundby, Den-
mark; Nels Peter, a farmer in the same town; Nels
Christian, also of Nurre Sundby, is a contractor
and farmer ; Jens, a general contractor of Seattle,
Washington; Maran Johanna, living in Denmark;
Soren, the special subject of this sketch; Christina,
residing in Denmark; Afrad Cilius, of Denmark, a
noted artist and musician; Nels, of Denmark, gen-
eral manager of the large estate of Count Schim-
melmen; and Arthur Henry, a very brilliant young
man, living in Denmark, where he has the general
management of the Government Experimental Agri-
cultural Station.
Educated in Denmark, Soren Nelson was gradu-
ated from the .Aalborg High School in 1902, and sub-
sequently traveled with his father throughout
Europe, more especially visiting the important cities
of Germany, France and Italy, where his father
sold high-bred, full-blooded stallions that he im-
ported from England and Belgium. Coming to the
United States in 1904. Mr. Nelson was engaged in
tilling the soil in Clinton, Iowa, for a year, and
having in that tim« become familiar with the English
language studied for three years under private
tutors, completing his early education. For two
summers thereafter he traveled in the interests of
the International Correspondence School of Scran-
ton, Pennsylvania, through Iowa, Minnesota and
North Dakota, during the winter seasons being asso-
ciated with the wholesale drug trade. Mr. Nelson
traveled all over South America and the Southern
Pacific Islands, making his living by trading. Com-
ing to Butte, Montana, in 1914, he became a clerk
for the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, and after
several promotions was made overseer of the top
work at the mines.
On June 2, 1917. having previously resigned his
position, Mr. Nelson enlisted as a private in the
Montana Administration Corps, and was sent to
Camp Dodge, Iowa. Proving himself faithful to
the duties there imposed upon him, he was promoted
through the different grades until made first lieu-
tenant, and was recommended for captaincy, but
the armistice was signed before he received his
captain's commission. Mustered out of service
December 9, IQ18. he returned to Butte, and subse-
quently organized the Motor & Tire Sales Com-
pany, which was incorporated February 15, 1919.
He served as secretary and treasurer of the com-
pany until August 15, 1919, when he was elected
president and general manager of the concern. This
company, with garage and offices at 123 South Mon-
tana Street, is carrying on a general garage busi-
ness, specializing in the Goodyear tires, and has the
state agency for the Kissel trucks and motoring
cars. This enterprising firm, of which Soren Nelson,
the subject of this sketch, is the president, general
manager and controlling stockholder, with E. H.
Nelson as vice president, secretary and treasurer,
has already built up one of the foremost industries
of the kind of western Montana, and in the tire
end of the business the largest in the entire state.
A man of great business intelligence and capacity,
Mr. Nelson is identified with various local enter-
prises. He leases the Stevens Block, at the corner
of Park and Montana Streets, a large business
block; the Dorothy Block, at the corner of Granite
and Wyoming Streets, one of the largest apartment
buildings in the city; and the Mueller Hotel, at 1002
South Montana Street, where he resides; and he
owns all of the furnishings in these different build-
ings. In his political relations Mr. Nelson is a
democrat, and religiously, true to the faith in
which he reared, he is a member of the Danish
Lutheran Church.
On November 26. 1917, Mr. Nelson married in
Helena, Montana, Mrs. Elizabeth (Hilker) Paxson,
daughter of Charles and Katlierine (Swanson
Hilker, and a graduate of the State Normal School
at Racine. Wisconsin. Her father, a brick manu-
facturer, is dead, and her widowed mother resides
in Butte. Mr. Nelson has a stepdaughter, Margaret
Paxson, born in June, 1906, a freshman in the Butte
High School and an especially brilliant scholar.
I
HISTORY OF MONTANA
487
Richard P. Hoenck. Much has been said in
these days of the necessity for backing in order that
a man succeed along any line. It is claimed by
some that unless a man has wealth or influence he
cannot hope to climb far up the ladder of fortune,
and yet many who have gained the topmost rung
were those who from early childhood were forced
to grapple unaided with life's problems, and mounted
through sheer tenacity of purpose and native ability.
To such men as these, commonly denominated self-
made, much credit is due, for beginning at the bot-
tom, each was but one in the throng crowding about
the ascent, and their progress from the first had to
he one of constant endeavor. Of course these men
had to possess more than average ability, and the
willingness to work and learn. Early discovering
their real bent in life, they developed themselves to
meet emergencies, and when the right opportunity
came, proved to be men for the work. Decidedly
belonging to this class is Richard P. Hoenck, ex-
ceedingly active in the furrier business of Butte.
Richard P. Hoenck was born at St. Paul, Min-
nesota, on October 27, 1885, a son of Edward
Hoenck, born in Germany in 1845. After receiving
a university education in Germany and Denmark,
Edward Hoenck came to the United States in young
manhood, and in the early '70s established himself
as a civil engineer at St. Paul, Minnesota, where
he spent the remainder of his life, although he died
at San Francisco, California, in 1910, while on a
visit. After he secured his citizenship papers he
became a republican, and continued to vote the
ticket of that party as long as he lived. Like other
Germans, he gave the required period of service in
the army and took part in the Franco-Prussian war,
immediately after its close coming to the United
States.
Richard P. Hoenck was reared at Saint Paul,
where he attended the public schools until he com-
pleted the grammar grades, which was when he was
fifteen years of age. He then began learning the
fur trade, and after serving his apprenticeship with
a St. Paul furrier he went to Fargo, North Da-
kota, and became a designer for his brother, who
was a member of the firm of Joseph & Hoenck,
furriers. Leaving this concern in 1915, Mr. Hoenck
came to Butte and worked for a Mr. Rauh, who
owned the furrier business at No. 206 North Main
Street, and on January 8, 1917, Mr. Hoenck bought
the business. 'This was the pioneer furrier estab-
lishment of Butte, and Mr. Hoenck is now the sole
owner of it. It is also one of the oldest concerns of
its kind in the state, but since taking charge of it
Mr. Hoenck has so expanded its volume that it is
now the largest in Montana. Mr. Hoenck special-
izes in the manufacture of fur garments, robes,
neckwear, mittens, men's beaver coats, fur rugs and
in fact everything that is made from fur. Some idea
of the expansion of the business may be had from
the fact that when Mr. Hoenck bought it only two
to three men were employed as assistants, while now
at least fifteen are required during the busy season.
In the near future Mr. Hoenck expects to cover not
only Montana with his salesmen, as he is now doing,
but also Wyoming and Idaho. Some of his trade
comes from Alaska, his fame as a furrier having
reached out that far, and people desiring expert
work on their furs send to him.
Mr. Hoenck is not married. He resides in the
Goldberg Block at the corner of North Dakota and
West Park streets. Fraternally he belongs to Butte
Lodge No. 2^0. Benevolent and Protective Or-
der of Elks, and socially he is a member of the
Rotary Club. His inclinations have not led him
into public life, in fact he has no liking for pub-
licity of any kind, but in his energetic, business
way, has accomplished more than many whose names
are brought into notice. He is generous in his sup-
port of worthy movements and causes, and ready
to lend aid to advance the welfare and promote the
prosperity of his city and state.
John K. Claxton has successfully established him-
self in the practice of law at Butte, coming to this
city and state from Kentucky, where his family has
lived for several generations and where he earned
his first honors as a lawyer.
Mr. Claxton was born at Louisville June 25, 1888.
His paternal ancestors were English and colonial
settlers in Virginia. His grandfather, David Harri-
son Claxton, was born at Carrollton, Kentucky, in
1821, and spent most of his life at Louisville, where
he died in 1904. For many years he operated a fleet
of boats towing and transporting lumber and ties
from the upper waters of the Ohio Valley to Louis-
ville and Memphis. He served as a Confederate in
the Civil War. He married Bettie Roar, who was
born at Covington, Kentucky, in 1836, and died at
Louisville in 1910. All of their children are now
deceased.
The father of the Butte lawyer was John Nicholas
Claxton, who was born in 1859 and died in 1906,
spending all his life in Louisville. He was for some
years extensively engaged in business as a railroad
tie contractor. He was a democrat, an active sup-
porter of the Methodist Church, and a Royal Arch
and Knight Templar Mason and Shriner. He mar-
ried Lydia Claxton, of the same family name but
not related. She was born at Bethlehem, Kentucky,
in 1866, and is now living at Pleasureville, a suburb
of Louisville.
John K. Claxton, the only child of his parents,
was educated in the Louisville public schools, gradu-
ating from high school in 1905. He then spent four
years in the old State College at Lexington, gradu-
ating with the A. B. degree in 1909. He is a mem-
ber of the Tau Theta Kappa college fraternity.
With his literary studies he also combined a course
in law and was admitted to the Kentucky bar No-
vember 15, 1910. After that he practiced steadily
at Louisville until 1917, and in January, 1918, be-
gan his professional career at Butte, where he has
offices in the Hennessy Building and has a large
general and criminal practice. Mr. Claxton is sec-
retary and general counsel for the Butte-Louisiana
Oil Company and is treasurer of the Butte Copper
Czar Mining Company.
He is a member of the Montana State Bar As-
sociation, the Silver Bow Club. Butte Country Club,
is a democrat, a Methodist, and aflftliated WMth Lodge
No. 410. Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons, at
Pleasureville, Kentucky, and Lodge No. 240 of the
Elks. He resides in the Mueller Apartments at 501
Granite Street.
September 9, 1919, at Seattle, Mr. Claxton mar-
ried Miss Margaret Driscoll, daughter of Dennis
and Mary (Taft) Driscoll. Her mother resides at
1118 Fifteenth Avenue, North, in Seattle. Her fa-
ther, who died at Butte, was one of the early pioneers
of Montana, locating in the vicinity of Butte about
1865. He was a mine operator, and also established
the first store at Walkerville, a suburb of Butte.
Mrs. Claxton is a highly educated woman, being a
graduate of Georgetown College at Washington,
District of Columbia, with the A. B. degree. She
is a member of the Sons and Daughters of the Mon-
tana Pioneers Association.
Claude Charles Huyck. Energetic, enterpris-
ing and progressive, Claude Charles Huyck, of Butte,
488
HISTORY OF MONTANA
has won a notevvortliy position among the substan-
tial business men of his community, being one of
the leading automobile dealers of western Montana.
A son of Charles Edward Huyck, he was born De-
cember 13, 1886. in Santa Cruz. California, and is
of honored Dutch descent, the founder of the Huyck
family of America having immigrated from Holland
to the United States in early colonial days, settling
in New York State. His grandfather. John Huyck,
born in 1830, was engaged in agricultural pursuits
during his active career. As a young man he lived
in New Jersey, and was there married. Subsequently
moving to Alabama, he bought a large plantation,
which he managed successfully many years. Re-
tiring from active labor, he lived with his son Charles
in both Florida and New York, spending his last
years, however, with a daughter in Kansas.
Born in 1857, in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Charles
Edward Huyck was there bred and educated. On
attaining his majority he joined in th€ pioneer rush
to the newly opened mines of Leadville, Colorado,
where he was soon employed as pumpman at the
Silver Star Mine. While there he married, and
about 1883 removed to Santa Cruz, California,
where he became a builder and contractor. Going
from there to Mobile, Alabama, he continued there
in the same business for eighteen months, and was
afterward similarly employed for another eighteen
months in Sanford, Florida. Continuing his resi-
dence in that state, he resided a short time in Saint
Petersburg, and then went to Jacksonville, arriving
in that city the very day it was destroyed by fire, a
calamity that furnished him with plenty of work,
as he took an active part in its upbuilding. Going
to New York State in 1901, he followed his trade
at Sea Cliff, Long Island, and was also hotel pro-
prietor until the fall of 1916, when he went to Wash-
ington, District of Columbia, to put up buildings for
the United States government. In January, 1919,
he returned to California, locating at Long Beach,
where he is still actively working at his trade of a
contractor and builder, his services being in great
demand.
Charles E. Huyck married in Leadville, Colorado,
Lelia Youngs, who was born in New Jersey in 1859,
and they have two children, Claude Charles, the spe-
cial subject of this sketch, and Orpha, wife of Harry
Hall, who is with the Standard Oil Company a't
Long Beach, California. Politically the fathe'r is
a stanch republican, and religiously he and his wife
are active members of the Baptist Church.
Obtaining the rudiments of his education in the
public schools of Santa Cruz, California, Claude C.
Huyck continued his studies in the schools of Ala-
bama, Florida and New York, completing his early
education at Sea Cliff, Long Island. Leaving school
at the age of eighteen years, he worked at the
trade of a carpenter with liis father, and also learned
cabinet making, making e.xcellent use of his native
mechanical talent and genius. Mr. Huyck devoted
much of his time for awhile in working on gasoline
boats, but turned his attention to automobiles when
they made their advent, and in 1907 owned his first
car, a one-cylinder Cadillac. He subsequently spent
two years in Florida, and in the spring of 1910
came to Butte, Montana, where he followed his
trade of a carpenter until June, 1917, when he be-
came an automobile salesman, working first for the
Silver Bow Motor Company, and later for the Butte
Automobile Company.
On September 20, 1918, Mr. Huyck organized the
Butte Second Hand Automobile Company, which he
has handled most successfully, and on January i,
1920, organized the Cleveland Motor Cars Company,
himself and wife constituting the company. This
wide-awake firm, with offices, display rooms and
service station at Nos. 43-45 East Galena Street,
handles both the Cleveland and Chandler automo-
biles, and is doing a lively business. Mrs. Huyck,
who is a high school graduate, and has received a
thorough commercial education, is accountant for
the firm, and attends to the advertising and book-
keeping and all inside work, while Mr. Huyck does
all of the buying and selling, his territory covering
Silver Bow, Beaverhead, Madison and Jefferson
counties.
Mr. Huyck married in August, 191 1, at Dillon,
Montana, Miss Mabel Laura Caldwell, a daughter
of Frank and Hannah (Thomas) Caldwell, of Dil-
lon, her father, a retired farmer, being owner of
a large farm in Post Oak, Missouri. Mr. and Mrs.
Huyck have two children, Mabel Scotta and Claude
Caldwell. Mr. Huyck is a straightforward republi-
can in politics, but has never been an office seeker.
He owns an attractive, modernly-built resident at
1232 West Granite Street, and within its hospitable
walls he and his wife gladly welcome their many
friends.
C. C. Covington. Both the Town of Augiista and
Lewis and Clark County owe C. C. Covington a
heavy debt because of his eflforts in their behalf,
and it is safe to say that in all future movements
looking to a betterment of existing conditions he
will be found in the front of the effective workers.
By profession he is a civil engineer, and he has
used his skill and ability in behalf of this region,
as well as his intelligence and public spirit. Mr.
Covington comes of two old American families. On
the paternal side his family came from England to
Georgia in' Colonial times, while on the maternal
side there was a representative on the historic May-
flower.
C. C. Covington was born at Beaver City, Utah,
on February 23, i86g, a son of C. C. Covington, Sr.,
who was born at Rockingham, North Carolina, in
1832, and died at Farmington, Utah, in 1904. Reared
at Rockingham, he naturally espoused the cause of
the South in the war between the two sections, and
enlisted in the Confederate army in 1861, and served
under General Price. With the close of the war he,
like so many others of southern sympathies, felt that
things were in too chaotic a condition for him to
settle down in his old home and so in 1865 he went
west to California and from there to Southern
Utah, where he was married, and located at Beaver
City. From then until 1880 he was actively engaged
in ranching and handling cattle. In the latter year
he went to Stewartville, DeKalb County, Missouri,
where with the assistance of his namesake son he
was engaged in farming, but sold his property after
a few years and returned to Utah, and lived in re-
tirement at Farmington until his death. In politics
he was a democrat.
The maiden name of the wife of C. C. Coving-
ton. Sr., was Ellen Perkins, and she survives her
husband, making her home at Stewartville, Mis-
souri. Their children were as follows: Sarali, who
married Richard Morton, now deceased; C. C Jr.,
whose name heads this review; Thomas A., who is
a contractor and builder of Oakland, California;
Caroline A., who married G. B. Christian, lives at
Augusta, Montana ; Laurence, who served in the
railroad corps during the World war, was overseas
for eighteen months, and in the front line trenches,
but, having returned home, is now engaged in rail-
roading at Oakland, California: and George Ed-
mund, residing at Augusta, Montana.
C. C. Covington, Jr., attended the private schools
of Beaver City, Utah, and the Beaver City Acad-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
emy, the public schools of DeKalb County, and com-
pleted his educational training in the University of
Missouri at Columbia, Missouri. Until he was
twenty years old Mr. Covington assisted his father
in agricultural labor, and he was engaged in teach-
ing school in DeKalb County for a period of six
years. In 1896 he came to Montana to locate per-
manently, although he had spent the summer of
1891 in the state and then returned to DeKalb
County for the ensuing five years. Upon locating at
-■Augusta Mr. Covington was the first educator of
the place, and was here engaged in teaching for five
years, and during all of this period was becoming
acquainted with the people and conditions. In 1898
he was appointed United States commissioner, and
as the duties of that office increased, in 1901 he
left the schoolroom and embarked in a real-estate
business, and was elected a justice of the peace. He
also became a notary public and was the only one
of Augusta. In 191 2 he resigned his office of United
States commissioner, as in the meanwhile, in 1910,
he had become elected commissioner of Lewis and
Clark County, taking office in January, 191 1, and
holding it for six years. During the last four years
in this office Mr. Covington was chairman of the
board. While he was on the board he inaugurated
and saw carried out some of the most far-sighted
policies with reference to obtaining for this region
suitable good roads, with the result that the county
has as good highways as any similar section iif the
state, and the people of Lewis and Clark have him
to thank for them.
In 1917 Mr. Covington went on his ranch eight
miles south of .\ugusta, which he still owns and on
which he raises hay, grain and stock. Mr. Covington
also owns a residence on Main Street, in which he
has his offices. For some years he has devoted him-
self to working at his profession of civil engineer-
ing, hiring his ranching done by others. The greater
part of the construction work in this part of the
coutity is done by him. In politics Mr. Covington is
a democrat. He belongs to Augusta Lodge No. 54,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of which he is
past master; to Dearborn Lodge No. 21, Indepen-
dent Order of Odd Fellows, of which he is past
grand; Augusta Camp No. 221, Woodmen of the
World ; and Augusta Camp No. 6136, Modern
Woodmen of .America.
On April 26, 1900, Mr. Covington was married at
Choteau, Montana, to Miss Minerva Carter, and
they became the parents of two children, namely:
Marian, who was born July 26, 1901, was graduated
from the Augusta High School as a member of the
first graduating class, and she is now teaching in
District No. 45. which is a large consolidated dis-
trict ; and Clay, who was born on November 29,
1910.
Mr. Covington has been chairman of the school
board of Augusta since 1901 and has been instru-
mental in building up the school system from a little
one-room schoolhouse to a large consolidated dis-
trict containing fifteen schools and a four-year
course high school. A $50,000 high school building
is soon to be constructed at Augusta, and in this
project, as in all of the other work of this class at
.Augusta and the county, Mr. Covington has been
the prime mover.
During the World war he and Mrs. Covington
took a very effective part in all of the local drives
and in Red Cross work, exerting themselves to the
limit to aid the administration in carrying out its
policies.
Mrs. Covington's father, Edwin Carter, is now a
resident of Letcher, South Dakota. He was born
in the State of New York in 1835, a son of Asa
Carter, also a native of New York, who died near
Streator, Illinois.' Asa Carter was a farmer in his
native state, but in 1853 he located in Illinois and
became a pioneer farmer near Streator. He mar-
ried Hannah Bramer, whose mother's maiden name
was Paris, and both were born in New York State.
Mrs. Hannah Carter died near Streator, Illinois.
Edwin Carter was reared on his father's farm
near Streator, Illinois, and was quite extensively
engaged there in farming, remaining in that vicin-
ity until 1874, when he moved to Iowa County, Iowa,
where he continued farming. In 1901 he went to
Sanborn County, South Dakota, and bought a farm
in the vicinity of Mitchell. Although he has retired
from his farm, he continues to live in Sanborn
County, as Letcher is located within its confines.
-Mthough a strong republican, Mr. Carter voted for
Woodrow Wilson for the presidency. He is a
member of the Christian Church.
The first wife of Edwin Carter was Sarah
Frances Turner, whom he married while living near
Streator, Illinois, and she died there, having borne
him the following children: Milton, now deceased;
.Adelaide, who married Benjamin F. Norris, a re-
tired minister of the Christian denomination, and
they live near Arlington, South Dakota; Esther
Maria, who married Wallace W. Moore, a farmer
of North English, Iowa ; Hannah Theressa, who
married Edgar B. Sears, a successful farmer and
stockman, formerly a pioneer of Montana, but now
living at Garden City, Kansas ; Asa Joseph, who
is a farmer of North English, Iowa; and Cynthia,
who is deceased.
.As his second wife Edwin Carter was married to
Elizabeth Abigail Norris, who was born in Decem-
ber, 1853, in Canada, and educated in Michigan, her
parents having moved to that state in 1862. By his
second marriage Mr. Carter had the following chil-
dren: Mrs. Covington,' who was the eldest born;
Bertha, who married Tillman Hathaway, a farmer
of Letcher, South Dakota; Jerome, who lives at
Omaha. Nebraska, is a violin maker ; Grace, who
married .Arthur Wertz, a farmer, resides at Bancroft,
South Dakota ; Edwin, who is a farmer of Letcher,
South Dakota; Fred, who is also a farmer of Letch-
er, South Dakota; Frank, who is a veteran of the
World war, served overseas as a member of the
aviation branch of the service for eighteen months,
is now engaged in farming at Letcher, South Da-
kota ; and Mark, also a farmer near Letcher, South
Dakota.
Mrs. Covington was born in Iowa County, Iowa,
and was educated in its public schools and the Iowa
City Academv. from which she was graduated in
1895. For the subsequent two years she taught
school in Iowa, and then in 1897 she came to Mon-
tana, and for two years was a teacher in the Au-
gusta school, and for one year at Cascade, Mon-
tana, when she was married.
In politics Mrs. Covington is a democrat, and
recognition of her services to the region was shown
in her appointment on March 18, 1912, as United
States commissioner, which office she still holds.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Covington are rightly numbered
among the most worthy and representative people
of the county. They have made their value felt in
many instances, and can always be depended upon
to contribute freely to all of the practical civic un-
dertakings of their community, but are not apt to
be carried away by those which will not guarantee
excellent returns to the taxpayers, and permanent
improvements of this locality.
Ch.\rles D. Mc.Aboy. While his youth was spent
largely on his father's extensive stock ranch in the
490
HISTORY OF MONTANA
State of Washington, Charles D. McAboy was not
inclined toward agriculture or livestock husbandry,
and as a youth began an apprenticeship at the plumb-
ing trade'. His experience and thirst for knowledge
in his special line have since carried him to prac-
tically everv state in the Union. For the past eight
years he has been a resident of Butte, and is now
proprietor of a plumbing and heating business of
large and prosperous proportions.
Mr. McAboy was born at Alexandria, Minnesota,
August 29. 1885. His paternal ancestors were Scotch
and were colonial settlers in Virginia. His grand-
father, William Mc.A.boy, was born in West Virginia
and spent many years as a merchant in Ohio, and
finally moved out to Alexandria, Minriesota, where
he died before the birth of his grandson Charles.
The father, Edgar McAboy, was born in Ohio in
1843, was reared in that state, and about 1867 moved
to Alexandria, Minnesota. He was one of the very
early settlers in that section of Minnesota, and after
his marriage he developed a large tract of land as
a farm. In 1897 he left Minnesota and went to
Seattle, Washington, buying a stock ranch forty
miles from that city. He gave his personal super-
vision to his stock interests there for twenty years,
but since 1917 has lived retired in the city of Seat-
tle. Since early youth Edgar McAboy has been a
very devout Presbyterian and regular worker in
that church. He is independent in politics. His
wife was Lucinda Strang, who was born in the
territory of Minnesota in 1854, her people having
pioneered in the northwest. To this marriage were
born six children : William E., born in 1877, a
rancher at Medford, Oregon ; Jessie, born in 1879,
is the wife of Henry Schaefer, who has a brick
manufacturing business at Seattle but lives at Sno-
homish in that state ; Frank, born in 1883, was an
auditor and accountant and died at Missoula. Mon-
tana, in 1915, at the age of thirty-two; Charles D.
is the fourth in the family ; Robert, born in 1890,
was a plumber and died at Butte at the age of
twenty-six ; Paul, born in 1895, is a stationary en-
gineer living at Snohomish, Washington.
Charles D. McAboy attended the district schools
of King County, Washington, and remained on his
father's ranch to the age of thirteen. After that
he spent several years as an apprentice plumber in
Seattle, and remained there as a journeyman until
1903. Partly to satisfy his desire for travel, but
more particularly to gain a complete knowledge of
all the systems and customs of the plumbing busi-
ness in different sections, he worked as a journey-
man in every state of the Union, and during that
time assisted in the installation of many large and
important contracts. After this varied and inter-
esting program Mr. McAboy came to Montana in
1912, locating in Butte, and continued work as a
journeyman until May i. 1918. .^t that date he
acquired from William Killeen the Plumbing Union
Plumbing and Heating Shop, and is now 'sole owner
of that establishment, located at 117 East Broadway,
.^n expert himself, Mr. Mc.^boy has surrounded
himself with men of skill and experience, and has
all the facilities for handling the largest class of
contracts in plumbing and heating.
During the World War Mr. McAboy gave much
of his time to patriotic causes, and assisted in every
way possible to promote the cause of the govern-
ment. He is a member of the Montana Loyalty
League, the Montana State Master Plumbers' As-
sociation, is a republican, and is affiliated in Masonry
with Summit Valley Lodge No. 123, Ancient Free
and -'\ccepted Masons, Deer Lodge Chapter No. 3,
Royal .^rch Masons, Zabud Council No. 2, Royal
and Select Masters, Montana Commandery No. 3,
Knights Templars, and Bagdad Temple of the
Mystic Shrine.
Mr. McAboy resides at 709 Colorado Street. In
191 1, at Virginia, Minnesota, he married Miss Myr-
tle Milligan, daughter of William and Mary (War-
ner) Milligan, now residents of Plentywood, Mon-
tana. Her father is proprietor of a grain elevator
there. Mrs. McAboy is a graduate of the high
school at Minneapolis, Minnesota. They had two
children, Charles William, who died in infancy, and
Louise Jessie, born November 5, IQ15.
Arthur Tolle, who learned telegraphy in the
office of the Northern Pacific Railway at Forsyth,
Montana, has for the past nine years been with
the Western Union Telegraph Company, and his
skill and ability have been rewarded by several im-
portant posts, including his present office as man-
ager for the company at Butte.
Mr. Tolle was born at Bernon in Marion County,
Illinois, May 17, 1878. The Tolle family is of Eng-
lish extraction, and were early settlers in Virginia.
Mr. Tolle's grandfather served as a soldier in the
Revolutionary War. His father was the late Rev.
C. J. T. Tolle, who gave the greater part of a long
life to the service of the Methodist ministry. He
was born near Lexington, Kentucky, in 1815, and as
a young man went to Illinois, where he was married.
He spent over fifteen years in the Methodist min-
istry. He filled pulpits at Vernon. Champaign, Ol-
ney, Salem and other points in Illinois, and was
also a builder and organizer of churches as a cir-
cuit rider. During the Civil War he was a volun-
teer religious worker, preaching and performing
other services in army camps. He died at Vernon,
Illinois, in 1890. He was a republican and a mem-
ber of the Masonic fraternity. He was three times
married. The only child of "his first wife is George
W. Tolle. a prominent Kansan. former county treas-
urer, and now an insurance adjuster at Eldorado,
Kansas. There were two children by the second
marriage. Kate and Lovey, both unmarried and liv-
ing at Topeka. Rev. Mr. Tolle married for his
third wife Mary Brown, who was born in Macoupin
County, Illinois, in 1834, and is now living at Riley,
Kansas, at the age of eighty-six. She was the
mother of four children, Arthur being the third.
May, the oldest, is the wife of I. H. Wilton, a sales-
man and real estate man at Salt Lake City. Faye
is the wife of Henry Oglesby, an Illinois farmer
near Patoka. Emily is the wife of Rev. C. 'H.
Gerkin, a Methodist minister, living at Riley, Kansas.
Arthur Tolle received his first educational ad-
vantages in the public schools of Vernon. Illinois,
and attended the high school at Patoka in that state
through his junior year. On leaving school at the
age of eighteen he worked on the home farm two
and a half years, and for a similar period was an
apprentice in the carpenter and repair shops of the
Illinois Steel Works in Chicago. His experience
in the northwest began in 1900, when he spent
several months on a ranch at Fargo, North Dakota.
.'\fter that he was employed in a restaurant at
Fargo until March i. 1901. which was the date he
located at Forsyth, Montana, and became a call boy
for the Northern Pacific Railway. While perform-
ing those duties he learned telegraphy, and after
a year and a half was made operator at Forsyth.
He remained there until 1907, and then became oper-
ator with the Oregon Short Line Railway at Mont-
pelier, Idaho, and two and a half years later was
promoted to ticket agent for the same road at Boise,
Idaho.
Mr. Tolle entered the service of the Western
Union Telegraph Company in 191 1 as manager at
HISTORY OF MONTANA
491
Anaconda, Montana. He was transferred as man-
ager to Wallace, Idaho, in 1913, and in 1915 was
sent to Kansas City, Missouri, and made traffic
supervisor. He returned to Montana in 1916 as
manager of the company's business at Billings, and
since the spring of 1919 has had the management of
the important office at Butte. His office and operat-
ing rooms are at 16 East Broadway. Mr. ToUe has
under his supervision seventy employes, and is not
only a skillful telegrapher but a thorough business
man and executive.
In Butte he is member of the Rotary Club, is on
the official board of the Methodist Episcopal Church
and politically casts his ballot independently. His
home is at 722 West Granite Street, and he also
owns a dwelling at Boise, Idaho. July 3, 1906, at
Oxford, Wisconsin, Mr. Tolle married Miss Willie
M. Smith, daughter of George B. and Hannah
(Williams) Smith. Her mother resides at El Reno,
Oklahoma. Her father, who died in the spring of
1919, at El Reno, was a retired lumber manufac-
turer.
Arthur C. Jones, M. D. A graduate in medicine
from the University of Michigan, Doctor Jones has
devoted much of his time since then to research study
and training in special lines of practice, and in Butte
and over the state is widely known for his success-
ful work in handling diseases of the eye, ear, nose
and throat.
Doctor Jones is of Welsh ancestry and was born at
Shamrock, Nevada, June 26, 1887. His father, Mar-
vin P. Jones, was born in Kentucky in 1855 but has
spent nearly all his life in the great West. He was
reared in California and Nevada, was married at
Austin at the latter state, and was a pioneer miner,
stockman and rancher in that vicinity. Subsequently
he was proprietor of a hotel at Shamrock, and in
1891 he drove a flock of sheep to Belmont, Mon-
tana. On or adjacent to his ranch he established a
postoffice, and was the incumbent of that office
for twelve years. In 1903 he removed to Chinook,
Montana, where he continued his interests as a stock
raiser, and also owned a livery stable and a general
store. Since 1908 his home has been at Malta, Mon-
tana, where he is still active as a farmer and cattle
man. He is a republican and a member of the
Masonic fraternity. Marvin P. Jones married Miss
Katy Riley, who was born in California in 1864.
She died at Chinook, Montana, in 1908. Dr. Arthur
is the oldest of their three children. Grace is the
wife of Dr. Charles E. Blankenhorn, a physician
and surgeon at Butte. Cathlyne is unmarried and
lives with her brother Doctor Jones.
The latter attended the public schools of Chinook,
Montana, and has spent nearly all his life in this
state. After completing the high school course there
he entered the Shattuck Military Academy at Fari-
bault, Minnesota, graduating in 1908. From there
he entered medical school of the University of
Michigan, and received his M. D. degree in 1912.
He is a member of the Phi Rho Sigma college fra-
ternity. After graduating he spent a year- in the
Murray Hospital at Butte, and for nine months in
1913 was assistant to Dr. H. M. Cunningham, a
prominent specialist in the eye, ear, nose and throat at
Marquette, Michigan. Doctor Jones then went abroad,
remained in London three months and another three
months at Vienna, where he continued his special
studies in the eye, ear, nose and throat. Doctor Jones
returned to Butte in 1915, and for the past five years
has confined his work to his special lines. During
1918, however, he was with the Mayo Brothers at
Rochester, Minnesota, in the Division of Plastic
Surgery and Radium, and has since added those to
his special lines of work. His offices are in the
Silver Bow Club Building, and he is secretary of
the Silver Bow County Medical Society and also a
member of the State and American Medical associ-
ations.
Doctor Jones is a republican, a member of the
Episcopal Church, is affiliated with Silver Bow Lodge
No. 48, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Butte
Lodge No. 240, Benevolent Protective Order of
Elks, and is a member of the Silver Bow Club
and the Rotary Club of Butte and the Butte Coun-
try Club. His modern home is at 1161 West Plati-
num Street. He married at Butte in 1914 Miss Lois
C. Gunn, daughter of Dr. J. W. and Jessie (Clayton)
Gunn, of Butte. Her father is a well known Butte
physician. Mrs. Jones completed her education in
the National Park Seminary at Washington, D. C.
To their marriage were born three children : Lois,
born October 18, 1914; Arthur C, born April 5.
1916; and Barbara Evlyn, born in January, 1918.
Edward Irving McDole. Possessing much native
business ability and judgment, and inheriting in a
marked degree the habits of industry and thrift
characteristic of a long line of Scotch ancestors.
Edward Irving McDole, manager of the New Method
Laundry Company, is actively identified with one of
the more useful industrial enterprises of the city,
and one of the most extensively patronized. A son
of Henry McDole, he was born July 23, 1888, in
Jefferson City, Missouri, but was brought up and
educated in Butte.
Henry McDole was born in Springfield, Missouri,
in 1854, and during his earlier life was engaged in
agricultural pursuits in his native state, having car-
ried on general farming in Springfield, Jefferson
City, and in other near-by places, in the meantime,
however, having learned the blacksmith's trade. In
1892, seized by the wanderlust, he migrated to Walla
Walla, Washington, where he followed his trade
for a year, the following two years being similarly
employed at Deer Lodge. Montana. Coming with
his family to Butte in 1895, he established the first
smithy in the place, locating here where blacksmith-
ing was in great demand, and during the next few-
years built up a substantial patronage. In 1904 he
rernoved to Dayton, Washington, where he is still
actively and prosperously following his chosen oc-
cupation. He is a straightforward democrat in
politics, and a worthy member of the Baptist Church,
of which he is a liberal supporter. He is of honored
Scotch ancestry, the McDole family having origi-
nated in Scotland, from whence the founder of the
McDole family in America came to the United
States in colonial days, settling in Virginia.
Henry McDole married Marthe Ann Kelso, who
was born in Missouri in 1855, a daughter of William
and Sally (Turner) Kelso, the former, a pioneer
farmer of Missouri, having been born in Virginia
in 1812, and having died in Nevada, Missouri, in
1899, while the latter was a native of Kentucky.
Three children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Henry
McDole, as follows ; James W., a time keeper at
the West Colusa Mine, died in Butte when but
twenty-one years of age; Edward Irving, the special
subject of this sketch; and Roy Goldwin, living at
Los Angeles, California.
After his graduation in 1906 from the Butte High
School, Edward Irving McDole was for five years
associated with the Yegen Brothers Bank, being first
employed as a clerk and later as bookkeeper. From
191 1 until 1912 he worked for the Standard Oil
Company in Butte, and during the next three years
was in the employ of the Newbro Drug Company.
Accepting the position of bookkeeper for the New
492
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Method Laundry Company in 1916, Mr. McDoIe
has continued with the firm until the present time,
since October i, 1918, having had entire manage-
ment of the concern, which is one of the largest and
most prosperous of its kind in the whole state of
Montana. The plant and offices of this laundry
are located at the corner of Silver and Wyoming
streets, and under the able supervision of Mr. Mc-
DoIe is doing an extensive and well-paying busmess,
its 100 employes being kept busy during every work-
ing hour. Its officers are men of enterprise and
good business judgment, being as follows: James
T. Finien. president; John J. Burke, vice president;
John E. Corette, secretary and treasurer; and Ed-
ward I. McDole, manager.
Mr. McDole married, November 30, 1918, Miss
Virginia Rand, who was born, bred and educated in
Butte, and now presides with ease and generous
hospitality over their pleasant home at 2939 Keokuk
Street. Politically Mr. McDole is a democrat, and
religiously he and his wife are consistent members
of the Baptist Church.
.^BRAM Lincoln Bradley. The Oilman State
Bank has as its presiding official one of the most
constructive citizens of the Sun River Valley,
Abram Lincoln Bradley, a man to whose efficient
efiforts is due practically all of the development of
this region. He has participated, usually as a
leader, in every movement inaugurated for the pur-
pose of bringing about much-needed improvements,
and his name is known all over this part of Mon-
tana.
The birth of Abram Lincoln Bradley took place
on a farm in the Province of Ontario, Canada, on
May IS, 1865, and he is a son of Thomas and Per-
meiia Bradley, and grandson of Thomas Bradley,
the latter of whom was born in England, and there
died before his grandson was born, having spent
his life in his native land. The Bradley family is
one of the old ones of England, and on his mother's
side .Abram Lincoln Bradley also came of good, old
English stock.
Thomas Bradley, father of Abram Lincoln Brad-
ley, was born near Sheffield, England, in 181 1, and
he died in the Province of Canada in 1869. About
1831, being then of age, Thomas Bradley left his
native land for Canada, locating on a farm ni the
Province of Ontario, where he spent the remainder
of his life. He was very active in his support of
the Methodist Episcopal Church of his neighbor-
hood, to which he belonged. Thomas Bradley mar-
ried Permelia Halsted, born in Ontario in 1815,
where her life was spent, and where she died in
1900. Her parents came to Ontario at an early
day. Thomas Bradley and his wife had thirteen
children, of whom Abram Lincoln was the young-
est born.
Abram Lincoln Bradley was reared in the
Province of Ontario, attended its schools, and was
graduated from the high school of Bowmanville,
Ontario, Canada, in 1882. His business career was
begun as a messenger boy in the Merchants Bank
of Saint Thomas, Ontario, Canada, and he was pro-
moted through several grades during the two and
one-half years he remained with this institution.
Mr. Bradley then came to the United States and
took up a homestead in the vicinity of Langdon,
North Dakota, and lived on his claim until 1894,
when he went into Langdon and for six years was
connected as bookkeeper with a large implement
house of that city, and for ten years was in the
same capacity at Cando, North Dakota.
In igio Mr. Bradley came to Montana and estab-
lished the Augusta State Bank, of which he was
president. In 1913, when the railroad was built
through this section, it was terminated two miles
from Augusta, and a station was built and named
Oilman. With the consequent moving to Oilman
of many of the residents of Augusta, and the trans-
feral of business to the new community, it was
deemed expedient to move the bank to Oilman, and
the name was changed to the Oilman State Bank, _
Mr. Bradley continuing, however, as its president.
Mr. Bradley's associates in the bank are E. B.
Boone; vice president, and C. W. Terwell, cashier.
This bank has a capital of $25,000,. a surplus of
$8,000, and its deposits are about $250,000. The
bank is conveniently located on Main Street.
Well known as a Mason, Mr. Bradley belongs to
Cascade Lodge No. 34, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons of Oreat Falls, Montana; Helena Con-
sistory, Scottish Rite No. 3, in which he has been
made a Thirty-second Degree Mason, and Algeria
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mys-
tic Shrine of Helena, Montana. He is also a mem-
ber of the State Bankers Association and the
.'\merican Bankers' Association. The Bradley resi-
dence is located on Montana Street, and is owned
by Mr. Bradley, and he owns other realty at Oil-
man and ranches in North Dakota and Montana.
In December, 1913, Mr. Bradley was married at
Great Falls, Montana, to Mrs. Allie L. (Treadwell)
Dawson, a daughter of William and Lucinda A.
Treadwell, an old English family. Mrs. Bradley is
the mother of Elmer E. Dawson, auditor at the
Commercial National Bank, Oreat Falls, Montana.
Mrs. Bradley is a graduate of the normal college at
Ann Arbor, Michigan. Mr. and Mrs. Bradley have
no children.
.'\s president of the Oilman State Bank Mr. Brad-
ley has been largely instrumental in developing tfie
Sun River Valley and has interested outside capital
in several of the projects. During the World war
Mr. Bradley was very active, serving as chairman of
the Liberty Loan drives of his district, putting all
of them over the top, and received two Honor Flags
which he generously declares belong to the com-
munity.' In addition to the above work Mr. Bradley
assisted the Red Cross and other organizations in
their various drives, and in every way did all in his
power to aid the administration in carrying out its-
policies.
John Brimacombe. As proprietor of the Butte
Window Olass Works, John A. Brimacombe is iden-
tified with one of the foremost industries of the
kind in the state, and is widely and favorably known
throughout the community as a man of honor and'
integrity, eminently worthy of the high respect in
which he is held. A native of Michigan, he was
born February 11, 1877, in Marquette, of English
lineage on the parental side of the house.
William Brimacombe, his father, was born at
Tavistock, Devonshire, England, in 1830, where he
but conditions in this country failing to reach his
high expectations he returned to his native, land, and
continued there at his trade a number of years. In
1873, being again seized by the wanderlust, he came
to America, locating in Marquette, Michigan, where
he worked for four years as a contractor and
builder, being a pioneer in that line of work. Mov-
ing to Houghton, Michigan, in 1877, he continued in-
his special work in that city until his death in 1892.
He was a stanch republican in politics, and a mem-
ber of the Ancient Free and Accepted Order of
Masons. He was twice married. His second wife,
whose maiden name was Sarah Coyle, was borrf in-
1857 in Michigan, and is now a resident of Hough-
ton, that state. Six children were born of their
.^/^.
■<:^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
493
union, as follows : Richard, of Butte, is engaged in
the real estate business, being associated with the
firm of Wall & Jackman Company, Incorporated ;
Margaret, wife of A. M. Edyvean. agent for the
Standard Oil Company at Marquette, Michigan ;
John, the special subject of this sketch; Ada, wife
of S. P. Penberthy, of Houghton, Michigan, 'book-
keeper for the Copper Range Smelting Company;
Charlotte, wife of Dr. C. F. Ferris, a dentist at
Houghton, Michigan, and at the present writing
mayor of the city; and Jennie, wife of E. L. Hawsie,
agent for the Ingersoll-Rand Company at Hough-
ton, Michigan.
Leaving the public schools of Houghton when a
lad of but thirteen years, John Brimacombe began
life as a wage earner at the Michigan College of
Mines, for three years serving as mail carrier, jani-
tor and as a general all round worker. During the
next two years he was a clerk in the office of the
Dialuth, South Shore & Atlantic Railway, and sub-
sequently followed the trade of a carpenter and
builder in Houghton until coming to Butte in 1901.
Mr. Brimacombe continued at that trade in Butte
until 1914, erecting many prominent residences and
public buildings, and still works at it to some extent.
In 1914 he purchased the Butte Glass Works, es-
tablished in 1899, being the first of its kind in this
vicinity, and is carrj'ing on an extensive and lucra-
tive wholesale and retail business, dealing in window
glass, plate glass, mirrors, and all other kinds of
glass, his plants and offices being situated at 344
South Main Street.
Mr. Brimacombe married in 1907, at Superior,
Wisconsin, Miss Clara L. Wyckoff, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. J. W. WyckofT," of Houghton, Michi-
gan. Her father is county agent, and a veteran of
the Civil war. Her mother is not living, her death
having occurred when she was a comparatively young
woman. Mr. and Mrs. Brimacombe have one child,
Jean Caroline, born October 29, 1913. They have a
pleasant, modernly-built residence at 1019 Diamond
Street. Politically Mr. Brimacombe is a republican,
and fraternally he is a thirty-second degree Mason,
being a member of Butte Lodge No. 22, Ancient
Free and Accepted Order of Masons, of Butte
Consistory, and of Bagdad Temple, Ancient Arabic
Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.
Garfield B. Perier has been a resident of Butte
thirty-five years, was educated in this city, and for
a number of years was connected with the Rocky
Mountain Telephone Company, but is now secre-
tary and treasurer of the Montana Electric Com-
pany, a wholesale house dealing in electrical sup-
plies. Mr. Perier, who is of Canadian French and
Huguenot ancestry, was born at Aurora in Esmer-
alda County, Nevada, June 26, 1882. His father,
Desire Perier, was born at Chambly. Quebec. Can-
ada, June 13, 1845. and at the age of sixteen left
his native town and came to the United States. By
way of Panama he went to California, became a
miner at Port Wine, and in 1874 joined the rush to
Nevada after the discovery of the Comstock Lode.
He did mining there, for a time was connecte'd with
the Belcher mine at Aurora, and in the winter of
1882 returned to California and was employed by
the Syndicate Mines at Bodie. At the panic of 1884
he removed to Walla Walla, Washington, spending
a year on a ranch, and on October 5, 1885, came to
Butte. For nine years he was employed by the
Colorado Smelting & Mining Company, and in 1894,
when his health failed, he retired and died at Butte
October 24, 1898. He was a Mason, having taken
his first degrees in that order in California in 1870.
He was also an ardent republican. Desire Perier
married Delema Barsalou, who is still living at
Butte. She was born in Chambly, Quebec, January
20, 1855, and her first husband was Joseph Lefevre.
By that union she has a daughter, Cora Helen, who
is unmarried and lives with her mother.
Garfield B. Perier was the only child of his father.
His father though he had to depend upon himself
for his education by reading and associations with
business, became well informed, and was always re-
garded as a man of superior intellect and good judg-
ment.
Garfield B. Perier Attended the public schools of
Butte, finishing his sophomore year in the high
school, and in 1900 graduated from the high school
of Berkeley, California. He immediately returned
to Butte, had a brief experience in newspaper work,
and then for a time studied mining engineering.
•Eventually he got into the telephone business, and
from January, 1901, until the winter of 1904 was
chief clerk and assistant manager of the Rocky
Mountain Bell Telephone Company. He was then
made traveling auditor of the company, and covered
the Montana, Idaho and Utah division until 1907.
He resigned from the telephone company to become
secretary and treasurer of the Montana Electric
Company, now one of the leading houses of its kind
in the Northwest. His offices are in the Montana
Electric Company's Building at 50 East Broadway.
Mr. Perier is also vice president and director of
the Montana Mattress and Furniture Company of
Butte, is secretary, treasurer and director of the
Union Electric Company of Dillon, and secretary,
treasurer and director of the Washington Electric
Supply Company of Spokane.
Mr. Perier is one of Montana's most prominent
Masons. For the past thirteen years he has been
secretary of Butte Consistory No. 2 of the Scottish
Rite and on February 7, 1920, the thirty-third degree.
Inspector General Honorary, in that rite was con-
ferred upon him. He was secretary in 1904-05 of
Silverbow Lodge No. 48, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, is a member of Deer Lodge Chapter
No. 3, Royal Arch Masons, was recorder in 1904-05
of Montana Commandery No. 3, Knights Templars,
and is a member of Bagdad Temple of the Mystic
Shrine.
Mr. Perier and family reside in a modern home
at 804 Diamond Street. He married at Helena,
June 18, 1909, Mae Hildahl, who was born October
31, 1882, at Austin, Minnesota, the eldest daughter
of George S. and Amelia Petters Hildahl.
Mrs. Nellie (Bright) Sm.\ll, county superin-
tendent of schools at Butte, is a veteran educator
and during the life of her husband came to Mon-
tana and has been prominently identified with many
educational, civic and other organizations, especially
those in which the interest and advancement of
women are concerned.
Mrs. Small was born in Shullsburg, Wisconsin,
July 24, 1871, and the following year her parents
moved to Marquette County, Michigan. She was
educated in the public schools of Michigamme in
that county, graduating from high school in 1887.
The following two years she taught at Humboldt
and Michigamme, and then entered the Big Rapids
Training School, or, as it is better known, the Fer-
ris Institute at Big Rapids. Michigan, then, as now,
under the direction of W. N. Ferris, who is not
only a prominent educator, but served two terms
as governor of Michigan. Mrs. Small was gradu-
ated from the Ferris Institute in 1891, and the fol-
lowing eight years continued her work as a teacher
in Marquette County.
August 16, 1899, at Ishpeming, Michigan, she became
494
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the wife of Mr. P. F. Small. Mr. Small, a native of
the Province of Quebec, Canada, spent his early life
in Michigan, where he received his education, and for
several years was city clerk and recorder of Ish-
peming. " In August, 1906, Mr. and Mrs. Small re-
moved to Butte, where he was in the service of the
Hennessv Mercantile Company as a stationary en-
gineer. He died May 24, IQU- He was prominent
in democratic politics, serving as a member of the
County Central Committee of Marquette County,
Michigan, fourteen years. He was a Catholic, and
was affiliated with the Ancient Order of Hibernians
and the Locomotive Firemen's Order.
Mrs. Small has a family of four interesting chil-
dren: Francis, the oldest, born May 22, 1900, is a
senior in the Central High School; Catherine, born
November 10, 1901, graduated from the Butte High
School in 1919, and is now in her first year at the ,
Montana State University at Missoula; Helen, born
January 21, 1904. is a sophomore in the Butte High
School, while Margaret, born July 8, 1910, is in the
fiith grade of the Emerson School.
Mrs. Small, soon after the death of her husband
in 1913, in order to provide for her children's con-
tinued education, resumed teaching, and for several
years was in the Emerson School at Butte. She
was elected county superintendent of schools of
Silver Bow County in November, 1918, on the
democratic ticket, for a term of two years. Her
responsibilities now include the supervision of twen-
ty-two schools in the county and a staff of twenty-
two teachers.
Mrs. Small iS a member of St. John the Evan-
gelist Church at Butte. Besides her official work,
her numerous interests are indicated by her mem-
bership in the Desierie Branch of the L. C. B. A.,
as financial secretary of the W. C. O. F., as member
of the Marion White Arts and Crafts Club, the
Emerson Parent-Teachers Circle, Friends of Irish
Freedom, Woman's Relief Corps, Ladies of the
Grand Army, Ladies Auxiliary A. O. H., the Na-
tional Education Association, the National Admin-
trative Council of Women, the Montana State
Teachers Association, the Administrative Council of
AVomen of Montana and is also treasurer of the Sil-
ver Bow County Teachers Association. Mrs. Small
owns a modern home at 1924 Garrison Avenue.
Her father was Matthew Bright and her grand-
father also bore the name of Matthew. Her grand-
father was born at Grampian Hills, England, and
was directly related to the great statesman and
economist John Bright. Matthew Bright, Sr., brought
his family to America and became a pioneer in
Shullsburg, Wisconsin, where he was a farmer and
liveryman. He died at Shullsburg in 1848, the same
year that Wisconsin was admitted to the Union.
His wife was Catherine Richardson, a native of
Scotland, who died at Shullsburg in 1883. Matthew
Bright, jr., who was born at Shullsburg in 1848,
the same year his father died, grew up there on a
farm and in 1872 moved to Michigamme, where he
followed the trades of carpenter and builder until
his death on March 21, 1881, when his daughter
Mrs. Small was only ten years of age. In 1864,
at the age of seventeen, he enlisted in the 46th Wis-
consin Infantry, in Company G. and was a Union
soldier until the close of the war.' Afterward he
was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic
and was affiliated with the Episcopal Church.
Matthew Bright married Delia Morrissey, who was
born in County Waterford, Ireland, in 1853, and
died at Ishpeming, Michigan, January 24, 1901. Her
parents were Michael and Mary Grace (Houlihan)
Morrissey, the latter born in County Waterford in
1828 and died at Michigamme in 1898. Michael
Morrissey, who died at Michigamme March i, 1891,
came to the United States in 1856, and worked in
the lead mines around Shullsburg, Wisconsin, for
many years.
Mrs. Small is the oldest of four children. Her
sister Katherine is the wife of Herbert Adams, chief
auditor of the Cleveland Cliffs Mining Company at
Ishpeming, Michigan. The next sister, Adelia, is
the wife of E. Howard Dea, a construction engineer
for the Shevlin Clark's interests and a resident of
Minneapolis. Her only brother, Matthew, is an at-
torney at law at Los Angeles, California.
John E. Hample. While gold and silver brought
the first wave of settlement to Montana in the early
sixties, from a much earlier time the mountains and
valleys and the wilderness had been supplying some
considerable quantity of commercial product in the
form of furs and skins. The earliest emissaries of
trade to visit Montana were representatives of the
great fur companies doing business in the Rocky
Mountain region. About the time the buffalo and
other fur-bearing animals were beginning to disap-
pear, the vacant ranges were being filled up with
sheep, until in time Montana became the banner
sheep and wool state of the Union.
These facts are briefly noted to indicate the in-
teresting historical connection John E. Hample, of
Butte, has with the commerce and industry of Mon-
tana. In the early stages of wool production in
Montana there was little commercial organization
in collecting and marketing the clip. Mr. Hample
was probably the first outright wool buyer represent-
ing an eastern house to come personally to Mon-
tana and deal directly with the producers and local
wool merchants and market exchanges. In those
years he bought hides and furs as well as wool,
and for nearly forty years has been operating over
this northwest country, and for the greater part of
that time has been in active business in Montana.
Mr. Hample was born near Gothenburg, Sweden,
October 13, 1854. His grandfather was a native of
Germany, and was a soldier through the Napoleonic
wars. Later he moved to Sweden, where he died.
The father, Carl August Hample, was born at Dres-
den, Saxony, Germany, in 1829, and from the age
of eighteen lived near Gothenburg, Sweden, where
he became extensively interested in cattle and sheep
raising. In 1882 he came to the United States and
continued his business as a rancher and stock man
in the locality where the town of Oaks, North Da-
kota, has since grown up. He died at Oaks in 1909.
He was then eighty years of age. After coming to
America he voted as a republican, and was a mem-
ber of the Lutheran Church. He married Chris-
tina Jennings, who was born in Sweden and died
in 1905, at the age of eighty. Of their children
Louise lives at Stockholm, Sweden ; John E. is the
second; Gustavus is a farmer at Oaks, North Da-
kota; and Hannah is unmarried, lives at Minne-
apolis, and owns the old homestead in North Da-
kota.
John E. Hample was reared in Sweden, attended
a military school until his fifteenth year, and then
in 1869 came to the United States. For several
years his home was at Rockford, Illinois, where he
acquired his English education, graduating from the
high school of that city. While there he also gained
his first knowledge of the hide and wool business,
and in 1875 he entered the service of Oberne &
Hosick, an extensive hide and wool house of Chi-
cago, and remained in their service ten years, ac-
quiring a thorough knowledge of the business and
by 1879 was traveling on the road as their repre-
sentative for the buying of hides, furs, robes and
^^^£j4vi/y>^ruut^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
495
similar goods. In this capacity he made his first
visit to Montana in 1879, his headquarters being at
Miles City. .\t that time there were still great
quantities of buffalo hides on the market, and he
bought these furs as well as wool. From Miles
City he traveled all over the territory, and came in
close touch with the sheep men, Indian traders and
trappers of that time. In 1881 he opened a branch
house for Oberne & Hosick at Fargo, North Da-
kota, and a similar house at Winnipeg, Canada.
Mr. Hample returned to Montana in 1884 and es-
tablished his headquarters at Helena.
On leaving the house of Oberne & Hosick in
1886, Mr. Hample formed a partnership with A. J.
Davidson, and for ten years they conducted an in-
dependent business as buyers and dealers in hides
and wool at Helena. On retiring from this firm in
1896 Mr. Hample came to Butte, and this city has
since been his home and business headquarters. As
an individual dealer he has the largest business of
its kind in the State of Montana. His offices are
at the Butte Hotel, 13 East Broadway, and he owns
extensive warehouses in South Butte. A few years
ago it was stated that Mr. Hample handled fully
three-fourths of the hides and pelts sent out of
Montana, and for a long period of years supplied
the Jeremiah Williams Company of Boston with a
large part of the wool they received from Mon-
tana. A year's business frequently averaged fifty
thousand hides and several million pounds of wool.
Mr. Hample bought and shipped wool out of Bill-
ings by rail in 1882, and soon afterward sent a ship-
ment from Big Timber. He was the first to market
any quantity of wool and hides from those two
cities. For a number of years he was also produc-
ing sheep and wool on a large scale as owner and
operator of a sheep ranch at Twin Bridges and
Melrose. He is president of the Montana Butcher-
ing Company, which has a plant three and a half
miles south of Butte, and at one time was finan-
cially interested in a large packing house at Spokane.
Mr. Hample is also a banker, having founded and
since the opening of the bank on September I, 1918,
has been president of the South Side Bank. This
bank is at Harrison .\venue and George Street, and
has a capital of $50,000 and surplus and profits of
$15,000. The other ofticers are Albert Rochester,
vice president; Mr. Poindexter, cashier; and his
son, John M. Hample, assistant cashier.
Mr. Hample maintains a branch hide and wool
house at Helena, with H. E. Bower as manager.
He owns a modern home at 211 South Jackson
Street in Butte, and for many years has been re-
garded as one of the most substantial business men
and civic leaders of this city. He is a democrat
and a Presbyterian, and is affiliated with the Wood-
men of the World.
July 4. 1890, at Portland, Oregon, he married Miss
Minnie La Mott, a native of Iowa. Three children
were born to their marriage, but the only daughter.
Louise, died when about five years of age. Both
sons were soldiers in the World war. Edwin Por-
ter, born at Helena June 16, 1894, was educated in
a Philadelphia preparatory school and finished his
sophomore year in the University of New York,
and in May, 1917, enlisted m the army. He was
sent to Honolulu and served as a private until mus-
tered out in September, 1919. John Milton, the
younger son, born January 30, 1896, was educated
in the Butte High School and enlisted in August,
1917, while attending the University of California
at Berkeley. He was a private in an infantry regi-
ment sent across the Pacific to Tientsin, China. He
was mustered out in .August, 1919, and is now at
home and assistant cashier of the South Side Bank.
Vol. 11—32
Harry J. Skinner, a well known Montana
banker, has been a resident of the state over thirty
years, and from the time he came here until re-
cently had extensive banking interests at Great
Falls.
Mr. Skinner was born at Grand Rapids, Michi-
gan, April 4, 1866, second of the three children of
Adolphus and Lucinda A. (Provin) Skinner, the
former a native of New York State and the latter
of Michigan. His father, who died in 1895, was in
the real estate and loan business for many years at
Grand Rapids.^ For several terms he was register
of deeds of Kent County, Michigan, was a dem-
ocrat in politics and a member of the Masonic fra-
ternity.
Harry J. Skinner grew up and received his edu-
cation at Grand Rapids, and was twenty-one years
of age when he came to Great Falls in 1887. He
went to work for the First National Bank, was with
that institution many years, and has a broad and
fundamental knowledge of financial affairs in the
state. In 1907 he and his brother Mark organized
the Commercial National Bank of Great Falls. Mr.
Harry J. Skinner was president of this institution
until 1916, when he and his brother sold their in-
terests. Since then he has been primarily engaged
in the cattle, land and ranch business, with head-
quarters at Great Falls. His offices are in the Ford
Building. He is also president of the State Bank
•'t Belt and of the State Bank at Stockitt, Montana.
Mr. Skinner is a democrat in politics.
In 1891 he married Miss Estella E. Welch. Mrs.
Skinner died November 10, 1918, the mother of four
children : Mark G., Gertrude, Olive and Ruth.
^ Richard C. Howell, who is agent for the New
York Realty Company and manager for the Phoenix
Building at Butte, first came to this Montana city
nearly thirty years ago, but his active career covers
four decades, and has brought him much varied
experience in the life and affairs oi the west, as a
railroad man, mining prospector and in other lines
of business.
Mr Howell was born at Port Hope, Ontario,
Canada, October 15, 1858. His grandfather Howell
was a native of Wales, moved with his family from
that country tc the north of Ireland, and about 1830
settled at Port Hope, Canada. Robert Howell, fa-
ther of Richard C, was born in Wales in 1830, and
from early manhood lived in Canada, marrying in
Ontario. For over a quarter of a century he was
a merchant at Port Hope, and for a number of years
was a member of the City Council. He was also
a pillar in the Methodist Episcopal Church, holding
all the lay offices, and was chairman of the building
committee when a new church edifice was erected.
He was a liberal in politics. Robert Howell died at
Port Hope in 1877. He married Mary Jane Cot-
tingham, of English descent, who was born in 1832
and died at Port Hope in 1913. Richard was the
oldest of their children. H. S. Howell is a busi-
ness man at Berkeley, California ; W. S., a resident
of Chicago, was assistant g;eneral freight agent of
the Milwaukee Railway until the roads were takep
over by the government : H. W. Howell is a property
owner at Omaha, Nebraska, and until the war was
traveling freight and passenger agent for the Chi-
cago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway, with head-
quarters at Salt Lake City; Ida is married; Hattie
is unmarried and lives at the old homestead at Port
Hope.
Richard C. Howell finished the high school course
at Port Hope, and attended Trinity College in that
city through his sophomore year. He left school in
1876, at the age of eighteen, and when his father
HISTORY OF MONTANA
died the next year he took charge of the business
and continued "it until the fall of 1878. After he
left home he spent six months clerking in a grocery
store in Chicago, for a short time was a hotel clerk
at Denver, and then joined a number of men pros-
pecting for silver along the Blue River in Colo-
rado. In 1881 he returned to Omaha, and was an
employe of the Union Pacific Railway until 1888.
He started in the car department and eventually
was made chief billing clerk for west bound traffic.
For about four years, until 1892, he was bill clerk
with the Pacific Express Company, and in 1892 came
to Butte and in August of that year was made cash-
ier of the Pacific Express Company. He left the
express business in 1894 and engaged in the bicycle
business, the bicycle then being at the high tide of
its popularity. Selling out in 1897, Mr. Howell was
one of the enterprising men attracted to the cool
regions of the Klondike. He led an expedition by
way of Edmonton and the Athabasca River to the
Grand Rapids of that watercourse. There winter
overtook them, and for several months they en-
dured many hardships, including an attack of scurvy.
With the opening of navigation the next spring the
party was compelled to return. Mr. Howell reached
Butte in June, 1898, and for over ten years was
employed in the auditing department of the Mon-
tana Power Company. Since 1909 he has been agent
for the New York Realty Company, handling its
varied investments property in Montana and is also
manager of the Phoenix Building, one of the largest
office structures in the state, a six-story building
with the ground f^oor occupied by the Symon's Dry
Goods Company. Mr. Howell has his office and
resides in the Phoenix Building.
He is a republican in politics. March 15, 1919,
at Deer Lodge, he married Miss Florence Green-
man, a native of Illinois.
Frederick H. Sarles has spent nearly all his
active lifetime of forty years in the western states
of Colorado, Utah and Montana. For the past
fourteen years he has been a resident of Butte,
and in this city has built up one of the leading real
estate and insurance agencies.
Mr. Sarles represents an old English family which
was established in New York City in 171 5, more
than two centuries ago. His grandfather, William
Sarles, spent all his life at Mount Kisco in West-
chester County, New York, being a farmer there,
before his death dividing his estate among his chil-
dren. His son Alexander Hamilton Sarles was born
at Mount Kisco in 1826, and died there in 1869.
In early life he was a school teacher and later a
successful farmer and also had some business in
New York City. He was a republican and was af-
filiated with the Presbyterian Church. His wife
was Esther Williams, who was born at New Pres-
ton, Connecticut, in 1826 and died at Aspen, Colo-
rado, in 191 5, when nearly ninety years of age. She
was the mother of six children. Stanley W., the
oldest, who died at Mount Kisco at the age of
twenty-two, had acquired a liberal education and
just before his death was preparing to become the
principal of a large public school in New York City.
Joseph O. died in O.xford, Connecticut, at the age
of thirty-six, and was the owner of a meat market.
William A. was a farmer and died at Kent, Con-
necticut, aged thirty-eight. Frederick H. is the
fourth in the family. Eudora M. is the wife of
William S. Piatt, a merchant at Aspen. Colorado.
Hamilton Victor is in the retail meat business at
Bristol, Connecticut.
Frederick H. Sarles was born at Mount Kisco,
Westchester County, New York, February 22, i860,
and was nine years of age when his father died. He
grew up in the home of his uncle, Stanley Williams,
and was educated in the public schools of New
Preston, Connecticut, attending the Upson Seminary
there until graduating in 1880. He had taught a
term of school at the age of sixteen, and during
1880-81 taught in New Preston. In the latter year
he came west, spending two years in the sheep busi-
ness in Colorado Springs, and then took up mining
and prospecting at Aspen, Colorado. He operated
a mining claim there for ten years. During 1892
for a few months he lived in Salt Lake City. When
Davis H. Waite was elected governor of Colorado
Mr. Sarles received appointment as a commissioner
under his administration, an office he filled for two
years. Mr. Sarles in 1894 took up a homestead at
Rockwood, Colorado, a quarter section, and while
proving up his homestead, which he later sold, he
was appointed postmaster under President Cleve-
land, an office he held for four years. Mr. Sarles
moved to Salt Lake City in 1901, and remained
there as clerk in a book store for five years. Re-
turning to Butte in 1906, he was for four years
connected with the John G. Evans' bookstore, and
then engaged in the real estate business, represent-
ing the Hubbard Investment Company of Salt Lake
. City. He has been in the real estate business since
that time, and today his organization handles not
only real estate, but bonds, loans and insurance, and
has one of the leading enterprises of its kind in
Silverbow County. The offices are in the Phoenix
Building.
For many years Mr. Sarles has been a prominent
temperance worker as a member of the Independent
Order of Good Templars. He is now grand chief
templar of the state, being elected in August, 1919,
at the Grand Lodge, and filled the same office in
1914-15. He served as health inspector at Butte in
1914, and is a prominent church worker, being mem-
ber and elder of Emanuel Presbyterian Church of
Butte and for eight years superintendent of the
Sunday School. Politically he is an independent re-
publican. Mr. Sarles was vice chancellor and at
present is chancellor commander of Oswego Lodge
No. 9, Knights of Pythias, at Butte.
Mr. Sarles is father of a very interesting family
of children. At Aspen, Colorado, June 9, 1888, he
married Miss Eva Smith, who was born in Missouri
but reared and educated in New York state. She
was descended from James Wilson, a Pennsylvanian
whose name appears as a signer to the Declaration
of Independence and who subsequently was an as-
i;ociate justice of the Supreme Court of the United
States. Mrs. Sarles died at Salt Lake City April
15, 1905. There were four children, Frederick Wil-
liam, Eudora M., Beatrice Esther and Henry Up-
son. The daughter Eudora was born June 2, 1896,
attended the high school at Aspen, Colorado, and
is still living in that city. Beatrice Esther was born
July 29, i8g8, is a graduate of the Salt Lake City
High School, and is the wife of James C. Johnson,
living at 1012 West Quartz Street in Butte. Mr.
Johnson is an employe of the Montana Power Com-
pany. The son, Henry Upson, who was born August
2, 1900, at Rockwood, Colorado, was educated in the
public schools of Salt Lake City, graduated from
the Butte High School in 1918. and represented his
class and was captain of the State Debating Team
of the Butte High School in 1918. He is also
senior editor of the Mountaineer, a monthly publi-
cation by the Butte High School. His friends rec-
ognize in him a young poet of exceptional ability.
After leaving high school and while a student in the
Montana State School of Mines he was a member
of the Students Army Training Corps. He is now
HISTORY OF MONTANA
497
stenographer and bookkeeper for Sarles & Company.
The oldest son. Frederick William, was born
March 26, 1895, and is a graduate of the high school
of Aspen, Colorado. September 13, 1917, he en-
listed, receiving his first training at Camp Lewis,
later at Camp Cody, Deming, New Mexico, with the
Medical Corps, and finally at Washington directly
under the Surgeon General. He was promoted from
private to first class private, then sergeant, then to
first class sergeant, and finally to hospital sergeant,
first class, equivalent to the rank of regimental
sergeant major. While at Washington he was
assigned as advertising manager of the Walter E.
Reid Base Hospital paper called "The Come Back."
He was mustered out September 11, 1919, and has
since located at New York City, where his talents
are employed as assistant editor for the American
Agency Bulletin. He married in August, 1919, Miss
Marguerite Morris of Butte. Sergeant Sarles is a
gifted writer, and it is not out of place to quote the
stanzas of a solemn poem which he wrote while at
Camp Cody. The two central stanzas are :
"When it's moonlight on the prairie.
When the night winds softly blow.
And the sweet strains of the bugle,
From afar come soft and low.
Then our fancies swiftly wander.
Back to home, to hearth, and friends.
And we try to pierce the future.
To see where our journey ends.
In the whirling of Fate's spindle.
Our short lives are swiftly spun,
And at times the thread is cut off
Ere the web is scarce begun.
So as soldiers in our manhood.
We live each day for that day,
Worry not about what's coming
Feeling sure we'll find the way."
While the chorus runs :
"It seems, while our dreams
Take us back to the scenes
Of our past, that our future untold.
Like a scroll will unroll.
And show us our goal,
Friends we left in the dear days of old."
Charles Matthew Lauer, whose progressive
business career has led him stage by stage from
Massachusetts west to Montana and the Pacific
Coast, is manager of the Butte business of Hemen-
way & Moser Company, wholesale dealers in cigars,
controlling the largest volume of business in that
line in Montana.
Mr. Lauer was born at Rochester. New York,
October 11, 1874. His father, Matthew Lauer, was
born at Frankfort-on-the-Rhine, Germany, in 1848
and was a child when his parents came to this
country in 1842 and settled at Rochester. He was
reared and educated in that city, and spent the rest
of his life there. He became a skilled cabinet maker,
and was in the employ of several large wood
working concerns. He died at Rochester in 1884.
He was a democrat and a member of the Catholic
Church. Matthew Lauer married Mary Stupp, who
was also born at Frankfort-on-the-Rhine, in 1846,
and is still a resident of Rochester. She is the
mother of four children : Carrie, wife of Frank Hil-
bert, a farm owner at Rochester ; Charles M. ; Wil-
liam, an employe in the Eastman Kodak Company's
factory at Rochester; and May, unmarried and liv-
ing with her mother.
Charles M. Lauer attended the parochial schools
of Rochester, and has been dependent upon his own
exertions to earn his living and create his useful
position in the world since he was thirteen. At that
time he began working as cash boy in a whole-
sale and retail dry goods store at Rochester. Event-
ually he was promoted to bookkeeper of its whole-
sale' department. In 189.S he left that firm and be-
came bookkeeper for Michael, Doyle & Company
of Rochester, and in 1900 went to Boston as their
representative, remaining there three years. From
Boston he came west as far as Denver, Colorado,
where he was employed to represent the Colorado
Condensed Milk Company one year. For another
year he filled a similar position for the Utah Con-
densed Milk Company at Richmond, Utah. Mr.
Lauer has been a resident of Montana since 1904.
With headquarters at Spokane, he traveled out of
Butte, covering all of Northern Montana, Eastern
Washington, and the Coeur d'Alene Country of
Idaho, representing the Louis S. Cohn Company,
wholesale cigars. In August, 1913, Mr. Lauer was
selected by the Hemenway & Moser Company to
establish the wholesale cigar house at Butte, now
one of the largest branches of the main company
at Salt Lake City. The officers of this company
are: W. G. Moser, of Salt Lake City, president;
Fred Murphy, of Pocatello, Idaho, vice president ;
John Milan, Jr., of Salt Lake City, secretary and
treasurer. The business managed by Mr. Lauer at
Butte is at 122 West Broadway, where they have a
finely equipped plant and offices, with much storage
space in the basement and a warehouse on East
Front Street. This firm does the largest wholesale
cigar business in the state of Montana. Mr. Lauer
is a director in the Company, and under his active
supervision are three traveling salesmen covering
Montana, two city salesmen for Butte, and the gen-
eral office organization.
Mr. Lauer owns some mining interests and has
a beautiful modern home at 908 West Diamond
Street in Butte. He is a republican, a member of
the Catholic Church, and is affiliated with Butte
Lodge No. 240 of the Elks. January 7, 190S. a-t
Bozeman, Montana, he married Miss Blanche
Reynolds, daughter of Charles W. and Katherine
(Switzler) Reynolds. Her parents are now de-
ceased, her father having been a pioneer farmer
in the Bozeman district. Mr. and Mrs. Lauer have
one child, Eugene, born November 7, 1906.
Raymond Lester Ruhle. In writing of the ener-
getic and progressive men who have taken a prom-
inent and influential part in developing and promot-
ing the highest interests of Butte, special mention
should be made of Raymond Lester Ruhle, a live,
wide-awake business man. known far and wide as
vice president and general manager of the James
A. McKee Printing Company, the largest firm of
the kind in the State of Montana. A son of the
late L. T. Ruhle, he was born September 7, 1881, in
Leadville, Colorado, of German lineage.
Born in Germany in 1853, L. T. Ruhle came to
the United States in 1865, and at the home of his
brother, Robert Ruhle, in New York City completed
his early education. Rumors of the vast mineral
wealth of Nevada reaching the east, he joined the
tide of migration surging westward, and was en-
gaged in mining in Nevada for some time. Coming
from there to Montana, he continued as a miner in
Butte until he had accumulated quite a surn of
money, and then, in partnership with Henry Nickel,
established the first meat market in Butte, operat-
ing it for fifteen years, in the meantime meeting with
very satisfactory results. He subsequently traveled
extensively throughout the United States, visiting
498
HISTORY OF MONTANA
all the principal cities and points of interest. Being
appointed inspector of meats in Butte in 1913, he
held the position until his death in the spring of
1919. He was a republican in politics, and a highly
esteemed citizen. His wife, whose maiden name
was Carrie Mensenger, was born in Kansas City,
Missouri, and is now a resident of Butte. They
were the parents of two children, as follows : Ray-
mond Lester, the subject of this sketch, and Hazel,
who resides with her mother.
Brought up in Butte, Raymond Lester Ruble was
graduated from the Butte High School with the
class of i8g8, and in 1901 was graduated from the
Rolla, Missouri, School of Mines with the degree
of Engineer of Mines. Going directly to Old
Mexico, he remained there a year as mining
operator and prospector. Returning to Butte, he
was for two years associated with the North Butte
Mining Company, then known as the Largey &
Craighton Company, beginning as an underground
miner and being promoted to the assay office. Mr.
Ruble was subsequently superintendent of the county
poor of Silver Bow County for two years, ably
and faithfully filling the oflSce.
In 1907 Mr. Ruble became a member of the
James A. McKee Printing Company, which was
established in 1904, its officers being as follows:
James A. McKee, president; R. L. Ruble, vice presi-
dent and general manager; Louis Dreibelbis,
treasurer; and Bruce Kramer, secretary. This en-
terprising firm is carrying on business on an ex-
tensive scale, having two retail stores in Butte, one
in Billings, and one in Great Falls, and a manu-
facturing plant in Spokane, Washington. The com-
pany does a general printing, embossing and engrav-
ing business, and has won an extended reputation
for its artistic work. Its offices, situated at 138
West Granite Street, Butte, are among the busiest
places in the city. Mr. Ruble has acquired much
valuable property, having large mining interests in
Butte and other parts of the state, and owning a
modernly constructed residence at 125 North Ex-
celsior Street.
'Mr. Ruble married in 191 1, at Butte, Miss Jessie
Budd, who was graduated from a girls' seminary
in Chicago, Illinois. She is a daughter of H. O.
and Lizzie Budd, the former of whom died on his
ranch near Butte, and the latter lives in Butte. Mr.
and Mrs. Ruble are the parents of three children,
namely: Mary Lou, born in November, 1913 ; June,
born in June, 191 5; and Raymond, born in Novem-
ber, 1919. Politically Mr. Ruble is identified with
the republican party. Fraternally he is a thirty-
second degree Mason, being a member of Silver
Bow Lodge No. 48. Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, of Butte Consistory, and of Bagdad
Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine; he is also a member of Butte Lodge No.
240, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks; and
of the Butte Rotary Club.
William J. McMahon, who was born in one of
the great mining centers of the west and is almost
a lifelong resident of Montana, is a competent and
successful mining engineer, being employed in his
professional capacity by the Anaconda Copper Min-
ing Company at Butte.
Mr. McMahon was born at Virginia City, Nevada,
September 13, 1879. His father, Alexander McMa-
hon, was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1850,
and came to the United States at the age of eighteen,
in 1868. While at Holyoke, Massachusetts, he
learned the trade of plasterer. He went to Califor-
nia in 1872, working at his trade at San Francisco.
On moving to Virginia City, Nevada, in 1876, he
took up mining, and followed the same occupation
after coming to Butte in 1882. For many years he
was an employe of the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company, and died at Butte honored and respected
in 1905 He was a democrat and a Catholic, and
was a member of Butte Miners Union No. l. He
ajid Johanna Bresnahan were married at Virginia
City, Nevada. She was also born in County Kerry
in 1850, and died at Butte in 1917. William J. is
the oldest of their children. Alexander is a
machinist at San Francisco. Mary V. is a teacher
in the public schools at Butte. Thomas F. is a
Butte miner. Brandon P. is a mining engineer with
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, and lives at
Butte. Edmund S. is now in the junior year of
his studies in the medical department of Creighton
University at Omaha, Nebraska.
William J. McMahon as a boy attended public
schools, is a graduate of St. Patrick's High School
at Butte, and spent three years in the Missouri State
School of Mines at Rolla. His practical experience
in the mining industry covers a period of twenty
years. In 1900 he became assistant mining engineer
for the Parrot Silver & Copper Company of Butte.
He was with that corporation ten years, but since
1910 has been in the service of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company as mining engineer and surveyor.
He is the surveyor of the Steward Mine at Butte.
His offices are in the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company's Hardware Building at 300-302 North
Main Street. Mr. McMahon is a member of the
.American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical En-
gineers and the American Association of Engineers.
Along with his professional work he has rendered
some valuable service as a citizen and in politics.
During 1909-10 he was county surveyor of Silver-
bow County. In 1912 he was elected from Silver-
bow Count}' to the Legislature, and re-elected in
1914 and 1916. In all three sessions he was chair-
man of the mines and mining committees. In the
14th and 15th sessions he was chairman of the com-
mittee on rules, and in his last term was majority
floor leader. In the 15th session he was vice chair-
man of the important committee on appropriations.
Mr. McMahon is a democrat, a member of the
Catholic Church, and is a fourth degree Knight of
Columbus, being affiliated with Butte Council No.
668. of which he is past grand knight. He is also
a member of Butte Aerie No. II, Fraternal Order of
Eagles.
Mr. McMahon, who enjoys the comforts of a
modern home at 216 South Jackson Street, married
at Butte in 1904 Miss Theresa Courtney, daughter
of Dennis C. and Emma (Staples) Courtney. Her
mother is still living at Butte, where her father, who
died in 191 5, was for a number of years active as
a merchant, being associated with his brother, the
late Senator Thomas E. Courtney. Mrs. McMahon
is a graduate of St. Patrick's parochial schools of
Butte and also received a normal school training
and was a teacher in the Butte public schools before
her marriage. Mr. and Mrs. McMahon have a
family of four children : Marcia, born October 7,
190S, a student in St. Patrick's school ; Lois, born
August 15, 1907, in the same school; Theresa, born
April 23, 1909, a student in the Lincoln public school ;
and William A., born October 9, 1910. also attend-
ing the Lincoln school.
Capt. Thomas Couch. The time to have cele-
brated the achievements of Capt. Thomas Couch
was during his life, when he could appreciate it,
but it is a satisfaction to know that so many of his
dreams came true, so many plans were carried out
and with such benefits conferred upon all even re-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
499
motely connected with them that he must have been
contented with what he had done and felt in some
measure at least the appreciation of his fellow citi-
zens. Those who knew and understood him and
his work have not failed to credit him with having
been one of the greatest constructive factors not
only in the development of Montana but the entire
West.
An Englishman by birth, Captain Couch seemed
always most typically .American in mind, heart and
manner. He was born December 29, 1843, at Braiz-
Camborne, Cornwall. After a life filled with ad-
venture, crowded with discovery and invention and
paved with good deeds, he passed away February
5, 1902. He died in Lane Hospital at San Fran-
cisco, having gone to that state in search of the
one asset that his own great efforts could not bring
him — abounding health. The quest was in vain.
His body was carried back to Montana, the state
nearest his heart, where every citizen knew his name
and many had reaped the benefits of more intimate
knowledge of the man himself. His body rests in
Highland Cemetery, Great Falls, the town that he
finally chose for his home.
Even in his boyhood the mysteries of the earth
held for him a great fascination. When twenty
years of age he left England for America, attracted
here by rumor of the wonderful treasure beneath
our soil. On landing he went at once to the Lake
Superior or copper district. The great finds in Cali-
fornia, however, soon lured him to the coast. His
first trip was made by way of the Isthmus of
Panama to San Francisco. For five years he
worked in the gold fields of California, spending
most of his time at the Grass Valley mines and on
the properties near New Almaden. In 1868 he
pushed on into Nevada, two years later assuming
the control of the Hidden Treasure mine at White
Pine, the most important find of that vicinity, and
1871 found him temporarily in Camp Floyd, Utah.
From there he went to Tintic to become the man-
ager of the Mammoth Copperpolis, a gold and silver
mine of national reputation. Bingham next claimed
his attention. Here he operated successfully the
Neptune and Jordan silver and lead mines, leaving
Bingham to become superintendent of the Hidden
Treasurer of Dry Canyon, an exceedingly rich find
that was soon exhausted. The last property with
which he was connected in Utah was the Horn
Silver at Frisco.
Through study and experience he had now be-
come a scientist, versed in the difficult branches of
mineralogy, geology and metallurgy, as well as a
practical mine operator. In the interests of eastern
capital he traveled through the entire western por-
tion of the United States and Canada, examining a
mine here and opening one there as the case might
be-
Immediately upon arriving in Montana Captain
Couch " had been employed as a mining expert by
Col. C. A. Broadwater. Almost his first work in
the state was the examination of the Broadwater
properties at Neihart. Almost a year was devoted
to the examination of other mines in which Colonel
Broadwater was interested. It was under his direc-
tion that the important mines at Castle were de-
veloped.
On reaching Montana in 1883 Captain Couch
located in Butte. No rnining expert of his day
commanded greater confidence and was entrusted
with greater interests. Within a very short time
he reported on properties in Deer Lodge, Lewis and
Clark and Meagher counties. He was instrumental
in developing and managing some of the greatest
mines of the state. With Capt. John Daniels of
Michigan he examined and reported upon a group
of mines embracing the Mountain View, Colusa,
Liquidator and West Colusa. These were owned
by Mr. C. A. Larabie and tlie Montana Copper Com-
pany. His favorable report resulted in the pur-
chase of these properties, their consolidation and
the formation of the Boston* & Montana Copper
and Silver Mining Company, of which he was
made general manager. One of the greatest min-
ing corporations in the wold, it was the skillful
management of Captain Couch that in no small
degree contributed to the magnitude of the enter-
prise and the enormous dividends paid to its fortu-
nate stockholders. The smallest detail in connec-
tion with the development of this huge property
failed to escape his notice. He personally super-
vised the opening of each mine, the working of the
smelters and concentrators and the control of the
men employed above and below ground.
Largely upon his advice the company decided in
1889 to erect the huge smelters at Great Falls. Min-
ing men generally had no confidence in tlie plan,
but the work was rushed to completion. Within
two years after the smelters were completed the
company began to pay dividends. From that time
so long as Captain Couch remained in control divi-
dends, output and employes all increased to gether.
In l8g6 a new feature in the company's affairs so
displeased the captain that he handed in his resig-
nation.
At this time he undertook a tremendously big
scheme for the development of a low grade quartz
property on the mother lode of California at Coul-
tersviUe. Considerable capital was expended ia
exploration work, but the first mill tests were dis-
appointing in values, and, although the property
was worked on a smaller scale, the original project
was abandoned. This was one of the greatest dis-
appointments of his life, although in later years he
was requested by men who were interested in the
property to return and carry out his original
scheme, and he was considering the matter seriously
when ill health intervened and stopped his career
of development.
The low lying gravel beds on the Feather River
near Oroville claimed his attention in 1898. These
gravel beds had been known to carry gold in small
quantities since the days of "49" and all sorts of
schemes had been tried for reclaiming it, but with-
out success. Captain Couch interested the neces-
sary capital to construct a gold dredge, after a plan
that had originated in New Zealand. This was the
beginning of the development of gold dredging, the
first successful boat for dredging placer gold being
built at the mandate of Captain Couch. The enter-
prise proved a success from the first turn of the
wheels and developed into one of the big enter-
prises of California and has extended to all parts
of the world where placer mining is possible.
While the mines were incidental to his bigger
work as a mine operator, the ranching activities of
Captain Couch were in the nature of a public serv-
ice to the cause of agriculture and livestock hus-
bandry. He developed a model ranch, and invested
thousands of dollars in blooded cattle and horses,
and many farm owners in Montana today take pride
in the fact that some of their stock came from the
original Couch herds.
For several years Captain Couch was recognized
as the leader of the republican party in Montana.
He had but to reach out his hand to grasp the high-
est office it was in her power to bestow. In 1892
he was urged to accept the nomination for governor,
but declined the honor with decisive kindness. His
iron will and great personal magnetism, combined
with his love of the human race, made him always
a leader of men whether in a political campaign or
500
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a mining community. Although his political satel-
lites were willing to obey the slightest beck of his
hand, he never used his power for his own aggran-
dizement nor for that of his personal friends. After
1894 he gave little time to politics, although in 1896
he was a strong advocate of the free and unlimited
coinage of silver. It was a great disappointment to
him that the party to which he had given such loyal
service could not embrace this principle to which
the local conditions of Montana lent such impor-
tance. Even so, the captain was never anything but
a stalwart republican.
Captain Couch earned some of the finest rewards
of good fortune, measured not at all by wealth, but
by the possession of an ideal home and family,
many stanch and tried friends, and a great consum-
ing desire to do justice and make his life worthy
of the good fortune which attended it. Perhaps the
best summing up of his personal life is found in
the words of the address delivered at his funeral:
"Captain Couch was not an ambitious man in the
usual sense. He set a high standard of action and
attainment for himself, but worldly ambition was
not his aim. He was a power in the political field
of Montana, but that power was never wielded for
his personal benefit. He served the cause of many
a friend though. Rather than politics he chose the
home, and here it was that the charm of his char-
acter was felt. He was ideal in the home circle.
The hero of his half dozen boys— and hero worship
was no sin here— it was the expression of a filial
love and obedience to one who proved himself love-
able.
"Captain Couch was a man of large financial and
executive ability. To his genius is due the develop-
ment of mining properties which run into the mil-
lions. He was among a half dozen best mining men
in Montana. In our own city there stands a monu-
ment to his genius and toil, the great interests of the
B. & M. Smelting Company, and many public enter-
prises have received substantial aids from his brain
and liberal hand. While not a man of learning he
was a man of culture. He was broad and liberal
minded, having a knowledge of men and measures
that fitted him for the responsible positions held.
Always cool and level-headed yet not slow to decide
and quick to execute. Few men in the state had a
better knowledge of its affairs, political and finan-
cial, and he was always among the inner circle of
counsellors."
December 28, 1873, Captain Couch married Miss
Rachel Webber, daughter of John Webber, of
Goshen, Utah. She was a native of Wales and her
father was a pioneer miner in Utah and Nevada.
Captain Couch's family joined him in Butte about
the time he became manager of the Boston and
Montana Company. Mrs. Couch is still living, and
six of her seven children survive. The names of
these children were Thomas, Jr., Edward G., Fred-
erick M., Rachel Mary, wife of Lee M. Ford; Al-
bert C, John D., and William. The second genera-
tion have not been lacking in the stanch qualities
that don-inated Captain Couch. Three of the sons,
Albert, John and William, were participants in the
World war. Albert C. was with the Three Hundred
and Sixty-Fourth Infantry, Ninety-First Division,
was in the battle of the Argonne, and was severely
wounded in Flanders on the 4th of November, 1918.
John served as a lieutenant with the Twelfth In-
. fantry and was also in France. William finished his
training as an aviator at Miami, Florida, and sailed
with the Fourth Flying Squadron of the Marine
Corps, but died on board the transport Lapland Sep-
tember 28, 1918.
Thomas Couch, Jr., son of the late Capt. Thomas
Couch, is a resident of Great Falls, though his busi-
ness interests have a wide range over the state.
A resident of Montana since he was five years of
age, he was born at Goshen, Utah, June 14, 1878.
He was educated in the public schools of this state
and early became associated with his father in busi-
ness. He assumed the management of the ranch
interests in 1898, and enlarged the land and live-
stock holdings. Shortly after his father's death he
organized the family into a corporation and placed
the entire capital of the estate into land and real
estate. The land holdings have been increased to
25.000 acres of the choice lands of Cascade and
Teton counties.
The son of a man of unsurpassed initiative and
constructive genius, Mr. Couch has identified him-
self with a number of the progressive enterprises
of his city and state. He was one of the organizers
and president of the Great Falls Automatic Tele-
phone Company, and has thus been instrumental in
building up the splendid exchange and automatic
telephone system at Great Falls. He was active in
the organization of the Montana Life Insurance
Company and is still on its board of directors.
He was an organizer and is president of the
Northern Flax Fiber Company. While this industry
is in its infancy in the West, and this is the first
company undertaking the production of fiber in all
the western states, the fact that Montana is rapidly
taking the lead among the flax growing states of
the Union opens wonderful opportunities for the
growth and development of the company to a posi-
tion among Montana's leading industries..
Thomas Couch, Jr., married Miss Gwendolyn
Black, daughter of H. N. Black, a prominent Mon-
tana architect. They have one daughter, Gwen-
dolyn.
Davis E. Wilder, who is agent of the Consolidated
Ticket Offices of the various railroads centering at
Butte, has had a long and active experience in
railroad work and has been a resident of Montana
for the past ten years.
He was born at Austin, Minnesota, June 6, 1880.
His Wilder ancestors were English and colonial
settlers in New York. His grandfather, a native of
New York State, became a pioneer farmer in Wis-
consin and died at Sun Prairie, that state, in 1898.
E. W. Wilder, father of Davis E., was born at
Sun Prairie in 1852, was reared and married there,
and in 1879 moved to Austin, Minnesota. He was
one of the early settlers in that locality and spent
his active life as a farmer. His affairs were pros-
pered, and since 1902 he was lived retired. In
October, 1919, he took up his residence at Long
Beach, California. He held several offices of trust
and responsibility in Austin and wielded a con-
siderable influence in the civic life of that com-
munity. He is a republican in politics, a member
of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and is affiliated
with the Ancient Order of United Workmen. E.
W. Wilder married Katherine Davis, who was born
at Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, in 1854, and died at
Austin, Minnesota, November 14, 1911. Ruth, the
oldest of their children, resides with her father;
Davis E. is the second ; Nellie is the wife of John
Armstead, a farmer at Sioux Rapids, Iowa ; Frost
is in the hardware business at FairView, Montana:
and Katherine is the wife of Custer Armstead, a
brother of John Armstead, and they live on a farm
at Medelia, Minnesota.
Davis E. Wilder's early environment was a farm
in Mower County, Minnesota. From the farm he
HISTORY OF MONTANA
501
attended the neighboring district schools and also
spent four years in the University of Minnesota
Agricnltural^ Department, graduating with the class
of 1904. While in University he was affiliated with
the Alpha Sigma college fraternity. After leaving
university and preliminary to his railroad career
Mr. Wilder spent about two years learning the
undertaking business at Austin, and in 1906 came to
Sidney, Montana, where for two months he was in
the employ of the Yellowstone Mercantile Com-
pany. He entered the service of the Great Northern
Railway at Williston, North Dakota, beginning as
night ticket agent, was promoted to ticket agent,
and in February, 1910, was transferred to Great
Falls, Alontana, as ticket clerk for the Great North-
ern and with an increase in salary. In November,
191 1, he became city passenger agent for the Great
Northern at Helena, and in 1913 was appointed
city passenger agent at Butte. After the govern-
ment took over the administration of the railroads,
and when the various ticket agencies were consoli-
dated, Mr. Wilder on July i, 1918, was appointed
agent for the Consolidated Ticket Offices at Butte,
his offices being at Main and East Park streets.
Mr. Wilder has acquired real estate interests at
Williston. North Dakota, and at Butte, where he
owns a modern home at 1120 Steel Street. He is a
member of the Episcopal Church, affiliated with
Austin Lodge of Odd Fellows, Helena Lodge No.
193 of the Elks, and is a former member of the
Knights of Pythias at Williston and of the Silver
Bow Club of 'Butte.
November 14, 1914, at Butte, he married Mrs.
Jane (Williams) Lynch, daughter of Daniel and
Ann Williams. Her mother is living at 702 Colorado
Street in Butte. Her father, who died at Butte in
igi2, was a miner, and began working in the min-
ing district of Butte in 1883.
George E. Smiley. It has long been a recognized
fact that the great corporations of the country are
on the outlook for men of ability for they realize
that with such men in charge of the various aflfairs
of the business efficiency is secured and the number
of serious mistakes brought to a minimum. Because
of this tendency another fact has come to light, that
there are very few men connected with these organi-
zations who have not already proven their fitness
for the work under their supervision, and that em-
ployment in these concerns is the mark of real capa-
bility. One of those who is worthy of the con-
sideration of his company and fellow citizens in
every way is George E. Smiley of Butte, Montana,
assistant division manager of the Continental Oil
Company, who has risen to his present position
through individual merit.
George E. Smiley was born in Clarke County,
Mississippi, on December 31, 1885, a son of E. M.
Smiley. The Smiley family was founded in the
United States by the great-grandfather of George
E. Smiley, an Englishman who came to this country
at an early day. E. M. Smiley was born in i860, in
Clarke County, Mississippi, where his father had
located, and there he was reared, educated and
married, and there he was engaged in agricultural
pursuits until 1905, when he moved to Heidelberg,
Mississippi, and since then has been engaged in
conducting a mercantile establishment. He is a
democrat. The Baptist Church holds his member-
ship, and he is active in its work. For years he has
been a Mason, and he also belongs to the Woodmen
of the World. E. M. Smiley was united in mar-
riage with Maggie L. Goodwin, born at Meridian,
Mississippi, in 1864, and their children were as fol-
lows : George, who is the eldest ; Eunice, who mar-
ried William Campbell, a carpenter and builder of
Heidelberg, Mississippi : Estelle, wlio married Harry
L. Brashier, of Meridian, Mississippi, a traveling
salesman ; Willie Ray, who married John Arledge,
a farmer of Vossburg, Mississippi; and Bessie, who
is attending the Heidelberg High School, resides
with her parents. ^
George E. Smiley attended the rural schools of
Clarke County, Mississippi, and the Meridian High
School, from which he was graduated in 1904. Im-
mediately thereafter he began working for the R. G.
McCants Cotton Company, cotton brokers at Meri-
dian, Mississippi, and continued with that company
for two years, leaving it to form connections with
his present company at Denver, Colorado. He
started with the Continental Oil Company as a
general clerk and with the determination to master
the details of the business in such a manner that
when an opening occurred above him he would be
ready for it, and his subsequent career proves that
he has lived up to that determination in a remark-
able degree. His first rise made him order clerk,
his next, price clerk, and then, having by that time
proved his aptness, he was transferred to Havre,
Montana, to assume the responsibilities connected
with the position of district superintendent, taking
charge of that district in June, 1915. In 1917 he
was transferred to Butte, Montana, as assistant to
the division manager, and then, on January i, 1920,
was made assistant division manager under J. J.
O'Neil, division manager. The offices and plant
are located on Kaw Avenue.
Since coming to Butte Mr. Smiley has invested in
city realty and owns his home at No. 1015 Dakota
Street, a comfortable modern residence. Like his
father, he is a supporter of the democratic party.
For soine years he has been a member of the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church. Mr. Smiley maintains frater-
nal connections with Denver Camp No. 13, Wood-
men of the World, and the Railroad Council of the
Royal Arcanum at Denver, Colorado. He also is
a member of the Iowa State Traveling Men's Asso-
ciation.
On September 10, 1910, Mr. Smiley was united in
marriage with Miss Hattie D. Hardin, at Lincoln,
Nebraska. She is a daughter of Charles and Mary
(Beer) Hardin, the former of whom is now de-
ceased, after having been a pioneer farmer of Ne-
braska. The latter survives her husband and is
now residing at Blue Springs, Nebraska. Mr. and
Mrs. Smiley have one son, George Wayne, who
was born August 31, 1917.
The grandfather of George E. Smiley was John
M. Smiley, born in 1830 in North Carolina, where
his father had settled upon coming to the United
States. John M. Smiley went to Clarke County,
Mississippi, in young manhood, and was engaged
there in farming all of his active life, but is now
living in retirement in Clarke County. During the
war between the states he espoused the cause of the
South and was a brave and gallant soldier in defense
of the "Lost Cause." The democratic party has
always had his earnest support. Like his son E. M.
Smiley, he has been a member of the Baptist Church
all of his mature years.
John M. Smiley was united in marriage with
Martha Smith, born in Clarke County, Mississippi,
in 1835, and she died in the same county of her birth
during 1915. They became the parents of the fol-
lowing children : E. M., father of George E. Smiley,
who was the eldest; John, who is a resident of
Laural, Mississippi, is a member of the police force
of that city; James, who is a farmer of Clarke
County, Mississippi; Clarence, Guy and Andrew, all
of whom are also engaged in farming in Clarke
502
HISTORY OF MONTANA
County, Mississippi; Cora, who married Nicholas
Slayton, a farmer of Clarke County, Mississippi;
and Emma, who married John Thomas, a farmer
of Clarke County, Mississippi.
George E. Smiley is in the very prime of vigor-
ous young manhood and- yet has reached a position
of importance at a time when some men have barely
made a start in life. He is of the type that will go
far and attain much, for he possesses the staying
quality. He is a nature which does not shrink from
responsibility, but rather courts it, and having gained
the added duties, skillfully proceeds to discharge
them efficiently and rapidly. His knowledge of the
business and of men enables him to handle many
problems which a less experienced and practical
man might find difficult, and it is safe to say that
it would not be easy to find another man so well
fitted for the position now so expertly filled by
George E. Smiley.
Michael J. Loughran is a mining engineer, a
graduate of the Montana State School of Mines,
and for a number of years was associated in a
professional capacity with some of the great mining
corporations of Montana. Since 1919 he has filled
the responsible office of county surveyor of Silver
Bow County.
Mr. Loughran is a native of the great mining
district of the far west, born in Virginia City, Ne-
vada, September 9, 1887. His father, M. J. Lough-
ran, was born in County Tyrone, Ireland, in 1852,
and was a boy when he came to this country m
1867 and for several years lived at Pittsburgh, Penn-
sylvania, where he worked in the steel mills. About
1882 M. J. Loughran removed to Virginia City,
Nevada, and became interested in mining. In 1892
he was sent to Chicago in charge of Nevada's
mineral exhibits for the World's Columbian Ex-
position, and after the close of that Fair remained
in Chicago for a time as a merchant. In 1894 he
located at Butte, where he resumed his occupation
as a miner and continued so until his death in 1917.
He was a democrat and a member of the Catholic
Church. M. J. Loughran married Elizabeth Skin-
ner, a resident of Butte, who was born in Lisbon,
Illinois, in 1861. She is the mother of seven chil-
dren : Ann, wife of O. F. Brinton, manager of the
Jib Mining Company at Basin. Montana; Michael
J. ; Florence, a graduate nurse from St. James Hos-
pital of Butte, now the wife of Lewis Downing, a
druggist at Hamilton, Montana; Katherine, also a
graduate nurse of St. James Hospital, is employed
in her professional capacity at the Gold Hill Min-
ing Company at Gold Hill, Utah. David, a graduate
mining engineer from the Montana State School of
Mines, now foreman at the Goldsmith Mine and a
resident of Butte; Genevieve, wife of Chester
Coombs, a butcher at Butte ; and Consulo, who is
finishing her education in the Butte Business College.
Michael J. Loughran has lived in Butte since he
was seven years of age. He acquired his education
in the public schools, and was in high school until
his senior year. He graduated with the degree E.
M. from the Montana State School of Mines in
1909, and his first technical service in his profession
was one year in the testing department at Washoe
Smelter. After that his services were employed as
a surveyor chiefly at the Diamond Mine of the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company and at other proper-
ties of that corporation until January, 1919. In .No-
vember, 1918, he was elected county surveyor for
Silver Bow County, and to the duties of that office
now gives all his time.
Mr. Loughran is a member of the American
Association of Engineers, a democrat, a Catholic, a
third degree Knight of Columbus, being affiliated
with Butte Council No. 668, and is also a member
of Butte Lodge No. 240 of the Elks.
Mr. Loughran and family have a modern home
at 828 West Quartz Street. He married at Butte
in 1912 Miss Minnie Nickel, daughter of Gus and
Mary (Reihl) Nickel, whose home is at 217 North
Alabama Street in Butte. Her father is a retired
business man. The two children of Mr. and Mrs.
Loughran are James, born December 26, 1914, and
Celia, born July IS, 1918.
George N. Short. The business service rendered
by Mr. Short since coming to Montana has been in
selling and helping distribute the products of two
local cement plants. He has his home and offices
at Butte, and is sales manager for the Montana
territory of the Three Forks Portland Cement
Company.
Mr. Short was born at Bellefontaine, Ohio,
August 30, 1883. His grandfather, Hamilton Short,
was a native of Wilmington, Delaware, and was
an early day railway contractor. He went to Belle-
fontaine, Ohio, to superintend the construction of a
railroad that is now part of the Big Four system.
He died at Bellefontaine in 1859. He married Eliza-
beth Shively, a native of Philadelphia. E. J. Short,
father of the Butte business man, was born at Belle-
fontaine in April, 1850. and spent practically all his
life there. He was a successful general merchant
and died at Bellefontaine in April, 1909. For several
years before his death he had lived at Colorado
"Springs, Colorado. He was a republican, served as
a member of the City Council at Bellefontaine a
number of years, and was secretary of the Municipal
Water Company there. He was an active supporter
of the Methodist Episcopal Church and was a Royal
Arch and Knight Templar Mason. E. J. Short
married Mary R. Magruder. who was born at
Marion, Ohio, November 18, 1855. and is now living
at Butte, There were only two children, Grace and
George N. The former was born in 1881. and died
at Bellefontaine in 1902.
George N. Short graduated from the Bellefon-
taine High School in 1901, and soon afterward
entered the Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaware,
Ohio. He completed the regular course and gradu-
ated with the B. L. degree in 1905. He is a mem-
ber of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon college fraternity.
Mr. Short has made every year of the fifteen since
he left college count definitely in his business ad-
vancement. From September, 1905, until April of
the following year he worked for the Bellefontaine
Foundry and Machinery Company, a firm manufac-
turing steam dredges. For more than a year he was
connected with the welfare and advertising depart-
ments of the National Cash Register Company at
Dayton, Ohio, and in December. 1907, went to Colo-
rado Springs to visit his parents. In February, 1908,
he entered the cement business as traveling repre-
sentative of the Colorado Portland Cement Com-
pany of Denver. His territorv was Colorado,
Wyoming, the Black Hills of South Dakota, Ne-
braska and parts of Kansas. He kept the plant
busy with the orders turned in from that territory,
and continued in the service of the Colorado Com-
pany for seven or eight years. In June, 1915. he
came to Butte as sales manager of the Three Eorks
Portland Cement Company. On the first of July
of that vear the offices of the company were moved
from Trident to Butte. Mr. Short has charge of the
sales for the plants at Trident and Hanover, his
sales offices being in the Lewisohn Building. He has
two salesmen who cover Montana and the western
part of North Dakota and northwestern Wyoming.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
503
Mr. Short is a republican, a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, is affiliated with Belle-
fontaine Lodge of Masons, Lafayette Chapter, Royal
Arch Masons, at Bellefontaine. Colorado Com-
mandery No. i. Knights Templar at Denver, El
Jebel of the Mystic Shrine at Denver, and Butte
Consistory of the Scottish Rite. He is a member of
the Rotary Club, Silver Bow Club and the Country
Club. Mr. Short is unmarried and resides at the
Leonard Hotel.
Thompson W. Luce. It will always be a badge
of honor in this country to have it known that a
person's father, or even his uncle, enlisted in the
service of the country when the great rebellion
broke out, to assist in saving the Union and to erad-
icate slavery from our soil. Just as to this day we
boast that our grandfather or other ancestor fought
in the Revolutionary war to gain independence, or
in the War of 1812 to protect our rights on the
ocean, so the descendants of the gallant soldiers
who in the early '60s defended the Stars and Stripes
through the coming years will refer with pride to
the bravery and self-sacrifice of their fathers and
other relatives. Peculiar interest attaches to the
record of the Luce family, as outlined in the follow-
ing paragraphs from the fact that specific mention
is made of the splendid military record of the sub-
ject of this sketch.
Thompson W. Luce, of Pondera County, is a
native son of the old Buckeye State, having been
born on his father's farm in Warren County, Ohio,
on January 18, 1847. He is the son of William and
Mary (Cline) Luce, the latter of whom was born
in New Jersey and who died in 1863, in the forty-
sixth year of her age. William Luce, who was a
native of Pennsylvania, died in his eightieth year.
He was married three times and was the father o£
twenty-three children. To his first marriage were
born six children, three sons and three daughters.
Mary (Cline) Luce, his second wife and the mother
of the subject of this review, bore him fourteen
children, of whom the subject was the fourth in
order of birth, and of which number three sons and
tvvo daughters are still living. For his third wife
William Luce married Mrs. Martha Seaman, and
to that union were born three daughters.
William Luce accompanied his parents on their
removal to Ohio in 1799, they being among the very
earliest settlers in Warren County. The elder Luce
took an active part in the development and activi-
ties of the new country and was one of the first to
conduct a freight line between Sun Fish Hills and
Cincinnati. He also did a large mercantile business
with the settlers along the route, gathering up the
produce grown by the latter which he carried into
Cincinnati and there exchanging it for merchandise,
which he took out with him and sold to the settlers.
He also was successful as a farmer and created a
comfortable home in this new western country. He
was a democrat in politics and held several county
and local offices, including that of justice of the
peace.
Thompson W. Luce remained at home, assisting
with the farm work and attending the local schools,
until sixteen years of age. Then, in the spring of
1864, he enlisted in Company K, One Hundred and
Forty-Sixth Regiment, Ohio National Guards, for
the 100 days' service. .At the expiration of this
period he re-enlisted, this time for one year, or dur-
ing the war, and was assigned to Company G, One
Hundred and Eighty-Third Regiment, Ohio Volun-
teer Infantry. They became a part of the Twenty-
Third Corps of the Army of Ohio, and were, at
different times under the command of Generals
Thomas and J. M. Schofield. He received his dis-
charge in October, 1865, having taken part in many
battles and skirmishes, among the more important
of which were Spring Hill, Franklin, Naslwille,
Wilmington, Fayetteville and Kingston.
For about two years after his return from the
army Thompson W. Luce worked on his father's
farm, and then for about seven years he was en-
gaged as a carpenter and bridge builder, followed
by farming operations on his own account for a
couple of years. He then returned to his former
vocation as carpenter and bridge builder, being em-
ployed by several railroad companies up to 1891.
In that year he came to Montana, locating at Old
Pondera in Teton County, and entered the employ
of the Letheridge & Gault Railway, a narrow gauge
road, on construction w'ork, subsequently becoming
a section foreman. He then engaged in the sheep
business, being a large land owner, but in 1916 dis-
posed of his sheep and in the following year he
built the Luce Hotel, a brick building of thirty
rooms and comprising the best hotel in Teton
County.
Mr. Luce is a republican in his political views,
though he has never been an aspirant for public
office. On September 18, 1872, Mr. Luce married
Sarah A. Seaman, a native of Ohio, and to theni
have been born three children, namely: Raymond,
who married Ida Carson, and they are the parents
of six children; Blanche is the wife of E. D. Jones
and the mother of two children ; and Harry J.
The Luce family has long occupied a high place
in the esteem of the people of Teton County, be-
cause of their progressive spirit and their interest
in all movements for the advancement and upbuild-
ing of the community.
William Brownfield. Among Montana mer-
chants few have had a longer and more successful
experience in the territory and state than William
Brownfield, of the Brownfield-Canty Carpet Com-
pany of Butte. Mr. Brownfield was connected with
some of the large mercantile concerns of the terri-
tory during the eighties, and for over a quarter of
a century has been one of the active men in his
present business at Butte.
He is a Kentuckian by birth and member of one
of the oldest families in that state. The Brown-
fields were English and were colonial settlers in
America. His grandfather, Calvin Brownfield, was
born in LaRue County, Kentucky, in 1810, spent his
life as a farmer in Hardin County, and died there in
1886. George Brownfield, father of the Montana
merchant, was born in Hardin County in 1833, and
expended the efforts of a long lifetime in farming
and stock raising. He died in Hardin County in
1901. Politically he was a democrat. His wife was
Elizabeth Perry, who was born in Hardin County in
1835 and died there in 1866. Of her children Wil-
liam was the oldest. Mattie, now the widow of a
farmer in LaRue County, Kentucky, married for
her first husband Thomas Creal, a merchant of
Buffalo, LaRue County. Nannie is the wife of Dr.
J. C. Jones, a physician at Buffalo, Kentucky.
Richard is agent and train dispatcher for the Santa
Fe Railway at San Marcial, New Mexico. For his
second wife George Brownfield married Martha
Durrett, of a prominent family of Taylor County.
Kentucky. She died in Hardin County, and her four
children are still living: Sallie and May both mar-
ried and residents of LaRue County; Wade, a rail-
road man at Atlanta, Georgia, and Joseph, a broker
at El Paso, Texas.
Mr. William Brownfield spent the first eighteen
years of his life on his father's Kentucky farm.
504
HISTORY OF MONTANA
He attended the rural schools of Hardin County,
graduated from the high school at Elizabethtown,
the county seat, and also attended Hamilton College
at Elizabethtown. On leaving the farm he served
an apprenticeship as clerk in a general dry goods
store at Elizabethtown for seven years. That was
his training and his chief equipment when he came
to Butte in 1883. Mr. Brownfield for one year was
connected with the Bonner Mercantile Company,
after which for eight years he had charge of the
carpet department of Sands & Boyce, later J. R.
Boyce & Company. He then spent a year in Helena
in charge of the carpet department of A. P. Curtin,
and in 1892 returned to Butte and was one of the
principals in the establishment and incorporation of
the Brownfield-Canty Carpet Company, which began
business September 5, 1892. From the beginning to
the present time Mr. Brownfield has been active in
its management with the office of secretary and
treasurer. The other officers are James A. Canty,
president, and J. W. Kemper, vice president. There
is no other business of the kind in the state of Mon-
tana which carries a larger stock and sells its goods
over a wider area. The trade is by no means con-
fined to Butte and Silver Bow counties. The large
modern store at 48-54 West Park Street is stocked
with furniture, carpets, stoves, ranges and general
household furnishings.
In politics Mr. Brownfield is an independent and
is a member of the Baptist Church and the Rotary
Club. He owns a modern home at 1035 West
Platinum Street. In 1883, at Elizabethtown, Ken-
tucky, he married Miss Virginia C. McMurtry. Mrs.
Brownfield is a native of California, where her
father was at one time a judge of the District Court.
Mr. Brownfield's only child, William Clement, died
at the age of four years.
John Scovil, president and manager of the
C. O. D. Laundry of Butte, is one of the enter-
prising men of the city, who has known how to
advance his own interests and at the same time
build up the prestige of his community. He was
born at Provo City, Utah, on January 30, 1863. a
son of L. N. Scovil, who was born at Middletown.
Connecticut, in 1809, and died at Springville, Utah,
in 1890.
Going to Ohio in young manhood, L. N. Scovil
lived in that state, working as a court stenographer
until 1856, when he went west to Provo, Utah.
and served there as court stenographer and also as
postmaster until 1865, when he went to Springville
of the same state, and was a farmer in that vicinity
until his death. With the organization of the re-
publican party he found an expression of his po-
litical faith, and in the creed of the Mormons that
of his religious belief. In young manhood he was
made a Mason, and belonged to the local lodge
of his fraternity at the time of his demise. Too
old for active service during the war between the
states, he went to London, England, and was a re-
porter on the London Times. A very highly edu-
cated man, he was always a leader among his
associates. John Scovil is a child of his father's
second marriage, the maiden name of his mother
having been Hannah Marsden, and she was born
near Liverpool. England, in 1830. and died at
Springville. Utah, in July. 1907. Her parents came
to the United States in 1840 and settled at Bur-
lington, Iowa. Her father was William Marsden,
born in England, and died at Parawan. Utah, in
1887. to which place he had come from Burlington.
Iowa, at an early day, crossing the plains in pioneer
fashion. Both as a merchant and extensive farmer
he achieved success, and was one of the prominent
men of his neighborhood and day. He, too, became
a republican. The brothers and sisters of John
Scovil, who was the eldest, were as follows : S. S.,
who is a civil engineer of Salt Lake City, Utah ;
Sylvia, who married John Roylance. who died in
1917 at Springville. Utah, where for thirty years
he had been a clerk in the grocery store conducted
under the name of Packard, and where his widow
still lives ; Mina. who married E. J. Wignal. man-
ager of the Model Laundry of Salt Lake City,
with which he has been connected for thirteen
years : Clara, who married Eugene W. Raymond,
conductor for the Rio Grande Railroad at Salt Lake
City. Utah ; and Jennie, who married Walter R.
Dusenberry. an employe of the Model Laundry of
Salt Lake City, having charge of the automobile
department of it.
John Scovil attended the public schools of Spring-
ville. Utah, and when only thirteen years old left
school and went to work to help his father, and until
1884 was employed in teaming. In the fall of that
year he came to Montana and entered the employ
of the Upper Works at Anaconda as watchman and
later as timekeeper, remaining there for five years.
He was then manager of the milk ranch at Ana-
conda for a year, when he became driver for the
Anaconda Laundry Company and held that posi-
tion for a time. In 1894 he established the Mon-
tana Laundry at Anaconda, conducting it success-
fully until 1899, when he disposed of it to another
party and came to Butte. Here he bought the old
Union Laundry near the corner of Mercury and
Colorado streets from Keisser & Zundell, which was
one of the pioneer laundries of the city, and con-
ducted it for thirteen years, changing the name to
the Montana Laundry.
In 1905 Mr. Scovil and George H. Casey bought
all the other laundries of Butte, namely, the C. O. D.
Laundry, the Troy Laundry and the Palace Laundry,
each owning a half interest, and Mr. Scovil retained
his ownership of the Montana Laundry. T. J. Casey
was made manager of the C. O. D. Laundry.
In the meanwhile a new laundry, the Taylor
Laundry, was started on East Broadway, and Mr.
Scovil took over the leading interest in it, which
he still owns, having placed Joe Byrne in it
as assistant manager. Today Mr. Scovil is the
heaviest stockholder in the C. O. D. Laundry, which
is incorporated for $200,000, is its president and
manager, and he has Karl Niessler as his assistant
manager. Mr. Scovil is also president and man-
ager of the Taylor Laundry.
In 191 1 Mr. Scovil consolidated the Taylor and
Montana laundries and incorporated them for
$130,000, taking the controlling stock, which he still
holds. The C. O. D. Laundry is the largest in
Montana and employment is given to 100 persons,
while at the Taylor Laundry seventy-five persons
are employed. Therefore, taking into consideration
all of Mr. Scovil's laundry interests, he may truth-
fully be said to be the largest laundryman in Mon-
tana. The C. O. D. Laundry is at No. 400 East
Park Street, and the company owns it, also the
garage, barn and sheds, extending from East Park
Street to Galena Street, and also a lodging house
of forty-one rooms over the laundry. Mr. Scovil
also owns a modern residence at No. 201 North
Excelsior Avenue, which he built in 1917; an apart-
ment house at Nos. 205-207 North Excelsior Avenue,
which he built in 1917; the Lennox Hotel on West
Granite Street ; two brick blocks at the corner of
Mercury and Colorado streets ; two brick blocks
on Main Street; the building housing the Unique
Cleaning and Tailoring Company; three lots on Mer-
cury and Main streets on which are located the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
505
Speedway Stables ; a barn at No. 345 South Main
Street; and twelve other dwellings in Butte.
In politics Mr. Scovil is a republican. He be-
longs to the Masons, the Elks, having joined Butte
Lodge of that order eighteen years ago, and the
Knights of Pythias, which lie joined thirty years
ago. He is also a member of the Rotary Club, the
Butte Chamber of Commerce, the Silver Bow Club,
the Country Club, in which he is a stockholder, and
he is president of the Wardrobe Cleaning and Tailor-
ing Company of Great Falls, Montana, owning one-
third of the stock of that concern, which is incor-
porated, and owns the building in which it is located.
Mr. Scovil has other interests outside Butte in ad-
dition to that in the cleaning and tailoring company
just mentioned, for he owns an apartment house of
fourteen apartments at No. 341 East Second, South,
Salt Lake City, Utah; a business block at No. 451
South Main Street, and a modern brick dwelling at
No. 207 Belmont Avenue, both of Salt Lake City,
and a dwelling at Springville, Utah. He is president
of the Scovil Realty Company, Incorporated, of
Butte, which he also manages ; and is president of
the Unique Cleaning and Tailoring Company of
Butte.
In 1891 Mr. Scovil was married at Anaconda, Mon-
tana, to Miss Mary J. Keith, a daughter of Mrs. Jane
Keith, who died at Anaconda in igoi. Mrs. Scovil
was born at Corinne, Utah, in 1873, and died at
Anaconda on May 30, 1900, leaving one son, John
Ralph who was born on November 15, 1892, and a
sketch of whom appears elsewhere in this work.
He attended Shattuck Military Academy at Fari-
bault Minnesota, for three years, a preparatory school
at Princeton, New Jersey, for a year, and then took
a two years' course in the University of Pennsyl-
vania. He is now secretary, treasurer and manager
of the Unique Cleaning and Tailoring Company of
Butte. On June 12, 1901, Mr. Scovil was married
at Butte to Miss Lalia G. Walton, a daughter of
John and Henrietta (Smith) Walton, of Butte.
There are no children of this second marriage.
Mr. Scovil traces his family back to England,
from whence its representatives came to the Ameri-
can colonies and became prosperous in the New
England settlements. The story of Mr. Scovil's
rise reads like fiction, and yet it is the simple truth.
He is a man with an overpowering faculty for mak-
ing money and for investing it wisely and profit-
ably. Possessed of executive ability of the highest
order, he has known how to take rundown property
and build it up into paying investments. In addi-
tion he has been such an excellent judge of human
nature that he has seldom made a mistake in chos-
ing his associates and has placed in positions of au-
thority only those in whom he could put implicit
trust. There are few men of Butte, or the entire
state, who have more diversified holdings than Mr.
Scovil. and none of them are giving to their ditTer-
ent interests such conscientious supervision which
necessitates as much personal effort along divergent
lines. He is a remarkable man, and his rise and
continued prosperity reflect credit upon him and the
region in which he has been able to work these
manifold improvements.
Otis Lee has spent practically all his life in
Butte, and is a young man whose qualities have
gained him favor both in industrial affairs and
public life. For the past five years his name and
work have been associated with public office and he
is now clerk of the District Court at Butte.
Mr. Lee was born at Bessemer, Michigan, Janu-
ary 7, 1891. His grandfather, Edward Lee, was
born in County Waterford, Ireland, and as a young
man settled in New York State and later moved to
Northern Michigan. He died at Hancock, Michi-
gan, in 1873. The father of the clerk of the Dis-
trict Court is Patrick H. Lee. long an esteemed resi-
dent of Butte, whose home is at 849 West Copper
Street. He was born at Palmer Hill, New York,
in i860, but grew up in northern Michigan. One of
his early experiences was logging in the northern
peninsula, and later he was an engineer in the mines.
He was married at Hancock. Michigan, in 1886, and
finally left that state to go to North Dakota, as an
employe of the Northern Pacific Railway. In June,
189s, he arrived at Anaconda, Montana, and worked
in the smelters for Marcus Daly. His home has
been at Butte since September, 1899, and he followed
mining in Montana until he retired in 1913. He
is a democrat and a Catholic. His wife. Kate
Harrington, was born in 1862, at Hancock, Michigan.
She was one of the first born in that then isolated
settlement in northern Michigan. Patrick H. Lee
and wife had a family of ten children. Edward J..
the oldest, now at home and an engineer at the
mines, was born June 21, 1887, and made a brilliant
record as a soldier in the World war. He enlisted
Octolier 7, 1917, and after training at Camp Lewis
and at Camp Mills, New York, left Camp Merritt,
New Jersey, on December 14, 1917, crossed the At-
lantic on the Leviathan, reaching England Decem-
ber 23, 1917, and landing in France on the 30th of
December. He was on active duty during the
greater part of the year 1918 from the time the
American forces took their place in the battle line.
He was at Chateau Thierry, at Fismes, at San
Mihiel, and was twice on the front line in the Ar-
gonne Forest. He was in the Argonne when the
armistice was signed, and then went to Germany
with the first Army of Occupation, remaining from
November, 1918, until April, 1919. He was mustered
out May 24, 1919. Jerry, the second child, born
January 21. 1889, lives at home with his parents
and is a chauffeur for the Butte Fire Department.
The third is Otis. Loretta, born in 1893, is a gradu-
ate of the Butte Central High School. Mary, born
in 1895. is the wife of Charles Cappa, a millman at
Black Rock Mine and a resident of Butte. James,
born in 1897, a graduate of the Butte Central High
School and now at home and working as time
keeper at the Stewart Mine, enlisted in the navy
June 15, 1918, served with the Asiatic Squadron, and
his final duties were in the Harbor of Manila at
Cavite. He was mustered out June 30, 1919. Mar-
garet, the seventh child, was born in March, 1899,
and is a graduate of the Central High School. John,
born July 9, 1901. is an apprentice machinist at
the Berkeley mine. William, born April I, 1904, is
in the Central High School. Catherine, the youngest,
born June 27, 1909, is a pupil in the Immaculate
Conception School at Butte.
Otis Lee was about four years old when his
parents came to Montana. He graduated from the
Butte High School in 1909, worked in a mine one
year, and in 1910 became a timekeeper for the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company. He left that cor-
poration in 191 5 to become assistant city clerk dur-
ing the term of Charles H. Lane as mayor. This
office he resigned in 1916, having been elected clerk
of the District Court for a term of four years. He
entered office in January. 1917. and by his adminis-
tration has completely deserved the confidence of his
fellow citizens who chose him to this position. Mr.
Lee is a democrat, is affiliated with Butte Council
No. 668, Knights of Columbus. Butte Lodge No.
240, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and
is a member of the Catholic Church.
His home is at 426 South Main Street. May 21,
506
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1917, at Butte, he married Miss Doris E. Smith.
Her parents are William G. and Mary (Smith)
Smith, of the same family name but not related.
They are residents of Butte, where her father is
cashier for the Butte Electric Railway Company.
Elmer E. Esselstvn. While his name is most
widely known over the state of Montana through
his former service as state treasurer, Mr. Esselstyn
is and has been for a number of years one of the
prominent and substantial business men of Butte,
and the part he played in republican politics has
been incidental to a long and active career in Mon-
tana covering more than thirty years.
He was born at the little village of Aztalan in
Jefferson County, Wisconsin, November 8, 1864. His
people were Wisconsin pioneers, and his American
ancestry in the paternal line goes back to Jacob
Esselstyn, who immigrated from Holland to New
Amsterdam in 1657. His grandfather bore the name
Jacob Esselstyn and was born in Cape Vincent, New
York, in 1806 and subsequently became a pioneer
farmer in Wisconsin. He died in Richland City,
Wisconsin, in 1878. Jacob Esselstyn married a
Miss McLeod. a native of Scotland.
Roderick M. Esselstyn, a son of Jacob, was born
at Hudson, New York, in 1827, and as a young man
removed to Jefferson County, Wisconsin, where he
married and where for a number of years he fol-
lowed the business of mason contracting. In 1878
he went to Blue Earth, Minnesota, where he died
the following year. He was a republican and a
member of the Baptist Church, and his death was
the direct result of the severe wounds received
while a Union soldier during the Civil war. He had
enlisted in 1861 in Company F of the 29th Wiscon-
sin Infantry, and went all through the war. He
was in the battle of Gettysburg, and was also in
ttie Red River campaign under General Banks. He
was twice severely wounded. Roderick Esselstyn
married Ellen M. Strong, who was born in Hiber-
nia. New Jersey, in 1825, and died at Santa Barbara,
California, in July, 1919, at the advanced age of
ninety-four. She was of a prominent family, her
mother being a descendant of the De Castalines of
France. Her grandfather, John Strong, was a
native of Ireland, and came to the .American colonies
in time to participate as a soldier with the Con-
tinental armies during the struggle for independence.
By trade he was an iron worker. He died at Morris-
town, New Jersey. His son Samuel Strong, father
of Ellen M. Strong, was born in New Jersey in
1793, and for many years was a prominent iron
master at Hibernia, New Jersey. His last years were
spent in retirement at Blue Earth, Minnesota, where
he died in 1883.
Elmer E, Esselstyn is the younger of two children.
His older brother, Sam, is a dairy farmer in the
great dairy district of Jefferson County, Wisconsin.
Elmer spent the years of his boyhood on a farm in
Jefferson County, Wisconsin, and had to be satisfied
with the advantages of the rural schools. Soon
after he was thirteen years of age he began doing
regular farm work, and after going to Minnesota
with his parents he was employed in a store at
Jackson until the death of his father. Soon after-
wards he found an opening as clerk in a store at
Minneapolis, and lived there until 1887. His educa-
tion, his opportunities in a business way and his
varied achievements are all due to the initiative and
courage which enabled him to take life as he found
it and make the best of his circumstances.
Mr. Esselstyn came to Glendive, Montana, in
1887, in company with Angus Brown, master
mechanic of the Northern Pacific Railway. For a
time he was employed as shop clerk at Glendive and
during 1888-89 as a locomotive fireman. He was
then promoted to the purchasing department, with
headquarters at Red Lodge, and was in the service
of the Northern Pacific until he resigned to become
clerk of court of Carbon County. That county was
created in 1900, and he was elected as the first in-
cumbent of the office. He was re-elected in 1904, but
resigned in June, 1906, to accept the federal office of
register of United States Land Office at Billings.
He was the appointee of President Roosevelt, and
was the first register after the opening of the oftice.
This position he also resigned in 1908, after the
State Republican Convention had nominated him for
state treasurer. Mr. Esselstyn was elected in the
fall of 1908, beginning his duties in January, 1909,
and for four years was busy with his ofiiciai duties
at Helena.
In the meantime he was serving as trustee of the
funds at the organization of the Montana Life In-
surance Company and the Montana Fire Insurance
Company, and subsequently became vice president
and treasurer of the Montana Fire Insurance Com-
pany. In that capacity he has been instrumental in
developing the business of this corporation until it
is one of the leading concerns in point of volume of
business in the northwest.
Mr. Esselstyn is also a director of the Boston
Montana Development Company and the Southern
Montana Railway Company. His offices are at 120
West Granite Street. Mr. Esselstyn is a member
of the Baptist Church, is prominent in Masonry, his
affiliations being with Billings Lodge, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, Billings Chapter, Royal Arch
Masons, Billings Commandery, Knights Templar,
Helena Consistory and .Algeria Temple of the Mys-
tic Shrine at Helena. He is a member of the Rotary
Club and the Silver Bow Club at Butte.
Mr. Esselstyn resides in the Idaho .Apartments at
224 West Porphry Street. He married at Butte
April 6, 1915, Miss Lottie Hardee. Mrs. Esselstyn
was born in Iowa and is a graduate of the high
school of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
James P. Crouley, proprietor of the Towanda
Hotel of Hot Springs, is one of the progressive
young men of this section, and assisted by his
capable wife has developed a business that is in a
flourishing condition, and that has a reputation for
good service and excellent meals that is carried all
over the country by satisfied guests. He was born
at Towanda, Bradford County, Pennsylvania, a son
of James and Mary (Griffin) Crouley, and second
in order of birth in the family of six children of
his parents. The Crouley home was a fine old
colonial mansion, in which the father and grand-
father of James P. Crouley were also born. It had
massive white pillars supporting the veranda which
ran clear across the front, and great open fireplaces
inside. Having stood for so long, this house was
the scene of many interesting incidents, and it is
claimed that the blazed Indian trail used by the
noted Indian fighter and Revolutionary hero, Gen.
Anthony Wayne, ran through the Crouley property.
James P. Crouley was graduated from the
Towanda State College, having specialized in archi-
tecture and building, and followed that line of busi-
ness for some years prior to coming West to con-
tinue in it. He selected Seattle, Washington, as his
new place of residence, but later came to Montana,
and for a time was engaged as an architect and
builder at. Plains, executing some very important
contracts there, including the beautiful high school
building, which stands as a monument to his skill
and faithful carrying out of the specifications of
<^^-p^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
507
his contract. While at Plains he met and was
married to Miss Margaret Pendergrass, born at
Willsboro, New York, a daughter of Thomas and
Ellen (Ryan) Pendergrass, natives of Vermont and
Ireland, respectively, the ceremony occurring on May
2, IQIO. After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Crouley
lived at Sand Point, Idaho, for a time, where Mr.
Crouley was engaged in business, and from there
they went to Wallace, Idaho, and subsequently to
Couer d'Alene, in both of which places Mr. Crouley
continued to operate as an architect and builder.
In the meanwhile their attention was attracted to
Hot Springs and the opening here for a first class
hotel to accommodate the thousands who come here
yearly, and they finally erected a modern three-story
hotel containing thirty-four rooms and named it for
Mr. Crouley's birthplace. An electric light plant has
been installed which furnishes light for every room
and all the outbuildings, and the power for raising
a supply of soft water so that each room has in it
both hot and cold. While drilling for water Mr.
Crouley struck an unlimited supply of artesian water.
An experienced chef is employed and the cuisine is
famed for its superior quality. During the hunting
season the Towanda has as fine game on its tables
as can be found in the country, and all the year
around fresh vegetables, eggs, cream, milk and but-
ter are used in olentiful abundance. This hotel is
noted for the courtesy, geniality and amiability dis-
played. When a stranger steps into the large pleas-
ant lobby he is at once made to feel at home because
of the friendly and homelike atmosphere which pre-
vails. The lobby is decorated with rare and beau-
tiful plants, and the official barrenness so noticeable
in some hotels is entirely absent. Although new to
the business, Mr. and Mrs. Crouley have made their
undertaking a success from the beginning, and their
hotel ranks with the best in this part of the state.
They are boosters for Hot Springs, and are always
ready to give both financial and moral support to all
measures having for their object the betterment of
the community. As Mr. Crouley is occupied with
his building operations, much of the burden of the
management has fallen upon the shoulders of Mrs.
Crouley, who has proved equal to her responsibilities.
She is a cultured lady, who has traveled extensively
both in this country and abroad, at one time with
her mother traveling in Europe and visiting London,
Dublin, Edinburgh, and the principal cities of the
Continent. The people of Montana seem to pull
together to produce results. Much of the factional
jealousy to be found in other states fortunately is
absent here, and among those who are "pulling"
for their town and state Mr. and Mrs. Crouley
occupy a very prominent place.
Mrs. Crouley's father, Thomas Pendergrass, is
one of the pioneers of Montana, and after coming
here took so active a part in politics that he was
sent to the State Assembly to represent his district
several times, both in the Upper and Lower houses,
and is the father of some very important legisla-
tion. He served for four years as game warden of
Missoula County and four other counties which were
included in the district under his jurisdiction. His
wife was graduated from the University of Dublin,
Ireland, and was not only a lady of unusual mental
attainments, but strikingly beautiful as well. Mrs.
Crouley resembles her mother, and her capabilities
were developed at Saint Mary's Academy of Salt
Lake City, Utah, from which she was graduated,
following which she took a special course in music
in the Sisters Academy of the Sacred Heart of
Missoula, Montana. Desiring to be of use m the
world, she entered Columbus Hospital at Great Falls,
Montana, where she began her trainmg as a pro-
fessional nurse, and after a year went to Chicago,
Illinois, and completed her course in the Cook County
Hospital of that city, from which she was grad-
uated. There are not many ladies who have been
so carefully trained as she, and she feels that her
studies have been of inestimable use to her in her
present undertaking. Guests of the Towanda Hotel
benefit from the spotlessness of their rooms and the
entire establishment from her years of training in
sanitary observances, while her culture and musical
attainments make her a delightful hostess and valued
member of the best social circle of Hot Springs.
Mrs. Crouley is a Catholic. Both she and Mr.
Crouley are admirers of President Wilson, and vote
the democratic ticket.
Arthur Thomas has been a resident of Mon-
tana over thirty-five years, since early boyhood,
and the business that has chiefly occupied him and
in which he is still engaged is ranching, near Avon
in Powell County. Mr. Thomas is at present a
member of the Board of County Commissioners of
Powell County.
He was born in the neighboring state of Idaho
at Malad, August 29, 1872. He is of Welch an-
cestry on both sides. His grandfather, Thomas
Thomas, spent all his life in South Wales, where
he was a miner. The father, Reese P. Thomas,
was born in South Wales in 1815, was reared there
and came to the United States in 1849. Soon after-
ward he crossed the plains to Utah, was married in
that western territory, and farmed in Utah and
Idaho for a number of years. In 1884 he left his
ranch at Malad and located at Butte, where he did
teaming and followed other occupations for two
years. In 1886 he located on his ranch and farm
near Avon, and died there in 1892. His enterprise
as a farmer brought him abundant means and pros-
perity. Politically he was identified with the re-
publican party. His wife was Mary Evans, who
was born in South Wales in 1835. She died at
Deer Lodge in 1908. They were the parents of ten
children, Arthur being next to the youngest. Reese
the first in age was a farmer and died at Malad,
Idaho, at the age of sixty-two; Sarah married Isaac
Price and both died on their ranch at Avon; Eph
is a sheep man at Malad; Thomas is a retired
rancher at .'\von ; Margaret lives at Malad, widow
of David M. Jones, who was a farmer; Etta is
unmarried and a resident of Avon; Rachel lives
at Race Track, Montana, widow of P. H. Meagher,
who was a miner and rancher; Alexander died at
Avon at the age of twenty-nine; Arthur is the next
in age; and Emma is the wife of Frank Leibsch,
a cattle buver at Helena, Montana.
Mr. Arthur Thomas acquired his early education
in the public schools of his native town in Idaho.
He was twelve years of age when his parents located
at Butte and fourteen when they settled on their
ranch at Avon. He was his father's assistant on
the ranch which he now owns. He has 800 acres,
with water rights, and this is one of the valuable
places of Powell Countv. The ranch is five miles
north of Avon. Mr. Thomas does an extensive
business raising cattle.
He was elected to his present post as a county
commissioner in 1916 for a term of six years. He
was elected on the republican ticket. In February,
1914, at Helena, Mr. Thomas married Miss Laura
Beck, daughter of L. P. and Mary Beck. Her par-
ents reside at Race Track, Montana, her father being
a retired pioneer rancher of Powell County. Mrs.
Thomas before her marriage was a teacher tor sev-
eral years. They have one son. W illard, born
November 15, 1917-
508
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Andrew Karl Resner, M. D. In Iowa, where
he practiced fifteen years, and at Ronan, where he
has had his home since igio. Dr. Resner has always
enjoyed exceptional standing and success as a phy-
sician and surgeon. Special interest is added to his
professional standing by reason of his service with
the rank of captain in the Medical Reserve Corps
during the late war. One of his sons was also a
soldier, an aviator, and saw hard and strenuous
duty on the battle front in France.
Doctor Resner has been an American resident
since he was fourteen years of age. He was born
at Plotzka, Russia, July 22. 1865. His father, An-
drew Resner, was born in the same locality in 1839.
He had a small farm which he cultivated, and also
served at one time as chief of police at Plotzka.
After the death of his first wife he came to the
United States, became a farm owner at Scotland,
South Dakota, and in 1907 moved to Gascoyne,
North Dakota, where he still owns a farm and at
the age of over eighty retains much of his strength
and takes an active interest in his work and his
home community. He is a republican and a mem-
ber of the Congregational Church. His first wife
was Caroline Lyer, who spent all her life in Russia.
She was the mother of two sons : Jacob P., mana-
ger of the Masonic Temple at Yankton, South
Dakota; and Dr. Andrew Karl. For his second
wife Andrew Resner married Margaret Stortz.
They have four children : Mary, wife of Ludwig
Hoffman, a farmer at Gascoyne, North Dakota;
Nathaniel, John and Emanuel, all farmers at
Gascoyne.
Doctor Resner attended the public schools of his
native country to the age of fourteen. As a boy
on his father's homestead in South Dakota he at-
tended rural schools for two years, and in 1886
graduated from the German Seminary at Crete,
Nebraska. Doctor Resner first prepared himself
for the ministry, and is a graduate of the Chicago
Theological Seminary. He received his degree
from that institution in 1889. Later he abandoned
the ministerial calling, and in preparation for medi-
cine attended the University of Iowa at Iowa City,
where he was graduated M. D. in 1895. The same
year he began practice at Manning Iowa and during
the sixteen years of his busy work as a physician
there he was also president of the Board of Edu-
cation. Doctor Resner located at Ronan in 1910,
and except while away in the army has attended
with skill and proficiency to his extensive general
practice. He owns a modern home and office at
Ronan. For eight years he was president of the
Board of Education of District No. 28 at Ronan.
On January 25 1917, Doctor Resner was com-
missioned at Helena with the rank of first lieuten-
ant in the Medical Reserve Corps. He was called
to active duty on June I. 1918, was first at Fort
Douglas in Salt Lake City, spent two months with
the Twenty-first Regiment at Taliaferro Camp at
San Diego, California, then accompanied the Twen-
ty-first of Camp Kearney, and became regimental
surgeon of the Eighty-first Regiment, organizing its
medical service. He continued with the Eighty-
first until after the signing of the armistice. His
next duty was as post surgeon of the Remount Sta-
tion at Camp Kearney, and he remained there until
the date of his honorable discharge on May 20,
1919. Doctor Resner is still a captain in the Medi-
cal Reserve Corps, with a reserve commission valid
for five years, subject to call by the Government.
He is a member of the Missoula County and State
Medical Societies, also the American Medical Asso-
ciation, is a republican, and is affiliated with the
Woodmen of the World, Modern Woodmen of
America and a former member of the Odd Fellows.
In 1890, at Crete, Nebraska. Doctor Resner mar-
ried Miss Lydia N. Shaerer. daughter of John and
Margaret (Lamlin) Shaerer'. Her mother died at
Canton, Missouri, and her father at Lafayette, In-
diana. Her father was a Congregational minister
who served many churches in the Middle West.
Mrs. Resner completed her education in Doane Col-
lege at Crete, Nebraska, and met her husband while
there. They have four children : Herbert A., the
oldest, born June 5, 1891, attended the University of
Nebraska at Lincoln and is a professional musician
living at Butte; Carl B., born November 20, 1892,
is a graduate of the Manning, Iowa. High School,
and is now on his father's ranch Roy J., a twin
brother of Carl, is also a graduate of the Manning
High School and is on the home ranch. Harold R.,
born July 23, 1898. lives with his parents at Ronan
and is employed in a drug store. He was the sol-
dier son. He spent a year and a half in France,
being with the One Hundred and Fifty-seventh
Aerial Squadron. He was mustered out in June,
1919.
When Doctor Resner came to Ronan in 1910 he
homesteaded a claim and has invested much money
and time in the improvement of his place. He now
has 440 acres located nine miles south of Ronan.
This is a productive ranch, growing hay, grain,
cattle and hogs.
A. M. Sterling is proprietor of one of the chief
general mercantile establishments at Ronan. He
has been in Montana more than thirty years, and is
one of a numerous colony of former residents of
the eastern Canadian provinces who have become
substantial and highly respected residents in differ-
ent sections of Montana.
Mr. Sterling was born at Frederickton. New
Brunswick, February 12. 1869. His father, J. A.
Sterling, was born in the same Canadian town in
1836. and for many years was a merchant at Freder-
ickton. Later he lived for a time at Boston, Massa-
chusetts, and Block Island, Rhode Island, and in
1007 came to Montana and was a retired resident
of Missoula until his death in 1912. He married
Margaret Thorne. who was born in New Brunswick
in 1838 and died at Missoula in 1914. They were
the parents of four children: F. T.. president of
the Western Montana National Bank at Missoula;
.^gnes. wife of W. H. Reid, a printer at Augusta,
Maine; A. M. Sterling; and Margaret, who died
at the age of twenty-one years.
A. M. Sterling was educated in the schools of
Frederickton, and in 1883, at the age of fourteen,
began working in a general store at Block Island,
Rhode Island. He was there two years, and for one
year was employed by the grocery house of Cobb.
Bates & Verxa at Boston. Mr. Sterling was a very
young man when he came to Missoula in 1886. His
previous training made him a useful employe of the
Missoula Mercantile Company, an organization with
which he remained until 1899. The following year
he was with the Montana Hardware Company at
Butte, and in 1900 joined the tide of gold seekers
to Nome, Alaska. He prospected in mines in the
far north for a year and a half, but in the fall of
1902 returned to Montana and from January, IQ03,
to January, 1905, was under sheriff of Missoula
County.
Mr. Sterling has been a leading factor in the
community of Ronan since May, 1905, when he
bought the general store business of Jesse R. Sear.
He has a large store building, several warehouses,
?iid keeps all the goods and commodities required
by the people of his section of Missoula County.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
509
He also owns a modern liome in Ronan, a ranch
southwest of town, and another adjoining Ronan
on the east.
Mr. Sterling is state highway commissioner, an
office to which he was appointed in 1919. Politi-
cally he is a republican, and is affiliated with the
Ronan Lodge of Odd Fellows and Hell Gate Lodge
No. 383 of Elks, at Missoula.
In 1905, at Missoula, he married Miss Bessie J.
Farrell, daughter of T. J. and Elizabeth (Bannon)
Farrell, residents of Missoula. T. J. Farrell is
widely known among Montana stockmen. He and
his wife came to Montana during the territorial
period. At one time he owned the largest band of
horses possessed by any individual in Montana.
Mrs. Sterling is a graduate of the State Normal
I School at Dillon, and before her marriage was a
i successful teacher in the schools of Butte and Mis-
I soula. Mr. and Mrs. Sterling have three children:
Margaret, born March 6, lyo6, a student in the
Ronan High School; George, born October 3, 1909;
and Robert, born July 4, 1915.
Joseph A. Lemire. With a broad and varied ex-
perience in merchandising in Montana extending
over a period of a quarter of a century, Joseph A.
Lemire has been especially a prominent factor in
the Flathead district at Ronan. where for the past
ten years he has been a leading merchant, post-
master, and is a man of large affairs and influence.
Mr. Lemire was born in the Province of Quebec,
Canada, February 19, 1874. His father. Dr. Adolph
Lemire, was born at Three Rivers, Quebec, in 1847,
and received his Doctor of Medicine degree from
the McGill University at Montreal. He spent his
active life as a prominent physician and surgeon
in Essex County, Canada, but died near Windsor,
at Tecumseh, Ontario, in 191 1. He was a liberal
in politics, a member of the Catholic Church and
of the Catholic Mutual Benefit Association. Doctor
Lemire married Azilda Lupien. She was born in
Arthabaska County in the western part of the
Province of Quebec in 1849 and died at Tecumseh,
Ontario, in 1917. Doctor Lemire and wife had a
family of nine children : Adolph, a candy manu-
facturer at Lynn, Massachusetts ; Joseph A. ; Ar-
thur, a painter, paper hanger and decorator at Wind-
sor, Canada ; Ross E., a partner of Joseph A. ; Fred,
a carpenter and builder at Tecumseh ; Henry, who
is employed in the Dodge Company's automobile
works in Detroit, and has also attained considerable
fame on the stage as a prestidigitator; Anna, wife
of Israel Parent, a merchant at Tecumseh ; Azilda,
wife of Constant Carrierre, an employe of the Ford
automobile works at Ford City, Walkerville, On-
tario; and one child that died in infancy.
At the age of eighteen Joseph A. Lemire had
completed his education in the public schools of
Ontario, and had begun work in a general store
near Windsor. He gained much knowledge of mer-
chandising during the next four years, and in 1895,
when he came to Anaconda, he had the experience
that made him an acceptable and useful employe
with the McCallum & Clotier Mercantile Company.
He was with that organization many years, begin-
ning as clerk, and for twelve years was office
manager.
At the time of the opening of the Flathead Res-
ervation in the fall of 1909 Mr. Lemire established
a general store at Ronan. His store building and
stock of goods were destroyed by fire in 1912, fol-
lowing which he built his present store block, in-
cluding the postoffice building acjjoining. This is
one of the best equipped general mercantile estab-
lishments in Missoula County. Mr. Lemire was
appointed and has served as postmaster of Ronan
since 1915. He was the second citizen of Ronan
honored with the post of mayor, and he also served
one term as president of the local Coinmercial Club.
Another result of his enterprise and influence was
the Mission Valley Fair, which he helped establish
and which has held three succesful fairs at Ronan.
He is a director in the Ronan Flour Mill Company
and owns a modern home and other real estate.
Mr. Lemire is a democrat, a member of the Cath-
olic Church, of St. John's Society, and is a third
degree Knight of Columbus, being affiliated with
Anaconda Council No. 882, a member of the Cath-
olic Order of Foresters at Anaconda and Anaconda
Lodge No. 239 of the Elks.
In 7905, at Grand Forks, North Dakota, Mr. Le-
mire married Miss May McLean, daughter of Hugh
and Hattie (Tolan) McLean. Her mother lives
at Winnipeg, Canada. Her father, deceased, was a
railway station agent. Mrs. Lemire is a graduate
of the North Dakota Norma: School at Mayville,
and was a teacher in that state before her marriage.
Mr. and Mrs. Lemire became the parents of five
children: Gertrude, born March 10, 1906, a junior
in the Ronan High School ; Hugh, born January
4, 1908, and Paul, born February 17, 1910, both
grammar school pupils; Marjorie, born January
I, 1914, and Lois, born February i, 1917.
James Newton Alexander, M. D. The physician
of today not only is a trained man whose every
faculty has been brought to the highest perfection,
but he is also one whose vast experience with people
and affairs enables him to act with the efficiency of
a really first-rate man, and to energize all those with
whom he comes in contact. He does not work for
spectacular results, but sane, sound progress, not
only in his profession, but in other directions. To
him and his associates belongs the credit for prac-
tically all the advance made in civic sanitation and
the obliteration of many dread diseases formerly
deemed incurable. Such results have come from
aggressive and self-sacrificing labor not only on the
part of the few who come into public notice, but
the profession as a whole, for no other band of men
so truly work together as do those who are devot-
ing themselves to medical science. One of the men
who stands high among the physicians and surgeons
of this class is Dr. James Newton Alexander of
Roundup.
Doctor Alexander was born at Fannettsburg,
Franklin County, Pennsylvania, April 8. 1873, a son
of Randall McGinley and Mary Janet (McGanghey)
Alexander, and great-grandson of Col. W. .'Mexan-
der, who served during the War of 1812, defending
Baltimore, Maryland, against the attacks of Lord
Ross. Randall M. Alexander was born at Shirleys-
burg, Pennsylvania, and died at the age of sixty-
eight years in 1913. His wife was born at Fair-
field, Pennsylvania, and died at the age of thirty-
eight years, in 1895. They had three children, of
whom Doctor Alexander is the eldest. Growing up
in his native town, Randall M. Alexander attended
its schools and Jefferson Medical College, and after
completing his studies located, at Fannettsburg
Pennsylvania, where he spent the remainder of his
life. He belonged to the Franklin County Medical
Association, the Pennsylvania State Medical So-
ciety and served on the school board for many years.
He was a democrat in his political convictions.
James Newton Alexander attended Mercersburg
College, from which he was graduated in 1891, and
Jefferson Medical College, from which he was grad-
uated in 1895, following which for eighteen months
he was house surgeon of the Pennsylvania Railroad
510
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Hospital at Altoona, Pennsylvania. In August, 1896,
Doctor Alexander was appointed chief surgeon of
Saint James Hospital at Butte, Montana, and held
that position for ten years, and then returned to his
old home and for a time was associated with his
father in the latter's practice. Still later he spent
six months at Washington, District of Columbia, in
surgical work, and then came back to Montana, lo-
cating permanently at Roundup, as physician and
surgeon for the Republic Coal Company, and was
so serving when he enlisted in May, 1917, for the
great war, receiving his commission as captain on
October I, 1917, and on April I, 1918, was called
into the service, being sent first to Fort Riley in
the Officers' Training Camp, from which he was
transferred to the Casualty Officers' Depot in
France on July i, 1918. On July 8th of that year
he received orders to report to Base Hospital No. 7,
La Rochelle, France, and was assigned as chief as-
sistant to the base surgeon there, but was later made
chief operating surgeon at Base Hospital No. 39,
and given the major operations of the American
Red Cross Hospital at La Rochelle. In August,
1918, he was recommended for a commission as
major, which he received on February 17, 1910. The
base hospital was abandoned in May, 1919, at which
time he was the commanding officer and operating
surgeon at Sussex Hospital, Base Section No. 7, La
Rochelle. On July i, 1919. he received orders to
report at Brest, France, and returned to Hoboken,
New Jersey, and later to Camp Dix, Wrightown,
New Jersey, and was given a week's leave to report
to Camp D. A. Russell, Wyoming, where he re-
ceived his honorable discharge on July 15, 1919, and
returned at once to Roundup, where he resumed his
practice, and his former affiliation with the Repub-
lic Coal Company. He belongs to the county and
state medical societies, and to the Sons of the Amer-
ican Revolution. Like his father. Doctor Alexan-
der is a democrat.
Doctor Alexander was married to Germaine
Kiere, who was born in Belgium, educated in Eng-
land and was at the head of the welfare work of
the .'Xmeritan Red Cross at La Rochelle, France,
which had charge of taking care of the Belgian
refugees. Doctor Alexander and his wife met while
engaged in their work for humanity, and were mar-
ried on February 8, 1919, at La Rochelle. Their
experiences during the great war have broadened
them in every respect, and made their outlook on
life somewhat different from those who have only
viewed the conflict through the reports of others.
Having for so long had the responsibility of the
welfare of many upon their hands, they developed
a capability which will never leave them, and al-
though that was the last consideration they had in
mind when they enlisted to help others, their future
will be the brighter and happier for what they
learned in that connection. Doctor Alexander is at
present a major in the Medical Reserve Corps, U. S.
Army.
James R. Faulds came to Montana more than
thirty-five years ago and soon turned from teach-
ing to the newspaper business, a vocation and pro-
fession in which his singular gifts and abilities have
had their best scope.
Mr. Faulds, who was editor of the Northwest
Tribune of Stevensville, was born at Yellow Springs,
Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, April 19, 1853. His
grandfather, James Faulds, had come from Scot-
land and settled in Pennsylvania in the early forties.
He and several of his sons were mine workers in
Pennsylvania. Maryland and Virginia. James
Faulds. Jr., also acquired much knowledge of sur-
veying and was employed to operate stationary en-
gines for coal companies. Both James Faulds, Sr.
and Jr., afterward moved to Glencoe, Wisconsin,
where they spent the rest of their lives. James
Faulds, Jr., married a lady of Scotch family, her
father having been one of the California forty-
niners.
James Russell Faulds was a small child when his
parents moved to Wisconsin, and he received his
education in the common graded and normal schools
of that state. He began writing for newspapers
when only fourteen years old, and at the age of
sixteen began teaching school. He combined teach-
ing with work on a farm, and at the age of twenty-
seven he bought the plant of the Independent News
af Independence, Wisconsin. He managed and pub-
lished the paper for four years, and also was prin-
cipal of the graded schools there.
In 1886 Mr. Faulds came to Montana, primarily
to accept a place as teacher at Thompson Falls. He
found that a second contract had been made with
a woman from New York, and he gallantly resigned
the honor to her and began transporting goods from
Thompson to the mines at Murray, Idaho. In 1887
he was employed to teach the Stevensville school,
and he made his influence much wider than his im-
mediate contract with his scholars. He organized
debating clubs and did much to improve the intel-
lectual life of the community. In the summer of
1888 he took up a preemption on the west side of
the river, proved up on it, and on February 22. 1889,
entered upon his long continued duties with the
Northwest Tribune, beginning as secretary, editor
and manager. Soon afterward he bought the paper
from the stockholders and for practically thirty
years guided its destinies as one of the best news
organs in that section of Montana.
The Tribune in Mr. Faulds'' hands has been an
instrument directed toward the public's greatest
good. Politically it was independent, with clearly
and strongly expressed standards of law and order
in affairs both national and local. The value of his
ideals to the community has been recognized in the
numerous offices he has been asked to fill. For
several terms he held the office of alderman, and
for three terms the highest municipal office, that
of mayor. During his municipal career the city
waterworks were installed — owned by the munici-
pality—the electric lighting system put into opera-
tion, and the wide cement sidewalks built. The
elimination of grafting and law breaking received
his most earnest attention, and it is a matter elicit-
ing much gratification that Stevensville is now con-
sidered one of the cleanest towns in the state. So
courageous had Mr. Faulds been in defeiise of
the right and so determined in the exposition of
what he believed, or knew, to be wrong, that his
career of newspaper activity has at times been
fraught with difficulty. The five suits brought
against him cost him a four years' struggle, but
he was successful in his opposition of the "court
house ring," in which conflict he was ably sup-
ported by Colonel Sanders. In July, 1919, Mr.
Faulds disposed of his interest in the paper and has
since been engaged in closing the accounts of the
business.
Mr. Faulds is a democrat, was an active sup-
porter of Woodrow Wilson in both campaigns and
is a Royal Arch Mason, and for thirty years has
been actively and officially affiliated with the Order
of Good Templars. In 1893 he represented the
Grand Lodge of this order at Des Moines, in 1006
at Seattle, and in 1908 at Washington and attended
the one hundredth anniversary of Templars at Sara-
toga, New York, in 1908.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
511
Just before coming to Montana Mr. Faulds mar-
ried Miss Rosetta Mosimann on April 22, 1886.
She was a daughter of Christopher and Marie
(Bracher) Mosimann, of Swiss descent. Mr. and
Mrs. Faulds had one son and five daughters : James
Welcome, who was born at Thompson Falls, Mon-
tana, in 1887 ; and Martha, Ruth, Russell, Kathryn
and Elizabeth, all natives of Stevensville.
John Ecan came to Montana in 1891, and has
been -continuously since that time a resident of
Bonner. Connected with the Bonner plant of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company, his faithful and
diligent service has earned him steady promotion
until he is now mill superintendent of this plant
and one of the men high in the esteem of the
corporation.
Mr. Egan was born at Frederickton, New Bruns-
wick, Canada, January 3, 1868, son of John R. and
Mary (Nicholson) Egan. His father was born in
County Clare, Ireland, of Protestant ancestry, and
was a lifelong member of the Church of England.
He was reared in Ireland and was married in New
Brunswick. All his active life was spent as a school
teacher. He died in New Brunswick in 1891. In
politics he was a conservative. His wife, Mary
Nicholson, was born in Scotland in 1825 and died
at Bonner, Montana, in 1913. They had a large
family of children : Robert, who died at the age
of four years ; Elizabeth, who died in New Bruns-
wick ; Augusta, who has never married and is de-
partment superintendent in a cotton factory at Port-
land, Maine ; Theodore Edward, an electrical engi-
neer for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway
at Ravalli, Montana; John; Martha, wife of Charles
Hodgson, employed in the saw mill of the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company at Bonner ; Harry W., a
tanner living at Halifax, Nova Scotia; and Agnes.
wife of C. W. Hensel, a ship carpenter and ship-
yard worker living at Eureka, California.
John Egan received his education in the public
schools of his native city, and lived there until he
was twenty-two years of age. On leaving Canada
he worked in the lumber woods of West Virginia
for a year and then came to Montana. As mill
•superintendent at Bonner he has under his super-
vision a hundred and fifty employes of the plant.
He is a democrat in politics and is affiliated with
Covenant Lodge No. 6, Independent Order of Odd
Fellows, Hell Gate Lodge No. 383 of the Elks, and
Missoula Camp No. 5329, Modern Woodmen of
America, all at Missoula.
In 1903, at Spokane, Washington, he married Miss
Clara Lebert, daughter of Frank and Ellen (Cox)
Lebert, her mother being a resident of Bonner.
Her father, deceased, was a farmer. Mr. and Mrs.-
Egan have three children : Kathleen Mildred, born
April 9, 1905 ; Winifred, who died at the age of
two years; and Marion, born January 2, 1913.
William Edward Carroll has been a lawyer of
Butte for thirty years. The law was his first choice
of profession and he has remained loyal to its
ideals from the beginning. His practice has brought
him that satisfaction due to hard and successful
work, and a proper degree of remuneration for his
labors. Like many really successful lawyers Mr.
Carroll has only a brief record of participation in
public affairs.
He was born December 24, 1868, at Independence,
now a suburb of Kansas City, Missouri. He was
fourth among the five children of Rev. Alanson
and Mary E. (Murch) Carroll, the former a native
of Ohio and the latter of Vermont. His father
was a Presbyterian minister, educated at Western
ToL n— 33
Reserve University in Ohio, and was one of the
pioneers of his church in western Missouri and
eastern Kansas. He died at Independence \ugust
17, 1908.
William E. Carroll when three vears of age was
taken by his parents to Olathe, Kansas, but in 1881
the family home was returned to Independence.
He acquired his education in the public schools of
those two towns, also attended the Kansas City High
School, and graduated in law from the University
of Michigan in 1890. He came to Butte a young
lawyer well recommended by his preceptors and for-
mer associates, but for his success has chiefly relied
upon his individual ability to transact business and
solve problems of litigation to the best interests of
his clients.
Mr. Carroll was assistant city attorney of Butte
from 1907 to 1909, and at diflferent times has taken
an active and speaking part in republican cam-
paigns. He has been an official in the Grand Lodge
of Masons of Montana, was master of Mount
Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient Free and Accepted
Alasons at Butte from 1897 to 1899, and is also
athliated with the Modern Woodmen of America
and the Elks.
A ^' ^,"i"^ ^'^ September 27, 1894, he married Miss
Anna Martin, daughter of James T. and Margaret
(Corby) Martin. Her father was born in England
was a skillful mechanic by trade, was a veteran sol-
dier of the Civil war and died at Truro, Massachu-
setts, December 5, 1909. For many years he was
a resident of Montana and is well remembered
m the state. Mr. and Mrs. Carroll have three chil-
dren: Helen, born December 9, 1896; Chauncey
M., born August 8, 1901; and Charles R., born
December 12, 1902.
Miles Jordan Cavanaugh has been a prominent
Butte attorney for over a quarter of a century, has
extensive interests in mining and other enterprises
and represents a prominent pioneer family of the
territory and state.
He was born at Denver, Colorado, October 3,
1865, son of Miles and Elizabeth (Downs) Cava-
naugh. His father came to the Butte district of
Montana in the early sixties, was a miner and pros-
pector, and rose to the superintendency of a mine.
He was selected by President Grover Cleveland as
one of the men to safeguard the Government in-
terests along the Northern Pacific Railway.
Miles Jordan Cavanaugh received his education
m Butte, attending the public schools, and studied
law with Carter & Clayberg. He was admitted to
the bar November 2, 1891, and to practice in the
Supreme Court on the 5th of the same month. Mr.
Cavanaugh practiced at Helena from 1891 to 1894,
and since then has been at Butte. He is a director
and attorney for the Royal Development Company.
Mr. Cavanaugh is a safe counsellor, a well read
and hard working lawyer, and has also been a con-
stant reader of good literature and enjoys the out-
door sports of fishing and hunting. He is a past
noble grand of the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows, and is a member of the Silver Bow County
and State Bar Associations.
He married Alphonsine Milot, daughter of H. A.
Milot, one of the early mining men of Montana.
By their union he had two children, Lorena and
Martha. For his second wife Mr. Cavanaugh mar-
ried Cora E. Baugh, a native of Kentucky.
James Latimer Bruce, mining engineer at Butte,
has had an interesting record of personal service
during the past twenty years, one that has identified
512
HISTORY OF MONTANA
hira with some of the big mining districts of the
country and since 1913 with the state of Montana.
Mr. Bruce was born at Dubhn, Ireland, May 20,
1880. His father, Stuart Bruce, was a native of
Scotland and of a long line of sturdy Scotch an-
cestors. The mother, Margaret Latimer, was of
Irish birth and of Scotch-Irish family. James Lati-
mer Bruce received his first education in a kinder-
garten at London, England,, in 1885. Later in that
year his parents emigrated to Canada and from
that time until he was thirteen Mr. Bruce lived on
a farm and attended the public schools of Oxford
County, Ontario, from 1889 to 1893. He left Cana-
da with his brother, Stuart, for Denver, Colorado,
in 1893, to join their father, who was then in the
mercantile business. James Latimer Bruce during
subsequent j^ears had considerable work to do in his
father's store at Denver, and when not in school
was thus employed until 1899. He was a student
in the public schools of Denver until 1894, and in
1896 entered the Colorado School of Mines, where
he remained a student except for one year until
graduating with the degree E. M. in 1901. In the
meantime, in 1899, he was employed in the Cripple
Creek gold mining district.
His experience and progress as a mining engineer
during the past twenty years can be described briefly
as follows : From graduation in 1901 he was chem-
ist and assayer at the Little Johnny Mine at Lead-
ville, Colorado, until 1902; surveyor and draftsman
for the firm of Hills & Willis of Cripple Creek,
1902-03; chief engineer and later general foreman
of the Federal Lead Company of Flat River, Mis-
souri, until 1907; assistant manager of the Grace
Zinc Company of Joplin, Missouri, 1907-09; and
manager of the Continental Zinc Company of Jop-
lin, 1909 to 1913.
Leaving the great mineral districts of Missouri,
Mr. Bruce came to Montana and from March, 1913,
to January i, 1920, was manager of the Butte and
Superior Mining Company of Butte. In Septem-
ber, 1919, he accepted his present responsibilities
as manager of the Davis Daly Copper Company of
Butte. Mr. Bruce is also a director in several min-
ing companies.
He is a member of the Mining and Metallurgical
Society of America, the American Institute of Min-
ing and Metallurgy, the Montana Society of En-
gineers, the Silver Bow Club of Butte, the Butte
Country Club, Elks Club, Masonic order, and in
politics is a republican.
June 16, 1909, at Lexington, Missouri, he mar-
ried Mary Louise Temple, of Joplin, Missouri. She
died shortly after coming to Butte in 1913, leav-
ing no living children. On December 25, 1915, Mr.
Bruce married Leah Sidney Hills, of Denver, Colo-
rado. Her father was Victor G. Hills, who was one
of Colorado's early day engineers with office at
Pueblo, and for a number of years practiced his
profession at Denver and Cripple Creek. He was of
the firm Hills & Willis of Cripple Creek, men-
tioned in preceding paragraph as the firm that
employed Mr. Bruce soon after he graduated from
the School of Mines. Mr. and Mrs. Bruce have
three children: Mary Adaline, born in 1917; and
James Stuart and Janet Victoria, twins, born in
igig.
David E. Baird. The problems of health are
really the problems of life arid must pertain to all
questions of human interest, so that the physician
and surgeon is the most important man of his com-
munity. He must possess a wide range of general
culture, be an observant clinician and well read
neurologist, even though he never specializes along
any particular line. To take his place among the
distinguished men of his profession he must bear
the stamp of an original mind, and be willing to be
hard-worked, while at the same time his soul often-
times faints within him when studying the mysteries
of his calling. Acquainted as he is with the simple
annals of the poor, and the inner lives of his pa-
tients, he acquires a moral power, courage and con-
science which permits him to interfere with the
mechanism of physical life, alleviating its woes and
increasing its resistence to the encroachments of
disease. No wonder that a skilled, learned and sym-
pathetic medical man commands universal admira-
tion and respect. Within recent years another badge
of honor has been added to those to which the phy-
sician and surgeon is entitled, that of military serv-
ice. The very flower of the medical profession has
served this country in the hour of its greatest need,
and not only saved countless lives, but preserved
whole communities from the ravages of epidemics
which usually follow in the wake of wars. One of
the men of Montana entitled to distinction because
of his skill and the eighteen years of military serv-
ice he has rendered his Government, both as member
of the state guards and regular army, is Dr. David
E. Baird of Roundup.
Doctor Baird was born on his father's farm in
Venango County, Pennsylvania, June 22, 1876, a
son of John M. and Mary Grace (Hovis) Baird.
This farm was the original location of the great-
grandfather of Doctor Baird, who bought it in 1796,
and on it John M. Baird was born October 29, 1848.
His wife was also a native of Venango County, hav-
ing been born on July 16, 1852. In July, 1871, they
were married, and they became the parents of six
children, namely : Susan M., who is the wife of
J. C. Chambers, of West Newton, Pennsylvania;
Doctor Baird, who was the second in order of birth;
James C, who married Jessie Fulton, and served as
sergeant in the Aviation Corps during the late war;
Frank P., who married Bessie Barnes, is superin-
tendent of the Roundup public schools ; .-Mmeda F.,
who married Rev. Edwin Howe, a missionary, died
at Canton, China, where Mr. Howe was stationed, in
1915; and Jesse H., who married Sue Bragstad, of
Roundup. Montana, is a Presbyterian minister and
is now in charge of the First Presbyterian Church
of Youngstown, Ohio; John M. Baird is a farmer
and is also in the oil business, operating wells lo-
cated on his farm. He is a man of prominence in
his community, and has been elected several times
on the democratic ticket to township offices, includ-
ing those of assessor and collector. Very active in
the Presbyterian Church, he has held the office of
elder in it for many years and in the church and his
community is an influence for good.
. Doctor Baird attended the public schools of
Venango County, the Pennsylvania State Normal
School at Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania, the Grove
City College at Grove City, Pennsylvania, and the
medical department of the University of Maryland,
being graduated from the latter in the class of 1906.
For three years after his graduation Doctor Baird
was physician and surgeon for the Ritter Lumber
Company at Saginaw, North Carolina, from whence
in 1910 he came west to Carlyle, Montana, and then
on March i, 1911, located at Roundup, where with
the exception of the time he was engaged in mili-
tary service he has since continued. He belongs to
the county, state and national medical associations.
In 1916 Doctor Baird was appointed health officer
of Musselshell County, and reappointed in 1918,
and served for two terms, and in 1917 he was ap-
pointed city health officer of Roundup, and served
for two years. In politics he is a democrat, follow-
ing in the footsteps of his father in his political
belief. He belongs to Grove City Lodge No. 603,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
513
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, of Grove City,
Pennsylvania ; and he belonged to Bald Creek Chap-
ter No. 36, Royal Arch Masons, but demitted to
Roundup Chapter No. 30. Royal Arch Masons. He
belongs to the Asheville, North Carolina Cominand-
ery, Knights Templar, and Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at
Helena, Montana. Doctor Baird is also an active
member of the Phi Chi Greek letter fraternity, hav-
ing been the grand presiding national president.
In 1898 Doctor Baird enlisted in the Pennsylvania
National Guards, served through the anthracite coal
strike of 1902 with the Si-xteenth Regiment, Penn-
sylvania National Guards, and on August 29, 1910,
he was made a sergeant major of the Second Regi-
ment, Montana National Guards, receiving his com-
mission as second lieutenant in 1914, and was ap-
pointed assistant adjutant during the Butte riots in
1914. On June 19, 1916. he was ordered into service
on the border, and on June 22d of that year re-
ceived his commission as first lieutenant, being pro-
moted to be battalion adjutant. He was released
from duty on November 4, 1916, and mustered out
of the service on March 25, 191 7. During the late
war he was ordered back into the service as first
lieutenant, serving as such until August 3, 1917,
when he was released and honorably discharged.
He was appointed by Governor S. B. Stuart to serve
on the local draft board of Musselshell County after
he had volunteered for the medical service. His
commission was received and passed through the
surgeon-general's office to the adjutant-general's
office on the day the armistice was signed. During
1917 Doctor Baird was in the general command of
163 regiments stationed at old Fort Keogh, from
March 25 to August 5.
On October 30. 1907, Doctor Baird was united in
marriage with Sarah Alice Whitney, born at Bran-
don, Vermont. Doctor and Mrs. Baird have three
children, namely : Donald Whitney, Ruth Emily and
David James. Doctor Baird is an earnest, carefully
trained and faithful e.xponent of the healing art,
never too much occupied to give time and attention
to civic affairs, and few men stand any higher in
popular esteem than he, and he has earned the con-
iidence and afifection he inspires.
John J. O'Neill has been a resident of Butte
since 1903, in which year he moved from Denver
to become manager of the Continental Oil Company
over the district of Montana and northern Idaho.
His career might be briefly described as one of
hard work, and as he has worked he has used the
opportunities that have come and has achieved a
degree of success sufficient to satisfy the ambition
of a norma! American citizen.
His parents were James and Sarah (O'Brien)
O'Neill, both natives of Ireland. John J. was one
of fourteen children and was born at Clifton
Springs, Ontario County. New York, August 11,
i860. His birthplace is widely famous as the home
of the Clifton Springs Sanitarium, whose superla-
tive facilities have been patronized by many of
America's foremost business men. After a few years
of education in the local schools John J. O'Neill
went to work at the Sanitarium as an errand boy.
In time he made himself valuable to the manage-
ment and the patrons of the sanitarium, and with
increasing responsibilities remained there for ten
years. The direct opportunity for a change of em-
ployment was due to his acquaintance with a guest
of the sanitarium. Mr. C. S. Morey of Denver, who
offered him a position with the C. S. Morey Mer-
cantile Company.
Thus in 1881, at the age of twenty-one, Mr.
O'Neill went to Denver and for si.x years was with
the mercantile company, beginning as a utility man
and when he resigned to go into business for him-
self he was foreman in one of the departments.
Since 1887 practically all of Mr. O'Neill's business
energies have been devoted to the oil business. He
sold oil at retail in the city of Denver as a member
of the firm Horan & O'Neill for about two years.
In the meantime, in the latter part of 1887, he had
become city salesman in Denver for the Continental
Oil Company. Later he was made manager of the
company's business at Colorado Springs, was there
about six years, and for nine years had charge of
the company's business at Leadville, Colorado. Then
in 1903 the company selected him for the important
responsibilities of looking after their business in
Montana and northern Idaho, with Butte as his
headquarters.
Since moving to Butte Mr. O'Neill has identified
himself so far as consistent with all local enter-
prises and his name has been associated with the
high minded and patriotic citizens of Montana. He
is a democrat in politics, a member of the Catholic
Church,_ of the Silver Bow Club, of the Elks and
the Knights of Columbus, and is a former Grand
Knight of the latter order at Butte. While in Den-
ver he married Miss .Alice Kendrick, of Ottawa, Illi-
nois. She died at Denver in December, 1898, the
mother of two children. The son, John R., born
in July. 1890, at Colorado Springs, was educated in
the public schools in Gonzaga Universitv at Spokane
and in the Art Institute of New York City. The
daughter, Alice M., born in Colorado Springs, was
graduated in 1913 from the Colorado State Normal
School.
James Albert Poore. A native son of Montana,
James Albert Poore has enjoyed a steadily rising
reputation as a lawyer at Butte for the past fifteen
years. Most of this time has been devoted to the
interests of a private clientage, though for nearly
three years he was assistant attorney general of
Montana.
Mr. Poore was born at Boulder, December 15,
1879, son of James and Jane Taylor (Baldwin)
Poore. His parents were both natives of England.
His father, born August 29, 1829, came to America
in 1849, and was identified with the very first rush of
prospectors to the valleys and gulches of Montana.
He reached what is now the state of Montana in
1863, and was a placer miner at Virginia City, Last
Chance Gulch, the Butte district and the vicinity of
Boulder. After some years he went back to Eng-
land and in 1877 brought his bride to Montana, still
a territory. He died in Montana February 14, 1902,
at the age of seventy-three. His wife, who was born
October 2. 1846, survived her husband, and was the
mother of four children : Mrs. Sarah Maude Boy-
ington. James Albert, Thomas T. and Philip George.
James Albert Poore acquired his education in the
public schools of Boulder, the Helena Business Col-
lege and Butte Business College, and for five years,
beginning at the age of nineteen, was employed by
the law firm of Forbis & Mattison at Butte as a law
clerk and stenographer. He acquired a considerable
practical knowledge of the law while there, and also
earned the funds sufficient to complete his legal edu-
cation. Mr. Poore is a graduate in law from the
law school of the University of Virginia, receiving
his degree in 1905. From university he at once
returned to Butte, where he has made a reputation
for sound ability, careful handling of all interests
entrusted to him. and on more than one occasion has
exhibited brilliant qualifications as a lawyer. _ He is
a republican in politics and was nominated in 1908
514
HISTORY OF MONTANA
for county attorney of Silver Bow County. In May,
1910, he was appointed assistant attorney general,
and gave his time to the law department of the state
government until January, 1913.
Mr. Poore is a member of the Silver Bow Club,
and is affiliated with Butte Lodge No. 240 of the
Elks. June 3, 191 1, he married Miss Mamie Lingo,
daughter of Archie and Mary Lingo, of Anaconda,
Montana. They have two children, James Albert,
Jr., and Robert Arche.
Charles Warren Goodale is one of the eminent
engineers of America. A resident of Butte, he is
one of the oldest among a considerable number of
former graduates of the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology whose work and professional engage-
ments have made them residents of Montana. It is
forty-five years since Mr. Goodale graduated from
that great American "tech" school, and since then
his experience has taken him to many of the great
copper mining districts of the West, and on pro-
fessional engagements and in pursuit of recreation
and knowledge he has become a world traveler.
Mr. Goodale was born at Honolulu. Hawaii, Sep-
tember 6, 1854, a son of Warren and Ellen R.
(Whitmore) Goodale. He represents stanch and cul-
tured New England ancestry, and the early horne
where he lived with an uncle from the age of six
vears was the old Goodale homestead at Marlboro,
Massachusetts, an estate that has been in the family
for more than two centuries. Both his father and
mother were people distinguished by fine attainments
and exceptional experience. His father, who was
born at Marlboro, Massachusetts, in 1825, had to
give up his studies at Vale College owing to an
affliction of the eyes, and then on the recommenda-
tion of a physician took a long sea voyage, with
the Hawaiian Islands as his destination. His aunt,
Lucy Thurston, had for a number of years been a
missionary at Hawaii. He made the voyage around
Cape Horn in 1849, and considering the wonderful
fascination of the Pacific Coast at that time it seems
singular that he was not diverted to the gold fields
of California. In Honolulu he became a tutor in the
Royal School, subsequently was appointed marshal
of the kingdom, and subsequently served as collector
of customs at Honolulu. In 1852 he returned to the
United States to claim his bride. Ellen F. Whit-
more, to whom he had been engaged for several
years, was also a native of Marlboro, Massachusetts,
and as a young woman had become deeply interested
in the education of the American Indians. She pos-
sessed the real courage of her New England ances-
tors, and in 1850, about a year after Warren Goodale
set out upon his Pacific voyage, she undertook a then
even more hazardous undertaking, and duties and an
environment that offered a strange contrast to the
home of culture in which she had been reared. From
her eastern home she traveled by rail to Western
Pennsylvania, and thence by several stages traveled
down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers and up the
Arkansas as far as the low waters would permit, and
thence by stage coach and wagon over a rough road
to Tahlequah, the chief capital of the Cherokee tribe
of civilized Indians in Indian Territory, now Eastern
Oklahoma. She arrived after a joufney of nearly
six weeks and remained for two years as a teacher
in the Indian schools among the Cherokees. Hither
in the summer of 1852 Warren Goodale also came,
and on the 17th of June at the old Cherokee capital
they were united in marriage. .''Lfter revisiting in
New England they started for Honolulu, and lived
there until the death of Mrs. Goodale in 1861. War-
ren Goodale then took his five children to his old
home in Massachusetts, and the Civil war breaking
out soon afterward he enlisted in the itth Massa-
chusetts Battery, and during his service rose to the
rank of captain. After the war Warren Goodale
went back to Honolulu and for many years was con-
nected with the sugar industry in the Hawaiian Is-
lands. He died in Honolulu in February, 1897, at
the age of seventy-two. Charles W. Goodale re-
ceived his early education in the schools of Marl-
boro, graduated in 1871 from the English high school
in Boston, and then pursued his studies in the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which
awarded him the degree Bachelor of Science in 1875.
Practically his entire experience since graduating has
been as a mining engineer. His first services were
rendered the Boston and Colorado Smelting Com-
pany, remaining in the firm's office at Boston during
1S75-76. and at Black Hawk, Colorado, from 1876 to
1880. The following five years he was superintendent
and manager of the Boston and Arizona Smelting
and Reduction Company at Tombstone, Arizona.
Mr. Goodale has been a prominent figure in mining
circles in Montana for thirty-five years. He came
to Butte in 1885 as superintendent of the mining
department of the Colorado Smelting and Mining
Company. Since 1898 he has been with the Boston
and Montana Consolidated Copper and Silver Min-
ing Company, now the Boston and Montana depart-
ment of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company. He
is at present chairman of the Bureau of Safety of
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, His duties
required his residence at Great Falls from 1889 to
igoi. and-since then he has been at Butte as assistant
managerand manager. He is also president of the
Barnes-King Development Company.
Despite the busy routine of his life, Mr. Goodale
has had many active affiliations with professional,
technical and scientific organizations, and besides
the reports that have embodied the results of his
painstaking investigations and examinations of min-
ing properties and mining problems, he has prepared
and read many addresses on technical subjects. He
is a member of the American Institute of Mining
Engineers, the Mining and Metallurgical Society of
America, the Institute of Mining and Metallurgy of
Great Britain, the American Mining Congress, the
Colorado Scientific Society, the Montana Society of
Engineers. He is a member of the Engineers' and
Technology Clubs of New York, the Silver Bow
and Butte Country Clubs of Butte, the Montana Club
of Helena, the Anaconda Club of Anaconda, and the
Electric City Club of Great Falls. He is a member
of the Loyal Legion, is an Episcopalian and a repub-
lican. About thirty years ago Mr. Goodale was a
member of the City Council of Butte. Mr. Goodale
is unmarried. His interests and recreation outside
of his profession consist in outdoor sports and
travel. He is fond of golf and plays that game
chiefly on the links of the Butte Country Club.
PiLO C. Hanson is president of the MacPherson-
Hanson Company, real estate, mining investments,
one of the leading companies of this kind in
Montana.
Mr. Hanson is a keen young business man, and
was one of the associates in establishing this cor-
poration when only twenty-six years of age. He
was born at Racine, Wisconsin, January 3, 1883,
son of Lars and Anna B. (Jacobson) Hanson. His
father was born in Sweden in 1834 and his mother
in Christiana, Norway. They were married when
young people at Chicago and moved to Racine,
where Lars Hanson was employed in the lumber
mills for a number of years. Later the family came
to Butte, where the father died in April, 1899. Of
the seven children the first six were born in Racine
and the youngest at Butte.
Philo C. Hanson acquired a public school edu-
llMoWOim.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
515
cation, beginnirig at Racine and continuing at Butte.
He left the Butte High School to take a special
course in the Butte Business College, graduating in
1903, and then, at the age of twenty, began mak-
ing his industry and his talents useful in the office
of The Thompson Company. He was fortunate in
getting into his proper field' at the very outset, and
it was not long before he was spoken of as a young
man of more than ordinary powers and capabilities.
In 1909 with Mr. MacPherson he bought out The
Thompson Company and incorporated as the Mac-
Pherson-Hanson Company, handling real estate,
mining prospects and properties and investments.
The business has had a steady growth, and the
firm has handled some of the largest deals in recent
years in Silver Bow County.
Mr. Hanson has all the qualities of a popular
young business man. He mingles with his fellow
men in varied relationships, as a hunter and lover
of outdoors, a republican in politics, in Mount
Moriah Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
and in the Scottish Rite Consistory, also in the Elks
and Woodmen of the World at Butte. March 23,
IQ09, he married Miss Edith Terry, daughter of
Elmore and Sarah J. (Boatman) Terry, of Butte.
They have two daughters, Dorothy Racine and
Helen Terry.
N. P. Walters has enjoyed a long residence at
Helena, since 1883, and has found his talents and
energies engaged in many interesting and useful
lines of activity.
Mr. Walters was born at Onslunda, Province of
Skane, Sweden, January 19, 1864, and was therefore
only eighteen years of age when he came to Mon-
tana. His father. Per Nilsson, spent all his life in
the same locality as a farmer, born in 1841 and died
in 1913. He served the regular time in the Swedish
army and was a member of the Lutheran Church.
He found his wife in the adjoining community of
Efverod, Petronella Anderson, and she was born in
1 841 and died in 1916. Three of their children came
to .America. Besides N. P. Walters there is Tilda,
wife of Erick Olson, a painting contractor at West
Superior, Wisconsin, and also Otto P. Walters, who
is in the laundry business at Tacoma, Washington.
N. P. Walters acquired the equivalent of a high
school education in his native country. He also had
some experience as clerk in a store before coming
over in April, 1882. His first location was at Grove
City, Minnesota, but on April 3, 1883, he arrived at
Montana and located at Helena in October of the
same year. He had some various employment there
for a time, and in 1886 began applying himself seri-
ously to detective work, for which he had special
qualifications. In 1887 he established his detective
agency and has continued in that work to a certain
extent to the present time, being correspondent and
local representative for practically ever}- large de-
tective agency in the United States particularly in
Pinkerton's National Detective -Agency.
In the meantime a growing group of business in-
terests have absorbed his energies. He has mined
and ranched on a large scale, and among other
interests today he is secretary and treasurer of the
Helena Ice Company. For a number of years he
was manager and director of the Old Bald Butte
gold mine, one of the old and most productive gold
mines of Montana.
Mr. Walters still maintains offices in the Union
Bank Building. Soon after the United States en-
tered the World war Mr. A. M. Briggs of Chi-
cago organized the American Protective League to
work in connection with the United States Depart-
ment of Justice as a volunteer detective agencv
and for investigations and otlier work as exigency
required. Mr. Briggs was joined by Capt. Charles
Daniel Frye, \'ictor Elting, Capt. J. T. Evans and
S. S. Doty. The organization grew rapidly, the
headquarters were moved to Washington to be in
immediate touch with the various departments of
government, and braiiches were established in every
city, town and hamlet in the United States. Eventu-
ally the league comprised a membership of nearly
300,000. Mr. Walters by obvious qualification was
early selected by the executive officers of the or-
ganization to direct the work in Montana, becoming
chief in this state. He organized the Helena Divi-
sion and later became state inspector in charge of
the league work in Montana. He handled thousands
of cases, in the apprehension of draft dodgers, in
investigations prior to the granting of commissions
in the army, navy and other branches of the serv-
ice, in reporting on character and reputation of
applicants for positions in the Y. M. C. A., Knights
of Columbus and similar organizations. Its objects
and purposes thoroughly performed, the league
was disbanded February i, 1919. In the meantime
for more than twenty months Mr. Walters had
given his time without compensation to the task.
The services of the Montana organization are a
direct tribute to Mr. Walters, and the value of his
work was commended by the national directors of
the league. Probably no other volunteer organiza-
tion auxiliary to the great war cause performed
so much difficult and disagreeable work, and, by
the very necessities of the character of the service,
unrecognized and unappreciated by most people, ex-
cept government officials who had direct knowledge
of what the league was doing. The league was offi-
cially thanked by -Attorney General Gregory, who
acknowledged that tlie Department of Justice would
have been seriously crippled without the aid of this
volunteer organization.
Mr. Walters has never taken part in any political
campaign as candidate for office, though he has
worked in the interest of good government, and has
attended many local and state conventions of the
republican party. He is affiliated with the Masonic
fraternity, being a member of King Solomon Lodge,
No. 9, -Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Helena
Chapter No. 2. Royal .Arch Masons, Helena Council
No. I, Royal and Select Masters, Helena Com-
mandery No. 2, Knights Templar, Helena Consistory
No. 3 of the Scottish Rite, and is a Knight Comman-
der of the Court of Honor and a member of St.
Peters Conclave No. 8 of the Knights of the Red
Cross of Constantine. He is also affiliated with
-Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine, and Helena
Court No. 5 of the Royal Order of Jesters and for
several years past custodian of the Consistory-
Shrine Temple. He is a charter member of the
Helena Rotary Club.
He married at Helena in 1884 Maria Andersson,
who was born at Sellshog, Province of Skane, Swe-
den, a daughter of a noted educator. Per Andersson.
They have two children. The son, N. P., Jr., at-
tended Helena High School, is a graduate of the
Minnesota School of Pharmacy at Minneapolis,
and for the past eight years has been proprietor
of the Walters Drug Company at Wolf Point, Mon-
tana. The daughter, Marie, acquired a thorough
literary and musical training, is a skilled vocalist
and instrumentalist, and is now the wife of Dr.
Clem L. Shafer, an osteopathic physician of Helena.
Doctor and Mrs. Shafer have one child, Clem, born
in November. 1918.
John Lindsay, former judge of the District
Bench of Silver Bow County, earned his first suc-
cesses in the law at Butte nearly thirty years ago
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and has justified every claim made for him as an
able jurist and lawyer.
Mr. Lindsay was born at Lanarkshire, Scotland,
September 23, 1864. His parents came to the United
States when he was very young, and he received a
common school education and attended the law
department of the University of Minnesota. Grad-
uating in 1901, he chose the new state of Montana
as the scene and arena of his professional career.
After a brief residence at Butte he was enjoying a
living practice, and in 1896, at the age of thirty-
two, was preferred by the democrats of Silver Bow
County as their candidate for the district bench.
He was a young lawyer, of good character and
ability, but his qualifications for the bench were
not generally accepted. There was a faction of
his own party opposed to his nomination, but he
was elected by a big majority and entered upon
his duties in January, 1897. E)uring the next four
years Judge Lindsay applied himself to his judicial
duties with a degree of earnestness that made his
administration of the judicial court exceptional in
volume of results and in the splendid character of
his decisions. One interesting comment on his
judicial career is found in a set of resolutions passed
by a committee of lawyers, including the following :
"It is the sense of the bar of Butte that during his
incumbency of the oflSce he has just retired from
the Hon. Judge Lindsay has discharged his duties
with such painstaking care and with such high
sense of honor as has made for himself a name of
which he and his descendants may be justly proud."
Another comment, to some degree even more flat-
tering, is found in a newspaper which had opposed
his election : "Sometime in the course of a life-
time every man is liable to make a mistake. What
is true of a man is equally true of a newspaper.
In the four years Judge Lindsay presided over one
of the two departments of the District Court he
showed himself a model judge. His record is an
open book — one he has good cause to be proud of
— one that may serve as an example to others upon
whom time and conditions may impose the same
arduous duties."
Since retiring from the bench Judge Lindsay
has given his undivided time and energies to a
private practice, and has satisfied the most exact-
ing requirements of a successful lawyer.
He married Miss Cora Lee, of Burlington, Iowa.
Their three children are Ruth Christie, William
Harvey and Marion Lindsay.
William Martin Tuohy is a veteran business
man of Butte, a city with which his home and chief
interests have been identified thirty years, since
1890.
He was born at Bradford, Ontario, February
8, 1864. In Butte he has played an active part in
commercial affairs, and for many years has been
president of the Northwest Coal Company, one of
the largest coal dealing concerns in the Northwest
with headquarters at Butte. Mr. Tuohy has never
been in politics, his zeal in the public interests being
chiefly expressed through his work and official con-
nection with the public schools. For many years
the people kept him on the county school board,
and the advanced facilities and standards of the
Butte public schools are to be credited in a large
degree to his unflagging efforts in the cause of
public education.
Mr. Tuohy is a member of the Silver Bow Club
and is affiliated with the order of Elks. He mar-
ried Miss Anna Lee Kremer, of an old Kentucky
family. They have three children. Florence Belle,
wife of J. Ryan Gaul, with the Montana Power
Company, in Butte ; Charles, who was in the signal
service during the late war as second lieutenant and
was drowned at Vancouver Barracks on February
10, 1917; and Anna Lee.
Samuel B.\rker has spent nearly all his life in
the great mining districts of the Far West, and
for a quarter of a century has earned and main-
tained a high position among the mining engineers
of Montana.
Mr. Barker, whose home is at Butte, was born
in England, May 17, 1869, son of Samuel and Eliza-
beth (Oliver) Barker. His father met a tragic
death in 1869 and the widowed mother five years
later, in 1874, with her only child came to America.
She made her home for ten years at Virginia City,
Nevada, and then came to Butte.
Samuel Barker attended his first school in Vir-
ginia Cit}', Nevada, and finished his literary educa-
tion in the Butte High School. Neither wealth nor
influential friends had any part in shaping his early
career. He accepted life as he found it, and has
been the architect of his own destiny. At the age
of sixteen he was apprenticed to the firm of Rom-
berg & Hoff, civil and mining engineers. He served
another four years' apprenticeship with Wilson &
Gillie, prominent mining engineers, and rounded out
his professional education at the 'College of Mon-
tana at Deer Lodge, from which he received his
degree Mining Engineer in 1805.
After leaving college Mr. Barker resumed his
employment with Wilson and Gillie at Butte a few
months and in December, 1895. was placed on the
engineering staff of the Anaconda Mining & Cop-
per Company as engineer. In August. 1897, he and
W. W. Pennington acquired the engineering busi-
ness of Wilson & Gillie, and since then Mr. Barker
has engaged in an engineering practice that has made
his skill widely known all over Montana. He has
acquired mining interests of his own and enjoys
a secure reputation in business, professional and
civic circles.
Mr. Barker is a member of the American Insti-
tute of Mining Engineers, has served as an official
of the Montana Society of Engineers and is a mem-
ber of the National Geographic Society. He rep-
resented the Sixth Ward of Butte one or two terms
in the council, and is a member of the Silver Bow
Club, Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient Free
and .Accepted Masons, Butte Consistory of the Scot-
tish Rite and Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
He is a republican voter.
At Helena December 14. 1896, Mr. Barker mar-
ried Blanche Stuart, daughter of Samuel D. and
-Amanda J. Stuart. Mrs. Barker was born in Iowa,
and was liberally educated, achieving a high degree
of proficiency in painting, both in oil and water
colors. Mr. and Mrs. Barker have one son, Samuel
Stuart Barker, born at Butte December 31, 1903.
The family reside at 845 West Galena Street, while
Mr. Barker's offices are at 60 East Granite Street.
Lewis A. Smith is one of the most loyal and
enthusiastic citizen Butte has ever had. He first
came to this city nearly thirty years ago, and its
charms and advantages made such a strong impres-
sion upon him that as soon as he had qualified for
the law he returned and since 1896 has been one
of the hard working and eminently successful law-
yers of the city.
He was born at Blandinsville. Illinois, February
27, 1871, son of Peter A. and Sarah J. (Stimson)
Smith. His grandfather, Ambrose B. Smith, was
born September 22. 1810. and died July 2, 1859, in
Indiana. Peter A. Smith was born in Indiana June
HISTORY OF MONTANA
517
24, 1842, and when about nineteen years of age en-
listed in a regiment of artillery for service in the
Civil war. He was all through the war, his chief
commander being General Sherman. On January
23, 1864, he married Sarah J. Stimson, who was
born in Michigan October 11, 1847. From Illi-
nois the Smith family removed in 1877 to Burling-
ton, Iowa, where Peter A. Smith developed a large
and successful business in blacksmithing and car-
riage manufacturing. He and his wife had three
children : Cora C, born April 22, 1866, and died
in 1874; Frank A., born September 13, 1868, who
became a. contractor at Burlington, Iowa; and
Lewis A.
Lewis A. Smith acquired his public school edu-
cation at Burlington, Iowa, and in 1888, at the
age of seventeen, left home and with a boyish zest
for travel and adventure traveled over many of the
western states. At different times he was in Omaha,
Denver, San Francisco, Portland and Spokane, and
in 1891 arrived in Butte, where he remained until
1893. That year he returned to Iowa and entered
the law school of the State University, graduating
LL. B. in June, iSpS. While he had some experi-
ence as a lawyer at Peoria, Illinois, he soon re-
turned to Montana and was admitted to the Supreme
Court March 11, 1896. Since that year his time
and talents have been taken up with a constantly
enlarging general practice at Butte, and today his
name is associated with the very ablest lawyers of
the state.
In 1908 he was a candidate on the republican
ticket for district judge, being defeated by a small
majority. He was elected an alderman from the
Fourth Ward of Butte April i, 1912, and served
as president of the Council one year, and acting
mayor of Butte. Upon the organization of the
Silver Bow County Bar Association in January,
1905, he was elected the first secretary and filled
that office for a number of years. He is widely
known over the state as a Mason and has been
an official of the Grand Lodge. He was worship-
ful master in 1906 of Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Butte, in
1914 and 1915 was grand master of Masons of Mon-
tana, and has taken thirty-two degrees in the Scot-
tish Rite and is a member of Bagdad Temple of
the Mystic Shrine. He is also affiliated with the
Modern Woodmen of America and the Fraternal
Brotherhood. Other important interests outside of
his home and profession are dictated by his love
of outdoor sports, hunting and motoring being his
favorite pasttimes. He is a member of the Episco-
pal Church.
By his first marriage Mr. Smith had two children:
Walter Allen, born January 25, 1902, at Butte, and
died of lockjaw, brought on by an old-fashioned
Fourth of July celebration, in July, 1910; and Lil-
lian, born December 13, 1896, and died July 31, 1897.
His son's death was due to the explosion of a toy
pistol, and Mr. Smith employed his personal tragedy
to impress upon the Legislature at the next session
a law prohibiting the sale of toy pistols in Mon-
tana, one of the first practical steps taken by any
state to enforce what is now practically a nation-
wide safe and sane observance of the national
holiday. Mr. Smith married December 25, 1909,
Miss Lillian De Mordaunt, who died December 11,
1911. In 1913 he married Miss Rose Blake, then
principal of the Franklin School of Butte and a
daughter of one of Montana's early pioneers.
Anton M. Holter, at the age of eighty-nine, is
one of the very few survivors of that band of
Montana pioneers who came in the early '60s. A
sketch of his personal career is more than biography,
it is true history, and involves the beginning of
the lumber industry in Montana and nuicli of the
manufacturing and industrial enterprise of the old
territory and early state. His life has thoroughly
deserved the just tribute paid him some years ago:
"He is one of those rugged indomitable spirits to
whom the coming generation inhabiting the North-
west, and especially Montana, will owe in a large
degree the magnificent heritage that awaits them.''
Anton M. Holter was born thirty-two miles south
of Christiania, Norway, June 29, 1831, son of Foin
and Berta M. (Floxstad) Holter. As a young man
he learned a mechanical trade, and in April, 1854,
set out for America, landing at Quebec May 2Sth.
He traveled by railroad with others of his fellow
countrymen to Rock Island, Illinois, reaching there
at a time of a cholera epidemic, and fortunately
making his escape by river boat to the vicinity of
Decorah, Iowa, where he worked at his trade at
wages of $20 a month. He also made one or two
small investments, and at the end of a year had
accumulated a capital of $300. During the next four
or five years he was in Missouri and Iowa, and in
the spring of i860 started for the gold fields of the
Pike's Peak district in Colorado. He and his brother
Martin remained there mining and farming for sev-
eral years.
Some years ago Mr. Holter contributed to a trade
journal an article entitled "Pioneer Lumbering in
Montana," and gives an interesting account of his
coming to Montana and his first operations in the
lumber business in the territory. In the spring of
1863 he started with a team of oxen to Colorado,
and from there joined a large party whose destina-
tion was vvha't is now known as Ruby River, Madison
County, Montana. They left Colorado in September,
1863, and owing to their slow progress Mr. Holter
and Mr. Evenson, who had arranged a partnership
for the purpose of setting up a sawmill in Montana,
left the main train and arrived at Bevin's Gulch,
about eighteen miles from Virginia City, in Novem-
ber. They had bought a second-hand saw mill out-
fit, and during the following winter they, contended
with every conceivable difficulty, including personal
danger, making a camp, setting up their machinery,
and in the absence of foundries and machine shops
contriving with remarkable ingenuity to make a
limited equipment serve the intended purpose. Mr.
Holter gives a most interesting account of one of
Montana's first industrial enterprises, and while
that account_ is too long to be published here, it has
the great historic value of showing conditions of
early territorial times and the almost insurmountable
difficulties confronting men engaged in any line of
manufacturing.
Mr. Holter finally purchased Mr. Evenson's inter-
est in the business and formed a partnership with
his brother Martin Holter under the name A. M.
Holter & Brother. This firm established the first
planing mill in Montana in the summer of 1865,
operating it in conjunction with a saw mill on Ten
Mile Creek, about eight miles from Helena. After
going east to nurchase new machinery, Mr. Holter
describes conditions aflFecting the lumber industry
in the following sentences : "I arrived in Helena on
the 17th of May and found the lumber business in
a bad way. The firm of A. M. Holter & Brother
had closed the mill with the first snow storm in the
fall and had sent all the livestock to winter quarters,
so in a short time they were out of lumber and also
out of business. My first move was to hurry
the men after live stock and to prepare to start the
mill. Shortly after I had left Helena in 1866 the cut-
ting of prices began, and from this time on the
custom of selling for what you could get prevailed.
518
HISTORY OF :\IOXTANA
The prices obtained by A. M. Holier & Brother for
the year 1867 and up to August. 1868. averaged about
$50 for common lumber and $60 per thousand feet
for sluice, flume, and the better grades, but during
the month of August we reduced these prices $10
per thousand, without consultation with other dealers.
We had reduced the price of planing mill work to
$25 and $20 per thousand, according to quantity
and $10 for surfacing. Shingles sold for $6 and lath
for $12. We maintained the prices on the last three
items, as we had no competition on these. I finally
got the mill started and also erected a new mill on
Spring Creek. Several more mills sprang up in the
vicinity of Helena, mostly operated by inexperienced
men on borrowed capital, at a high rate of interest,
so they soon came to grief. I bought up some of
these saw mills in 1868 and 1869. We also added
to our holdings a water mill near Jefiferson City in
Jefiferson County, and a portable steam mill that we
located near Lincoln, in what is now Lewis and
Clark county."
For many years Mr. Holter was one of the fore-
most figures in the lumber industry in the Northwest.
He and his brother established in Helena in 1868
the first sash and door factory in Montana, the plant
being operated until destroyed by fire in 1879. Mr.
Holter established a pioneer lumber business at
Great Falls in 1886. He became associated with
William Thompson in the Montana Lumber & Manu-
facturing Company in 1889, this company operating
all over the western part of the state, with main
offices at Helena and Butte. Later his interests were
extended to Idaho, Oregon, and even to Alaska.
Mr. Holter still retains his official post as presi-
dent of the A. M. Holter Hardware Company. This
is one of the oldest business organizations of Helena,
having been established in 1867, by Mr. Holter and
his brother. Originally it was a general merchandise
store, but later became a general hardware business
and for years has been conducted both wholesale
and retail.
Mr. Holter was one of the organizers and incor-
porators of the company that established the first
waterworks system in Montana, known as the Vir-
ginia City Waterworks Company, incorporated in
January, 1865. This was the first corporation or-
ganized in the Territory of Montana, receiving its
charter from the first Legislature. The water mains
were logs, with a three-inch hole bored from end to
end, and by this crude pipe water was conveyed a
distance of two miles. Nearly all the equipment,
including faucets and valves, were made by hand.
Mr. Holter was also identified with the first hydro-
electric development in Montana. In 1890 he and
associates made application for the use of the water
of the Missouri River near Helena for power pur-
poses, and secured permission from Congress to
construct a dam across the river as a means of
developing the power.
In '1875 Mr. Holter and brother bought from a
German inventor the rights to manufacture the
Utsch Jig, a machine for concentrating ore. This
was the first jigging machine ever viiorked success-
fully in the mining business, and had a wide and
eflfective use in the mines of the Northwest. Mr.
Holter was also one of the organizers in 1898 of
the Sand Point Lumber Company at Sand Point,
Idaho, later known as the Hambird Lumber Com-
Such a career in itself is a constructive public
service, but Mr. Holter at different times has been
identified with official public life. He was the first
republican ever elected to office in Helena, being
chosen a member of the Territorial Legislature in
1878. In 1888 he was elected a member of the
City Council of Helena, and became president of that A
body. In 1889 he was elected a member of the first ^
house of representatives of the new state. He has ^
served as president of the Helena Board of Trade, 4
took a prominent part in securing the fine new high
school building for the city, and was president of
the association formed to build a statue to Montana's
pioneer vigilante and statesman, Wilbur Fisk San-
ders. He was also a member of the board that pur-
chased the grounds and buildings for the State Hos-
pital for the Insane. Mr. Holter built the Holter
Block in Helena, the home of the A. M. Holter
Hardware Company. For many years he has been
an interested member of the Montana Pioneer So-
ciety, of which he is a past president, is a Knight
Templar Mason and has been treasurer of Helena
Commandery for forty-nine consecutive years. He
is a member of the Lutheran Church.
In 1867, at Chicago, he married Miss Mary Pauline
Loberg, also a native of Norway. Their oldest
child is Norman B.. now vice president of the A. M.
Holter Hardware Company. Clara H. is the widow
of Percy H. Kennett. Edwin O. Holter graduated
from Yale L'niversity irr 1894, from the law depart-
ment of Columbia University, and is a practicing
lawyer in New York City. Albert L. is a H'^lena
business man and has gained prominence in the
republican party of the state. The next child, Austin
M., died at the age of five years. Aubrey M. gradu-
ated from Yale University in 1905 and is an official
of the A. M. Holter Hardware Company. Percy
W., the youngest, graduated from Yale in 1907, and
died at Helena November 23, 1908, at the age of
twenty-three.
NoRMAX B. Holter continuously for nearly thirty
years, ever since completing his university education,
has been identified with the great business of Helena
known as the A. M. Holter Hardware Company and
is vice president of that corporation.
Mr. Holter is a son of A. M. Holter, who is
president of the company, and whose long and hon-
orable business career in Montana is reviewed else-
where. Norman B. Holter was born at Helena
February 8, 1868, was educated in the local public
schools, and attended college at Columbia Univer-
sity, New York City. He graduated with the degree
Mining Engineer in 1891, but his career has been
one of practical business rather than professional.
He returned to Helena and joined his father and by
successive steps has acquired his present responsi-
bilities as vice president.
Mr. Holter is also a director in the Federal
Reserve Bank at Minneapolis. Is a director in the
Montana Flour Mills Company, and is president of
the Holter Company, which handles general prop-
erty interests in Montana.
Mr. Holter is a member of the Delta Psi college
fraternity, and in Masonry is affiliated with Helena
Lodge No. 3, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons,
Helena Chapter No. 2, Royal Arch Masons, Helena
Commandery No. 2, Knights Templar, Helena Con-
sistory No. 3 of the Scottish Rite, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine. He is a member of
the Rocky Mountain Club of New York City and the
Montana Club of Helena, and is a member of
Helena Lodge No. 193 of the Elks.
In 1900, at Helena, he married Miss Florence
Jefiferis, who was also born at Helena, daughter of
Charles M. and Sarah (Bell) Jefferis. Her mother
is still living at Helena, where her father died sev-
eral years ago. Charles Jefferis was a Montana
pioneer of the '60s, and served several times as
sheriff of Lewis and Clark County. He was an
influential republican in his section of the state.
CMc/^'^.m'^^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr. and Mrs. Holter have three cliildren : Marion,
born in July, 1904; Richard M., born in November,
1905; and Norman J., born February i, 1914.
Phillip Charles Goodwin came to Montana at the
age of eleven years, has been a Butte business man
throughout his active career, and has figured promi-
nently in both state and local politics.
Mr. Goodwin, who is president of the Sheehan
& Goodwin Company, general insurance and real
estate at Butte, was born at Columbus, Nebraska,
February 17. 1872, son of Phillip and Rosa (Quinn)
Goodwin. His father was a baker by trade, and in
May, 1883, the family settled at Butte. Phillip C.
Goodwin finished his education in the public schools
of Butte, and then entered the employ of the Butte
Miner and for twenty-two years was in the circu-
lation department of that great institution of Mon-
tana journalism. Besides his prosperous real es-
tate and insurance business Mr. Goodwin personally
owns some valuable farming land in Montana.
Twice he has been a candidate on the democratic
ticket for state office, though each time his can-
didacy fell in a year marked by abnormal strength
of the republican party. He was candidate for state
auditor in 1904 and for state treasurer in 1908.
From 1905 to 1909 Mr. Goodwin served as city
treasurer of Butte. On March i. 1916, he was ap-
pointed postmaster of Butte, and has given a splen-
did administration to the growing business of the
local office.
Mr. Goodwin served twice as chairman of the
Democratic Committee of Silver Bow County.
In September, 1893, he married Miss Nora Lynch,
of Butte. They have five children, Geraldine, Cath-
erine, Rose, Dorothy and James. Geraldine is the
wife of William E. Chapman, a civil engineer and
county surveyor of Beaverhead County.
Lee Mathew Van Etten. Preparatory to his
admission to the bar, Lee Mathew Van Etten had
an exceptionally, varied experience in mining en-
gineering and saw a great deal of the west, includ-
ing Montana. He is one of the prominent lawyers
of Butte, and a recognized authority on Public
Land Law.
He was born at Nunica, in Ottawa County, Mich-
igan, September 24, 1871. He attended public school
in his native state, and later for two years, while
employed by the Pullman Company in Chicago,
attended a night school maintained by that cor-
poration. Leaving Chicago, he went West to Cali-
fornia, and for eighteen months was an employe
of the Union Iron Works and helped build the
famous United States battleships Oregon and
Olympia. the latter Admiral Dewey's flagship at
Manila Bay, and the former making the remarkable
cruise around Cape Horn and joining the battle
fleet that shattered the Spanish flotilla at Santiago
Bay. For two years Mr. Van Etten lived on a ranch
in the state of Washington, and then came to Mon-
tana and was a student for two years in the Pres-
byterian College at Deer Lodge. During his sum-
mer vacations he followed surveying. Following
that he attended school three years in the Sheldon
Jackson Institute in Utah, and for a year was en-
gaged in mining in that state. Mr. Van Etten grad-
uated from Valpairaiso University in Indiana in
1901, and on returning to Montana engaged in min-
ing for three years. He took his law course in the
University of Michigan, where he spent three years
and graduated in 1907. Mr. Van Etten began prac-
tice at Butte in the fall of 1907, and has been one
of the busiest lawyers of the city since then.
On April i, 1912, he was appointed L^nited States
commissioner and was reappointed to that office in
1916. He is a republican in politics, and is a past
noble grand of the Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows and has sat in the Grand Lodge. September
15, 1909, he married Maidie Rife, of Dillon,
Montana.
Mr. Van Etten is a son of Samuel and Hannah
(Maycroft) Van Etten. His father also had a
career of exceptional experience. He was born in
Tompkins County, New York, April 6, 1827, and
died March 28, 1891. When nine years of age he
ran away from home, and worked driving a horse
along the towpath of the Erie Canal. The prin-
cipal reason he left home and took this work was
to get money to purchase tea for his mother. The
very first earnings he invested in tea and took it
home. Later he learned the carpenter's trade. He
was promoted from his work on the towpath to
captain or master of a canal boat, but left that
service about the time of the Mexican war, and
going to New York enlisted in Company K of the
Eighth Regiment of United States Regulars. With
his command he sailed to Vera Cruz, Mexico, and
marched with the victorious forces of General Scott
to the City of Mexico, being present at the time
of the surrender. He returned north after the war
to New Orleans, thence to Jefferson Barracks, Mis-
souri, and on receiving his discharge returned east
by way of Chicago and Michigan. While in Mich-
igan he became strongly attracted to the country,
though for several years he lived in New York and
resumed his work on the canal. Finally he went
west to Michigan, took up a homestead, and spent
the rest of his active life as a farmer. In 1861 he
was an early volunteer to put down the rebellion,
serving as a private in Company H, Fourth Mich-
igan Cavalry, a regiment that earned a high rec-
ord through the war. He was in the service three
years and three months. He married in Michigan
Miss Maycroft, who was of English parentage.
Jesse Rankin Wharton during a residence at
Butte of nearly forty years has at many points been
a leader in affairs, and always sincerely and deeply
interested in movements affecting the vital welfare
of the community. For nearly thirty years he has
had a thoughtful part in the management and oper-
ation of Butte's public utilities.
Mr. Wharton was born at Greensboro, North
Carolina, November 4, 1857, son of John Calvin and
Rebecca Jane Wharton. His ancestors were Scotch
Irish and settled in North Carolina about 1720. His
family has therefore been stanchly American for
two centuries.
Jesse R. Wharton attended the Greensboro Acad-
emy in his native state, and his boyhood was passed
in a period of peculiar depression and lack of oppor-
tunity, when North Carolina was recovering from
the disasters brought by war. In 1872, at the age
of fifteen, he went to work as clerk in a book store,
continuing until 1875. Before coming to Montana
he had a thorough training in banking, serving as
teller in the National Bank of Greensboro from
1875 to 1882.
His first work in Butte was as teller in the bank
of Donnell, Clark & Larabee and of W. A. Clark
& Brother. He was associated with those early Butte
banking interests from 1882 to 1888.
Mr. Wharton served as manager of the Silver
Bow Water Company from 1888 to 1890, as mana-
ger of the Butte Electric and Silver Bow Electric
Light Companies from 1890 to 1802, and from the
latter date until 1918 was manager of the Butte
Electric Railway Company. He is a director in
that corporation and also is a director and finan-
520
HISTORY OF MONTANA
cially interested in the Plainsmont Land Company,
the South Park Mining & Realty Company, the
Arizona Realty Company and the Trail Creek Water
Company.
As a young man Mr. Wharton had some military
training as a private in the Guilford Greys, a Nation-
al Guard Company in North Carolina. Though born
and reared a southerner, he is a republican in poli-
tics, is affiliated with Butte Lodge No. 22, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and is a member of the
Silver Bow Club, Butte Country Club, Rocky Moun-
tain Club of New York, is president of the News-
boys Club at Butte, a director of the Associated
Charities, is president of the Butte Young Men's
Christian Association, and a member of the Rotary
Club and Liberal Culture Club. The early religious
influences thrown around him were Presbyterian,
and he has always been loyal to that church and
is a ruling elder in his home church at Butte.
March 9, 1886, at Butte, Mr. Wharton married
Dorcas Elizabeth Noyes, daughter of Thomas and
Mary Ann Noyes, who came from Gushing, Quebec.
To their marriage were born four children : Jesse
Noyes Wharton, deceased ; Carolina P.. wife of Ed-
gar Wild; Carroll Clark Wharton, deceased; and
John Calvin Wharton, unmarried.
Charles Ransom Leonard, who has just rounded
out thirty years of residence in Butte and mem-
bership in the bar of that city, gained national dis-
tinction as a lawyer a number of years ago while
chief counsel for Augustus Heinze in the prolonged
litigation with the amalgamated copper interests,
known as the "copper war." In his home state
Mr. Leonard has not only enjoyed the well merited
successes and triumphs of the bar but public honors,
and is known as a man and leader to be trusted,
a brilliant lawyer and a gifted personality.
Mr. Leonard had earned his first successes in
the law in his native state of Iowa. He was born
at Iowa City, Johnson County, Iowa, December 3,
i860, son of Nathan R. and Elizabeth (Heizer)
Leonard. His parents, who lived for many years
at Butte, were widely known both in Iowa and Mon-
tana. His father for a number of years was presi-
dent of the School of Mines at Butte.
Charles R. Leonard was educated in the public
schools, received his A. B. degree from the State
University of Iowa in 1881, his Master of Arts
degree the same year, and graduated frorh the law
school of the University in 1883. He practiced law
at Creston, Iowa, for several years, and came to
Butte in 1890. He soon won a reputation as a
lawyer whose abilities and industry were adequate
for the most difficult problems of his profession.
His services were engaged by several corporations
and eventually he became chief counsel for Augus-
tus Heinze and at the end of the historic litigation
represented Mr. Heinze's interests in the settle-
ment negotiations at New York. Mr. Leonard still
represents a number of mining companies in Butte
as attorney and director, and has also given much
time to affairs outside his profession.
Mr. Leonard is a republican. In 1892, two years
after coming to Montana, he was a candidate for
the Legislature, but was defeated in that election.
In iSgi he was elected a member of the Montana
State Senate from Silver Bow County, serving un-
til i8g8. He was the Montana member of the Re-
publican National Committee from 1897 to 1899.
Mr. Leonard was chairman of the Temporary Mon-
tana Tax and License Commission which submitted
its recommendations on tax matters to the Legis-
lature of 1919.
Mr. Leonard has been generous of his time and
efforts in behalf of the broader interests and wel-
fare of his own profession. He has been a work-
ing member of committees of the Montana Bar
Association, and was honored by that association as
president for two years. He is affiliated with the
Masonic Order and the Woodmen of the World.
He is also a member of the Silver Bow and Coun-
try Clubs of Butte, and the Montana Club of Helena.
For eight years he was a member of the State
Board of Education.
August 10, 1887, Mr. Leonard married Miss Alice
Sample, of Carthage, Illinois. On May 28, 1901,
he married Fanny Sutphen Jones of Lancaster,
Ohio. His three children, by his first marriage, were
Frank, Margaret and Alice.
Henry Stephen Magraw, of Helena, state exami-
ner and superintendent of banks, is prominently
identitied with the banking interests of Montana, the
financial institutions of which he has control being
m a flourishing condition. A son of the late Henry
Slaymaker Magraw, he was born September 15,
1853, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. On the paternal
side of the house he comes of honored Irish ances-
try, his great-grandfather, John Magraw, a native
of County Kilkenny, Ireland, having emigrated to
the United States when young, settling first in Lan-
caster County, Pennsylvania, as a school teacher, but
spending the closing years of his life in West
Nottingham, Cecil County, Maryland.
James Magraw, Doctor of Divinity, paternal
grandfather of the subject of this sketch, was born
in Pennsylvania, and was there fitted for the min-
istry. Subsequently settling in Cecil County, Mary-
land, he established a homestead in West Notting-
ham, and there founded the Presbyterian Church
of which he had charge until his death. His wife,
whose maiden name was Rebecca Cochran, was born
in Cochranville, Chester County, Pennsylvania, and
died on the homestead in West Nottingham, Mary-
land.
Born in January^ 1815, at West Nottingham, Cecil
County, Maryland, Henry Slaymaker Magraw re-
ceived excellent educational advantages, and after
his admission to the bar in Lancaster, Pennsylvania,
began the practice of his profession in Pittsburgh,
that state. Following the pathway of the gold seek-
ers, he went by way of the Isthmus of Panama to
California in 1850, and there practiced law a year.
Returning to Pennsylvania in the winter of 1852, he
remained there as an attorney-at-law until 1863,
when he purchased the old homestead in Cecil
County, Maryland, on which he resided until his
death, which, however, occurred February i, 1867,
in Washington, District of Columbia, where he prac-
ticed 4aw for many years, practicing in the United
States Supreme Court.
A prominent member of the democratic party, he
was influential in state and national affairs, and a
firrn friend of President James Buchanan. While a
resident of Pennsylvania he served as district attor-
ney of Allegheny County two terms, and as state
treasurer for three consecutive terms of two years
each. At the time of his death he was a member of
the Maryland Legislature. He was affiliated with
the Presbyterian Church, and belonged to the An-
cient Free and Accepted Order of Masons.
The maiden name of the wife of Henry Slaymaker
Magraw was Emily Hopkins. She was born in June.
1818, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, being a direct
descendant of George Ross, who was one of the sign-
ers of the Declaration of Independence, and had the
distinction also of having been the first lieutenant
governor of Pennsylvania. She died on the home
farm in West Nottingham, Maryland, in March, 1870.
Jf^/^.z^
^t'V^r-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
521
Four children were born of their union, as follows:
Adam R., who died in 1908 in Germany, where his
body was interred; Rebecca, who spent her brief
earthly life on the homestead in Maryland, died in
1865 ; Henry Stephen, of whom we write ; and Emily,
twin sister of Henry S., married Samuel F. Rathvon,
residing in Denver, Colorado, for the past thirty-
five years.
Acquiring his preliminary education in the West
Nottingham Academy and in the Chambersburg
Academy at Cliambersburg, Pennsylvania, Henry
Stephen Magraw continued his studies at Lafayette
College in Easton, Pennsylvania, completing his
junior year. Leaving that institution in the fall of
1874, he remained on the parental homestead until
1880, when he went to Salida, Colorado, where ne
was engaged in forwarding freight for a year. The
ensuing four years Mr. Magraw spent in the Bo-
nanza mining camp, Colorado, where he lost all of his
money. He subsequently spent a short time in Lead-
ville, Colorado, from there going to Kansas with
the locating corps of the Saint Louis and San
Francisco Railway Company.
Coming to Helena, Montana, in November, 1887,
Mr. Magraw was for two years agent for the Con-
tinental Oil Company, and subsequently was vari-
ously employed until becoming bookkeeper in the
Thomas Cruse Savings Bank, a position he held for
two years. He was subsequently engaged in the
lumber business at Basin, Montana, for two years.
Entering the State Savings Bank at Butte, Montana,
in 1896. Mr. Magraw was there receiving teller for
four years, gaining in the meantime knowledge and
experience of value. Assuming charge of a logging
camp for the Largey estate in 1900, he retained the
position a year, and then, on account of impaired
health, rested from all labor for a year. Subse-
quently organizing the Sheridan State Bank at Sheri-
dan, Montana, Mr. Magraw served as its cashier for
seven years, and the ensuing four years was officer
manager at Big Timber, Montana, for the Glass-
Lindsay Land Company.
Returning to Helena in 1913, Mr. Magraw, who
had been appointed by Governor S. V. Stewart state
examiner and superintendent of banks, assumed the
duties of his responsible position on March i, 1913,
his offices being in the State Capitol. Proving him-
self eminently capable and efficient, he had the honor
of being re-appointed to the same high office in 1917,
and is now serving his second term in the same
satisfactory manner. Finding that previous state ex-
aminations of banks had been merely perfunctory,
Mr. Magraw has established a new system of re-
cording for the counties, and has revised and con-
siderably elaborated the methods of accounting and
reports for both counties and hanks, so that now
when he receives or makes reports he has a thorough
knowledge of the conditions of both, and the banks
realize that there has been a real examination.
When Mr. Magraw accepted his present position his
office force consisted of three assistants and one
clerk, a number that has since been increased to ten
assistants and two clerks.
Politically Mr. Magraw is identified with the
democratic party. Liberal in his religious views, he
is an influential member and a trustee of the Uni-
tarian Church. He is a thirty-second degree Mason,
and a member of Sheridan Lodge No. 20, Ancient
Free and Accepted Order of Masons, of Sheridan,
Montana : and of Helena Consistory No. 3. He is
likewise a member of the Sigma Chi college fra-
ternity. At 214 North Ewing Street he has a pleas-
ant home.
Mr. Magraw married, January 23, 1890, Eugunia
Norton, daughter of Charles and Ursula (Smith)
Norton, neither of whom are now living. Her
father was a grain buyer and elevator manager of
Illinois, for many years carrying on an extensive
business. On her mother's side, Mrs. Magraw is
a direct descendant of Henry Sunster, the first
president of Harvard University. Mr. and Mrs.
Magraw have two children, Rebecca Ursula and
Henry Slaymaker. Rebecca Ursula is the wife of
John Uhl, of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, president
of the Pennsylvania Tobacco Company, wholesale
manufacturers of smoking and chewing tobacco.
Mrs. Uhl, a woman of much culture, was graduated
with honors from Miss Wolcott's School, a famous
educational institution of Denver. Colorado. Henry
Slaymaker Magraw, now living with his parents, en-
listed in the World war in May, 1917, as a private in
the Machine Gun Troop, Twenty-fifth United States
Cavalry, and was afterward made second lieutenant
in Field Artillery A. E. F., and served with the
Fifty-second Ammunition Train, Thirty-first Bri-
gade, First Army Corps. He was sent overseas, sail-
ing from New York January 20th, took an active
part in the Meuse and Argonne drives, and a few-
weeks after the signing of the armistice sailed tor
home, landing in New York on January 23, 1919.
He is a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity, and
is a thirty-second degree Mason.
Thomas J. Walker was admitted to the bar in
1902, has been a resident of Butte since 1888, and
for nearly twenty years his work and interests
have brought him a substantial reputation as a
sound and able lawyer and thoroughly public spir-
ited Montana citizen.
He was born at Plymouth, Pennsylvania, March 25,
1878, son of David and Ellen (Comerford) Walk-
er. His father brought the family to Butte in 1890,
and for many years was actively identified with the
mining interests of the state.
Thomas J. Walker was about twelve years of
age when he came to Montana, and completed his
primary education in the public and parochial schools
of Butte. He was also a student at All Hallows
College in Salt Lake City and for three years pur-
sued his classical course in Georgetown University,
District of Columbia. He attended the University
of Virginia, taking the law course, and was gradu-
ated in 1902, and at once took up the labors of his
profession in Butte. He was associated with the
firm McHatton & Cotter for a time, later with Ed-
win M. Lamb, and for the past several years has
been senior member of the firm Walker & Walker,
his brother being his partner. The firm handles
a large corporation practice, and Mr. Walker in-
dividually has acquired some valuable mining and
other interests in the state.
Early in his professional career he was elected
a member of the Legislature, representing Silver
Bow County in the lower house in 1905. He was
elected county attorney in 1908 and reelected in
1910. He is a democrat, is a member of the Silver
Bow Club and is affiliated with the Elks, the Eagles
and Knights of Columbus.
June 7, 1905, he married Miss Maud Galen. Her
father was a pioneer citizen of Helena.
Frank Comerford Walker has made a sound
reputation as a corporation and general lawyer, and
also as a leader in politics and public affairs, and
has been in active practice at Butte since 1909.
He was born at Plymouth, Pennsylvania, May 30,
1886, son of David and Ella (Comerford) Walker.
His parents settled at Butte in 1890 and his father
became interested in the mining industry of the
state. The son was educated in the parochial schools
of Butte, attended the Jesuit Institution. Gonzaga
University, at Spokane, Washington, three years,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
graduating in 1906, and took his law work at Xotre
Dame University in Indiana. He was admitted to
the bar in July, 1909, and in the same year was ap-
pointed deputy county attorney of Silver Bow
County, filling that office with all the zeal and dis-
cretion of a mature lawyer for three years. His
first year in practice he was associated with Charles
R. Leonard. He then formed a partnership with
his brother, Thomas J., and the firm Walker &
Walker is still one of the best known legal part-
nerships in Butte. Mr. Walker was elected a mem-
ber of the Legislature in 1913, serving one term.
While his field is general practice, he is attorney
for the Northern Pacific Railroad, Swift & Com-
pany, The Mountain States Telegraph & Telephone
Company, the Murray Hospital, the National Life
Insurance Company of Montana and several other
corporations.
He is a member of the Knights of Columbus, the
Silver Bow and Country clubs, and on November
II, 1914, married Miss Hallie Boucher, a native
daughter of Butte.
August Reichle. Known as a prompt, courteous,
efficient business man of Butte for a quarter of a
century, August Reichle has given a just name and
reputation among Montanans to the Atlantic Buf-
fet, of which he is proprietor.
Mr. Reichle has had an interesting career since
coming to Montana. He was born at Stuttgart,
Germany, the capital of Wurtemberg, a son of An-
drew and Elizabeth Reichle. He was liberally edu-
cated, attending a technical college at Stuttgart and
graduating as a civil engineer. At the age of nine-
teen he came to America, landing in New York, and
thence traveling by an emigrant train from New
York to Glen's Station, Beaverhead County, Mon-
tana. This journey lasted nine days. He came to
Montana to join his older brother William, who
had already become well satisfied with the Mon-
tana country and was a prosperous rancher and
stock raiser, merchant and postmaster in Beaver-
head County. The postoffice when first established
was known as Willis and later the community was
named Reichle. William Reichle was a homesteader
in the valley, and August on arriving helped his
brother improve the land with buildings.
August Reichle had the characteristics of indus-
try, thrift and economy so frequently found in
Americans who came from Germany, and out of
his early wages and savings he bought 160 acres,
and when his brother William moved to Butte to
engage in the hotel business .'\ugust remained
in charge of the ranch and the postoffice at Willis.
He was postmaster there five years.
When he came to America he did not altogether
sever the ties that bound him to Germany. There
remained behind the sweetheart of his youth. Eu-
genia Retter, who was a native of Ludwigsburg,
Germany, daughter of Mr. and Airs. William Ret-
ter. After August Reichle had made some satis-
fying progress in Montana and had the dignity of
postmaster of Willis he returned east as far as
Boston, where he met his betrothed, and they were
married in that city. She came to Montana with
him, and was soon introduced to the commimity
at Willis and was doing her part as a homemaker.
In 1895 the family moved to Butte. Four chil-
dren were born to Mr. and Mrs. Reichle ; Paul
A., Helen, Walter and Martha. The children have
beep carefully educated and as young people show
the results of their training and also the inheritance
of integrity of character. Both sons completed
their education in the Gonzaga L'niversity of Spo-
kane, Washington, and graduated with the A. B.
degree. Paul made a splendid record as a student,
receiving three gold medal scholarship honors.
Walter during his college career received two medals
for general excellence and in oratory. Paul Reichle
married Miss Mame Collins, and is now cashier of
the South Side Bank of Butte and has two children,
Jean and John Paul. Walter was one of the young
patriots of Montana who volunteered their serv-
ices during the war with Germany. He entered
the officers training camp at Camp Taylor, Ken-
tucky, was given a thorough training in the artil-
lery branch of the service, received a commission as
second lieutenant, and was appointed as a training
instructor and is still held in reserve though not
in active duty. He was ready for overseas work
when the armistice was signed. He is now asso-
ciated with his father in business. The daughter,
Helen, a graduate of the Butte High School, and
who also specialized in music in St. Vincent's Con-
vent at Helena, is likewise a partner in her father's
business. Martha is in the third year of her high
school work at Butte.
The Reichle family are devout members of the
Catholic Church at Butte. The sons, Paul and
Walter, are fourth degree Knights of Columbus
and members of the Elks. Politically they vote in-
dependently, supporting men and measures they con-
sider best suited to local, state or national needs.
It has been a matter of great satisfaction to Mr.
Reichle that as a young man he cast in his lot with
America, that his affairs have prospered in Montana
and that he has reared two sons every inch
Americans.
Joseph L. Asbridge has gained more than state-
wide recognition in his office of United States mar-
shal. Although a true American citizen, loyal and
devoted to its institutions, his birthplace was in Eng-
land and he is a member of an old and prominent
family of the mother country. His grandfather,
John .'\sbridge, more familiarly known as "Jackie."
was born in Cockermouth, England, in 1790. He was
known in his native land as a gentleman, a position
in America relative to a capitalist, and he died at
the place of his nativity in about the year 1784.
Joseph Asbridge, a son of John and the father
of Joseph L., was born in Cockermouth, England,
in 1822. He was there reared, educated and mar-
ried, and all of his children were born there. He
was engaged in the wholesale and retail hardware
business throughout the entire period of his indus-
trial career, and in the place of his birth he now lies
buried, although his death occurred in London, while
there on a visit, in 1872. He was a conservative in
politics, and a member of the Church of England
and of the Masonic fraternity. Joseph .f^sbridge
was an ardent sportsman, a devotee of both hunting
and fishing.
He married for his first wife Rebecca Fisher,
who was born near Cockermouth, England, in 1827,
and died there in 1865. Their children were : John,
who died in the City of London in 191 1, where he
had been engaged as a ship broker ; Joseph L., the
present United States marshal ; and Robert, who
died from the effects of an accident when but eight
years of age. For his second wife Joseph Asbridge
married Fannie Rapley, who still resides in Cock-
ermouth, aged eighty-two years. There were no chil-
dren by this second union.
Joseph L. Asbridge was born at the ancestral
home of the family at Cockermouth January 9, i860.
Cockermouth, located in Cumberland County, is his-
torically knowp as the birthplace of the poet Wads-
worth, and this old town also sent a representative
to the first English parliament which was formed
^ (M^ yr-i.cLi
HISTORY OF MONTANA
523
during King John's reign. Joseph L. Asbridge was
reared and educated in Cockermouth, later attend-
ing the old St. Bees grammar school, which was
founded in the seventeenth century.
Leaving his native land for the United States,
Mr. Asbridge arrived in the City of Billings, Mon-
tana, June I, 1883, and established his home in what
was then Fergus County, on Willow Creek, west of
the Town of Roundup. There he homesteaded 160
acres, and in a short time became an extensive cattle
and sheep raiser and organized the firm of High-
tower, Asbridge & Battams. The ranch was known
as the Lazy X, so named because tlie letter X did
not stand in true, straight lines. Mr. -\sbridge left
this ranch in 1915, and as a democratic representa-
tive was elected to the State Legislature from Fer-
gus County, serving as a member of the twelfth ses-
sion. While a member of that governing body he
was largely instrumental in introducing a bill es-
tablishing a grain laboratory at Bozeman for testing
seeds. Although this bill became a law, it met with
strong opposition from seed houses outside of the
state, who had previously used Montana as a dump-
ing ground for poor grades of seed. During this ses-
sion Mr. Asbridge was also actively interested in the
organization of the County of Musselshell, and in
1912 he was elected the first state senator from
Musselshell County and served during the thirteenth
and fourteenth sessions.
At the time of his appointment as United States
marshal Mr. Asbridge came to Helena and took the
oath of office May 5, 1915, this being a recess appoint-
ment. He was reappointed January 11, 1916, by
President Wilson, and the appointment was con-
firmed on that date by the United States Senate.
On March 16, 1920, he was again reappointed for
four years, the appointment being confirmed by
the Senate, and he took the oath of office on April
I, 1920. He has offices in the Federal Building.
While living in Musselshell County he also served
eight years as a member of the State Board of Sheep
Commissioners. He is a member of the Judith Club
of Lewistown. was a member of the Billings Club
while living in that city and conducting his ranch,
and is a member of the Pioneers of Eastern Mon-
tana. During his school days Mr. Asbridge played
halfback on the St. Bees-Rugby team, also occupied
the same position with the Cockermouth team, and
in his earlier life was a splendid athlete. He was
also a member of the Cumberland County team and
often assisted the Northumberland County team.
He has a record for a quarter mile run in fifty-three
seconds and the mile run in 4.46, and this early ath-
letic training has helped him to retain his physical
vigor during all of his subsequent life. He is still
an enthusiastic sportsman with the rifle, and takes
great pleasure in all out-of-door sports. While on
his ranch near the Town of Roundup he put in
twenty years in the saddle.
Mr. Asbridge's present home is at 609 North Jack-
son Street, Helena. He was married on the loth
of July, 1893, at Billings, to Miss Celia A. Ring, a
daughter of Capt. E. P. Ring, deceased. He was a
veteran of the Civil war and resided at Lake Park,
Iowa. Five children were born to Mr. and Mrs.
Asbridge, namely: Joseph, who was accidentally
shot and killed on his father's ranch when but thir-
teen years of age ; Vern, who enlisted for the World
war as a private in 1917, served fourteen months
in France with Company B, One Hundred and Sixty-
Third Infantry, was mustered out as a sergeant, and
is. now engaged in ranching near Somers, Montana ;
Hazel, attending the State Normal College at Dil-
lon; Frances, who died on the ranch when fifteen
years of age; and Robert, who died in Billings when
but two years old.
The mother of these children died in Billings in
1901, and on the 1st of October, 1908, Mr. Asbridge
was married in that city to Miss Aimee P. Coates,
who was born in Pennsylvania She is a member of
an old Quaker family of English descent which was
established in this country during colonial times.
She is a graduate of Swarthmore College in Pennsyl-
vania. Three children have been born of this union :
Dorothy, who was born December 10, 1909; Robert,
born January 23, 1912: and Ruth, who was born
June 15, 1913.
William Baker Rodgers came to Montana and
began the practice of law more than a quarter of
a century ago. During that time one of the most
important honors and remunerative positions in the
profession have been accorded him. He is a for-
mer United States district attorney for Montana.
For many years he has been counsel for the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company. His home is at
Anaconda, but as counsel tor this corporation he
maintains his chief offices in Butte.
Mr. Rodgers was born in Coles County, Illinois.
His paternal ancestors were Scotch-Irish and set-
tled in North Carolina in colonial days. One or
more of the family were Revolutionary soldiers.
Mr. Rodgers' grandfather, John W. Rodgers, was
a native of Alabama, but early in the nineteenth
century moved to Illinois and became a pioneer
farmer in Coles County, where he died. His wife
was Lovisa Balch, a native of Kentucky, John
White Rodgers, father of William B., was born in
Illinois in 1828, and spent his active life as a farmer
in Coles County, where he died in 1884. He was
a very zealous and devout Presbyterian and an elder
in the church for many years. Politically he voted
as a republican. His wife was Margaret Elizabeth
Gellenwaters, who was born in Illinois in 1838 and
died in Coles County in 1887. They had five chil-
dren. The oldest, James Farnsworth, was a gradu-
ate of Rush Medical College at Chicago and prac-
ticed medicine for many years, he died at Bowling
Green, Kentucky, in August, 1 918. The only daugh-
ter, Mary Livonia, is the wife of Dr. L. W. Bun-
nell, a physician and surgeon at Trenton, Missouri.
The three younger sons, William B., Hiram W. and-
Henry G., are all well known Montana lawyers,
the first at Butte, the second at Anaconda and
Henry G. at Dillon.
William B. Rodgers was educated in the rural
schools of Coles County. He grew up on his father's
farm, attended Lincoln University at Lincoln, Illi-
nois, and then entered Cumberland University at
Lebanon, Tennessee, graduating in the law depart-
ment and with the LL. B. degree in 1891. In Uni-
^•ersity he was a member of the Alpha Tau Omega
Fraternity. Soon after graduation Mr. Rodgers
came to Montana, practiced at Phillipsburg one year,
and in 1892 was elected county attorney, moving his
home and office to Deer Lodge in January, 1893.
He was county attorney two years. In 1894 he was
chosen joint representative for Deer Lodge and
Missoula counties, being elected on the republican
ticket. He was a member of the important legis-
lature of the fourth session, and there served as
a member of the committees on judiciary, ways
and rneans, state board and offices, code, and other
committees. Mr. Rodgers continued his practice at
Deer Lodge until 1897, when he accompanied the
county seat on its removal to Anaconda in that
year. In the fall of 1897 he was appointed assist-
ant United States attorney for the Montana dis-
trict. In 1898 he was appointed United States attor-
ney, and for four years had charge of all the liti-
gation in the Federal Courts of the state. On re-
tiring from that office he resumed private practice
524
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Anaconda, and soon afterward was made local
counsel for the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.
In 1900 he was promoted to general counsel for
this corporation, with headquarters at Butte, where
his offices are in the Hennessey Building.
During 1901-02 Mr. Rodgers was president of the
Montana State Bar .\ssociation, and for six years
he was vice president from Montana of the Amer-
ican Bar Association. He has always been a stead-
fast republican in politics, is affiliated with the Pres-
byterian Church, and is a member of Deer Lodge
Lodge No. 14. Ancient Free and .Accepted Masons,
Deer Lodge Chapter, Royal .\rch Masons, and Deer
Lodge Commandery of the Knights Templar, also
Helena Consistory No. 3 and Algeria Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is a member of Mon-
tana Lodge No. 13, Knights of Pythias, at Ana-
conda, and belongs to the Anaconda Club, the Silver
Bow Club at Butte, the Lambs Club at Helena, the
Anaconda Countrj' Club, and the Rocky Mountain
Club of New York City.
June 17. i8g6. at Petersburg, Illinois, Mr. Rodgers
married Miss Alice Jeannette Knowles, daughter
of W. D. and Elizabeth (Shepard) Knowles, both
now deceased. Her father was an Illinois farmer.
Mr. and Mrs. Rodgers have one daughter, Margaret
Elizabeth, nineteen years of age.
L.\WRENCE S. Groff, deputy United States mar-
shal for the District of Montana, has a remarkable
knowledge of men and of world geography, and
though he is a native son of Montana and has had
many of his life interests here, Mr. GrofT may be
said to be at home anywhere and possesses that rare
faculty of being equal to any emergency. He is
always ready for duty and has seldom gone into
anything without seeing it through.
Mr. Groff was born at Missoula, July 6, 1882, son
of Joseph H. and Matilda C. (Shirell) Groff. His
father was a Montana pioneer and had a long and
most interesting career. He was born near Jef-
ferson City, Missouri, in 1843, was educated in the
public schools of his native state, and as a youth
joined the Confederate army at the outbreak of
the Civil war. Most of his service was in the
Vestern border country and exposed to singular
risks and hardships. He was under Capt. Joe
Shelby, also under the command of General Marma-
duke and of the great guerrilla leader Quantrill.
He was at the battle of Wilson's Creek, at Lone
Jack, and many campaigns through southern Mis-
souri. Arkansas and Kansas. At the battle of Lone
Jack he was one of a party commanded by Cole
Younger, later a famous character in American
criminal history, detailed to capture a hotel occupied
by a number of Federal troops. Under the pro-
tecting fire of his comrades Cole Younger, with
some kindling wood and a can of kerosene, made
a bold dash to the west side of the hotel, and undis-
turbed by the bullets raining about him cooly kindled
a fire which with a favoring wind soon drove the
Federals out of the building. After the battle
of Lone Jack Mr. Groff was under the command
of General Shelby until the close of the war. He
was mustered out at Stockton, Missouri, in 1865.
His military ardor being unsatisfied, he then went
south and joined the Texas Rangers. He helped
fight the Kiowa Indians in Oklahoma, also the Nav-
ajo tribes in Texas and New Mexico. After leav-
ing that service he returned to Missouri, was mar-
ried, and his wedding trip started with his bride
in a cavalcade of ox teams from Stockton, Mis-
souri, up to Omaha, Nebraska, and then across the
plains by the Platte River route to Ogden, Utah,
and on to Tillamock, Oregon. He engaged in min-
ing and prospecting about two years in Oregon,
and then came overland to the district where the
city of Missoula now stands. At that time only
six log cabins had been built at Missoula. He be-
came prominently known among the pioneers of
Montana as a freighter and also conducted a gen-
eral store at Missoula. He ran his freight trains
between Missoula and Fort Benton, also to Deer
Lodge, Butte and Helena, and continued in that
business until 1873. On leaving Missoula he moved
to within four miles of Corvallis, and continued
freighting from Corvallis to and from Fort Ben-
ton and also established a general merchandise
store. His was one of the first log buildings con-
structed in the Bitter Root Valley. A man of great
enterprise, he also helped develop the farming and
cattle ranching interests of the valley, his chief
partner being his father-in-law, Jacob Shirell. They
ranged their cattle in the Bitter Root Valley and
the Milk River country, and also south and east
of the Great Falls localitj'. At that time the near-
est accessible point to a railroad was at Cheyenne,
Wyoming. Their market beef was driven overland
to Cheyenne, thence shipped by cars to Chicago.
The last shipment by way of Cheyenne was made
in 1879. The Groffs had their share of experience
with the outlaws and cattle thieves of the day. At
one time Joseph Groff and Scott Shirell soon after
leaving their ranch headquarters observed three
distinct flashes of fire, and soon afterward the
appearance of a gang of cattle thieves who tried
to stampede the herd. A sharp engagement en-
sued, and before the fire of the resolute and deter-
mined cattle men the thieves withdrew. Joseph
Groff was one of the volunteer participants in the
campaign against the Indians which culminated in
the historic battle of Big Hole in 1876. However,
he was detailed to lead the command and look after
the safety of his family, taking his wife and three
children to old Fort Owens. He witnessed the
hanging of the noted horse thief Pete Matt at
Stevensville in 1878. Joseph Groff continued in the
general merchandise and stock business in the Bit-
ter Root Valley until 1882. His wife, who was
born in Cooke County, Tennessee, died in 1882, a
few weeks after the birth of her youngest child,
Lawrence. There were five other children, three
sons and two daughters, and four are still living.
After the death of his wife, Joseph Groff took his
family overland to Fort Benton, there boarded a
steamboat and went down the Missouri River to
Yankton, Dakota territory and thence by railroad
to Versailles, Missouri. He lived in Missouri the
rest of his life and died in September, 1009. He
had become a member of the Masonic Order at
Stockton, Missouri, at the age of twenty-one.
Lawrence S. Groff was a very small infant when
Ijis father returned to Missouri. He received his
education in High Point, Missouri, but while still
a boy came back to Montana and at Hamilton found
employment in the famous racing stables of Marcus
Daly. He was there from 1896 to 1897, and during
1898 was a messenger boy at the Daly home, and
then became coachman for the Daly establishment
in the Bitter Root Valley. In 1899 he went with
the racing stable of the late Senator Stanford at
Palo Alto, California, and in the spring of iQoe
was given the responsibility of taking Senator Stan-
ford's string of famous horses to Hartford, Con-
necticut, where the stock was sold.
Mr. Groff's next engagement was formed at New
York City, where for a year he was with the New
York Cuba Company. In 1902 he joined the Mer-
chant Marine and in the next two or three years
he traveled to nearly all parts of the civilized world.
HIST(3RY OF MONTANA
525
His ship touched at such famous poiuts iu world
geography as Gibraltar, Liverpool, London, Shet-
land Islands, Glasgow, Copenhagen, through the
straits and seas of the north to Christiania, Nor-
way, Kronstadt, Russia, the modern Petrograd, and
while at Kiel, Germany, his ship, which was one
of the few that had survived a recent storm, was
anchored near Emporer William's yacht. He went
through the Kiel canal of sixty miles into the North
Sea, landed at the English harbor of so much inter-
est to Americans, Plymouth, and from there cleared
for Madeira, where the ship took on a load of wine,
sailing for the Canary Islands and finally unloaded
its cargo at Saint Thomas. Here they took on a
cargo of rum for Trinidad and Port Au Spain.
While there, by permission, Mr. GrofT visited the
famous leper colony of 400 people, thence back to
Kingston, Jamaica, where a cargo of Panama hats
and other supplies was taken on, and they sailed
to San Domingo, Haiti, San Pierre, Havana, Cuba,
where they reloaded with tobacco and cigars for
New Orleans. At New Orleans Mr. Groff signed
papers with the Pacific Steamship Company, and
went with a cargo of machinery to South America,
to Rio de Janeiro, and from there a cargo of fruit
was taken back to New Orleans. After leaving the
Merchant Marine Mr. Groflf took a steamship to
New York City, reaching there in May, 1904, after
having traveled over twenty-four thousand miles.
He finally returned to Montana in September, 1904,
and soon afterward entered the train service of the
Northern Pacific Railway at Missoula. The next
stage in his adventurous career came in May, 1907,
when he went to the great Bonanza gold district at
Gold field, Nevada, remaining there prospecting and
mining until 1908. He then resumed railroading,
was conductor with the Great Northern at Havre,
Montana, and in June, 191 1, became yardmaster
for the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul. After
about a year he went to Mexico City and was a
conductor with the Mexican Central Railway from
1912 until the spring of 1913.
Mr. Groff was appointed a deputy United States
marshal on May 10, 1915, serving until the spring
of 1917. Then, about the time America entered
the war with Germany, he was appointed to the
United States secret service as a special agent, under
the direction of Secretary of the Treasury McAdoo.
The district to which he was assigned included
Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, It'aho and part of
the state of Washington. Mr. Groff in 1918 re-
turned to Montana and resumed his duties as deputy
United States marshal for the district of Montana.
Less than forty years of age, Mr. Groff has lived
on terms of intimacy with many of the great capi-
talists and business men of America, and has tasted
the joys of experience and adventure in all parts
of the world. He is an esteemed member of Hell-
gate Lodge No. 383 of the Elks at Missoula, Morn-
ing Star Lodge No. 5, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, at Helena, the Scottish Rite Consistory No.
3 and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
Oliver V. McIntire, while a resident of Mon-
tana only a few years, has given conspicuous evi-
dence of his initiative and business enterprise by
establishing and building up one of the largest
mercantile houses in the western part of the state.
He is head of the Pablo Mercantile Company at
Pablo.
Mr. McIntire was born at Oakland, Illinois, Sep-
tember 23, 1888, and inherits at least a part of his
commercial genius. His grandfather, Oliver Mc-
Intire, was a native of Ireland and an early settler
in southern Indiana. A man of liberal means but
of even mere decided enterprise, he was associated
with the establishment of a number of business con-
cerns and of two towns in southern Indiana. He
spent the rest of his life in that state. John Ed-
ward McIntire, father of the Pablo merchant, was
born in Illinois in 1859, and, is now living at Terre
Haute, Indiana. He was reared and married in
Illmois, and for many years his home was at Oak-
land, W'here he was a real estate operator. His
keen judgment made him one of the first to open
the great Illinois oil field west and southwest of
Terre Haute, Indiana, at one time one of the rich-
est and most productive oil districts in the Middle
West. He has been an oil operator for many years,
was very successful iu that line, and now has ex-
tensive interests in the wonderful new oil districts
of Texas. He is a republican, a Presbyterian and
a member of the Knights of Pythias. John Edward
McIntire married Elsie Ellen, who was born at
Oakland, Illinois, in 1859, and died at Terre Haute
in 1917. Their family consisted of the following
children: Jeannette, wife of B. C. Kirsch a rail-
road man at Terre Haute; Dada E., wife of E. R.
Rowan also a railroad man, living at Pablo, Mon-
tana; Ada. unmarried, who for the past fifteen years
has been connected with Terre Haute's leading de-
partment store, the A. Herze Mercantile Company;
Oliver v.; Edward B., who is clerk in a clothing
store at Terre Haute, enlisted in 1917, and spent
about a year overseas and at the signing of the
armistice was at the front in the Motor Truck
Division being mustered out in 1919, with the grade
of sergeant; and Wanda Alice, wife of Maurice
Hewitt, who IS son of one of the largest coal oper-
ators in Indiana, Maurice being a stockholder and
interested in an automobile supply firm at Terre
Haute.
Oliver V. McIntire was educated in the public
schools of Oakland, graduated from high school
in 1906, and for several years lived at Terre Haute
with his parents. For two years he was employed
in one of the leading industries at Terre Haute,
the Columbia Enameling and Stamping Works.
Mr. McIntire arrived in Montana in 1908. During
the next seven years he was serving a practical
apprenticeship at merchandising as clerk in a store
at Arlee. During those seven years he laid the
foundation of his sound experience and judgment
as a business man. After a brief time at Ronan
he moved to Pablo and established the Pablo Mer-
cantile Company, the largest firm of its kind in that
section of Missoula County. The corporation owns
a large modern store building and warehouses, and
handles an immense trade, drawn to the store by
the progressive methods of merchandising. Mr.
Mclntii-e is president of the company, with W. F.
Stimpson, vice president and B. O. Shannum, secre-
tary and treasurer.
Mr. McIntire is a republican, a member of the
Presbyterian Church and is affiliated with Poison
Lodge No. 78 of the Masons. At Arlee, Montana,
in 1912, he married the daughter of one of the
best known pioneer families of Montana, Miss Alice
A. DeMers. She is a daughter of A. L. and Grace
(Lambert) DeMers, the latter now deceased. A. L.
DeMers, a resident of Arlee, was born near Mon-
treal, Canada, and came to Montana in 1S74. His
enterprise has a conspicuous part in the history of
the Flathead district in the old locality known as
DeMersville, which antidated the modern city of
Kalispell, which is supplanting it. Mr. A. L.
DeMers was a pioneer merchant there, later was
associated with his brother Jack DeMers as a mer-
chant at Frenchtown, and he opened the first log
store building at St. Ignatius, Montana. Since
526
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1904 he has been retired at Arlee. Mr. and Mrs.
Mclntire have three children: Virginia, born in
1913; Jean, born in 1915; and Edward Alexander,
born in 1 918.
Bert W. Dimmick, chief merchant and present
postmaster at Pablo, has spent all his life in the
Northwest and has had a busy and eventful career.
He has been a farmer, rancher, merchant, county
official, and his name is known and respected in
several communities in Minnesota and the Dakotas
as well as in Montana.
Mr Dimmick was born near St. Paul, Minne-
sota, April 7, 1870. His people were pioneers in
Minnesota territory. His grandfather, John Dim-
mick, was born in New York State in 1797, |nd
opened up a farm in Minnesota as early as iS57-
He died at Princeton in that state in 1883. John
Dimmick married Cynthia Payne, a native of New
York State, who died in Minnesota. The Dimmicks
are an English family and were colonial settlers
in America. William Dimmick, father of Bert W.
Dimmick, is also a resident of Pablo, Montana.
He was born in New York State in 1845, was twelve
years of age when his parents moved to Minnesota,
grew up and married near St. Paul, and was a
farmer, lumberman and engaged in other occupa-
tions in Minnesota for many years. Since 1917
he has lived retired at Pablo. During the Civil war
he was a soldier with a Minnesota regiment. Politi-
cally he is a republican. William Dimmick mar-
ried Anna Rines, who was born in the State of
Maine in 1845 and died at Elk River, Minnesota,
in 1914. Their children were three in number;
Nina wife of Fred Stimson, a carpenter and builder
at Pablo. Montana ; Bert W. ; and Blanche, of Dick-
enson, North Dakota, widow of George Frye, who
was a cattleman and real estate broker there.
Bert W. Dimmick attended public schools, grad-
uated from the high school at Princeton, Minne-
sota, in 1888 and then spent three years learnina
business in a store in the Red River Valley of
North Dakota. For three years he clerked and
did other work at Anderson in Shasta County,
California, and then returned to North Dakota and
was in a grocery store at Grand Forks one year,
following which for several years he was in the
cattle raising industry in McKenzie County, North
Dakota. While in that county he was appointed
county auditor in 1904, and was elected to that
office in 1906, serving four years, from 1905 to
1909. He was appointed and served as clerk of the
District Court of McKenzie County nearly two
years. In the meantime he filed on a homestead of
160 acres in that county, proved up his claim and
lived on it for three years. From North Dakota
Mr. Dimmick went back to his native state and
bought a farm at Elk River, but sold it at the end
of three years.
Mr. Dimmick came to Montana in 1917, and after
a brief stay at Poison located at Pablo in May of
that year. He built the first store building in the
town, still owns that structure, and has made his
one of the leading mercantile establishments in that
section of Missoula County. He also owns a farm
five miles east of Pablo. He was appointed to his
present duties as postmaster on January 2, igi8.
Mr. Dimmick is independent in politics, and is
a member of the Modern Woodmen of America.
In 1909, in Montana, Mr. Dimmick married Mrs.
Marie (Lusier) Miller, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Joseph Lusier, retired farmers of Forest Lake, Min-
nesota. By a former marriage Mr. Dimmick has
one son. Thomas, who is a cowbov at Shafer.
RiCH.^RD LocKEY. A resident of Montana more
than half a century, Richard Lockey has played
many parts in his long life, soldier, pioneer, mining
prospector, merchant, banker, public official, and
for many years has been one of the largest real
estate owners in Helena. Richard Lockey is pre-
eminently constructive and he has doubtless derived
his greatest satisfaction from doing big things in a
big way, and with less consideration for his own ad-
vantage than for seeing worthy undertakings prop-
erly carried out. He is an inveterate worker, and
while now approaching his seventy-fifth birthday
his wonderful vitality enables him to keep a master
hand on a large and complicated business.
Richard Lockey was born in Yorkshire, England,
June II, 1845. His father, John Lockey, was born
in the same district of England in 1816, and in his
native country was a miner. He married in York-
shire Mary Raw, who was born there in 18,18. Three
of their children were born in England. In 1846
John Lockey brought his family, Richard then a boy
of one year, to America and settled at Dubuque,
Iowa, where he spent the rest of his lite and where
he died in 1874. He owned a farm near Dubuque
and was also interested in some of the lead mines
in that section. After coming to America he was
identified with the republican party and was a life-
long supporter of the Methodist Church. His wife
died at Helena, Montana, in 1898. The oldest of
their children was Jane, who became the wife of
Crawford Bowman of Dubuque, and died in the fall
of 1919 in South Dakota. Crawford Bowman died
in 1918. He was a Union soldier, a farmer, and for
several years was a guard at the State Penitentiary
at Animosa, Iowa. Barnard Lockey, the second of
the family, was a farmer and died at Spencer, Iowa.
Richard was the third in age. James T. is a resident
of Helena and interested in mining. Elizabeth died
in infancy. John W. now occupies the same office
at Helena with his brother. Sarah E. was the wife
of Emile Brulo, a carriage and automobile trimmer
at Helena, who died at Helena, Montana, in 1915.
George W. was a merchant and died at Bozeman.
Joseph E. also died at Bozeman.
Richard Lockey, though he left school between the
age of si.xteen and seventeen, made good use of his
opportunities in the public schools of Dubuque. He
had begun regular work as a clerk in stores at the
age of eleven j'ears. Mr. Lockey was small for his
age, and therefore found his patriotic enthusiasm
frequently balked when he applied for enlistment
in the Union army. However, he was accepted as a
member of the Fremont Huzzars in Missouri, under
Col. George E. Waring, and in 1862 was appointed a
clerk in the quartermaster's department. His first
service was in some of the campaigns through Mis-
souri and Arkansas. The winter of 1862-63 he spent
at Columbus, Kentucky, and in Tennessee, and in
the spring of 1863 the quartermaster's departrnent
of which he was a member was attached to the Si.xth
Division of the Sixteenth Army Corps under Gen.
A. J. Smith. In the fall of 1863 he went to Mem-
phisj then to Columbus, Kentucky, and was in Ala-
bama under Gen. William T. Sherman. Early in
1864 he returned to Vicksburg and soon afterward
was sent up the Red River with Banks expedition.
It was Gen. A. J. Smith who really saved that ex-
pedition from disaster'. Mr. Lockey was with the
transports and gunboats and had charge of the quar-
termaster and commissary departments of the Sixth
Division, Sixteenth Army Corps during the cam-
paign. The southern climate induced malaria, and
he was invalided to Memphis and finally returned to
Dubuque. While recuperating he attended a busi-
ness college there. About the time the war was
closed General Smith sent for him to go to St.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Louis to close up the accounts of the quartermaster
and commissary departments, and he was diligently
engaged in those duties from the fall of 1865 until
February, 1866.
It was on March 7, 1866, that Mr. Lockey started
with Capt. Charles Wunderlich in a party crossing
the plains with mule teams, and arrived at Helena
July 7, 1866. They made the quickest trip that year,
four months. He became twentj'-one years of age
after arriving in Montana.
Mr. Lockey was therefore a witness of the Last
Chance Gulch and Helena at the high tide of its
fame as a mining center. In recent years he has
frequently expressed his lively satisfaction at seeing
Helena returned to its former importance as a min-
ing center, since today there are more mines pro-
ducing ore around Helena than at any time for a
quarter of a century.
The first work he did in Montana was five months
helping to build the Truitt and Plaisted ditch around
Mount Helena for the purpose of bringing water
to the placer mines. That ditch is now used as
the Mount Helena Boulevard. After that until 1868
he was employed by the Cannon Brothers in their
grocery store and bakery, occupying the present
site of the Record-Herald office on Broadway. Then
came a diversion when he made a horseback tour
to Walla Walla. Washington, and Portland. Oregon,
and it was probably during that time that Mr. Lockey
looked upon the great falls at the present site of
Spokane, and deliberated whether he should settle
and secure for a practically nominal sum the land
included in the site of that now rich and populous
city. Returning to Helena the same winter Mr.
Lockey took up the study of law, first in the office
of the great Montana pioneer and vigilante Col. W.
F. Sanders and then in the offices of Chaumasero and
Chadwick. He continued reading law until 1871, but
has used his legal knowledge chiefly in his private
business. After that he was a merchant for a time
and then became associated in the real estate and
commission business with Seth Bullock, later of
Deadwood, South Dakota, until 1872. Seth Bullock
was one of the great characters of the Northwest,
and became nationally known because of his long
intimacy with the late Colonel Roosevelt. Mr.
Lockey in 1872 opened a store and bakery on Main
Street. Helena, at- the point where Sixth 'Avenue
now joins that thoroughfare. His old bakery oven
is now buried about six feet under the street car
tracks on East Sixth Avenue between Jackson and
Main streets. Mr. Lockey did well in this business
and in 1877 opened a branch store and bakery at
Bnzeman, one of the chief features of his manu-
facture being hardtack for the army and Indian
(Ic'i'-tments. In 1881 he sold his Bozeman interests
to his brothers John W. and and George W. and also
disposed of his Helena store to William H. Ulm.
Thus relieved of the cares and responsibilities of
merchandising, Mr. Lockey opened in 1881 a real es-
tate, insurance and abstract of title business, and still
looks after that, the oldest business of its kind in
Montana under individual ownership. His offices are
in the Lockey Building at 112 East Sixth Avenue
and his home is in the same building.
Through all the years Mr. Lockey has maintained
an undeviating faith in the City of Helena, and has
seldom neglected an opportunity to show his faith in
a practical manner by investing a large bulk of his
surplus capital in local real estate. At times he has
been probably the largest real estate owner in
Helena, and still owns many buildings in the city and
much unimproved property. The ground for the
State Capitol was donated from one of his additions,
and he still owns much of the addition known as the
Corbin. He also owns nearly all of the Lenox
addition adjoining the Corbin addition, and the
larger portion of the Lockey addition at about the
center of. the platted part of the city. There are
parcels of property in nearly every section of Helena
owned by Mr. Lockey, and some of the leading busi-
ness blocks are included in his holdings.
Mr. Lockey was an organizer of the American
National Batik of Helena and served as a director
for twenty-one years. He organized and is president
of the Helena Realty Board, and through that or-
ganization has performed a splendid service to the
entire city. He is also president of the State Invest-
ment Company and was president of the Helena
Rapid Transit Company. He was one of the leadmg
contributors to the Montana Wesleyan College, serv-
ing as a trustee and vice president of the board for
many years. He donated to the c-ty the Lockey Ave-
nue Park, and no one has been more generous of his
means and his time in beautifying and upbuilding
the capital city.
His entire business career constitutes a real public
service, though he has also held many official titles.
He has always been a straight republican in politics.
In earlier years he served as United States gauger,
as justice of the peace, held a commission as notary
public twenty-one years, for two terms was a school
trustee and a member of the City Council two terms.
Richard Lockev was one of the most influential
members of the third State Legislature of 1893.
Always interested in education, he did all he could
to influence the Legislature to provide for one cen-
tral university, embracing all the practical and pro-
fessional schools, instead of having four or five
branches in diflferent sections of the state. The con-
solidation and centralization of Montana's institu-
tions of higher education has been one of the live
questions in the state in recent years, and the argu-
ments put forth in behalf of the plan seem a special
tribute to the foresight of Mr. Lockey a quarter of
a century ago.
Mr. Lockey has been identified with the Methodist
Episcopal Church since thirteen years of age. He is ■
one of the widely known and prominent Masons of
Montana. He served as master of Helena Lodge
No. 3 in 1876, and is one of its oldest members,
having joined it in 1867. He became affiliated with
Helena Chapter No. 2, Royal Arch Masons, in 1868
and has served it as high priest. He was the first
Knight Templar created in Helena Commandery of
the Knights Templar in 1869. He is also a mem-
ber of Helena Council No. i. Royal and Select
Masons, and he took an active part in organiz-
ing the Scottish Rite bodies in 1881, and has
been Almoner since Helena Consistory No. 3
was reorganized in 1910. He is an honorary
thirtv-third degree Mason. Mr. Lockey joined
.\lgeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine in 1889,
and is a past potentate. He was imperial represen-
tative at Omaha and Dallas and as such instituted
under dispensation and charter. Elkorah Temple of
Boise, Idaho. Another interesting fraternal distinc-
tion is that he is the oldest living Odd Fellow in
Montana. He joined Montana Lodge No. i in 1868,
and is a past grand. He is a former member of
Helena Lodge No. 193 of the Elks, and was promi-
nent in the organization of the Good Templars m
1868, in which he was a member many years, and
is also a son of St. George. Much of the good work
accomplished bv the Helena Commercial Club m up-
building, the city has been due to the active energies
of Richard Lockey.
For all the heavy burden of practical affairs he has
carried Richard Lockey has always been fond of
good fellowship, and he has exemplified a real genius
for friendship. -A man of remarkable experience,
528
HISTORY OF MONTANA
with a rare charm of personality, he possesses the
gift 6f humor and his quaint and unexpected wit has
been associated with his name in Montana for man>
yeai The old timers of the state know him by the
title of "Duke of Last Chance." He is and has been
for about forty years the presiding officer of the
"House of Lords," a burlesque legislative assembly
first organized in Virginia City and moving to
Helena when that city was established as the state
capital. It was the unique combination of judicial
gravity with sudden turns of wit and humor charac-
terizing the orders and rulings of the presiding offi-
cer that gave this assemblage its long continued
fame.
June S, 1870, at Helena, Mr. Lockey married Miss
Emily E. Jeffrey, a native of Ohio. Mrs. Lockey
died at Palo Alto, California, December 26, 1907.
Five children were born to their marriage, but only
two survive, Mary Ishbel and Richard, Jr. The
daughter presents a rare combination of the success-
ful educator and the successful business woman. In
1906 she organized and established the Castilleja
School, a girls preparatory school at Palo Alto, Cali-
fornia, now one of the leading institutions of its kind
on the Pacific Coast. She is president of the cor-
poration, and principal of the school, and the prop-
erty includes fine grounds and six modern buildings
on a campus a mile east of Stanford University
There are now twenty-five teachers in the faculty
and the enrollment is 'limited to forty-five boarding
pupils and a hundred twenty-five day students.
The son, Richard, Jr., is a graduate of the law
school of Stanford University, also attended Har-
vard University, and for a number of years was a
special agent and adjuster in Montana, Idaho, and
Utah for a number of fire insurance companies, and
for several years past has been actively associated
with his father in business.
P. S. Rennick. M. D. a physician and surgeon of
the highest standing and attainments. Dr. Rennick
has practiced in Montana over fifteen years and
recently located at Stevensville, where in addition
to a general practice he is owner of a well equipped
general hospital, an institution that gives that town
many advantages over its neighbors in that section
of Montana.
Doctor Rennick grew up at Missoula but was born
at Farmington, Missouri, May 6, 1880. His Eng-
lish ancestors were colonial settlers in Virginia.
His grandfather was born in Ohio in 1820 and was
an early settler at Bismarck, Missouri, where he
followed farming. He died at Bismarck in 1895.
His wife was a Miss Barry.
J. W. Rennick, father of Doctor Rennick, was
born in Missouri in 1845, and when little more than
a boy joined a Kansas regiment and participated in
several campaigns during the Civil war. He grew
up and married in Missouri and graduated from the
law department of Illinois College. For a number
of years he practiced law at Farmington, and in
1882 moved to Ogden, Utah, where he continued
practice, and in 1894 came to Missoula. In Mon-
tana he spent his time as a farmer. He died at
Missoula in 191 7. J. W. Rennick was a republican,
a Baptist and affiliated with the Independent Order
of Odd Fellows. He married Nancy Shelley, who
was born at Bonneterre in Missouri in 1849 and
diied at Missoula in igoa. Lenore, the oldest of
their children, is a teacher in the Missoula public
schools; Dr. P. S. Rennick is second; L. C. Ren-
nick has spent many years in government service
on the Crow Indian Reservation ; and Paul, the
youngest, is a stationary engineer with home at
San Francisco, and enlisted in 191 7 in the army and
was in service until mustered out in 1919.
P. S. Rennick aaquired his early education in
the public schools at Missoula, attending high school
and also the State University for six years. He
graduated with the degree Bachelor of Philosophy
from Montana Universitv in 1900. He took his
medical course at Louisville, Kentucky, in the Uni-
versity of Louisville, receiving his M. D. degree in
1904. That year he began practice at Victor, Mon-
tana, and in 1910 moved to Helmville, where he
remained until 1917. On coming to Stevensville
Doctor Rennick bought the hospital at Third and
Church streets, and his personal management and
widely known skill as a surgeon has made its facil-
ities appreciated not only in the home community
but over much of western Montana. Cases come
to him from as far away as Great Falls. The hos-
pital is a modern brick structure with accommo-
dations for twenty patients.
In July, 1918, Doctor Rennick accepted a call
to duty in the army as a member of the Medical
Reserve Corps. He was first lieutenant and was
on duty at Fort Riley, Kansas, until mustered out
in December, 1918. He has done much post-grad-
uate work, attending the Chicago Post-Graduate
School of Medicine in IQ08 and again in 1919, at-
tended the Chicago Polyclinic in 1916, and in 1919
also pursued a course in the Charity Hospital at
New Orleans. Doctor Rennick is the present city
health officer at Stevensville. ■
Politically he is an independent voter. He is
affiliated with Stevensville Lodge No. 28, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, Western Sun Chapter
No. II, Royal Arch Masons, St. Omer Commandery
No. 9, Knights Templar, Algeria Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Helena, Covenant Lodge No. 6,
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and Stevensville
Camp, Modern Woodmen of America. Doctor Ren-
nick is a. member of the Western Montana, State
and American Medical associations. He owns a
ranch of 160 acres near Stevensville.
In 1905, at Helena, he married Miss Odelia Daigle,
daughter of D. and Philhimena fCyr) Daigle, re-
tired farmers of Missoula. Mrs. Rennick is a grad-
uate of the Garden City Commercial College of
Missoula.
Gilbert Dr.\ke MacLaren is a native of Stevens-
ville, the Montana town where his business efforts
are in evidence today. His active expedience has
taken him over several of the northwestern states.
Mr. MacLaren was for a number of years engaged
in the lumber industry, but is now manager at
Stevensville for the May Mercantile Company.
He was born at Stevensville June 24, 1888. He
is of Scotch ancestry. His grandfather, Thomas
MacLaren, was born in Scotland in 1819 and set-
tled at an early day in New Brunswick, Canada,
where he followed farming and also owned a saw
mill. He died at Titusville, New Brunswick, in
1894. Joseph R. MacLaren, father of Gilbert Drake,
was born at St. John. New Brunswick, in 1848, and
was reared and married there. He was trained as
a lawyer and in 1883 he settled in Stevensville, Mon-
tana, where for a time he was a carpenter and
contractor. He had the contract for the erection
of the graded schools which are still in use at
Stevensville. Later he practiced his profession as
a lawyer, and he died in northern Oregon in 1913.
He was a republican, a Baptist and was affiliated
with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Joseph
R. MacLaren married Miss Lydia Wetmore, who
was born at St. John, New Brunswick. November
30, 1842, and is still living at Stevensville, Montana.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
529
Gilbert is the youngest of four children. Fannie,
the oldest, lives with her mother. Sarah is the wife
of W. T. Harlan, manager of a flour mill at Wil-
son, North Dakota, Ella also lives at home and is
bookkeeper for the May Mercantile Company.
Gilbert Drake MacLaren attended public school
at Hamilton, Montana, graduating from high school
there in 1905. The following four years he spent
as a regular student in the State University of
Montana at Missoula. He received his degree Bach-
elor of Science in 1909. While in university he was
a member of the Sigma Chi Fraternity. He re-
mained at Missoula for six months employed in the
office of the Missoula Mercantile Company. He
spent three years at Astoria, Oregon, beginning as
a laborer and was finally promoted to charge of the
cargo shipping for the Hammond Lumber Com-
pany. In 191 2 he and his brother-in-law, W. C.
Harlan, were associated in the management of the
Hamilton Flour Mill Company. After a year Mr.
MacLaren accepted a place in the lumber depart-
ment of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company.
For a time he was the lumber representative of
this corporation at Minneapolis, was transferred
to the retail department, and conducted the retail
lumber branch at Whitehall, Montana, until July,
1919. At that date he came to Stevensville to take
the management of the May Mercantile Company.
This is one of the leading department stores and
mercantile organizations of Ravalli County. Mr.
MacLaren supervises the large and completely
stocked store and has twenty employes under him.
In politics he is a republican and in religion is a
member of the Presbyterian Church. He is also
affiliated with Mystic Tie Lodge of Masons at
Whitehall. In 1916, at Seattle, he married Miss
Effie Cordz. a daughter of S. A. and Sadie Cordz,
residents of Seattle. Her father is a retired busi-
ness man. Mrs. MacLaren is a graduate of the
University of Washington, and holds the degree
Master of Chemistry. To their marriage were born
two children: Jean, born April 2, 1917, and Donald,
born March 27, 1919.
Harvey D. Fisher has been a resident of Mon-
tana for over thirty years and was one of the early
iron workers to establish in that business at Mis-
soula. For a period he was also a practical farmer
and rancher, and in later years has developed a
large and important real estate, loans and insur-
ance business at Missoula.
Mr. Fisher was born at Wooster, Wayne County,
Ohio, July 26, 1862. His parents were both na-
tives of Germany. Philip Fisher, who was born
in Darmstadt. Germany, in 1825, came to the United
States in 1842 and spent his life at Wooster, Ohio,
where he was a business man. farmer and property
owner. He died at Wooster in 1892. Politically he
expressed his convictions as a republican. His wife
was Anna M. Stevens, who died at Wooster at the
age of seventy-six. Their children were all born
in Wayne County, Ohio : Charles A., deceased ;
Mary, deceased ; Amelia, of Toledo, widow of Dan
A. Brown, who was a meat packer; Henrietta, of
Toledo, widow of Joseph Prentice, a prominent
man in financial affairs : Josephine, of Chicago,
widow of Lee LaRue, who was a cattle buyer for
Armour & Company : Edward S., of Mansfield. Ohio,
traveling representative for the Mansfield Machine
Works ; Flora, of Stevensville, Montana, widow of
George W. Dickinson, who was a settler in Ravalli
County in the early eighties, and a pioneer farmer ;
Frank, who died in childhood : Ida L.. unmarried
and living at Wooster, Ohio; George A. and James
P., monumental granite and marble cutters at
Wooster; Emma T., of Chicago, widow of John
Healey, an attorney; George A. Fisher, for the
last ten years has served as mayor of Wooster.
Harvey D. Fisher is a graduate of the public
schools of Wooster, Ohio. He left school at the
age of sixteen and for three years served an appren-
ticeship at the iron moulders' trade with the firm
B. Barrett & Sons at Wooster. As a journeyman
he worked in various factories and shops at Mount
Vernon, Mansfield and Canton, Ohio, and in 1889
came to Montana and established the Missoula
Iron Works. This was one of the earliest indus-
tries of its kind in the town and he conducted it
until 1894.
Mr. Fisher next chose the vocation of farming.
He bought a farm near Stevensville in the Bitter
Root Valley and lived there and handled his acreage
until 1906. In that year he returned to Missoula
to open an oflice and engage in real estate, insur-
ance and loans. He has a large personal and
business acquaintance over western Montana, and
has developed a very prosperous business. His
offices are at 113 East Main Street, while his mod-
ern home is at 320 South Fourth Street, West.
Besides his residence he owns several other dwell-
ings and considerable real estate in Missoula, and
has a ranch of 200 acres in the Jocko Valley in
Missoula County. He is a republican voter and
a member of the Chamber of Commerce at Missoula.
December 25, 1894, at Stevensville, he married
Miss Mary E. Julian, daughter of Benjamin F. and
Hattie (Copening) Julian. Her mother now lives
at Victor, Montaha, and her father, who died at
Missoula, was an early farmer in this state. Mr.
and Mrs. Fisher have two children : Ada E., wife
of Elden Torr, an automobile dealer at Missoula ;
and Ethlyn M., born in 1902, and is a student in the
Missoula County High School.
Elmer Johnson came to Montana about six years
ago, a young and well recommended stranger, and
organized and has since been cashier of what is now
the First National Bank of Stevensville.
Mr. Johnson, who has acquired and has been given
many other interests and responsibilities in that com-
munity, was born at Worthington, Minnesota, Nov-
ember 10, 1884. His father, August Johnson, born
in Sweden in 1850, came to this country when a
young man, was married at Worthington, Minnesota,
and followed farming for some years. For ten
years he was a section foreman on the Burlington
Railroad, with home at Round Lake, Minnesota. He
conducted a meat market at Kimbrae and Dundee,
Minnesota, until 191 1, and since that year has been
a resident of Montana. He took a homestead of
three hundred twenty acres at Chester, and was
actively engaged in raising stock and now owns
four hundred eighty acres there. He is a republican,
a member of the Presbyterian Church, and is aflili-
ated with the Modern Woodmen of America and the
Ancient Order of United Workmen. August John-
son married Anna Christina Hanson, who was born
in Sweden in 1864. They had four children: Elmer;
Adelia, a milliner at Bremerton, Washington ; Lil-
lian, who died at the age of twelve years ; and a son
that died in infancy.
Elmer Johnson was educated in the public schools
of Round Lake and Kimbrae. Minnesota, spent one
year in the preparatory school at McAllister College
at St, Paul, and in 1902 graduated from the Worth-
ington High School. His experience in bank work
and management has been continuous since he left
school. He was bookkeeper with the State Bank of
Dundee, and from that post was promoted to cashier.
He continued with the Dundee State Bank until
530
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1913, when he came to Stevensville. Montana, and
with associates organized the Farmers State Bank.
In 1915 a new charter was taken out as the First
National Bank. Mr. Johnson has been cashier and
practically the manager of the bank since 1913. M.
E. Wooster, of Stevensville, is president and J. G.
Howe, of Stevensville, is vice president.
Mr. Johnson is also treasurer and director of the
Farmers' Co-operative Association of Stevensville
and is part owner of the Stevensville Drug Com-
pany. During the war he was county food admin-
istrator, and was also chairman of the local Liberty
Loan committee, and gave Stevensville an enviable
record in oversubscription to those loans. He is
clerk of the School Board, is a republican in politics,
is a trustee of the Presbyterian Church and affiliated
with Garden Valley Lodge Xo. 14. Independent
Order of Odd Fellows, at Stevensville, and Dundee
Camp, Modern Woodmen of America. Besides his
modern home on Pine street Mr. Johnson owns a
farm near Stevensville of a hundred and sixty acres.
He married in 1910, at Owatonna, Minnesota,
Miss Lydia C. Sahler, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
William J. Sahler, the latler now deceased. Her
father is a retired farmer living at Owatonna. Mrs.
Johnson is a graduate of the Owatonna High Schqol.
They have two children, Lillian, born June 15, 191 1,
and Maurice, born October 3, 1912.
Edward Cason Day has been United States dis-
trict attorney for Montana since his appointrnent
in October, 1918, by President Wilson. The vigor
and efficiency with which he has handled this office
reenforce and give permanency to the reputation he
has long enjoyed as one of Montana's foremost law-
yers and public men.
Mr. Day, who came to Montana a year after the
state was admitted to the Union, had practiced law
and had served as a legal editor for six years. He
was born in Harrison County, Kentucky, March 20,
1862, son of Alfred and Mary Frances (Cason)
Day. Both the Day and Cason families came from
England and established their homes in Virginia
during the seventeenth century. Alfred Day and
wife were both born in Harrison County, Kentucky.
His father and grandfather both bore the narne of
Lewis, and the Days migrated from Virginia to
Kentucky in 1782. Lewis, Jr., married Miss Hawk-
ins, who died of the cholera in the '40s. The mater-
nal grandfather of the district attorney was Edward
Cason, who also bore an honored name in the early
affairs of Kentucky. Alfred Day for many years
was a farmer and served several terms on the county
board of magistrates in Harrison County. He died
at Cynthiana in that county in 1912.
Edward Cason Day, one of three children, ac-
quired his early education in the graded city school
of Cynthiana, graduating from high school in 1878.
He completed his literary education in Washington
and Xee University at Lexington, Virginia, receiving
his A. B. degree in 1880 and three years later his
degree in law. He studied law in Kentucky under
the direction of Judge Quincey Ward, who later Iie-
came a justice of the Kentucky Superior Court. He
was admitted to the Harrison County Bar in 1882
and in 1884 was admitted to the bar of Ohio and
practiced at Cincinnati until 1887. From 1887 to
1890 Mr. Day lived at St. Paul, Minnesota, where
he was connected with the editorial board of the well
known firm of law publishers, the West Publishing
Company, having charge of editing the law reports
issued by that company. That was an experience of
inestimable value and gave him a knowledge of legal
decisions and the vital principles of law such as no
attorney ever secures through his individual practice.
Mr. bay identified himself with the Montana bar
in 1890, and for the first six years lived at Living-
ston, and since 1896 has been a resident of Helena.
At Livingston he practiced with Judge J. A. Savage
and in Helena was successively a member of the firm
Cullen, Day & CuUen, organized in January, 1897,
Carpenter, Day & Carpenter, and now for many
years past as senior member of the firm Day &
Mapes.
While so much of his time has been taken up
with the duties of public office, Mr. Day is one of the
best grounded lawyers in the state, and has a master-
ful knowledge of the law and its application and
has won some of the hardest fought battles in the
courts of the state. He is also a popular public
speaker, and has interested himself in a broad
program affecting educational, religious and general
welfare movements. During the war Mr. Day served
as state chairman of the Red Cross, Young Men's
Christian Association and United War Work drives,
was chairman of the State Speakers Bureau of the
Council of Defense, and in these movements dis-
tinguished himself as an organizer and executive.
His first important political honor was an election
to represent Lewis and Clark County in the Lower
House of the Montana Legislature from 1898. How-
ever in 1892, two years after coming to the state,
he had been nominated on the democratic ticket for
the office of attorney general. He was again elected
to the Legislature in 1913 and 1915. Mr. Day is the
present city attorney of Helena, for the term 1919-20,
and had previously held that office from 1905 to
'907-
Mr. Day is one of the most prominent Masons in
Montana. He served as Grand Master of the Grand
Lodge of Masons in 1898, in 1909 as Grand High
Priest of the Royal Arch Chapter of the state, in
1900 as Grand Commander of the Knight Templar
Commandery, and in 1915 as Sovereign Grant In-
spector General of the Scottish Rite, thirty-third de-
gree. He is also a Past Potentate of Algeria Temple
of the Mystic Shrine and has been president of the
board of trustees of the Masonic Home of Montana
since fts creation in 1909. He is a Past Exalted
Ruler of the Livingston Lodge of Elks. Mr. Day
is a member of St. Peter's Episcopal Church at
Helena, is Chancellor of the Diocese of Montana
and has served as a member of the board of man-
agers of St. Peter's Hospital. He has been one of
the most prominent members of the Montana Club
at Helena since its organization, and is a member of
the Chi Phi college fraternity. He has also served
as president of the Rotary Club and is a member of
the state committee of the Young Men's Christian
Association. Mr. Day is unmarried.
Irbv Lambard for a man of his years had a wide
and varied commercial experience. He began his
career as a bank employe, but on coming to Mon-
tana worked on a ranch for a time, and by steady
promotion has attained the post of manager of the
Victor Commercial Company, the largest house en-
gaged in general merchandise in and around Victor.
Mr. Lambard was born at Gainestown, Alabama,
December 8, 1890. His ancestors were English and
were colonial settlers in Maine. The grandfather,
Jesse Lambard, was born at Augusta, Maine, and as
a young man settled at Gainestown, ."Mabama. He
was a skillful pilot on the Alabama River for sev-
eral years. He died at Gainestown when the father
of Irby Lambard was a child. His wife's maiden
name was Mary White, a native Georgian. Their
son, J. S. Lambard, was born at Gainestown, .■\la-
bama, in 1S44, and spent all his life in that com-
munity, where he died in .•\ugust, I9'8. As a youth-
ful soldier he entered the Confederate army at the
beginning of the war, and fought for the lost cause
Zmuajo^^^i^ (^ ^^>-^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
531
four years. Some of the battles in which he partici-
pated were Gettysburg, Shiloh, Lookout Mountain,
Missionary Ridge and Fredericksburg. Several
times he was taken prisoner, but managed to escape
from his captors. Except for this period of soldier
life he spent his career as a farmer and planter and
was a very prominent leader in community and
political affairs. He was a democrat, an active sup-
porter of the Methodist Episcopal Church and a
member of the Masonic fraternity. J. S. Lambard
married Elizabeth Gilmer Smith, who was born at
Petersburg, Virginia, in 1850. She is now living at
\'ictor, Montana. A brief record of their children
is : J. S., a real estate broker at Okmulgee, Okla-
homa; Lela, wife of C. H. Warren, a real estate
and insurance man at Cleveland, Texas ; Irma, who
died at Gainestown at the age of seventeen; Eliza-
beth, a graduate of the State Normal College at
Livingston, Alabama, a former teacher at Maubilla,
Bonsecour and Mobile, Alabama, and now book-
keeper for the Victor Commercial Company ; Rich-
ard E., proprietor of the home plantation at Gaines-
town, Alabama ; Flora, living with her brother Irby
at Victor ; William J., who is associated with his
brother Richard in a general store business at
Gainestown ; and Irby.
Irby Lambard began his education at Gainestown,
but from the second to the seventh grade was
schooled at Mobile. He also attended the Mobile
Military Institute three years. He began earning his
own living at the age of fifteen by work in the City
Bank & Trust Company, now the First National
Bank of Mobile. He was with that institution six
years, and during that time acquired a very thorough
commercial and banking training. He rose to the
position of general bookkeeper before he left. On
coming to Montana in 191 1 Mr. Lambard worked on
a ranch at Darby for two and a half years. He then
entered the Farmers State Bank at Victor as assist-
ant cashier and was with that institution four years.
He began with the Victor Commercial Company as
bookkeeper, and since February i, 1919, has had the
responsibilities of its management. This business is
a subsidiary branch of the Missoula Mercantile Com-
pany. Practically all the people who make Victor
a trading place do business in the large department
store on Main street. Besides general merchandise
the company also deals in hay and grain, owning a
large elevator of fifty thousand bushels capacity.
Mr. Lambard is a democrat and affiliated with
Victor Lodge No. 43, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. At Hamilton, Montana, February 15,
IQ14, he married Miss Hazel Waddell, daughter
of John F. and Clara (Knowles) Waddell. Her
parents are still living on a ranch near Darby,
Montana, where they settled in 18S3. being among
the first comers in that locality. Mr. and Mrs.
Lambard have two children, Massey S., born
November 7, 1914, and Richard Irby, born Septem-
ber 2(3, 1917.
Roy M. CoRi.EY has been postmaster of Stevens-
ville since the beginning of the Wilson administra-
tion. He is an old resident of the town, and has
figured prominently in business and ranching activ-
ities in that vicinity.
Mr. Corley was born at Corley, Iowa, October 12,
1882. His grandfather was a native of Dublin, Ire-
land, born in 1813, and as a boy ran away from
home and came to America. He spent many years
of his life as a farmer in Illinois, and died near
Joliet in that state in 1888. His son S. S. Corley was
born at Joliet in 1845, and though very young at
the time served four years as a L'nion soldier of
the Civil war. After the war he and his brother
John B. Corley moved to Iowa, and they founded
and named the town of Corley in that state. S. S.
Corley was a successful farmer there for a number
of years, and in 1883 moved to Dunlap, Iowa, where
he was in business as a contractor and builder. In
1895 he brought his family to Montana and settled
at Stevensville. Here in addition to farming and
stock raising he did some contracting. He was an
esteemed old timer of the community and his death
in November, 1916, was widely regretted. Politically
he was a democrat. S. S. Corley married Helen G.
Franklin, who was born in New York State in 1857
and died at Stevensville, Montana, in April, 1904.
She was the mother of seven children: Mabel, a
resident of Stevensville, is the widow of Frank L.
Bean, a young American soldier who lost his life
in the Argonne battle in France in 1918; Mary, wife
of Leonard Goodwin, county attorney of Ravalli
county, residing at Hamilton; Roy M. ; Martin J.,
a contractor and builder at Tacoma, Washington, as
IS also his brother Clyde C. ; Ruth, wife of Dr. R. H.
Hoskms, a physician and surgeon at Astoria, Ore-
gon; and James A., a stockman at Stevensville.
Roy M. Corley lived in Iowa until he was thir-
teen years of age and acquired his early education
m the public schools of Dunlap. He graduated from
the high school of Stevensville in igoo and spent
one year in the Butte Business College. His first
important business experience was in the purchasing
department of the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany at Butte, where he remained one year, then
for another year was in the stock business at Stev-
ensville, spent a year in the cattle division of the
stockyards at Omaha. Nebraska, and up to 191 1 was
successfully engaged in the lumber business at Stev-
ensville. In addition to his duties as postmaster, in
which he is now serving his second term, by appoint-
ment from President Wilson, Mr. Corlev owns and
operates a fine stock ranch of five hundred forty
acres on the Burnt Fork Creek. He also owns a
modern home at the corner of Second and Pine
streets. He is a democrat in politics and is affiliated
with Stevensville Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. Hamilton Chapter. Royal Arch Masons, and
Stevensville Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows.
In 1909. at Missoula, he married Miss Berna C.
Marks, daughter of S. S. and Adelaide (Hoke)
Marks, residents of Stevensville. Her father is a
justice of the peace and police magistrate. Mr. and
Mrs. Corley have two children : Helen, born July
19, 191 1, and Marion, born March 23, 1919.
H. C. Groff has had a busy career in western
Montana for thirty years. He was a school principal
at several towns in the state, has been extensively
engaged in farming and stock ranching for a num-
ber of years, is a former state senator, and is also
cashier of the Farmers State Bank at Victor.
Mr. Groff was born at Tillamook. Oregon, Janu-
ary 4, 1869. and by virtue of birth belongs to the
pioneer element of the northwest. His ancestors
were Holland Dutch and pioneer settlers in Penn-
sylvania. His grandfather, Thomas Groff, was born
in Virginia, and was an early settler at Excelsior.
Missouri, where he died in 1873. J. H. Groff. father
of the Victor banker, was born at St. Louis. Mis-
souri, in 1832. He possessed the thorough pioneer
instincts and enterprise. For several years in his
young life he was a merchant at Stockton, Missouri.
During the Civil war he was on the Confederate
side and was a soldier four years, being captain of
a company. He participated in the battles of Pea
Ridge and Wilson Creek and many other campaigns.
In 1865. at the close of the war. he came to the
northwest and established and operated one of the
pioneer hotels at Boise. Idaho. In 1868 he moved to
532
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the Tillamook Valley of Oregon, where he engaged
in farming. He became a Montanan in 1876 and
established his home on a farm near Corvallis. In
1879 he returned to Missouri and spent the rest of
his life on a farm at Iberia, where he died in 1912.
He was a democrat and a very consistent member
of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He was also
affiliated with the Masonic lodge. Captain Grotf
married Miss Matilda Sherrill, who was born in
Tennessee in 1838 and died at Corvallis, Montana,
in 1879. She was the mother of five children:
Varina, wife of John Campbell, a farmer at Excel-
sior, Missouri; Albert S., a stockman at Hamilton,
Montana; H. C. Grofif; E. F. Groi?, a farmer near
Victor; L. S. Groff, deputy United States Marshal
at Butte.
H. C. Grofif acquired part of his early education in
the public schools of Corvallis, Montana. He was
ten years old when his father returned to Missouri,
and he attended school in that state, Mr. Groff for
fourteen years was a teacher and school principal,
most of his work being done in Co.rvallis, Grants-
dale and Victor, Montana. In 1904, when he com-
pleted his last school term, he began farming near
Victor, and lived on his farm and gave his ranch
interests his chief personal attention until 1910. He
still owns two hundred and fifty acres in Ravalli
County. This is irrigated land and consequently
valuable and productive. Besides hay and grain he
specializes in pure bred Shorthorn cattle. He is
associated with his brothers under the firm name
GrofT Brothers, very e.xtensively engaged in the live-
stock industry.
The Farmers State Bank of Victor was organized
in 1907, being opened for business on the first of
April of that year. Since 1910 Mr. Grofif has been
cashier of this bank. H. J. St. John is president and
John F. Wood, vice president. The bank has had a
prosperous career. Its capital is twenty-five thou-
sand dollars, surplus and profits of ten thousand
dollars, and average deposits of two hundred and
fifteen thousand dollars.
Mr. Grofif was a representative in the State Legis-
lature in 1909, and served as State senator from 191 1
to 1913. He is a democrat in political afifiliations.
He is a past master of Victor Lodge No. 43,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons and member
of Hamilton Chapter, Royal Arch Masons. Mr.
Grofif and family reside on their farm adjoin-
ing Victor on the west. He married at Victor
in 1902 Miss Julia Smith, daughter of William and
Lottie (Tuxbury) Smith. Her mother resides at
Victor. Her father, now deceased, was an early
farmer in this section of Montana. Mr. and Mrs.
Grofif have two children : Helen, born July 3, 1905,
and Clayetta, born July i, 1915.
William Pearson Reynolds, M. D. Soon after
receiving his degree in medicine from the University
at Halifax, Nova Scotia, Doctor Reynolds began his
work in a Montana mining town. Most of his pro-
fessional career for twenty years has been spent in
the northwest. He is a physician and surgeon of
prominence at Stevensville, and shares his practice
with a talented wife, who is also a graduate
physician from the same university as her husband.
Doctor Reynolds was born in Halifax County,
Nova Scotia, June 17, 1868, of English ancestry. His
father, John G. Reynolds, was born in Nova Scotia,
in Halifax County, in 1834, and is still living there at
the venerable age of eighty-five. His life has been
spent in the quiet routine of farming. For tnany
years he held the office of justice of the peace and
other positions of local honor and responsibility.
He was a member of the Canadian forces which put
down the Fenian raid. John G. Reynolds married
Helen Athol, who was born in Halifax City in 1833
and died in the county of that name in igio. She
was the mother of four children : Francis, a farmer
at Stewiacke, Nova Scotia ; Wellwood, on the home
farm with his father ; Doctor William P. ; and Mar-
garet, a trained nurse living at home.
Doctor Reynolds attended rural high schools in his
native county, graduated from the Halifax High
School in 1887, and for four years was a teacher in
Halifax and Colchester counties. As one step to-
ward his professional career, Doctor Reynolds took
the nurse's training course in the Massachusetts Gen-
eral Hospital in Boston, and followed nursing as a
profession to earn the money needed to complete his
university course. He studied medicine in Dalhousie
University at Halifax, graduating M. D.. C. M.
in 1900. Soon afterward he came to Montana
and for eight years practiced at .\ldridge, a prom-
inent mining center. He then went back to Canada
for two years, returned to Montana and practiced
at the mining town of Aldridge for one year, next
went to Lane, South Dakota, where he practiced
five years, and in 1917 came to Stevensville, where he
enjoys a large general medical practice, with home
and offices at the corner of Main and Fourth streets.
He is a member of the Northwestern Montana
Medical Association and the American Medical As-
sociation. Politically he is a republican, and is affi-
liated with the Methodist Episcopal Church, being a
trustee and also serving on the ofiftcial board of the
church. Fraternally he is a member of Livingston
Lodge, Knights of Pythias.
At Butte, Montana, in 1901, he married Miss Wini-
fred Braine, daughter of Robert T. and Bessie
(Buckley) Braine. Mrs. Reynolds also holds the
degrees, M. D., C. M. from the same university as her
husband. Doctor and Mrs. Reynolds have three chil-
dren: Francis Gordon, born September 15, 1902;
Helen Marjorie, born October 7. 1905; and Catherine
Elizabeth, born May 5, 1909.
Leroy Southmayd, M. D. By many years of
service recognized as one of the most conspicuous
men in the medical and surgical profession in Mon-
tana, Doctor Southmayd of Great Falls has the dis-
tinction of being the first native son of Montana to
complete the regular course of training and enter the
ranks of physicians and surgeons.
He is a son of the late LeRoy Southmayd, Sr.,
and his wife, Sarah (Bartlit) Southmayd. His
mother was descended from Joshua Bartlit, one of
the signers of the Declaration of Independence. The
Southmayd family has been in America 'nearly three
centuries. William Southmayd, who came over to
the colonies in 1^0, was 'the youngest son of Sir
William Southmayd of Devonshire and Kent, Eng-
land.
LeRoy Southmayd, Sr., who died in 1883, was a
prominent Montana pioneer, one of the first miners
in Alder Gulch, and is frequently mentioned in the
annals of the Vigilantes. He, as well as his wife,
was born in Essex County, New York. His birth
occurred in 1833, while his wife was born in 1844.
She died in January, 1918, after about half a century
of residence in Montana. Doctor Southmaj'd was
the first of their four children, three of whom are
still living. LeRoy Southmayd. Sr., was educated in
his native state and in 1849 located at .A.ppleton, Wis-
consin, and subsequently engaged in the steamboat
and transportation business on the Missouri River
between St. Louis and the present site of Kansas
City. In that enterprise he had his bjother as a part-
ner. In 1859 he went overland to Denver, Colorado,
and was a miner in Georgia Gulch. He arrived at
.^Ider Gulch, Montana, in the spring of 1863, having
made the trip across the country by ox team. He
t£f^,utL^^ t^j^^^.ej.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
533
and A. C. Hall were partners and were connected
with the exploitation of some of the first mining
claims in and around Alder Gulch. In 1864 Mr.
Southmayd returned to St. Louis. There he con-
tracted for the construction of a stamp mill, which
was shipped in parts overland to Alder Gulch, and
on being set up was the first institution of its kind
in the Montana mining district. It was operated
very successfully for several years. In 1866 Mr.
Southmayd again returned East, this time to Essex
County, New York, where he married and spent
about a year. He and his wife then left the old home
on their wedding tour, traveled by railroad to St.
Louis, and thence by steamboat up the Missouri
River. On account of Indian hostilities the steamer
was compelled to tie up to the shore every night,
and consequently they were three months in making
the journey. LeRoy Southmayd as one of the promi-
nent men among the miners of Alder Gulch and
Virginia City had an active part in the Vigilantes
organization. He and Mr. Hall continued their
partnership until the early '70s, and afterwards he
was identified with the gold mining industry until
his death. He was affiliated with Summit Lodge No.
I of the Masons at Alder Gulch, was a Methodist
and a democrat.
Dr. LeRoy Southmayd was born at Alder Gulch
July 19, 1869. He received his early advantages in
Montana, but was sent East for his literary and med-
ical education. He attended the University of Mich-
igan and graduated M. D. with the class of 1892.
He first engaged in .practice at White Sulphur
Springs, but shortly afterward luoved to Virginia
City. In May, 1898, Doctor Southmayd was appointed
assistant surgeon of the First Montana Infantry
when that regiment was enrolled among the United
States Volunteers for service in the Philippines. He
spent eighteen months with the regiment, and was on
active duty during the greater part of the insurrec-
tion of the Philippines. In March, 1900, after his
return from the Orient, Doctor Southmayd located at
Great Falls, and for twenty years has been one of
the leading physicians of that city. He was as-
sociated with the late Dr. R. P. Gordon, and since
his death has been in practice alone. During the
war with Germany he served nine months as a major
in the Medical Reserve Corps. He had charge of
the Three Hundred and Sixteenth Sanitary Train at
Camp Lewis, Washington, with 930 enlisted rnen and
52 medical officers under his medical supervision.
By his attainments Doctor Southmayd is a member
of the American College of Surgeons. He has
served on the. State Board of Health, is a past presi-
dent of the County Medical Society, and also belongs
to the State and American Medical Associations. He
is a member of the State Board of Medical Examin-
ers. Fraternally he is affiliated with Montana Lodge
No. 2, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Vir-
ginia City, with the Scottish Rite Consistory, at
Helena and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
In politics he is a democrat.
Doctor Southmayd married Charlotte Pixley. Four
of their five children are living, William P., Char-
lotte, LeRoy, Jr., and John.
George R. Fisk. the present postmaster of Hamil-
ton, has been citizen and business factor in that com-
munity for over twenty years, and his high standing
as a citizen and his business training furnish him
every qualification for the official responsibilities he
now enjoys.
Mr. Fisk was born at Sparta Center in Kent
County, Michigan. August i. 1S72. His English an-
cestors were colonial settlers in Canada. His father,
William H. Fisk. was born in the Province of On-
tario in 1844. and is now living with his son George
at Hamilton. He was reared and married at On-
tario, where he followed farming, and learned the
blacksmiths' trade. At the age of seventeen he left
his father's farm, and about 1863 located in Kent
County, Michigan. He conducted a blacksmith shop
for a number of years at Sparta Center, but in 1882
moved to Osceola County in that state, and his
energies were absorbed in farming until he retired
and removed to Hamilton in 1909. He served as
supervisor of Marion Township in Osceola County,
Michigan, and held other local offices. He is a
democrat and a member of the Masonic fraternity.
William H. Fisk married Margaret Ross, who was
born in Ontario in 1844 and died at Hamilton,
Montana, in 1915. They had four children, George
being the youngest. Arthur E., the oldest, was a
farmer and died in Osceola County, Michigan, at the
age of fifty-two. W. O. Fisk was manager of the
Valley Mercantile Company at Hamilton for many
years, and during the World ivar served as a member
of the State Efficiency Board. His heavy responsi-
bilities in that connection only terminated in the
summer of 1919. Hugh Wesley, the third of the
family, is janitor of the high school at Hamilton.
George R. Fisk received his early education in the
rural schools of Osceola County, Michigan, and lived
on his father's farm until he was seventeen. Having
an inclination for industrial life, he went to Detroit
and spent three years as an employe of the Detroit
Twist Drill Works. On coming to Montana in 1896
he worked for one year on the Marcus Daly ranch
near Hamilton. For two and a half years he shipped
lumber for C. S. Kendall at Florence, and another
year was spent with the Big Blackfoot Milling Com-
pany at Butte. In 1900 he returned to Hamilton and
for two and a half years clerked in the Page Hotel.
Then followed his longest period of connection with
one establishment, ten years with the Anaconda Cop-
per Mining Company in the lumber department as
tirnekeeper and lumber checker. Mr. Fisk was ap-
pointed postmaster by President Wilson in 1914.
He is also a director of the Vermillion Silver, Gold
and Lead Mining Company. In politics he is a
democrat and is affiliated with Ionic Lodge No. 38,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hamilton Chap-
ter No. 18, Royal Arch Masons.
Mr. Fisk owns a modern home at 520 South Sec-
ond Street. He married at Hamilton in 1906 Miss
Mamie Whitney, daughter of M. C. and Emma
(Moran) Whitney, residents of Montana, her father
being a rancher near Hamilton. Mr. and Mrs. Fisk
have three children : Doris, born August 8. 1907 ;
Marjorie, born March 30, 1909; and Ruth Esther,
born October 14, 1915.
Laurence A. Holt is one of the young bankers
of Montana, being cashier of the First State Bank
of Stevensville. He received his first training in
banking in his native state of Ohio, and for a num-
ber of years was an official with a large bank at
Spokane.
He was born at East Randolph, New York. Febru-
ary 5, 1885, and is of Scotch-Irish ancestry. His
people settled in New York in colonial times. His
father, A. H. Holt, was born at East Randolph,
New York, in 1856, and was a merchant there for
several years. Later he went on the road as a
traveling salesman and for past twenty years has been
representative in the state of Ohio for the Clavvson-
Wilson Company. He now lives at Columbus. Ohio.
He is a republican in politics. A. H. Holt married
Ella Stevens, who was born at Charlotte Center,
Chautauqua County, New York, in 185S. They have
three children: Mabel, wife of James M. Linton, an
attorney at Columbus. Ohio ; Laurence A.: and Har-
old A., who is a partner in an automobile business
534
HISTORY OF MONTANA
at Stevensville, holding the agency for the Ford
cars and accessories.
Laurence A. Holt attended public schools at Sin-
clairville, New York, until he was twelve years of
age, and in ig02 graduated from the high school of
Columbus, Ohio. Soon afterward he was on the
pay roll of the Ohio State Savings Bank at Columbus
as a messenger boy, and by diligence and ability-
earned promotion until he was a teller. He left
Columbus in 1906 and for ten years served as trust
officer of the Northwest Loan and Trust Company
at Spokane, Washington.
Mr. Holt accepted his present duties as cashier of
the First State Bank of Stevensville in October, 1916.
This bank was established in 1909 under a state
charter, and is a prosperous institution with forty
thousand dollars capital, twelve thousand dollars
surplus and profits and deposits aggregating three
hundred seventy-five thousand dollars. The bank is
located at the corner of Main and Third streets.
The president is James M. Higgins and the vice
president, George T. Baggs.
Laurence A. Holt is an independent voter in
political affairs and is a member of the Episcopal
Church. He is treasurer of Stevensville Lodge No.
28, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and is
affiliated with Garden Valley Lodge of the Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows. During the war
he was generous of his time in behalf of patriotic
movements, taking an active part in all the cam-
paigns for funds and was treasurer of the War
Service League. Mr. Holt owns a modern home on
Third Street. He was married at Spokane in 1909
to Miss Mary Ethel James, a native of Missouri.
They have one child, Kendall, born December 5, 1910.
James Edwin Totman has been manager of the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company at Hamilton for
over twenty years. He is a veteran lumberman, and
he grew up in the big woods of Wisconsin and be-
gan his practical apprenticeship in the woods and
around saw mills more than fifty years ago.
Mr. Totman, who is also the honored mayor of
Hamilton, was born at Plattsburg, New York, June
9, 1849. He is of Scotch ancestry. His grandfather,
Asaph Billings Totman, was born in Scotland in
1793 and came to this country with eleven brothers.
He established his home on a farm two miles from
Peru. New York, where he became a large and
prosperous farmer. He died at Saratoga Springs,
New York, in 1874. His wife was Anna Lindsley,
of Scotch ancestry.
Henry Totman, their son, was born in New Y'ork
State in 1827, grew up and married at Peru, and in
early life took up the lumber industry. He operated
saw mills in northern New York, and w^hen that
district lost its importance in the lumber field fol-
lowed the tide in his business to Wisconsin. He
went to that state in 1856, and was one of the pioneer
sawmill men there. He was a graduate of the
Malone College at Malone, Vermont. Henry Tot-
man died at Oconto, Wisconsin, in 1867. Politically
he was a republican. His wife was Elizabeth Jack-
son, who was born in 1828 and died at Oconto, Wis-
consin, in 1884.
James Edwin Totman was the only child of his
parents. He was seven years of age when his par-
ents moved to Wisconsin and acquired his early
education in the public schools of Oconto. Later
he entered Beloit College, Wisconsin, but his father's
death in 1867 called him home. He next began
working in the woods and around sawmills. During
the winter of 1876 he was engaged in scaling lumber
in the woods around Nealsville, Wisconsin. During
the ne.xt five years he was in the employ of C. L.
Coleman, owner of one of the large saw mills at La-
Crosse, Wisconsin. He spent eleven years as saw-
mill superintendent for the lumber firm of Sawyer
& Austin at LaCrosse, and for five years was saw-
mill superintendent for Laird & Norton at Winona,
Minnesota.
Mr. Totman arrived at Hamilton, Montana, on
December 24, 1898, and since then has been con-
tinuously on duty as manager for the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company there. He is also president
of the Hamilton Hospital and president of the
Farmers' and Business Alen's Association of Ravalli
County. He was elected mayor of Hamilton in May,
1919. for a term of two years. He votes as a repub-
lican and is affiliated with Ionic Lodge No. 3S,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Hamilton Chap-
ter No. 18, Royal Arch Masons, Crusade Com-
mandery No. 17, Knights Templar, Winona Con-
sistory of the Scottish Rite and Osman Temple of
the Mystic Shrine at St. Paul.
Mr. Totman resides in the Colter Block on South
Second Street. September 2, 1872, at Oconto, Wis-
consin, he married Miss Anna B. Dukelow. She was
born at Mount Morris, New York, in 1850 and died
at Missoula, Montana, in 1891. She is survived by
two daughters, Eva and Bessie. Eva is the wife of
George Beckwith, and they live at St. Ignatius,
Montana. Bessie lives in Missoula, widow of D. W.
Hughes, whom she married at Hamilton. Mr.
Hughes was in a retail lumber yard at Butte, where
he died. In 1904, at Hamilton, Mr. Totman married
his present wife, Mrs. Mary L. Moore, a native of
New York State.
John Fr.^nk Borough has been a merchant at
Stevensville beginning as far back as thirty years
ago. He is still active, and is proprietor of the
largest and most completely stocked hardware store
in Ravalli County.
Mr. Borough was born in Seneca County, Ohio.
May 20, 1854. His Holland Dutch ancestors settled
in Pennsylvania in colonial times. His grandfather,
Frederick Borough, was a very remarkable man in
many particulars. Born in Dauphin County, Penn-
sylvania, in 1771, he had some memories and recol-
lections of the War of the Revolution. Had he lived
nearly a year longer he might have witnessed the
celebration of the hundredth anniversary of the
Declaration of Independence. He died in Monroe
County. Michigan, in 1875, at the age of one hundred
four years, four months and fourteen days. As a
young man he knew George Washington. His
hundredth birthday anniversary was celebrated by
dinner with Vice President Schuyler Colfax at the
latter's home in South Bend, Michigan. Most of
his active life Frederick Borough spent as a farmer
in Seneca County, Ohio.
Rev. J. Borough, father of the Stevensville mer-
chant, was born in the Shenandoah Valley of Vir-
ginia in 1817 and as a young man accompanied his
parents to Seneca County, Ohio. He was married
in that county, afterward moved to Hancock County
in the same state, and as a minister of the Evangel-
ical Association and as a circuit rider his labors were
widely extended. For many years he was one of the
best known ministers of that denomination in Michi-
gan and Indiana. He reared his children in Ohio
and Michigan. He was a republican in politics.
Rev. Mr. Borough died at Traverse City, Michi-
gan, in 1912. His wife was Susannah Hetler, who
was born in Ohio in 1835 and died at Traverse City
in 1902. They had a large family of eleven chil-
dren : William, a retired farmer, now eighty years
of age and living at North Baltimore, Ohio ; David,
a farmer, aged seventy-eight, a resident of Leelanau
HISTORY OF MONTANA
535
County, Michigan ; Isaac, a farmer who died in
Ohio in 1887; Sarah, wife of William Brightville,
a farmer of Calhoun County, Michigan ; George, a
farmer in Monroe County, Michigan; John F. ; J.
Milton, a traveling salesman whose home is at
Marshall, Michigan: Samuel, a farmer who died at
Traverse City in 1881 ; Letta, of Maple City, Michi-
gan, widow of John Dull, a farmer who died in
1899; Charles Theodore, who for many years has
conducted a grocery business at Traverse City ;
Emma, wife of William Bright, a farmer at Lee-
lanau County, Michigan ; and Catherine, who is the
wife of a farmer in Leelanau County.
John Frank Borough acquired his early education
in the district schools of Monroe County, Michigan,
spent one term in the State Normal School at Ypsil-
anti, Michigan, and linished his education in the
high school at Wauseon, Ohio. He attended his
last school when he was about twenty-two years of
age, and then went to work at the trade of harness
maker, an occupation he followed both in Michigan
and Ohio. In 1881 Mr. Borough became a merchant,
and that occupation he has followed with few inter-
ruptions for nearly forty years. He established a
hardware business at Ovid, Michigan, and con-
ducted it until 1889.
He arrived at Stevensville, Montana, March 24,
1889. For twenty-three years Mr. Borough was
president of the Amos Buck Mercantile Company,
a large and thriving concern at Stevensville. He
sold his interests in 191 2, and during the next two
years did not consider himself on the active list of
local business men. He then bought the corner lot
on Main and Third streets and re-entered business •
as a hardware merchant in partnership with C. C.
Fulton. The firm of Borough & Fulton without
exception does the largest business in hardware in
Ravalli County. On coming to Stevensville thirty
years ago Mr. Borough erected a substantial resi-,
dence on Buck Avenue, and he still lives there. This
is one of the good homes of the town. He also owns
a ranch of two hundred acres five miles northwest
of Stevensville. His land is irrigated and his chief
crop is hay.
Back in his home state of Michigan Mr. Borough
served as mayor of Ovid and as township treasurer
several years. He was one of the first councilmen
in Stevensville. Politically he could be described as
a dyed-in-the-wool republican. He is past master
of Stevensville Lodge No. 28, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons and was also master of his lodge
at Ovid, Michigan. He is nast king and past scribe
of Hamilton Chapter No. 16, Roj'al Arch Masons,
a member of Hamilton Commandery, Knights
Templar, and Bagdad Temple of the Mvstic Shrine
at Butte.
September 27, 1877, Mr. Borough married in
Monroe County, Michigan. Ada Bitting, daughter of
Frederick and Elizabeth (Buck) Bitting. Her father
was a saw mill operator. Both her father and
mother lost their live.s when the propeller Ironside,
on which they were passengers, was sunk in Lake
Michigan en route from Grand Haven to Milwaukee.
Mrs. Borough is a graduate of a young ladies'
seminary at Monroe. Michigan. Mr. and Mrs.
Borough had two children. The only son, C. W.
Borough, died in 1907, at the age of twenty-nine.
Death interrupted for him an exceedingly promising
and able business career. He was an associate with
his father, and his business ability was known and
admired over this part of the state. The daughter,
Edna May, born May 2. 1884, is the wife of Herbert
Metcalf, and they reside on their irrigated ranch of
three hundred ten acres two and a half miles south
of Stevensville. Mrs. Metcalf is a graduate of the
Stevensville High School.
Robert S. Ford. Only those familiar by study,
reading or experience with the great and varied life
of the west and northwest during the past half
century can appreciate the many incidents in the life
of such a man as the late Robert S. Ford of Great
Falls. When he began his career at the time of
the Civil war, one of the greatest industries in the
middle west was overland freighting and transpor-
tation before the era of transcontinental railways.
He helped carry goods back and forth over the
plains and brought his first cargo of merchandise
into Montana in 1864. The extent of his subsequent
enterprise as a stockman might justify the title
"cattle baron," though the modesty and simplicity of
the man would make such a phrase inappropriate
except to describe the importance of his business
relations.
For over twenty years he lived in Great Falls,
where he died October i, 1914. An imposing monu-
ment to his life is the Ford Building at Great Falls,
which was in process of construction at the time of
his death and is regarded as one of the finest public
buildings in the state. The Ford Building now fur-
nishes facilities for many offices and is also the home
of the Great Falls National Bank.
Robert S. Ford was born in Simpson County, Ken-
tucky, January 14, 1842, a son of John C. and Hen-
rietta (Simpson) Ford. In i847_ his father died.
In 1855 the family moved to Westport, Alissouri,
then a town of great importance, since practically
merged into the larger Kansas City. Robert S. Ford
had a common school education in Missouri. At the
age of nineteen he began working for a freighting
outfit which used ox teams and wagons in carrying
goods between Nebraska City and Fort Laramie.
The following year he was advanced to assistant
wagon master, and in 1863 had charge of a wagon
train. When he came to Montana in 1864 he had
charge of an ox train of sixteen wagons of mer-
chandise. Following that for several years he
freighted from Benton, Cow Island and the Milk
River countrj' to the mining camps of Helena, Vir-
ginia Cfty, Bannock and Deer Lodge. In 1868 he
returned to Kentucky to visit his mother, who had
returned to her home state during the war.
The beginning of his enterprise as a cattle man
was made in 1869, when he bought 300 head of
Texas cattle in Colorado and drove them into Beaver
Head Valley. The venture was profitable, and he
next bought seven hundred head of stock in Colo-
rado and wintered them during 1871 at the mouth of
the Sun River. His winter cabin was about two
miles from Great Falls. In the fall of 1872 he
brought still another large herd of cattle from Colo-
rado. From the spring of 1873 his headquarters
were near Sun River Crossing, in which locality he
developed one of the most extensive ranching
projects in the valley. Taking his livestock in the
aggregate during the next twenty years Mr. Ford
was one of the prominent livestock men in the terri-
tory.
He removed to Great Falls in 1891. and soon estab-
lished the Great Falls National Bank, which he
served as president until January 14. 1913. His
estate also comprised a large amount of city property
and other valuable interests.
Of a southern family, Mr. Ford was always a
democrat. In 1876 he represented Choteau County
in the State Legislature, and in 1877 Choteau and
Meagher counties in the Territorial Council or .Sen-
ate. In 1880 he was again chosen to represent his
district in the Fourteenth Assembly.
536
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr. Ford also went back to Kentucky to claim
his bride. In that state in 1878 he married Miss
Sue McClanahan, member of one of the oldest fami-
lies of Kentucky. She was born in Simpson County
July I, 1859, daughter of James Wesley and Lydia
A. McClanahan. A few weeks after their wedding
they came to Montana and Mrs. Ford for seventeen
years lived near Sun River Crossing on the ranch.
She died October 25, 1906, at Great Falls. Of the
five children born to their marriage three died in
infancy. The two sons are Lee M. and Shirley S.,
whose careers are noted briefly on other pages.
Lee M. T"ord, son of the Montana pioneer, the
late Robert S. Ford, was born on his father's ranch
on Sun River near Fort Shaw in what is now Cas-
cade County April I, 1883.
When he was about twelve years of age his parents
moved to Great Falls, where he attended the grain-
mar and high schools. He also was a student in
St. Paul's School at Concord, New Hampshire. In
1904, having attained his majority, he went to work
for the Great Falls National Bank, of which his
father was president, in the capacity of messenger,
and by his own diligence and merit was prorrioted
from time to time until he was chosen president
of the institution in January, 1913.
Mr. Ford is a democrat and takes an active inter-
est in many of the broader concerns of his home
state. He is vice president of the Montana State
Historical Society. November 14, 1906, he married
Rachel Mary Couch, daughter of Capt. Thomas
and Rachel (Webber) Couch. They have one
daughter, Rachel Sue.
George L. Gagnon. The wonderful growth in
realty values in Butte have brought to the fore-
front a class of men who for general ability, as-
tuteness and driving force are unsurpassed in the
annals of trade in this state. It is well to say that
conditions develop men, but it is better to say that
men bring about conditions. The realty market
of Butte owes what it is to the men who have had
the courage to persevere, to act wisely and to keep
their operations clean in one of the most difficult
fields of endeavor. One of the men who" through
his energetic- endeavors has made himself a most
honored citizen of Butte is George L. Gagnon.
George L. Gagnon was born in the Province of
Quebec, Canada, in the City of Chicoutimi, on Sep-
tember 3, 1864. Timothy Gagnon, his father, was
born in the same province as his son in the year
1821 and died at Chicoutimi in 1875. He was a
member of a family that had settled in Canada
from France at a period antedating the occupancy
of these provinces by the British. After his mar-
riage at Malbe, Quebec, Canada, to Miss Marcel-
line Guay, born at Malbe in 1823, and died at Chi-
coutimi, Quebec, Canada, Timothy Gagnon moved
to Chicoutimi, being the third white settler to locate
in that community, and there he followed lumber-
ing during the early days, later going into farm-
ing, and becoming successful in the latter calling.
He was a member of the Roman Catholic Church.
The children born to Timothy Gagnon and his wife
were: Celina, who married Joseph Cote and lives
at Saint Joseph d'Alma, Canada ; Peter, who resides
at Lynn, Massachusetts; Marie, who married
Charles Bouttot, lives at Vancouver, British Co-
lumbia, Canada ; Louise, who married R. C. Harvey,
now living at Sudbury, Ontario, Canada; Ellen,
who married Peter La Lancette, lives near Chicou-
timi, Canada; Emma, who married Charles Tram-
bley, and lives at Sudbury, Ontario, Canada; George
L. whose name heads this review; and seven, who
are deceased.
George L. Gagnon was reared on his father's farm
and when only fourteen years old, and after the
death of both his parents, he left home and went
to work in a sawmill at Ottawa, Ontario, Canada,
where he remained a year. He then came to the
United States, his objective point being Potsdam.
New York, and he spent the subsequent three win-
ters there in the employ of the Snell Lumber Com-
pany, returning to Ottawa for the summer seasons.
At the time he came to this country he could speak
nothing but French, but was ambitious and deter-
mined to learn the English language and the cus-
toms and methods of the United States, and it was
not long before he gained a fair working knowledge
of tTie language. Although having been denied edu-
cational advantages as a boy, his quick perception
soon discovered the larger possibilities which were
presented to him, and he concluded to try for higher
things ; and in order to gain specialized acquaintance
with commercial forms he took a business course
in 1891, and a second one in 1906, and is now one
of the best informed men in his line of endeavor.
Commencing his business career with but little and
having to rely on his own faculties and resources,
he has succeeded far beyond even his own expec-
tations.
However, he traveled a long way before he at-
tained his present prosperity. Leaving Potsdam, Mr.
Gagnon entered the employ of the Canadian Pacific
Railroad as a bridge carpenter, and for four years
was employed in construction work in the Province
of Ontario. In 1887 he came to Helena. Montana,
and followed his trade as a bridge builder for the
Montana Central Railroad, operating from Helena
to Butte, assisting to construct all of the bridges,
section houses, depots and tanks on this route, and
remained with this company until the fall of 1888,
when he went with the Butte & Boston Mining
Company at Butte as foreman carpenter and held
that position for thirteen years. In 1902 he resigned
this position and took charge of the carpenter work
at the Cora Mine for A. Heinze, where he remained
for four years. For the subsequent year Mr. Gag-
non worked for the North Butte E.xtension Com-
pany, putting up all its buildings, and then em-
barked in the ice business, which he sold in the fall
of 1911. Leaving Butte for a short time, Mr. Gag-
non went to Poison, Montana, and began handling
real estate, and in it found the field for which he
was particularly adapted. Returning to Butte in
the spring of 1912, he established himself in a gen-
eral realty and insurance business, and also handles
large timber contracts. This business has grown
until Mr. Gagnon now has one of the leading con-
cerns of its kind in Silver Bow Countv, with offices
at 41-42 Owsley Block. He is president of the
Gagnon Realty Company, which he incorporated in
1914, and also a member of the board of directors
of the Vadnais Realty Company and administrator
of the estate of Polydor Vadnais. Mr. Gagnon
is owner of several business buildings in the heart
of the city as well as a large. amount of real estate
and mining property in other parts of the city and
state.
Mr. Gagnon is a member of Saint Jean Baptiste
Society and served the Butte branch of it as presi-
dent for two terms, and of Butte Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America.
Mr. Gagnon is a modest and retiring gentleman
who has aspired to no elective or appointive politi-
cal offices, and seems happiest in the pursuit of his
business duties or in the quiet of his home. In 1891
Air. Gagnon was married at Butte, Montana, to Miss
Tarissa Golden, a daughter of William and Amelia
(Smith) Golden, pioneers of Kansas, Mr. Golden
having served as captain in the Union army through-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
537
out the war between the states. Mr. and Mrs.
Gagnon became the parents of three children: Edna,
who married Charles Hambly, Maud, who married
G. Leslie Bolitho, both of whom were graduated
from the Butte High School, and Beulah who is
attending the Butte High School at present.
Too much credit cannot be given to a man like
Mr. Gagnon, for not only has he achieved a not-
able success through his own efforts and against
many obstacles, but he has proven himself as well
a generous contributor to worthy objects and a
faithful and loyal friend to measures of a public
nature. While becoming very successful, the more
commendable fact remains that he has budded for
himself a character which as a citizen, as a man
of affairs, and as husband and father enables him
to reflect some of the noblest traits which mankind
can own. His record stands today without stain
or blemish, and he is eminently entitled to his name
of representative citizen. Clear-sighted and ener-
getic, he has never failed in his allegiance to Butte
since locating permanently in its midst, and he has
placed the city under heavy obligations to him for
his constructive labors in its behalf.
Lester J. Hartzell is professor of chemistry at
the Montana State School of Mines at Butte. As
a mining engineer his experience covers a large
part of the West, though for practically a quarter
of a century he has been identified with the mining
industry of Montana.
He was born at Golden, Colorado, March 21,
1871, and is of Holland-Dutch and Pennsylvania
ancestry. His father, James G. Hartzell, was born
in Illinois in 1839, was reared and married in that
state, and in 1861, at the beginning of the Civil war,
enlisted in the Missouri Sharpshooters. Later he
was transferred to the Sixty-Si.xth Illinois Infan-
try, and saw a great deal of active service in the
Middle West, being with Sherman on the March
to the Sea. In 1869 he moved to Golden, Colorado,
followed farming, and since 1914 has lived at the
Soldiers' Home in California. He is a republican
and a Mason. James G. Hartzell married Nellie
M. Merryman, who was born at Moline, Illinois,
in 1849 and died at Golden, Colorado, in 1898. Les-
ter J. is the oldest of their three children ; the second
is Harry Hartzell, and the third is Roy.
Mr. Hartzell attended public school at Golden
and Denver, for four years was on the range as a
cowboy, and June 6, 1895, graduated Bachelor of
Science from the School of Mines of Golden, Colo-
rado. He specialized, in mining engineering. Dur-
ing 1895 he traveled all through the South and Old
Mexico, and on November loth of the same year
arrived at Butte. He followed his profession in
mining and metallurgy at difTerent points, and be;;
gining in 1898 was for five years chief chemist of
the Granite Bi-Metallic Silver & Copper Mining
Company at Philipsburg, Montana. The following
two years he was employed at Butte and Anaconda
by the Anaconda Copper Mining Company as as-
sayer, resigning this post in 1904 to become assis-
tant professor of chemistry and metallurgy in the
State School of Mines. After two years he was
promoted to the Chair of Chemistry, and has given
practically all his time to the duties of this office.
He is a member of the American Chemical Society
and the Montana Society of Engineers, is a repub-
lican, a member of the Episcopal Church, and is a
member of Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and Deer Lodge Chap-
ter No. 3, Royal Arch Masons.
December 31, 1896, at Golden, Colorado, Mr. Hart-
zell married Miss Emma Hockings, daughter of
Simon and Emma (Wall) Hockings, the latter now
deceased and the former a retired resident of Mis-
soula. Mr. and Mrs. Hartzell have one son, Lester
J., Jr., born February 29, 1904.
Samuel J. Trevillion came to Montana about
fifteen years ago, was employed as a machinist for
several years, and then became interested in the
monument business and is now president of the Tre-
villion-Mole Monument Company, the leading con-
cern of its kind at Butte and in Silverbow County.
Mr. Trevillion was born in Cornwall, England,
June 17, 1884. His people have been Cornishmen
for a number of generations, and their business
for the most part has been mining. Mr. Trevillion's
grandfather, John Trevillion, while a miner by oc-
cupation, was well known at one time in America
as an athlete and prize fighter. He died in New
Jersey in 1889. Samuel J. Trevillion, Sr., father
of the Butte business man, was born in England in
1859, and in 1884, just before the birth of his son
Samuel, came to America and spent some time in
the mines of New Jersey. He then went back to
Cornwall, where he still resides, though for another
short period he was in this country, spending most
of his time in Arizona. His occupation and profes-
sion all his active life has been mining. He is a
member of the Episcopal Church. His wife bore
the maiden name of Amelia Mitchell. She was born
in Cornwall in 1859. A brief record of their chil-
dren is as follows: Hannah Jane, wife of David
Thomas, foreman in a powder factory of the Hale
Powder Works in Cornwall ; Mabel, unmarried and
living with her parents; Lillie, wife of David Noble,
of Cornwall; Samuel J.; Beatrice, living in Corn-
wall, is the widow of Richard Matthews, who came
to Butte in 1907 and accidentally lost his life in 1910
while in the employ of the Speculator Mine; Lila
is the wife of Richard Edwards, a resident of
Canada, Mr. Edwards having sustained honorable
wounds while a soldier in the World war ; Thomas
Charles, a farmer in Cornwall ; Ethel Maude, mar-
ried and living in Canada; Archie a farmer in Corn-
wall, and Rhoda May, unmarried and at home.
Samuel J. Trevillion acquired his education in the
public schools of Cornwall. At the age of ten years
he began to work in the machine shops of his na-
tive country, and had acquired a thorough knowl-
edge of his trade before he came to the United
States in 1903. For the first seven years in Butte
he worked in the Leonard Machine Shops. In 1910
he became president of the Trevillion-Mole Monu-
ment Company. This business was established by
Theodore Walker and was the pioneer concern of its
kind in Silverbow County. It is a family corpora-
tion, Mr. Trevillion's father-in-law, Antone Wicke,
being vice president, while his wife. Lena L. Tre-
villion, is secretary and treasurer. The plant is lo-
cated at 2400 South Montana Street, and has com-
plete facilities for all classes of monumental work in
both marble and granite.
Mr. Trevillion is a republican voter, a member
of the Episcopal Church, and affiliated with Moni-
tor Lodge No. 35, Ancient Free and Accepted Ma-
sons, Washington Lodge No. 35, Independent Order
of Odd Fellows, and the Sons of St. George. Be-
sides his business he owns a modern residence at
2900 Elizabeth-Warren Avenue.
He married at Helena, Montana, in 1911 Mrs.
Lena L. (Wicke) Walker, widow of Edward Walker
and daughter of Antone and Pauline Wicke. Her
parents reside at Portland, Oregon, where her father
has been a merchant for thirty-five years. Mr. and
Mrs. Trevillion have two children, Samuel Roy and
June.
538
HISTORY OF MONTANA
JosiAH L. Wines. Few Montana attorneys have
been permitted to gather the laurels of success in
the law for a longer period than Josiah L. \\ ines
of Butte. Mr. Wines was admitted to the bar and
tried his first cases as a lawyer about the time the
great American Civil war came to an end. During
the '70s he moved to Nevada, and has spent over
forty years in his profession in that state and Mon-
tana.
He was born in Wabash County, Indiana, No-
vember 25, 1838, son of J. L. and Rebecca (Little)
Wines, his father a native of Vermont and of New
England stock. J. L. Wines was an Indiana farmer,
and died in 1840, when his son was only two years
of age. The widowed mother survived until 1906.
Josiah L. Wines grew up in an Indiana rural dis-
trict, but acquired a thorough literary as well as
professional education. He attended old Asbury
or DePauw University at Greencastle, Indiana, and
completed his course in the law school of the Uni-
versity of Michigan in 1865. During the next nine
years he practiced law in Eastern Kansas at Olathe,
and then removed to Nevada, where he achieved dis-
tinctive eminence as an attorney. He practiced five
years at Elko and subsequently lived at Eureka
and Reno. Mr. Wines located at Butte in 1894, and
with an energy that few men of his age could equal
continued to 'handle a large professional business,
and for a number of years was attorney for the
Southern Pacific Company in Nevada, and also in
Montana for the Oregon Short Line Railroad Com-
pany. Mr. Wines retired from the active practice
of his profession in December, 1918.
As a young man Mr. Wines became identified with
the Ma'sonic fraternity, and is one of the oldest
Masons in Montana. In i860 he married Miss Eliza-
beth Jackson, a native of Indiana. Their one daugh-
ter, Eva L., was married to James B. Gallagher,
a mining man of Butte, who died leaving one son,
Frank M. Gallagher. After the death of Mr. Gal-
lagher she became the wife of Nat. H. Wood of
San Francisco.
Miles Romney. Every fact in his life record is
an additional qualification for the inclusion of Miles
Romney among the real progressives in Montana
politics and public affairs. His home for many years
has been in Ravalli County, where he has acquired
substantial ranching interests, is publisher of The
Western News, the official paper of Ravalli County,
and for many years has been prominent in Mon-
tana public affairs. One of his most recent distinc-
tions was his service with the rank of captain during
the World war.
He was born at St. George, Utah, December 18,
1872. His grandfather. Miles Romney, was born in
Dalton, Lancashire. England, and married in Eng-
land Miss Gaskell. He brought his family to
America and lived at St. George and Salt Lake City,
Utah, where he followed his profession as an archi-
tect and builder. He died at St. George. Thomas
Romney, father of the Montana newspaper man,
was born at Nauvoo, the old time capital of tlie
Mormon Church in Illinois, in 1846. He was reared
at St. George, Lltah, was married there, and also
became a carpenter and builder. In 1881 he set-
tled on a ranch a mile east of Hamilton, Montana,
and had a long and successful career as a farmer
in this state. In 1912 he removed to Seattle, Wash-
ington, and died there in 1914. He was a republican
in politics. Thomas Romney married Annie Wood,
who was born in England in 1846 and died at Cor-
vallis, Montana, in 1907. Miles was the oldest of
their children, and three died in early childhood.
Tane is the wife of P. J. Murray, a teacher living at
Creston, Washington; Naomi is the wife of E. L.
Popham, a rancher at Corvallis, Montana ; Kenneth
is cashier for the House of Representatives at Wash-
ington, District of Columbia; Winifred is the wife
of Franklin Pratt, an insurance man of Los Ange-
les, California; and Thomas was a newspaper pub-
lisher and died in New Mexico at the age of thirty-
five.
Capt. Miles Romney acquired his early education
in the rural schools of Ravalli County, being nine
years of age when his parents located on their ranch.
At the age of fourteen he went to work and spent
two years at common labor. He then went east to
complete his education with a business course at the
Ohio Northern University at Ada. He returned to
Corvallis in 1889 and was employed on ranches, saw
mills and in other lines of work until he moved to
Hamilton in 1895 and bought The Western News.
This paper was originally established at Stevens-
ville in 1889 and was transferred to Hamilton in
1894. It is a democratic paper, being the official
paper of the county, and has an extensive circula-
tion in that and surrounding counties. The plant
and offices are at 176 Second Street.
Mr. Romney owns a valuable ranch of 200 acres
of irrigated land two miles west of Hamilton. Forty
acres of this is planted to orchard. The trees were
set out in 1906 and for several seasons past the or-
chard has borne a valuable crop of apples. Captain
Romney also owns a modern home on Third Street
in Hamilton.
He earned his first distinctions in public affairs
when elected mayor of Hamilton in 1902, holding
that office two years and during tliat time establish-
ing a free public library and reorganizing the fire
department and beautifying the city by planting trees
along the streets and improving the cemeteries. In
1904 he was nominated by the Democratic State
Convention as secretary of state, and was renomi-
nated on the same ticket in 1908 for the same office.
In the meantime he had been elected state sena-
tor from Ravalli County, and was one of the most
effective workers for progressive legislation during
the period from 1906 to 1910. His association with
the progressive element is indicated by the legisla-
tion which he supported, including the enactment
of measures providing for first investigation of
spotted fever, protecting orchards, establishing hor-
ticultural experiment stations, requiring prompt re-
port of sales by commission merchants, lengthen-
ing terms and increasing efficiency of public schools
by a readjustment of the school tax levy, and oppos-
ing the notorious House Bill 160 which legalized and
domesticated mining, waterpower and timber
monopoly in Montana.
In 191 1 Captain Romney organized the People's
Power League of Montana and as its president direct-
ed the initiative campaign that resulted in enactment
by the people of primary laws and corrupt practices
act. In 1914 he took up the initiative campaign for
workmen's compensation and farm loan laws. In
1916 Mr. Romney was one of the most prominent
candidates for the democratic nomination for gov-
ernor of Montana, and went before the democratic
voters on the record of his experience and service
in the Legislature and as an advocate of an advanced
program of state administration.
During the Spanish- American war in 1898, Mr.
Romney recruited a company for the war. In the
World war he was away from home and business
for eighteen months. He enlisted August 25. 1917,
entering the officers' training camp at the Presidio,
San Francisco, California. He was commissioned a
captain in the Quartermaster Corps on April 20,
1918, and served twelve months on the staff of the
quartermaster general. He was ordered to Atlanta,
Georgia, the general supply point and headquarters
Ul^JV^h^
ZXaA^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
539
for the Southeastern Department, and was super-
vising oiificer for the distribution of supplies for
more than 1,000,000 troops during September, Octo-
ber, November and December of igi8. After that
he was made traveling camp inspector in the same
zone, and visited all the sixty stations in that zone.
He was recommended for the rank of major, but
no promotions were made on this side of the ocean
after the signing of the armistice. He was mustered
out April 15, 1919.
Captain Romney served as president of the Mon-
tana State Press Association in 1902. Fraternally
he is affiliated with Ionic Lodge No. 38, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, Butte Consistory of the
Scottish Rite and Algeria Temple of the Mystic
Shrine at Helena. He is also a member of Hell
Gate Lodge No. 383 of the Elks at Missoula and
Ravalli Aerie No. 1693 of the Fraternal Order of
Eagles.
In 1897, at Corvallis, Montana, Captain Romney
married Miss Bessie Robbins, daughter of Albert
E. and Susan E. (Florida) Robbins. Mrs. Robbins
lives with Captain and Mrs. Romney. Mrs. Rom-
ney's father, who is deceased, was for many years
a Montana rancher. Mr. and Mrs. Romney have one
son. Miles, born December 6, 1900. He is now in
the second year of the State University of Montana
at Missoula.
Benedict P. McNair has been a prominent busi-
ness man of Great Falls for nearly thirty years. He
is a former county commissioner and lias shown a
public spirited willingness to assume many responsi-
bilities in connection with the progress and advance-
ment of his locality.
Mr. McNair was born at Dansville. New York,
August 23. 1862, a son of Isaac and Caroline (Pierre-
pont) McNair. His father, a native of Pennsylvania,
died in 1903, at the age of seventy-six. He took his
family to Minneapolis in 1868, and was a pioneer
business man of that city.
Benedict P. McNair was the second in age among
his father's children. He attended the public schools
of Minneapolis, also the University of Minnesota,
and gained his early business training with the whole-
sale hardware house of Janney, Brooks & Eastman
of Minneapolis. He was clerk and subsequently for
six years had charge of the wholesale shipping de-
partment of the business. From Minneapolis he went
to Kansas and opened the State Bank of Colwich
in Sedgwick County, near Wichita, and managed that
institution successfully for about six years. He
tlien spent a year in New York, and in March, 1893,
arrived at Great Falls and since then has been
steadily engaged in the real estate, loan and insur-
ance business. He was associated with Charles M.
Webster, under the name of Webster & McNair,
and also with H. J. Skinner, under the name .McNair
& Skinner, but since 1909 has been in business under
his own name. He also has some valuable interests
in stock raising and farming. Mr. McNair was one
of the earnest war workers, particularly in the
campaign for the sale of Lib^ty Bonds. He is a
democrat in politics and served as county commis-
sioner of Cascade County from 1897 to 1901. He is
a past master of Euclid Lodge No. 58, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and was a member of
the Board of Trustees when the Masonic Temple
was erected at Great Falls. He is also a mem-
ber of Chapter No. 9, Royal Arch Masons, Black
EJagle Commandery No. 8, Knights Templar, and a
tliirty-second degree member of the Scottish Rite.
August 12, 1896. Mr. McNair married Miss Marion
Grace Sprague, who was born at Spragueville, New
York, a town named for her grandfather. She is a
daughter of Chester and Laura (McGill) Sprague,
also natives of New York State. Mr. and Mrs. Mc-
Nair have three children. Chester Sprague, the old-
est, enlisted at the age of nineteen with the Engineer
Corps, was transferred to the aviation branch at
Mineola, Long Island, went overseas to England in
September, 1918, and after the armistice was re-
turned home and granted an honorable discharge.
After another year at college he is now associated
with his father in business. Sarah Pierrepont, the
second of the family, is a graduate of the Great
Falls High School and during her senior year was
editor in chief 01 the high school paper. The Round-
up. She is now in college and intends to graduate
at Stanford University. Benedict P., Jr., is a stu-
dent at Massee Country School, Bronxville, New
York.
Charles Stephen Henderson has been a resident
of Montana nearly thirtj--five years, grew up in this
state, and has long been prominent in business and
civic affairs at Butte.
He was born at Hastings, Nebraska, October 19,
1874, son of George and Helena (Adamstone) Hen-
derson. His father was a civil and mining engineer
and' was employed by some of the great mining and
industrial corporations in the West. The family
located at Butte in 1886, where Charles S. Hender-
son completed his education. He began his busi-
ness career as salesman in a local mercantile branch,
remaining there fifteen years.
■ Mr. Henderson came into political prominence
when he was elected sheriff of Silver Bow County
in 1906, serving for two years. In 1914 he was
again elected to that office, and handled every duty
with energy and promptness characteristic of him.
■ Mr. Henderson was appointed United States mar-
shal for Montana by President Taft in March,
1910.
He served two terms as a member of the Butte
School Board, and during the period of the World
war he devoted practically all his time to various
patriotic causes, serving as chief of staff under B. E.
Calkin on the Thrift Stamp Committee and in be-
half of bond sales.
Mr. Henderson is a member of the Silver Bow
Club, the Rotary Club, a life member of the Elks,
and is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason
and Shriner.
April 19, 1895, he married May Barnard, of Butte.
They have one daughter, Rita Barnard.
Edgar Gifford. Among the able and influential
members of the Montana bar no attorney holds a
more honored position than Edgar Gifford, of Bil-
lings, who by reason of his scholarly attainments,
comprehensive knowledge of law, and his legal abil-
ity has won distinguished success in his chosen pro-
fession. The descendant of one of the earlier fami-
lies of New England, he was born May 24, 1869, at
North Dorset, Vermont, which was likewise the
birthplace of his father, the late Jerome Gifford. He
comes of Scotch ancestry, the founder of the branch
of the Gifford family to which he belongs having
immigrated from Scotland to America in 1632, set-
tling in Salem, Massachusetts. His great-grandfath-
er on the paternal side served in the Revolutionary
war, holding a captain's commission.
Ezra Gifford, grandfather of Edgar, spent his
entire life in North Dorset, Vermont, being en-
gaged in the independent calling of a farmer. He
was a veteran of the War of 1812. His wife, whose
maiden name was Sarah Tabor, was born in Ben-
nington County, X'ermont, and died in North Dor-
set. She, too, belonged to a colonial family of note,
one of her distinguished cousins having been the late
Senator Tabor of Colorado.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Born in 1821, Jerome Gifford succeeded to the
ancestral occupation, and during his earlier life car-
ried on general farming in his home town, North
Dorset, Vermont. He subsequently moved with
his family to Michigan, and having bought land
near Port Huron there continued his agricultural
labors until his death in 191 1. From the formation
of the republican party he was one of its most ar-
dent supporters. A man of strong religious ten-
dencies, he was for seventy-one j'ears an active
member of the Presbyterian Church. He married
Amanda Powers, who was born at Woodstock, Ver-
mont, in 1823, and died in Michigan, near Port
Huron, in 1913. They were the parents of the fol-
lowing children : Henry D., who died near Port
Huron, Michigan, in 1870, was then studying for
the ministry ; Lucy, who died at Edmonton, Alberta,
Canada, in the summer of 1917. was the widow of
Henry Mellick, who died on his home farm a short
time after their marriage ; Rev. Myron W., a Metho-
dist Episcopal minister, resides near Lansing, Michi-
gan ; Albert, engaged in the insurance business at
Forestville, Michigan; and Edgar.
A studious lad, fond of his books, Edgar Gifford
attended first the rural schools of St. Clair County,
Michigan, and in 1889 entered the Northwestern
University at Evanston, Illinois, and in 1893 was
there graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Arts.
He has never relinquished his interest in his alma
mater, retaining his membership in the Beta Theta
Pi fraternity, and in the Greek Letter Social Fra-
ternity, B. O. T. Entering the field of journal-
ism, Mr. Gifford was for two years editor of the
Valley City Times Record at Valley City, North
Dakota, in the meanwhile devoting all of his leisure
to the study of law. Going to Minneapolis, Min-
nesota, in 1896, he was receiver for the Republic
Mining and Lumber Company of Seattle, Washing-
ton, until 1912, assisting while there in the reor-
ganization of the concern. The ensuing four years
he taught law in the Minneapolis College of Law,
proving himself a most competent teacher. Com-
ing to Montana in 1916, Mr. Gifford was engaged
in the practice of his profession at Columbus until
April, 1918, when he located at Billings, with offices
at 215-16-17-18 Securities Building. Devoted to the
best interests of his many clients, he has built a
large general civil and criminal practice, which is
constantly increasing in extent and importance, and
he is now one of the leading attorneys of Southeast-
ern Montana.
A democrat in politics, Mr. Gifford has but little
time to devote to public affairs, his legal business
demanding his entire time and attention. One of
the most faithful and trusted members of the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church, he has filled practically all
of the lay offices, having been a trustee and a steward
in Minneapolis, and having served as supermtendent
of the Sunday school. Fraternally he is a member
of Valparaiso Lodge, Ancient Free and .-Xccepted
Masons, at Valparaiso, Indiana ; of Fargo, North
Dakota, Consistory, being a thirty-second degree
Mason; and of the Knights and Ladies of Security.
He is also an ex-member of the Independent Order
of Odd Fellows. He likewise belongs to the Yel-
lowstone County Bar Association, being an active
member. He resides at the Martha Hotel in Bill-
ings.
Mr. Gifford married, in 1894, at Detroit, Michigan,
Miss Emma Wright, a daughter of Thomas and
Anna Wright, neither of whom are now living. Mrs.
Gifford passed to the higher life in 1909, her death
occurring in Detroit. Mr. Gifford has one child,
Marie, who was educated at Alma College, St.
Thomas, Ontario, Canada, and is now teaching in
Detroit, Michigan.
Robert B. Kelly, safety engineer for the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company, is one of the valued
rnen of the corporation, whose experience and fore-
sight are recognized. He was born in Grundy Coun-
ty, Illinois, March 28. 1863. a son of Timothy Kelly,
and grandson of Robert Kelly, born in County Mayo,
Ireland, who died in LaSalle County, Illinois, about
1836. A substantial business man in Ireland, he was
there well known as a tavern keeper, but after he
came to the United States in 1853 he engaged in
farming. His wife bore the maiden name of Ed-
wards, and she, too, was a native of County Mayo,
Ireland.
Timothy Kelly was born in County Mayo, Ire-
land, in 1822, and he died on his home farm in Nor-
man Township, Grundy County, in 1901. He was a
young man when he came to Canada, joining his
mother's brother at Montreal, and there he com-
pleted his education by taking an engineering and
mathematical course. Later he came to the United
States, and for a time was in the employ of the
City of Detroit, Michigan, in an engineering capac-
ity, but subsequently went to Chicago, and was
employed on the construction work of the Illinois
& Michigan Canal, in the engineering department.
Moving to Ottawa, LaSalle County, Illinois, he
formed a partnership with Frank Edwards, and they
carried on a large contracting business until Mr.
Kelly left for New Orleans, Louisiana. The out-
break of the Civil war prevented his making any
permanent connections there, and he returned to Ot-
tawa, and continued his operations with Mr. Ed-
wards until he bought a farm in Norman Town-
ship, Grundy County, which comprised 160 acres
of land, to which he later added eighty acres, mov-
ing on this farm and making it his home the re-
mainder of his life. It is still owned by his heirs.
A democrat, he served as township supervisor of
Norman Township for a number of years, and also
as road commissioner, being largely responsible for
the construction of the bridges in Grundy County.
A man of superior education and sound practical
ideas, Mr. Kelly made many improvements, and
was the first man in Grundy County to lay tiles to
drain his farm, thus redeeming many acres of low
land, and becoming one of the most successful agri-
culturalists of his region. All his, life he was a
devout member of the Roman Catholic Church.
Timothy Kelly was married to Margaret Killale,
born in County Galway, Ireland, in 1837. She sur-
vives him and makes her home at Seneca. Illinois.
Mr. and Mrs. Kelly had the following children:
John, who died when eighteen years of age ; Robert
B., whose name heads this review; Edward, who
resides at Seneca, Illinois, is employed in the main-
tenance department of the Illinois & Michigan Canal;
Mary,_ who died at the age of 214 years ; Timothy,
who is an attorney, real estate dealer and post-
master at Seneca, Illinois ; Margaret, who is un-
married, lives with her mother; and J. W., who is
an attorney, lives at Denver, Colorado.
Until he was twenty-one years old Robert B.
Kelly lived on his father's farm and attended the
rural schools. He then left home and going to
Chicago' secured employment in the motor power
department of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific
Railroad, and when that company extended their
line west of the Missouri River Mr. Kelly went to
Horton, Kansas, and remained in the motor power
and mechanical department of this road until the
spring of 1889. In that year he came to Montana
and was in the same department for the Northern
Pacific Railroad at Livingston until 1894. He then
left railroad work and for a year conducted a gro-
cery at Livingston, when he entered the employ
of the Livingston Lighting & Power Company, con-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
541
tinuiiig with it until 1901. That year saw Mr. Kelly's
advent at Anaconda, and the beginning of his con-
nection with the Anaconda Copper Mining Com-
pany when he started in the mechanical and electri-
cal department, rising by 1905 to the position of
master mechanic. In 1913 Mr. Kelly was pro-
moted to be safety engineer, which position he still
holds, with offices in the machine shop building
of the Washoe Reduction Works, two miles east
of Anaconda. Mr. Kelly is firm in his adherence
to the principles of the democratic party, and was
chairman of the board of county commissioners for
four years while residing at Livingston, and was
candidate for state senator on his party ticket of
Park County in 1900. The Roman Catholic Church
holds his membership. Mr. Kelly belongs to Ana-
conda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent and Protective Or-
der of Elks, and Anaconda Camp No. 6039, Mod-
ern Woodmen of America. The Kelly family resi-
dence is at No. 1892 Elm Street, Anaconda.
In 1892 Mr. Kelly was married to Miss Margaret
Ralph, a daughter of Thomas and Ella (Thompson)
Ralph, both of whom are now deceased. Mr. Ralph
came to Gallatin County, Montana, in 1875, and was
one of the pioneer farmers of that region. Mr.
and Mrs. Kelley became the parents of the follow-
ing children : Robert T., who lives at home, is a civil
engineer in the employ of the .'Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, was graduated from the Univer-
sity of Montana at Bozeman, with the degree of
Civil Engineer; Jean D., who is also at home, was
graduated from the agricultural department of the
University of Montana at Bozeman, and is now
in the employ of the Goodyear Rubber Company at
Butte, Montana. He enlisted in May, 1917, for the
great war, was sent to Presidio, California, and after
taking the course was commissioned a second
lieutenant, assigned to Camp Lewis, Washington.
After receiving his commission as first lieutenant he
was detailed to Camp Perry, Ohio, where he was
qualified as a sharpshooter, and was returned to
Camp Lewis, where he was detailed as fire control
officer. Still later he was 'commissioned captain,
and just prior to the signing of the armistice he was
detailed for Siberian service, and was twenty hours
out at sea when the expedition was recalled, and he
was mustered out of the service ifi February, 1919.
Mr. Kelly is a man who holds the confidence and
respect of all with whom he is associated. He has
always had the good of the community at heart, and
is generous in his donations of time and money for
the betterment of civic conditions, possessing in
marked degree those qualities always conspicuous
in the best citizenship.
John Milton Murphey, who came to Butte from
Spokane, Washington, where he was in the insur-
ance and real estate business, has been an active
associate since 1898 with Gen. Charles S. Warren in
mining enterprises.
Mr. Murphey, who was born at Des Moines, Iowa,
March 19, 1869, represents some lines of the old
Colonial Quaker ancestry of the Carolinas and East-
ern Indiana. His grandfather, Robert T. Murphey,
was born at Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1789.
At an early date he moved to Eastern Indiana, and
married there Sarah Burgess, who was born at Rich-
mond, Indiana, in 1795. Miles Milton Murphey,
father of the Butte business man, was born at Mil-
ton. Indiana. October 10, 1829, was reared and mar-
ried in that community and then removed to Mid-
dletown. Indiana, where he took up a business that
attracted the attention and enterprise of many in-
dividuals at the time, pork packing. In 1868 he
removed to Des Moines, Iowa, and continued in the
same line of business for six years. In 1885 he moved
his home to Auburn, California, where he entered
the real estate business and in 191 1 retired to Eugene,
Oregon, where he died in 1914. In politics he was in-
dependent. Miles Milton Murphey married Mary Vir-
ginia Yount, who was born at Middletown, Indiana,
February 17, 1837, and died at Omaha, Nebraska.
Her parents were Joseph E. and Sophia Yount, both
natives of Virginia.
John Milton Murphey acquired his early education
in the public schools of Des Moines, also attended
Drake University in that city, and was about sixteen
years of age when his parents moved to California.
In 1889, at the age of twenty, he engaged in the
fire insurance and real estate mortgage loans busi-
ness as a member of the firm of Alonzo M. Murphey
& Company at Spokane, and remained there untd
1898, when he came to Butte. Mr. Murphey is sec-
retary and director of the Revenue Consolidated
Gold Mines, and in the past twenty years has been
identified with other concerns of the group headed
by General Warren.
Mr. Murphey in 1889 served as a member of
Company C of the Second Regiment National Guard
of Washington. He is a republican, is a member
of Lodge No. 228 of the Elks at Spokane, and in re-
ligion is a Protestant Episcopal. January 19, 1898,
in All Saints Cathedral at Spokane, he married
Mary Alice Warren, daughter of Gen. and Mrs.
Charles S. Warren of Butte. They have one daugh-
ter, Katherine Warren Murphey, now a student in
the University of Montana.
Rev. Michael T. O'Brien. There is no earthly
station higher than the ministry of the Gospel ; no
life can be more uplifting and grander than that
which is devoted to the amelioration of the human
race, a life of sacrifice for the betterment of the
brotherhood of man, one that is willing to cast aside
all earthly crowns and laurels of fame in order to
follow in the footsteps of the lowly Nazarene. It
is not possible to measure adequately the height,
depth and breadth of such a life, for its influences
continue to permeate the lives of others through
succeeding generations. One of the self-sacrificing,
ardent and loyal spirits who has been a blessing to
the race is Rev. Michael T. O'Brien, chancellor of
the diocese of Great Falls, and a man who holds
the unequivocal confidence and esteem of the people
among whom he has labored.
Michael T. O'Brten was born in Barre, Massachu-
setts, on April i, 1862, and is the son of Patrick and
Johanna (Callahan) O'Brien, both of whom were
natives of Ireland. Patrick O'Brien was born on
March 17, 1823, and in young manhood left his
native land and went to Canada, where for some
time he followed agricultural pursuits. Later he
went to Barre, Massachusetts, where he located on
a farm and where he spent the remainder of his
days. Politically he was a democrat. His wife, who
was born in 1822, died in 1890. They were married
in Canada and became the parents of five children,
of whom two are living.
Michael T. O'Brien attended the public and
parochial schools, and then was a student in St.
Hyacinth's College in the province of Quebec, Can-
ada ; was a student in Holy Cross College. Worces-
ter, Massachusetts, where he was graduated on June
25, 1885, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts ; then he
attended St. John's Ecclesiastical Seminary at Bos-
ton, Massachusetts. He was ordained to the priest-
hood in Holy Cross Cathedral, Boston, on June 22,
1889, by Most Rev. John J. Williams, Archbishop of
Boston. He was at once assigned to St. John's
Church at Worcester, Massachusetts, where he re-
mained for fourteen years. He was then placed in
charge of St. Mary's Church at Orange, Massachu-
542
HISTORY OF MONTANA
setts, being the first priest to be stationed at this
church. From there he was sent to Sioux City, Iowa,
where for three years he was in charge of the
cathedral. In October, 1910, he came to the Mussel-
shell Valley, Montana, with a colony of his people
and established what came to be known as the
O'Brien Colony, and which became the nucleus for
as fine a community of souls as settled anywhere in
Montana. There he built a church and hall, subse-
quently built a church at Ryegate. and in 1913 he also
built a church at Columbus. In 1916 he built two
more churches, one at Reed Point and one at Ab-
sarokee. The parish was divided in 1917 and Father
O'Brien was placed in charge of the churches at
Columbus, Big Timber. Reed Point and Absarokee.
He promptly took hold of this work and had just
finished the building of a parish house at Columbus
when Bishop Lenihan called him to Great Falls and
placed him in charge of the cathedral. He was made
chancellor of the diocese and also has direct charge
of the school, with about two hundred and eighty
students. He brought to the 'work here the ripe ex-
perience of years and an enthusiasm which was bound
to overleap all obstacles, so that the efforts and
labors of Father O'Brien at Great Falls have borne
abundant fruit. A ripe scholar, forceful and elo-
quent in utterance, systematic and methodical in his
administration of the aflfairs under his charge, he
has impressed his personality on the varied interests
of the diocese, and enjoys to a remarkable degree
the love and esteem of the people among whom he
labors.
Harry W. Turner, who is president of the Mon-
tana Electric Company of Butte, made applied elec-
tricity his profession at an early stage of its de-
velopment, and was handling the interests of elec-
trical companies in the Northwest when about the
only use to which electricity was put was electric
lighting, and when great power plants and hydro-
electric development had hardly begun.
_ Harry W. Turner was born at Madison, Wiscon-
sin, September 27, 1863, son of Dr. Henry W. and
Sarah (Noland) Turner. His father, born in New
York in 1836, was a successful physician and sur-
geon and practiced in Iowa many years. In the Civil
war he was a hospital steward, regimental sur-
geon, and was mustered out with the brevet rank
of major of the Sixteenth Wisconsin Infantry. He
died in Iowa in 1876. His wife, left an orphan.
was adopted by Simeon D. North, president of Ham-
ilton College in New York, and was liberally edu-
cated. While at college in Wisconsin she married
Doctor Turner, and she spent her last years at
Butte, where she died in 1900.
Harry W. Turner went to Northern Iowa with
his parents in i86.>, and at the age of twelve had
to leave school and contribute his labor to the sup-
port of his widowed mother. He had some rugged
experiences during his youth, was driver of a stage
coach, taught school, clerked in stores, and also read
law.
In 1887, about the time the first electric street
failway lines were being built in the United States,
he entered the service of the Thomson-Houston
Electric Company at St. Paul, Minnesota, and ac-
quired a practical knowledge of the industry. In
1889 the company sent him to take charge of its
business at Portland, Oregon, and later made him
manager of its sales agency at Helena, Montana.
In 1892 Mr. Turner removed to Butte and took
charge of the plant and business that is now the
Butte Electric and Power Company. During the
successive years under his management the com-
pany's service doubled many times, and enormous
sums were expended in development and extension
of its working plant. Mr. Turner continued the
general management until 1910, and is still finan-
cially interested in the industry.
The Montana Electric Company, of which he is
president, is a wholesale concern dealing in electric
supplies and equipment and was established by Mr.
Turner in 1895. Later a similar business was estab-
lished at Spokane known as the Washington Elec-
tric Supply Company, and Mr. Turner is also presi-
dent of that corporation.
Mr. Turner has been one of the live and enter-
prising citizens of Butte for nearly thirty year,-;.
He is a member of the Montana Society of Engi-
neers, the Silver Bow Club, the Butte Country Club,
the Rocky Mountain Club of New York, is a Knight
Templar Mason and Shriner and also an Elk. Politi-
cally he is independent.
He married at St. Paul September 7, 189 1, Mary
N. LeBeau, and they have one daughter, Frances
Maried, born at Helena in 1892. She was graduated
from the Marlboro School for Girls at Los Angeles
in 1912.
Harry A. Gallwey. That Montana offers plenty
of opportunities to the brainy man is proven many
times over by the rapid advancement of those who
have selected this state as their field of operation,
and among them one worthy of special mention is
Harry A. Gallwey, general manager of the B. A. &
P. Railroad, and former senator of the State As-
sembly. He was born at Virginia City, Nevada,
August 16, 1866, a son of Dan Gallwey, who was
born at Clonakilty, County Cork, Ireland, in 1832,
and died at Virginia City. Nevada, February 5.
1885. Reaching mature years in his native land. Dan
Gallwey then left Ireland for the United States
and coming west to San Francisco, California, was
engaged for a time in acting as purser on a boat
running between that city and the Isthmus of Pan-
ama. In 1852 he went to Virginia City, Nevada,
being one of the pioneer miners of that place. In
politics he was a democrat, and in religious faith a
Roman Catholic. He married Ellen HicTtey, who
was born in Limerick. Ireland, in 1834, and died
at Virginia City, Nevada, January 31, 1885. Their
children were as follows : Harry A., whose name
heads this review ;' Margaret, who married James
Farrell, a grocer and general merchant of Butte,
Montana : William, who was an electrician in the
employ of the Hennessy Company, died at Butte,
Montana, in 1899 : and Daniel, who died in infancy.
Harry A. Gallwey attended the public schools of
Virginia City until he was sixteen years old, at
which time he began working and for two years was
a telephone operator for the Bell Telephone Com-
pany, leaving it to become bookkeeper for the West-
ern Union Telegraph Companj', rising to be manager
of the company's office at Reno, Nevada, in 1886,
and holding that position for a year, when he re-
signed and became bookkeeper for J. R. Douglas,
a stock broker of Virginia City, Nevada, with whom
he remained for six years. Mr. Gallwey then went
to Sutro, Nevada, to engage as bookkeeper for the
Sutro Tunnel Company, leaving them after eighteen
months to come to Butte, Montana, and spent a
short time during 1894 in that city, but then re-
turned to Virginia City, Nevada, and was deputy
county clerk and treasurer of Story County. In
October, 1895. he came back to Butte, Montana, and
for a year was bookkeeper for the Pat Mullen
grocery store. Once more he left Montana, and
for a year was bookkeeper for the De Lamar's, Ne-
vada, Gold Mining Company of De Lamar, Nevada.
At the expiration of that period he became book-
keeper at Butte, Montana, for the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company and was promoted to be general
HISTORY OF MONTANA
543
manager of the Parrott Silver & Copper Company
at Butte, and held that position until 191 1, when he
was made general manager of the Butte, Ana-
conda & Pacific Railroad, having worked" his way
up to this position by hard work and faithfulness to
his responsibilities. His offices are in the general
office building of the Butte, Anaconda & Pacific
Railroad on West Commercial Avenue, Anaconda.
His division extends from Butte to Anaconda, and
he has under his immediate supervision some 500
employes.
Always a strong democrat, Mr. Gallwey has been
called upon to represent his district, and in 1899
was a member of the Lower House of the State
Assembly from Silver Bow Count}% Montana, and
during his period of service was chairman of the
committee on privileges and elections, and a mem-
ber of other important committees, upholding the in-
terests of his constituents and assisting in the pass-
age of some very constructive legislation. His rec-
ord was such that he was re-elected several times,
serving in all twelve successive sessions the last
two times being a member of the Upper House.
For years he has been a member of the Democratic
State Central Committee, and was its chairman sev-
eral terms. While in the Senate he was on the
judiciary, mines and mining, and the railroad and
transportation committees, as well as others of im-
portance. For a number of terms he was chairman
of the County Central Committee of his party, and
has always been very active in party matters. The
Roman Catholic Church holds his membership. He
belongs to Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, of which he was exalted
ruler in 1910. and district deputy in 191 1. The Ana-
conda Club, the Anaconda Country Club, the Rotary
Club, the Silver Bow Club, and the Country Club,
all furnish him social relaxation. For some -time
he has been an active member of the Butte Chamber
of Commerce. Mr. Gallwey belongs to the Ameri-
can Institute of Mining Engineers. He at one time
was president of the Independent Telephone Com-
pany of Butte, having been active in securing its
organization. The Gallwev family residence is at
No. 207 North Excelsior Street, Butte, Montana.
Mr. Gallw^ey has been twice married, first in 1895,
at San Francisco, California, to Miss Georgia
Brophy, born at Virginia City, Nevada, and died
in 191 1 at Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. There were no
children. On July 12, 1913, Mr. Gallwey was mar-
•ried to Mrs. Mary (Fagin) Kennedy, born at Salt
Lake City, Utah. She is a graduate of St. Mary's
College of Salt Lake City. Mr. and Mrs. Gallwey
have no children.
Not only is Mr. Gallwey recognized as a business
man of more than ordinary capabilities, but is also
accredited with being a nower in his narty. In ad-
dition to holding the ofiices already mentioned, he
has been a delegate to six state conventions, and two
national conventions of the democratic party, and
has made his influence felt in tlie deliberations of
these bodies. He is a man who wins the affection,
the respect, the understanding and adherence of the
men with whom he comes into contact. As a party
leader he is sagacious and far-sighted, able to plan
and look ahead and so govern his actions as to bring
about constructive action, rather than that which is
destructive. As an executive he has been able to
so regulate the affairs .of his division as to eliminate
much of the friction and bring about a better un-
derstanding with his men. Utterly unafraid, he
forges ahead to accomplish what he believes is best
and right, and is always ready and anxious to render
an accounting of his actions and to back them up
with unanswerable arguments.
J-\MEs ScoFiEU) O'RouRKE. It is no doubt true
that Ireland, of all countries of the world, has sent
more immigrants in proportion to population to the
United States than any other country, and the rea-
son is well known. For hundreds of years the
Emerald Isle has been denied many valuable rights
and privileges by Great Britain, and the pride and
honor of the people were ground into the dust.
They could avoid all this only by leaving the island,
much as they loved it, and accordingly thousands of
them, as the years rolled round, have crossed the
wide Atlantic to find homes of greater freedom in
America. In every state they settled and built up
comfortable homes. They were among our first
teachers and business men, and today they occupy
many of the proudest positions within the gift of
our people.
Among the sons of Ireland who have "made good"
in Montana should be specifically mentioned James
Scofield O'Rourke, an extensive rancher and stock
raiser, residing near Wilsall. Mr. O'Kourke was
born in County Tipperary, Ireland, on January 13,
1849, the son of William and Mary (Scofield)
O'Rourke. The father was born in County Tippe-
rary in 1815 and was there reared to the life of a
farmer. In 1868 he came to the United States and
settled first in Chicago, moving shortly afterwards to
Pueblo, Colorado, where he died in 1889. He was
a democrat in politics and a member of the Catholic
Church. His wife was also born in County Tip-
perary, in 1821, and she died in Pueblo, Colorado,
in 1889. To these parents \vere born the following
children : Cornelius, who died in Pueblo at the
age of forty-five years, had been employed by vari-
ous mercantile concerns. He served six years in
the United States army, beginning at the close of
the Civil war. and took part in the campaigns against
the Apache Indians. John, who was a member of
the fire department of the City of Chicago, was
killed in the line of duty during a big fire, a water
tank falling from the top of a building and killing
him and four others. Thomas, who was a railroad
engineer in Texas, is deceased. William, of Cali-
fornia, who also followed railroad engineering, is
deceased. James is the immediate subject of this
sketch. Mary became the wife of John Donnahue,
a merchant in Chicago, and both are deceased.
Michael is a merchant in Pueblo, Colorado. Edward
is a railroad conductor and resides at Taft, Cali-
fornia. Harry is president of the LaSalle Institute,
of Kansas City, Missouri. Nellie became the wife
of Jack O'Connor, who was engaged in the mer-
cantile business at Denver, Colorado, but is now de-
ceased, and slie is now conducting the business.
Four other children died in childhood.
James Scofield O'Rourke received his education
in the public schools of County Tipperary, Ireland,
where he remained until nineteen years of age. In
1868 he came to the United States, settling at West-
chester, New York, where he remained for two
years. He then came west and engaged in rail-
roading,' working in Colorado, Texas, New Jlexico
and Arizona. In 1883 he came to Livingston, Mon-
tana, and was employed as road master by the
Northern Pacific Railroad, with which company he
remained until 1894, when he bought a ranch lo-
cated on Elk Creek, about nine miles northeast ot
Wilsall, where he now resides. He is now the
owner of 1,280 acres of fine irrigated land. In the
same year in which he bought the ranch Mr.
O'Rourke engaged in railroad construction work for
the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad and constructed
the road through to Cripple Creek. During this
period his family were living on and operating the
ranch. Then, from 1896 to 1906, Mr. O'Rourke was
Vol. n— 35
544
HISTORY OF MONTANA
with the Southern Pacific Railway in Texas as road
master, but since then he has devoted his entire
time and attention to his ranch. He has been very
successful as a raiser of blooded Shorthorn cattle
and Percheron horses, and also raises immense
quantities of hay and grain. His ranch buildmgs,
including residence, barns and outbuildings, are well
built and conveniently arranged, and the ranch is
considered one of the best in this locality.
In political matters Mr. O'Rourke gives his sup-
port to the democratic party and his religious con-
nections are with the Roman Catholic Church. Fra-
ternally he belongs to the Knights of Columbus at
El Paso, Texas.
In i88s, at Helena. Montana, Mr. O'Rourke mar-
ried Octavia Murphv, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
S. S. Murphy, both of whom are deceased. Mr.
Murphy was one of the pioneer ranchers of 1880
on Elk Creek, Montana. To Mr. and Mrs.
O'Rourke have been born the following children:
Mary is the wife of Nels Crane, of Bozeman, an
engineer on the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul
Railroad ; James is in the automobile business at
Livingston; William is employed in the Northern
Pacific railroad shops at Livingston; James, who
enlisted in the United States army, was sent over-
seas in June, 1918, and was in France for eighteen
months, being assigned to the Ninety-first Division,
Machine Gun Corps. He fought at Chateau Thierry,
the Argonne Forest and other hotly contested en-
gagements, and returned to the United States in
May, 1919, and was mustered oiit. He is now con-
nected with the automobile business in Livingston.
Stephen has been overseas with the United States
forces for two years, being first with the Eighty-
first Division, and now with the Army of Occupa-
tion. He too took part in Chateau Thierry, Argonne
Forest and other historic drives by the American
forces. Octavia died at the age of twenty-one years.
John remains at home on the ranch.
Mr. O'Rourke, though not favored by inherited
wealth or the assistance of influential friends, has,
by perseverance, industry and wise economy, at-
tained a comfortable station in life and is well and
favorably known because of his accomplishments.
He possesses a social nature and by his genial and
kindly attitude to those with whom he comes in
contact he has won the confidence and respect of
every one.
George W. Stapleton possessed abilities and char-
acter which elevated him to a rank among Mon-
tana's most eminent lawyers and statesmen. He
was a man of action as well as a lawyer, law giver
and law maker, and in some respects it is doubtful
if any of his contemporaries exercised such a pro-
found influence over the life and affairs of the state
from the earliest territorial period until statehood
as did George W. Stapleton.
A pioneer in Montana, he came of pioneer an-
cestors. It was the pioneer spirit that had caused his
family by successive stages to leave the Atlantic
Coast in South Carolina and move across the moun-
tains to the Kentucky frontier, where were born
Judge Stapleton's parents, Cyrus S. and Margaret
(Scott) Stapleton. His father was a skilled physi-
cian and lived with his family and practiced his pro-
fession in Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa. G.
W. Stapleton was born in Rush County, Indiana,
November 28, 1834, and first attended school in
Iowa. He finished his literary training in an Acad-
emy at Fort Madison, Iowa, and in 1852 began the
study of law at Lancaster, Iowa. He was admitted
to the Iowa bar in November, 1855, about the time
he reached his majority. After practicing in that
state four years he joined the rush of settlers to
Colorado, and for several years practiced among the
gold miners of that territory.
Judge Stapleton arrived in what afterward be-
came Montana territory, in 1862. As there was no
territorial organization and no established courts,
there were also no professional engagements for a
lawyer. However, he was equally at home among
the prospectors and shared in the rough work and
adventure of the early miners. He made one of the
pioneer gold discoveries at Grasshopper Creek and
founded a town there which he named in honor of
the Indian tribe of the country, Bannack. About a
mile below the camp he purchased a claim and witli
a crude, hand-made wooden rocker he took out gold
at the rate of from $200 to $500 per day. .\t that
he was only moderately successful, since provisions
and supplies could then only be purchased in Mon-
tana mining camps at figures that would make
modern high cost of living seem tame.
In 1863 Judge Stapleton was prominent among the
parties that stampeded to the Alder Gulch discovery.
While on the way he drew up a code of laws for
the government of the new camp, and as his party
was the first in considerable numbers to reach Alder
Gulch his "charter" of laws was immediately enacted,
and this was the first community in Montana that
might be said to have come under a regular system
of law and order. Here again Judge Stapleton ac-
quired some profitable claims, but in 1865 moved to
Last Chance Gulch at Helena and then resumed his
law practice. A few months later he resumed min-
ing at Ophir Gulch and later practiced law and
did quartz mining at Argenta in Beaverhead County
until 1879.
Judge Stapleton was a resident of Butte from
1879 until his death thirty years later. In that city
he devoted his time and energies to the law, and
earned that eminent reputation which will always
be associated with his name in the history of the
Montana bar. He also developed some extensive
mining interests, and having acquired a comfortable-
fortune he retired from active business several years
before his death, after that appearing only occa-
sionally in court either in his own behalf or for some
old time friend, .^fter locating at Butte he was as-
sociated with Judge Spratt as a partner until the
death of the latter in 1881. and then as member of
the firm Robinson & Stapleton until the death of
Mr. Robinson in 1898. During his last years his
partner was his son Guy W., who is one of the
prominent lawyers of Butte today.
Judge Stapleton died April 25, 1910. His last
words comprise a terse epitaph that many men would
delight to deserve: "I have lived long; I have had
a good time; I am not scared to die; the game's
over." He had in fact lived to see the fruit of his
labors and the prosperity and happiness of the people
he so faithfully served, and the established success
of public institutions to whose creation and develop-
ment he so essentially contributed.
The story of his life is essentially bound up in
the history of Montana territory and' state. But as
some further comment on his career the following
well deserved tributes should be quoted : "Judge
Stapleton was really one of the first attorneys of
the state to devote his attention to mining law,
which was destined to become such an important
feature of the practice in Montana. The experience
he gained in mining and frorp close touch with all
the varied phases of early Montana life proved of
very great assistance to him in his professional
career, and was also of invaluable assistance to the_
territory and state through the practical knowl-
edge he was able to bring to bear in the framing of
mining and other laws of the new country. Few,
if any. of Montana's pioneers were any more service-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
545
able and valuable, and it is douljtful if any man
played a more influential "art in shaping the laws
and early history of the territory. He was elected to
the territorial legislature four times — as often as he
would serve— and during his tenure was first speaker
of the House and then president of the Senate.
He was also a member of the judiciary committee
of each House. When it was found necessary to
codify the laws of the territory, all eyes turned to
him as a capable man to head the commission for
the purpose, owing to his wide practical knowledge
and great ability. As such he was the leading force
in giving clearness and consistency to the bodies of
the statutes and proper trend to tlie course of sub-
sequent legislation.
"He also served conspicuously in the convention
of 1889 that formulated the constitution on which
Montana was admitted into the Union as a state.
He was always identified with the democratic party,
and had practically the refusal of every office within
the gift of the people, governor, attorney-general,
supreme court justice, member of Congress, and all
the rest, absolutely declining them all.
"As a citizen he was not only one of Montana's
oldest, at the time of his death, but one of her
worthiest and most valued ones. Throughout his
life he was thoroughly independent in thought and
action ; he hated sham and had a very great aversion
for pretense and hypocrisy, as well as being a
bitter foe of fraud, a firm advocate of political honor
and an earnest and indefatigable striver after of-
ficial honesty and square dealing. One of his
strongest characteristics was his rugged honesty.
His reading was wide in its scope, he was broad-
minded in his views, independent in thought and
fearless in execution."
In 1870 Judge Stapleton married Miss Cora E.
Mcintosh, a native of Missouri. Their only son is
Guy W. Stapleton, who has always regarded the
example and character of his father as the chief
source of his inspiration. He was educated at
Deer Lodge, Montana, and graduated from the law
school of the University of Virginia in 1895. For
a quarter of a century he has been a lawyer at
Butte, and, as noted above, was associated with his
father for nearly fifteen years. He has been county
attorney of Silverbow County, and a member of the
Montana Legislature.
Roy E. McKnight. In touching upon the life
history of Roy E. McKnight, the well known auto-
mobile salesman of Great Falls, the writer aims to
avoid fulsome encomium and extravagant praise ;
yet he desires to hold up for consideration those
facts which have shown the distinction of a true,
useful and honorable life. Having by sheer force
of character and persistency won his way to a place
of influence among the business men of this com-
munity, Mr. McKnight is entitled to special mention
in a volume of the nature of the one in hand.
Roy E. McKnight w-as born in Mapleton, North
Dakota, on November 3, 1884, and is the youngest of
the six children born to his parents, Eugene Victor
and Elizabeth (Trombley) McKnight. The father
was born in Rochester, New York, in 1840, and at
the age of fifteen years he came West as far as
Battle Creek, Michigan, where he began to earn his
own living, his first employment being in a stove
works, which he soon relinquished for a job as team-
ster. Later he removed to St. Paul, Minnesota, and
engaged in farming in Ramsey County until 1874,
■when he located near Mapleton, North Dakota, and
took up homestead and tree claims. He gave his
attention to wheat raising there until 1892, when he
went to Sheldon, and secured 1,280 acres of land,
which he devoted to the raising of wheat until 1904,
when he sold his land and improvements and re-
moved to Los Angeles, California. There he npw
resides. Politically he is an ardent supporter of the
republican party and while a resident of Ransom
County served as a county commissioner. He is also
a member of the Masonic fraternity. His wife was
born in Ramsey County, Minnesota, and died in 1911,
at the age of fifty-six years.
Roy £. McKnight was reared under the parental
roof and secured his education in the public schools
of North Dakota, in the Fargo (North Dakota)
Agricultural College, and at the Los Angeles (Cali-
fornia) Business College. At Fargo, North Dakota,
when but eighteen years of age, Mr. McKnight took
over the management of his father's farm for a
period of about four years. He then located at
Russell, North Dakota, where he became identified
with the banking business, being one of the prin-
cipal organizers of the Firs' State Bank of Russell,
of which he became the first assistant cashier, and
later its cashier. His brother, John F. McKnight,
who had co-operated with him in the organization
of the bank, was made president. They remained
identified with the banking business up to 1909, when
they engaged in the real estate business at Minot,
North Dakota, under the firm name of the McKnight
Land Company. They continued in this business up
to 1912, when he resumed the active management
of his land interests in North Dakota and was occu-
pied in wheat raising up to 1916, when he came to
Great Falls and engaged in the automobile business,
organizing the Overland-Great Falls Company, of
which he is president. They are distributors of the
Overland and Willys-Knight automobiles and Inter-
national motor trucks, and, though they have been
handling these macliines here for only about four
years, they have already made a very flattering rec-
ord in the matter of sales. Mr. McKnight thor-
oughly understands the automobile business and
having two cars in which he has abundant faith he
has no trouble in convincing prospective buyers of
their merits. Yet he is conservative and careful,
not overstepping the bounds of good business ethics
in his relations with his customers. The result is a
satisfied clientele and a rapidly increasing business.
On December 27, 1917, Mr. McKnight was married
to Charlotte Woodburn, who was born in Terre
Haute. Indiana.
Politically Mr. McKnight gives his support to the
republican party. Fraternally he is a member of
Great Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks. Mr. McKnight has pursued
the even tenor of his way in a quiet and unosten-
tatious manner and it is not a matter of wonder that
the elements of a solid and practical nature which
unite in his composition should win for him a con-
spicuous place in the business circles of the com-
munity.
A. vox D-\CHENHAUSEN. president and general
manager of the Electrical Equipment Company of
Butte, has had many years of training and ex-
perience in the management of public utility cor-
porations, and first came to Montana twelve or
thirteen years ago as one of the ofiicials of the
Montana Power Company.
Mr. von Dachenhausen was born in Washington,
District of Columbia, September 20, 1872. His
father, Adolphus Henry Carl von Dachenhausen,
made a distinguished record as an officer in the
American regular army, serving all throuijh the Civil
war and remained in the regular army until his
death, at Washington, District of Columbia, in 1874.
He was born in Hanover, Germany. His father held
the rank of a colonel in the Prussian army, and was
with the Prussian troops under the Duke of Wei-
546
HISTORY OF MONTANA
lington at the battle of Waterloo and for specially
meritorious action in that historic engagement, re-
ceived a medal of honor. Adolphus Henry Carl
von Dachenhausen was reared and educated in Han-
over, and during his youth was an officer in the
Imperial Guard. He came to the United States in
1861, and as a result of his military training, readily
acquired a commission in the Union army and
served as captain and adjutant in tlie One Hundred
and Sixty-ninth New York Cavalry, He was in
the battle of Gettysburg and in many other cam-
paigns, and his early death was directly due to the
hardships sustained during the war. Captain von
Dachenhausen married in 1864, when the war was
still in progress, Margaret Elizabeth Hunter, a
southern girl, born at Fairfax Courthouse, Virginia,
in 1849. She died at Washington, District of Colum-
bia, May 24, 1912. Of her three children the Butte
business man is the youngest. Frederick William,
the oldest, is connected with the United States Geo-
logical Survey and lives at Washington, District of
Columbia; George Adolphus is also a resident of
Washington and is in the automobile business.
A. von Dachenhausen was educated in the public
schools of Washington, District of Columbia, grad-
uating from high school there, graduated in 1890
from the State School of Virginia at Blacksburg,
and for three years studied law at Georgetown Uni-
versity, District of Columbia. He was diverted from
his early ambition for the law and in 1893 entered
the service of the Washington Gas Light Company.
He remained with that corporation seven years and
familiarized himself with all details of business
management and much of the technical work. From
1900 to 1906 he was manager of the gas department
of the Public Service Corporation of New Jersey,
with headquarters at Camden.
Mr. von Dachenhausen came to Montana in 1907
and for ten years was commercial manager of the
Montana Power Company and the Great Falls Power
Company. He has been a resident of Butte since
March, 1907. He resigned from these corporations
January I, 1917, and in the following July organized
the Electrical Equipment Company of Butte, of
which he is president and general manager. W. A.
Willoughby is vice president and R. E. O'Reilly
secretary and treasurer. The company's offices are
at 28 East Broadway. The firm handles electrical
supplies of all kinds, gs per cent of the business
being wholesale, and its trade relations cover the
states of Montana, Wyoming and Idaho.
During the late war Mr. von Dachenhausen was
chairman of the Silver Bow County Fuel committee,
and rendered every patriotic service within his
power. He is an independent democrat in politics,
a member of the Episcopal Cluirch. and the Silver
Bow Club and Country Club. His home is at 1256
West Aluminum Street. Deccnilier 5, niii, at Butte,
he married Edith Olive Hall, a graduate of the
Montana State University of Missoula. Her mother
is Mrs. M. H. Hall of Butte. They have one child,
Alexander, Jr., born April 21, 1915.
Arthur Murchie Riddell is treasurer and gen-
eral manager of the Riddell Paint and Art Company
of Butte. This is a business which has enjoyed a
successful growth of a quarter of a century. The
Riddell family were pioneers in Montana, and .'\rthur
Murchie Riddell was' born at Missoula October 9,
He is of Scotch ancestry, his grandfather having
come from Scotland and established the family in
the Province of Ontario, Canada. Joseph Alexander
Riddell, father of Arthur M., was born at Bolton,
Ontario, in 185,^, was reared and educated at Toronto,
was married at Grafton, North Dakota, and at an
early day came to Missoula, Montana, where he en-
gaged in business as a genera! contractor and mason.
He probably owned the first brick yard in Missoula.
As a contractor his business was widely extended.
He did a great deal of public work for the state,
including the erection of the buildings of the School
of Mines at Butte, the State Normal School at Dil-
lon, the State Agricultural College at Bozeman, the
Deaf and Dumb Asylum at Boulder. He also estab-
lished the business in which his son is now an active
official at Butte. Joseph A. Riddell is now living
retired at Long Beach, California. He is a demo-
crat, a Presbyterian, and a member of Butte Lodge
No. 240 of the Elks.
He married Catherine Murchie, who was born in
Ontario in 1866. Arthur M. is the oldest of three
children. The second, Marion, died at the age of
seven years. Robert, the youngest, is a student in
the Harvard Military School at Los Angeles.
Arthur M. Riddell was educated in the public
schools of Missoula, graduated from the Butte
Business College in 1908, and his active business as-
sociations from that time have been chiefly with
the Riddell Paint & Art Company. His father in
1895 founded the Butte Paint and Wall Paper Com-
pany. The Riddell Paint & Art Company is the
direct outgrowth of that business. It is the leading
store of its kind in Silverbow County, and is lo-
cated at 131 West Park Street. The company is in-
corporated, Catherine Riddell being president, P. C.
Dietler, vice president and secretary, and A. M.
Riddell, treasurer and general manager. Mr. Rid-
dell entered the business as assistant manager and
has been general manager since igi6.
He is also secretary and treasurer of the Empire
Amusement Company of Butte. Mr. Riddell, who
is unmarried, is a democrat, a member of the Ro-
tary Club, and is affiliated with Silverbow Lodge
No. 48, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Deer
Lodge Chapter No. 3, Royal Arch Masons, Montana
Commandery No. 3, Knights Templar, and Bagdad
Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
Herman Strasburger, city treasurer of Butte,
has had many interesting associations with the life
and affairs of Montana, including the fact that he
was born in the old mining town of Virginia City
nearly fifty years ago.
Mr. Strasburger is a son of Isadore Strasburger,
who was born near Warsaw, Russia, in 1838. The
Strasburgers were long a noted family in Warsaw,
and some of them were scientists of distinction and
were associated with the management of the famous
Botanical Institute, one of the distinguishing fea-
tures of the old capital of Poland. Isadore Stras-
burger came to tlie United States in 1854. From
New York City he went to Ohio, then to Kentucky,
to Missouri, and in 1859 arrived on the site of the
present city of Denver. He was a merchant and
dealer, and his business for many years identified
him with pioneer mining communities. From Colo-
rado he returned to the East for a time, and in
May, 1863, was one of the early arrivals at Ban-
nock, while on the 6th of June of the same year
he located at Virginia City, and in that crude and
rough mining center opened a stock of merchandise
under a tent. He remained active as a merchant
at Virginia City for twenty years, and eventually
owned a large and flourishing establishment. In
1883 he transferred his mercantile enterprise to
Bozeman and in 1885 to Butte. In the beginning
he sold dry goods, but for the last fifteen years of
his career was a furniture dealer. He died at Butte
in 1904, and is well remembered as one of Mon-
tana's real pioneers and a distincth' useful and public
spirited citizen. He was a republican voter and in
HISTORY OF MONTANA
547
1866 he became affiliated with Virginia City Lodge
No. 2, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. Tlie
wife of Isadore Strasburger was Rachel Cohen,
who was born at New Orleans in 1850 and died at
Butte in June, 1908. They had a family of ilve
children: Nettie, a teacher of music at Duluth. Min-
nesota; Eva, wife of A. W. Lignell, a Duhith archi-
tect; Herman; Edgar J., city engineer and commis-
sioner of public works at Butte; and Rod E., a
mining man at Butte.
Herman Strasburger was born September 6, 1871,
and spent his early life at Virginia City. His edu-
cation was acquired in the schools of Virginia City,
Bozeman, Salt Lake City, San Francisco and at the
high school in Butte. He also attended Deer Lodge
College. Mr. Strasburger inherits from his an-
cestors a love of study, and has mastered many
branches of knowledge. For several years under
private tutors he specialized in bookkeeping, the
German and French languases, and mining engineer-
ing, and for eighteen months was a student of law.
Meanwhile, at the age of seventeen, he put forth
his efforts in practical business. He was first em-
ployed in a clothing store at Butte, and became man-
ager of the M. P. Sipnle Clothing Company. He
next took charge of the W. W. Wishon men's fur-
nishing establishment for one year, and for si.x
months was bookkeeper for Dave Goldberg, a rail-
road broker and commission agent. Leaving Mon-
tana he took charge of a large mercantile estab-
lishment in Park City, Utah, and wound up its af-
fairs during the next year. On returning to Butte
he was associated with his father in the furniture
business until 1899 four years of which were spent
at the bench as a cabinet maker, after which he
spent a year as bookkeeper with the Boston-Montana
Mining Company, and the following two years as
manager of the McRae Strasburger Harness Com-
pany. Mr. Strasburger has helped originate and
manage several distinctive enterprises in Butte com-
mercial district. In igoi he organized the Safety
Fuse Ignition Company, manufacturers, and had ac-
tive charge of the plant for three years. In 1904.'
for a year he had charge of the Pipestone Hot
Springs, and then under Pat Boland had the chief
responsibility of the county assessor's office. After
that he engaged in mining at Bear Gulch in Madi-
son County, and was also managing director of the
Empire Exploration Company. After an interval of
a year, during which he was recovering from an in-
jury received in a railroad accident, Mr. Stras-
burger again took charge of the Pipestone Springs,
and continued their management until the fall of
19x1. He then located on a ranch he had previously
bought nine miles north of Whitehall, on the White
Tail Creek, and employed his time buying and sell-
ing cattle until April. IQ13, when he sold his ranch
and cattle. For the sake of his wife's health Mr.
Strasburger then spent three months in Los Angeles
and three months at Prescott, Arizona. On his re-
turn to Montana he was engaged in contracting and
building at Whitehall for a year and then became
secretary of the first commercial organization of
Whitehall. From there' he returned to Butte, and
was secretary and general manager of the Monarch
Sales Company, underwriters, and also secretary
and treasurer and part owner of the Mountaineer
Welding Company. From 1916 until the fall of
1918 he was manager of the Vignoles-Rail Chair
Company. Mr. Strasburger was elected city treasurer
in the spring of 1919, but he still has many im-
portant business responsibilities.
He is secretary-treasurer of the Beaty's Sporting
Goods Company; secretary-treasurer of the Butte
Copper Links Company; secretary and managing di-
rector of the Empire Exploration Company ; is also
active in the management of the Vignoles-Rail Chair
Company; and is president of the West Butte Min-
ing Company.
Mr. Strasburger is a member of the American
Academy of Political and Social Science. He joined
the Masonic order at Whitehall and is now affiliated
with Summit Valley Lodge, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, at Butte, and is a member of the
Silver Bow Club. He resides at the Touraine Apart-
ments, 226 West Silver Street.
In 1906 he married Miss Carrie Lou Lindley,
daughter of Charles D. and Catherine (Fitzhugh)
Lindley.
G. W. Craven is an electrical engineer of twenty-
two years' experience, and for the past fifteen years
has divided his services between his duties with the
Montana Power Company of Butte and as professor
and vice president of the Montana State School of
Mines.
Mr. Craven was born at Helena, Montana, April
I, 1871, being one of the older native sons of Mon-
tana. His father was the late Rev. R. M. Craven,
a Montana pioneer of revered memory. R. M.
Craven was born at Walterboro, South Carolina,
in 1841, son of James Craven, and descended from
the Scotch Cravens who were colonial settlers in the
Carolinas. James Craven spent his life in South
Carolina as a farmer and married a native of the
State of Maine and of colonial New England stock.
R. M. Craven grew up in his native state, and
served as a Confederate soldier with the Second
Volunteer Regiment of South Carolina throughout
the war period. He also entered the ministry of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and it was as a
missionary tJiat he came to Montana, arriving in
the Prickly Pear Valley on June 28, 1868. It was
his distinction to be the first ordained minister of
that church in Montana, and he carried the message
of the Gospel and performed the services of his
office all over the territory. He was an enthusiastic
Montanan, believed in its great possibilities and
resources, and was greatly beloved by all classes
of citizens. For many years he was called upon to
preach memorial services not onl" for the Con-
federate dead but also for deceased Union soldiers.
For over fifty years he was member of the Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows and in politics a
democrat. He died at Columbia Falls in June, 1919.
His wife was Mary E. Frazier, who was born in
Ohio in 1843, and is still living in Prickly Pear
Valley and Lewis and Clark County. G. W. Craven
is the oldest of her three children. Ina E. is prin-
cipal of the Pingree School at Ogden, Utah. W. S.
Craven, a resident of Utah, connected with the State
Highway Commission, enlisted in 1917 and as cap-
tain of the Twenty-third Engineers spent eleven
months overseas. He received his honorable dis-
charge at Camp Lewis in July, 1919, with the rank
of major in the reserve corps of United States
Engineers.
G. W. Craven acquired his early education in the
schools of Bozeman, graduating from its high school
in 1892. During one year he was a student in the
Chauncey Hall Preparatory School at Boston, and
for five years was a student of the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology of Boston. He graduated
with the degree Bachelor of Science in Electrical
Engineering in June, 1808. having fiven additional
time to mechanical engineering. Returning to Mon-
tana, he joined the technical staff of the Boston-
Montana Consolidated Silver Mining Company at
Great Falls, and that corporation immediately sent
him to Salt Lake City on construction work for the
Highland Boy Company's smelter at Murray, LTtah.
In 1899 he was transferred to Butte, and continued
HISTORY OF MONTANA
with the Boston-Montana Company until 1905, hav-
ing in the meantime been promoted to chief en-
gineer of construction. He resigned to become iden-
tified in 1905 with what is now the Montana Power
Company of Butte, and in the same fall accepted
additional responsibilities as professor^ of mathe-
matics and mechanics in the Montana State School
of Mines. He still continues his work as consulting
engineer for the Montana Power Company. As
vice president of the Montana State School of Mines
he has offices in the Administration Building. Mr.
Craven is owner of a modern garage at 215 South
Main Street and has a residence \vith every im-
provement and equipment at 951 Caledonia Street.
He is a member of the Montana Society of En-
gineers, and the National Association of Stationary
Engineers, and also holds first class license from
State of Montana. Since early youth he has been a
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In
Masonry he is past master of Mount Moriah Lodge
No. 24, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, past high
priest of Deer Lodge Chapter No. 3, Royal Arch
Masons, past commander of Montana Commandery
No. 3 Knights Templar, and a member of Bagdad
Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
June 30, 1903, at Butte he married Miss Marthell
Arnold daughter of William H. and Susan (Mc-
Ginley) Arnold, the latter now deceased. Her father
is a resident of Butte, a retired merchant tailor, and
for many years incumbent of the office of justice of
the peace. Mrs. Craven is a graduate of the Butte
High School. To their marriage were born :
Dorothy, on May I, 1904, and Eleanor, on August 7,
1907.
Frank A; Crase. The local demands of a city
as large as Butte are very heavy and of sufficient
importance to engross the attention of some of the
most energetic of the business men of the state.
Each line has its own representatives, and all of
them are kept busy meeting the requirements and
solving the problems now more than ever com-
plicated, especially in the coal trade. The local
consumption of this commodity is immense, and
daily increasing with the speeding up of the various
industries located in Silver Bow County, combined
with the needs of individual consumers, and one of
the largest retail concerns in the coal business here
is the West Side Coal Company, of whom Frank A,
Crase is president and treasurer, the remainder of
the stock and offices being in the hands of his wi.fe
and daughter.
Frank A. Crase was born at Rockland, Ontonagon
County, Michigan, on July 2, 1867. a son of William
Crase. The birth of William Crase took place in
Cornwall, England, on the estate of Lord Bassett,
his father, grandfather of Frank A. Crase, being
head gardener of the Bassett estate. He was born
and spent his entire life in Cornwall, England.
William Crase came into the world in 1833, and he
left it in 1912, passing away at Calumet. Michigan.
When he was eighteen years old William Crase
came to the United States, leaving Cornwall. Eng-
land, where he had been reared and educated, ac-
companied by his bride, and they settled at Copper
Harbor, Michigan, where the youthful husband car-
ried on copper mining for a time, but later pros-
pected for copper in the iron regions of ilichi-
gan Still later he went to Rockland, Michigan, and
was there engaged in mining until 1878, when he
moved to Keweenaw County, Michigan, and until
1882 was engaged in mining at the old Central Mine.
For the next three years he was engaged in mining
in Marquette County and Ishpemina-, Michigan, but
in 1885 he returned to Keweenaw County and was
made foreman on the surface for the Copper Falls
Mining Company, which position he held for three
years. Once more he returned to the old Central
Mine, but left it in 1893, when he moved to Calumet,
Michigan, where he lived in honorable and well-
earned retirement until his death. He was one of
the pioneer miners of Michigan, and experienced
many hardships incident to the time and locality.
At one time Mr. Crase crossed Lake Gogebic with
Capt. James Dunston and his wife, the latter being
the first white woman who ever made the crossing.
They were prospecting for copper, and she accom-
panied her husband on the journey into the wilder-
ness. From the time he cast his first vote William
Crase was a republican, and he never swerved from
his adherence to the principles of that party. The
Methodist Episcopal Church held his membership,
and benefited from his efforts in its behalf. His
wife bore the maiden name of Caroline Richards,
and she was born in England in 1832. Her death
occurred at Ishpeming, Michigan, in 1882. She
and her husband had the following children born to
them: Silena, who is deceased; William T., who
is also deceased; Caroline, who married Alexander
Collins, yard foreman for the West Side Coal Com-
pany, and they reside at No. 1233 West Copper
Street, Butte; Richard H., who is deceased; James
J., who lives in Houghton County, Michigan, is a
stationary engineer; Edward Charles, who is solici-
tor for the West Side Coal Company, lives at No.
605 West Silver Street, Butte ; Frank A., whose
name heads this review; Minnie and George A.,
both of whom are deceased.
Frank A. Crase attended the public schools of
Michigan, and received the equivalent of a high
school course. He left school when fifteen years of
age, having been very quick at his lessons, and
began to be self-supporting as a caretaker of ma-
chinerv in the mines of Keweenaw County, Michi-
gan. In that connection he learned the machinist
trade and worked at the old Central Mine until
1894, but in that year left Michigan and arrived at
Butte, Montana, on August 17th, and until 1905 was
occupied working at his trade.
During the period he was working as a machinist
he was making a wide acquaintance and gaining a
knowledge of conditions with the view of going into
business for himself, so that when he founded the
firm of Gillis & Crase he was at once able to control
an excellent trade, and one which justified the in-
corporation of the business in 1907. when it became
the West Side Coal Company. The yards and of-
fices are located at No. 520 North Excelsior Avenue.
Mr. Crase is president and treasurer of the com-
pany; Edith Crase, who is Mrs. Crase, is the vice
president; while Ethel Crase, their daughter, is the
secretary. This company owns and operates one
of the largest retail coal yards in the State of
Montana. In addition to his other interests Mr.
Crase owns a comfortable modern residence at No.
521 North Excelsior Avenue. In politics he is a
republican. Having been brought up in the faith of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, he early connected
himself with it. and has remained a faithful member
ever since. He belongs to the Silver Bow Club
of Butte.
In 1894 Mr. Crase was married at Calumet. Michi-
,gan, to Miss Edith T. Robert, a daughter of John
F. and Henrietta (Brunn) Robert the former being
a direct descendant of Colonel Robert who served
in the American Revolution, and was married to a
sister of LaFayctte. John F. Robert was superin-
tendent of a mine in Michigan, but later came to
Butte. Montana, and at the time of his death in
iqog was secretary of a mining company of this
city. Mrs. Robert died on January 4. 1920.
Mr. and Mrs. Crase became the parents of the fol-
/ /^ ^ C^^-^-^^:^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
549
lowing children: Ethel, who is secretary of the
West Side Coal Company, attended the 'Montana
College at Deer Lodge, Montana; and Frederick
Robert, who is attending the Butte High School.
Mr. Crase is an excellent type of the self-reliant
man who has made his own way in life. While
he has been forging ahead, overcominnr obstacles
and laying the foundations for his present flourish-
ing business, he has not neglected other things, but
has always taken a sincere and dependable interest
in civic matters as a private citizen, and has cheer-
fully and efTectivelv given his support to those meas-
ures and movements which in his estimation would
prove beneficial to the majority.
Thomas F. O'Connor. The career of Thomas F.
O'Connor, of Great Falls, is too well known to the
readers of this work to need any formal introduc-
tion here, for he has been prominently identified
with the business life of the community for nearly
a decade. He enjoys distinct prestige here, his prac-
tical intelligence, mature judgment and sound busi-
ness sense winning for him the confidence and good
will of all with whom he has come in contact.
Thomas F. O'Connor, who successfully conducts
well-ordered undertaking parlors at 701 Central
Avenue, Great Falls, was born in Ralls County,
Missouri, on January 3, 1869, the seventh in order of
birth of the nine children born to Thomas and Mary
(Flanagan) O'Connor. Thomas O'Connor was born
in County Cork, Ireland, and his death occurred in
1904, at the age of seventy-eight years. In young
manhood he came to the United States, the trip being
made in one of the typical slow-going sailing ships of
that day. His first permanent location was in Pitts-
burgh, Pennsylvania, where he became a stone cut-
ter and contractor, which business he carried on
there for some years. Subsequently he located in
Ralls County. Missouri, where he engaged in farm-
ing and stock raising, in which he was fairly suc-
cessful. There he spent his remaining years and
died. Though he took an intelligent interest in all
public events, he never cared for public office. He
was a democrat in his political views, and in religion
he was. a communicant of the Roman Catholic Church
His wife was born in County Louth, Ireland, and
came to the United States in a sailing ship when
eighteen years of age. She located in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania, where she met and married Thomas
O'Connor. She is now living in Great Falls, at the
ripe old age of ninety-one years.
Thomas F. O'Connor spent his boyhood days on
the paternal farmstead up to 1898, when he took the
course in the Barnes Embalming School, Chicago,
where he was graduated in 1899. His first location
was at Butte, Montana, in 1900, where he was as-
sociated with E. H. Sherman in the undertaking
business for about two years. Then for about five
years Mr. O'Connor was engaged in stock raising,
following which he located in Townsend. Broadwater
County, _and there conducted a successful undertak-
ing business up to June, 191 1, when, desiring a
larger field for business, he came to Great Falls and
has since been engaged as a funeral director here.
His offices on Central Avenue are well arranged for
funeral parties when desired, and every facility is
afforded for the comfort and accommodation of
patrons. Since locating in Great Falls Mr. O'Con-
nor has received his full share of patronage. Be-
cause of .his courteous ways and sound common
sense exercised in performing the exacting duties
devolving upon him he enjoys the esteem and con-
fidence of all who have had dealings with him.
On October 22, 1892, Mr. O'Connor was married to
Catherine Leake, who was born in Ralls County,
Missouri, and they are the parents of two children.
William, the first born, who is now twenty-five years
of age, enlisted in September, 1917, in the U. S.
Army, and in July, 1918, he was sent overseas. His
first service was in France, and then stationed
at Cologne, Germany, having seen service in prac-
tically all the front lines. The other child is Mar-
garet I.
Politically Mr. O'Connor gives his support to the
democratic party, and his religious faith is that of
the Roman Catholic Church. Fraternally he is a
member of Great Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevolent
and Protective Order of Elks; the Fraternal Order
of Eagles, the Woodmen of the World, the Modern
Woodmen of America, the Loyal Or«er of Moose
and the Knights of Columbus. He is also a mem-
ber of the Montana Funeral Directors' Association.
Personally Mr. O'Connor is a man of pleasing and
attractive address and is a popular member of the
social circles in which he moves.
Rev. Charles Frederick Chapman, rector of
Saint John's Episcopal Church of Butte, is recog-
nized as one of the scholarly men of his profes-
sion and through his efficiency and genuine sin-
cerity he has not only been able to develop his parisli
and expand the scope of its influence, but also has
been instrumental in bringing about some much
needed reforms in civic affairs. He was born at
Piedmont, West Virginia, on April 17, 1872, a son
of Dr. Ephraim Chapman, grandson of Edwin Chap-
man, and great-grandson of William Chapman.
William Chapman was possessed by the same
spirit of adventure which animated Daniel Boone,
and followed the latter Indian fighter and fron-
tieersman into Kentucky from his native State of
Vermont. Still later he went into what was then a
part of the Northwest Territory, but is now the
State of Ohio, and there he acquired land and be-
came one of the pioneer farmers of Jackson County.
His son, Edwin Chapman, was born in Ohio, where
he was married and where he lived for a number
of years. The pioneer instinct of his father lived
again in him, however, and he finally left Ohio for
Missouri, acquired land and was engaged in de-
veloping it when he was stricken with typhoid fever.
His wife came down with the same disease, and both
died before the birth of Charles Frederick Chapman.
In politics Edwin Chaoman was a whig.
Dr. Ephraim Chapman was born on a farm in
•Jackson County, Ohio, in 1838, and died at Keyser.
West Virginia, on March 25, 1882. Growing up in
his native county he was engaged in teaching his
district schools for some years after reaching his
majority. .\t the death of his father he was ap-
pointed administrator of his estate and after he
had settled it he and his wife moved to Cumber-
land, Maryland, where he embarked in a mercantile
business. All his life he had been ambitious, desir-
ing to become a professional man, and while at
Cumberland found opportunity to realize his hopes
and studied medicine with Dr. J. M. McCormick.
Later he attended Jeflferson Medical College at
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Washington Medical
College of Baltimore, Marj-land, from which he was
graduated with the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
Following his graduation Doctor Chapman located
at Piedmont, West Virginia, which was a division
point of the Baltimore & Ohip^ Railroad. When this
division point was moved to Keyser, West Virginia,
the greater number of the inhabitants of Piedmont
flocked to the new place. Doctor Chapman going
with them, and there he rounded out his practice,
although death claimed him in the prime of life.
Inheriting his father's political convictions, it was
HISTORY OF MONTANA
but natural that he became a republican. Both as
a Mason and an Episcopalian Doctor Chapman lived
up to the highest ideals of manhood.
Doctor Chapman was married to Julia Russell,
born in 1839 at West Libertv, a suburb of Wheeling,
West Virginia. She survives her husband and
makes her home at Delaware, Ohio. Doctor and
Mrs. Chapman became the parents of the following
children : Elizabeth May, who lives viiith her mother ;
Charles Frederick, who was second in order of
birth; John Percy, who is a merchant of Delaware,
Ohio, lives with his mother; and Lela Pearl, who is
assistant librarian in the University at Delaware,
Ohio, also resides with her mother.
After the death of Doctor Chapman, Mrs. Chap-
man went with her four children to live in the home
of her father, John Russell, at Berlin, Pennsylvania.
For the six years the family lived there Charles
Frederick Chapman studied so as to prepare him-
self for a collegiate course, and when he was ready
for it, removal was made to Delaware, Ohio, and
he matriculated in the university there and was
graduated therefrom in June, 1895, with the degree
of Bachelor of Art. In the fall of 1895 he entered
Bexley Hall Theological Seminary of Kenyon Col-
lege at Gambier, Ohio, from which he was graduated
in June, 1898, with the degree of Bachelor of
Divinity. That same year he was ordained a deacon
of the Episcopal Church and the year following
was ordained to the priesthood. In the fall of
1898 he was in city missionary work at Cincinnati,
Ohio, and continued in that field until May I, 1902,
when he came west to Central City, Nebraska, and
took charge of Christ Episcopal Church of that citv.
In the fall of 1906 he was placed in charge of the
Church of Our Saviour at North Platte, Nebraska,
and remained there until August 24, 1913, when he
came to Butte, and since then has been rector of
Saint John's Episcopal Church.
Saint John's Episcopal Church was established on
October 20, 1875, in the store of Foster & Ray,
by Rev. M. N. Gilbert, who was afterward bishop
coadjutor of the diocese of Minnesota, and the
parish covers all of Silver Bow County. During the
administration of Reverend Chapman the splendid
parish house has been erected at a cost of $38,000.
It is used for social service work as well as for the
regular church work, and he and his people are con-
templating building an addition to the church con-
sisting of a chancel and organ loft, the latter to
accommodate the magnificent new organ generously"
donated by Senator W. A. Clark. This addition
will cost approximately $20,000, The church is lo-
cated at the corner of Idaho and Broadway streets,
and the rectory is at No. 15 North Idaho Street.
Reverend Chapman is a republican. He is a
Mason and has risen very high in his order, be-
longing to Platte Valley Lodge No. 32, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, at North Platte, Nebraska ;
Euphrates Chapter No, 15, Royal Arch Masons, at
North Platte ; Palestine Commandery No. 13,
Knights Templar, also of North Platte ; was made a
thirty-second degree Mason at Hastings Consistory
No. 3, at Hastings, Nebraska ; and he belongs to
Zabud Council No. 2, Royal and Select Masters, of
Butte. He is also a member of North Platte Lodge
No. 985, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks
and of the Butte Rotary Club. In his church honors
have Ijeen conferred upon him and at present he is
president of the standing committee of the Episcopal
Church of the Diocese of Montana and one of the
examining chaplains of the diocese.
On September 3, 1902, Reverend Chapman was
married at Cincinnati, Ohio, to Miss Carrve Garlick,
a daughter of Henry and Ida (Stow) Garlick. Mr.
Garlick was a wholesale dealer in naval stores at
Cincinnati, Ohio, where he died, but his widow sur-
vives him and now lives at Los Angeles, California.
Mrs. Chapman attended the Oxford University at
Oxford, Ohio. The children of Reverend and Mrs.
Chapman are as follows: Henry Charles, who was
born on September 3, 1903, is attending the Butte
High School; Elizabeth, who was born on July 27,
1906, is attending the Butte High School; Frederick
Garlick, who was born March 25, 1909; and Edwin
Stow, who was born in May, 1912.
Reverend Chapman is very proud of the fact that
his family on both sides dates back to the colonial
period of this country. The Chapmans were founded
here by Robert Chapman, who came from Whitby,
England, and located in Massachusetts in 1635. John
Russell, Mr. Chapman's maternal grandfather, was
born near Wilmington, Delaware, in 1807, and died
at Delaware, Ohio, in 1892. For some years he lived
at Wheeling, West Virginia, and he was also at one
time a resident of Berlin, Pennsylvania. By trade
a millwright, he developed into an inventor of some
note and among other patents he took out were
those for a separator, a machine for taking smut
from wheat, and also a rice cleaner, but was un-
fortunate with reference to it, for although it was
a valuable invention he did not receive a cent for
it. He married Mary Smith, who was born in
Western Pennsylvania. The execution of Lord Wil-
liam Russell of England drove the Russell family
out of England to the American colonies, and mem-
bers of it settled in Southeastern Pennsylvania and
Delaware, from whence they spread to different
portions of the country. Miss Elizabeth Russell, a
sister of the mother of Mr. Chapman, was a mis-
sionary under the mission board of the Methodist
Episcopal Church to Japan, where she spent forty-
five years. It was she who founded the woman's
college at Nagasaki, known as Kwassui Jo Gaekko.
This lady gained and held the respect and esteem
of all classes, and when she left Japan in the fall
of 1919, was decorated by the Japanese emperor for
distinguished service in the field of education, a
most remarkable honor.
A man of scholarly attainments. Reverend Chap-
man also possesses other characteristics which enable
him to reach the understanding of his people di-
rectly and surely, and to stimulate them to whole-
hearted endeavor. He is a nobly gifted man, sin-
cere and unselfish, patriotic and courageous and
possesses a striking personality, general ability and
a working knowledge of human nature and the mo-
tives which control men and their actions, so that
there is little wonder that he has risen to the place
in his church and community to which his talents
entitle him.
Judge Sydney Sanner, former associate justice
of the Supreme Court of Montana, now one of the
most distinguished members of the legal profession,
has long been noted for his brilliant intellectual
qualities, fine discriminating ability and a sensitive
conscience. He is now conducting a large and im-
portant law practice as a member of the firm of
Templeman & Sanner. one of the strongest com-
binations not only of Butte, but of the entire state.
Judge Sanner was born in Maryland on October
16, 1872, a son of James B. and Maria (Beetly) San-
ner, natives of Maryland and Virginia, respectively.
On both sides of the house the forebears were of
Revolutionary stock, but when the disputes between
the North and the South culminated in war, James
B, Sanner, like many of his associates in Maryland,
took the side of the South and gave expression to
his belief by enlisting in the Confederate army.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
551
The supporters of the "Lost Cause" returned home
after the close of the war broken in fortune, and
Sydney Sanner, coming into the world during the
difficult reconstruction period, was thrown upon his
own resources when still a child. Until he was
fifteen years old his education was entirely self-
directed, but at that age he reached Helena, Mon-
tana, and began to work his way through high
school. His efforts proved successful, and he was
graduated from the Helena High School in 1892.
In the meanwhile he had given all of his spare time
to the study of law and after completing his high
school course he continued his legal studies under
the preceptorship of Judge" Henry C. Smith, of
Helena, to such good purpose that he was admitted
to the bar in 1894.
For two years after his admission to the bar
Judge Sanner was engaged in a general practice at
Helena, and then went to Big Timber, Montana,
where he continued in practice for four years. He
then moved to Miles City and formed a partnership
with Judge George R. Milburn, which association
continued until it was dissolved by mutual consent.
Judge Sanner thereafter continued alone, building
up a large and valuable clientele in the eastern sec-
tion of the state. From 1903 until 1907 he served as
a member of the Custer County high school board,
and in 1908 was appointed to represent the First
Ward of Miles City in the city council. During,
that same year he was elected judge of the Seventh
Judicial District, taking his place on the bench in
1909. During his incumbency Judge Sanner dis-
played the sound judgment, the intellectual honesty
and freedom from bias so necessary in a jurist, and
his judgments were recognized as being so accurate
that when he was placed on the democratic ticket for
the high oflice of associate justice of the Supreme
Court of Montana, his fellow citizens, irrespective
of party lines, ,i,'ave him handsome support and
elected him on November 5, 1912. The nomination
came to him entirely unsolicited, and was the ex-
pression of his party's confidence in him and his
capabilities.
A Miles City journal had the following reference
to Judge Sanner's election :
"Tlie election of Judge Sanner to the Supreme
Bench will mean the loss to this community of one
of the brightest legal minds in this section of the
state. Regardless of party lines, local people will
be glad to know of the honor which has come to the
Miles City man, and thev believe that he will estab-
lish the same record for probity, fairness and efli-
ciency in the Supreme Court that he has in the
District Court since assuming his judicial office
here.
"Judge Sanner has been a conspicuous and in-
fluential force, not alone in the legal profession, but
as a leading citizen, interested in the important
public movements of the day. and it is but natural
that he should have the esteem of the people in the
communities in which he has lived, and the sincere ■
friendship of a wide circle of acquaintances."
Some conception of his . work on the Supreme
Bench may be gathered from the many opinions
written bj- Judge Sanner, and the quality of that
work may be gauged by the more notable of these
opinions "in Scott v. Waggoner, 48 Montana 541 ; '
Pittsmont Copper Company v. O'Rourke, 49 Mon-
tana 288; Colbert's Estate, 51 Montana 462; Hill
V. Rae, 52 Montana 378 ; Empire Theatre Company
V. Cloke, 53 Montana 187; State v. Weinrich et al.,
54 Montana 391 ; State v. Stewart, 54 Montana 506.
These decisions have reached the dignity of na-
tional authority.
Like millions of other Americans when this country
entered the World war, Judge Sanner tendered his
services to his Government, and in October, 1918,
he resigned his distinguished office to enter the
United States army. Hq was placed in the Judge
Advocate General's Department with the rank of
major, receiving promotion on April 23, 1919, to
the rank of lieutenant colonel, and was honorably
discharged with that rank. While in the service he
was chief of the special board of review, created
to re-examine records in court martial proceedings,
and he vyas also a member of the general board of
review charged with the duty of formally reviewing
all cases of private soldiers convicted of violations
of the Civil and Military law. Of his service in
the army his commanding officer had this to say:
"I cannot see you go without expressing to you my
deep personal appreciation of the splendid work you
have done while on duty in this office. Your pro-
found knowledge of the law, accurate judgment and
strong common sense have combined to make you an
invaluable member of the Board of Iveview of the
Military Justice Division, the work of wiiich has
been of the most arduous, difficult and important
character. I shall miss your wise counsel more than
I can say."
After being mustered out of the service Judge
Sanner returned to Montana and resumed the prac-
tice of his profession at Butte. The firm of Temple-
man & Sanner has offices in the Miner Building.
Judge Sanner was married in 1901 to Miss Kirtlye
Hill, a daughter of W. D. and Lucy A. (Russell)
Hill. Mr. Hill was a stockraiser and ranchman, but
is now deceased. IMrs. Hill survives him and lives
at Miles City, Montana. Judge and Mrs. Sanner
have one daughter, Lucy Beetly, who is attending the
Butte High School. Fraternally Judge Sanner be-
longs to Yellowstone Lodge No. 26, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, and Miles City Lodge No.
537. Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. He
is also a member of the Montana State Bar Asso-
ciation an4 of the American Legion.
Judge Sanner takes rank with the foremost orators
of the state. He is a persistent student who has
made himself a man of large learning and broad
views. His vision is always forward. Responsive
to the popular will, he has nevertheless been honest
with himself and true to his settled convictions of
duty. In every capacity his service has been loyal,
faithful and fearless.
Harold Gordon G.mnor. A young man of sterling
ability and worth, Harold Gordon Gainor, manager
of the Walkerville Market, located at 27 West
Daly Street, is distinguished not only as a native
born citizen, but from the honored ancestry from
which he is descended, being of substantial New
England stock on both the paternal and maternal
side of the house. A son of Louis T. Gainor, his
birth occurred September 17, 1894, and with the ex-
ception of the time during the AA'^orld war that he
was in the United States service has resided in
Walkerville.
Born in i860, in Maine, Louis T. Gainor received
his education in his native state, and continued a
resident of New England until after attaining his
majority. Coming to Montana in 1883, he spent a
brief time in Butte, from there coming during the
same year to Walkerville, and establishing himself
as the pioneer butcher of this suburb of Butte. He
was at first associated with the firm of Bielenburg
& Gurman, and later became junior member of the
firm of Bielenburg & Gainor. The firm being dis-
solved in 1918 he became sole proprietor of the large
business which is now being carried on at 27 West
Daly Street under the name of the Walkerville
552
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Market, the leading meat market of the city. He
has also been a member for the past thirty years
of the Butte Butchering Company, of which he is
now secretary and treasurer, its abattoirs being
situated at the south end of Montana Street. Butte,
and he is likewise secretary and treasurer of the
Metropolitan Meat Company.
Public-spirited, progressive and intensely inter-
ested in the establishment of all beneficial enter-
prises, Louis T. Gainor was a stockholder in the
Butte Independent Telephone Company, and from
igoo until 1902 held an interest in the Walkerville
Drug Company, In 1900 and 1901 he served as
mayor of Walkerville, and from 1911 until 1914, in-
clusive, was a member of the local school board.
Interested in the advancement of the prosperity of
both Walkerville and Butte, he is numbered among
the foremost business men of both cities. He is a
republican in politics, and a member of Olive Branch
Lodge No. 22, Independent Order of Odd Fellows,
of Walkerville, and of Walkerville Camp No. 6422,
Modern Woodmen of America.
Louis T. Gainor married Julia Hevey, who was
born in 1871 in Vermont, and into the household
thus established three children have made their ad-
vent, as follows: Harold Gordon, the subject of this
sketch; Hazel, wife of Elmer Duhame. a butcher
for the Walkerville Market, residing at 849 West
Broadway; and Virginia, born July 24, 1905, now a
freshman in the Butte High School, is noted for
her brilliant scholarship.
Having acquired his elementary education in tlie
Walkerville public schools, Harold G. Gainor entered
the Butte High School, where he remained a student
until completing half the course of study in the
senior year. Then, at the age of eighteen years, he
learned the butcher's trade with his father, with
whom he has since been associated, at the present
time holding a position of responsibility and trust
as manager of the Walkerville Meat Market.
On July 13, 1017. Mr. Gainor voluntarily enlisted
for service in the World war at Seattle. Washington.
and during the following five months was with the
United States Naval Reserve Corps at the University
of Washington Camp on Lake Union. He then
served for two months as fireman on the United
States Steamship Great Northern, and the ne.xt
month filled a similar position on the United States
Steamship Maine. Being then transferred to the
United State's Steamship Roanoke, he was made
second class cook for fifteen months, having charge
of the ice boxes and butcher's shop. During the time
he was on the sea Mr. Gainor sailed all around the
north coast of Scotland, and along the western coast
of Norway, going 150 or more miles north of Bergen,
near the "Land of the Midnight Sun." He was with
the fleet that laid the mine in the North Sea, in his
marine travels having experiences that are indelibly
impressed upon his mind. On May 12. 1919, he dis-
embarked at Newport News, \'irginia, and on May
28, 1919. was mustered out at Bremerton, Wash-
ington, but he is still a member of the United States
Naval Reserve force, being on inactive duty. Re-
turning to Walkerville. Mr. Gainor worked for the
Schrock-Nelson Packing Company until September
17, 1919, when he assumed the management of the
'Walkerville Market, a position he is filling with
characteristic ability.
Mr. Gainor married, in December, 1915. at Ana-
conda. Montana, Miss Charlotte Collins, daughter of
J. P. and Olive (Reese) Collins, who now reside at
1050 West Galena Street, Butte, where Mr. Collins,
now a stationary engineer, was a pioneer settler.
Ed Mathews. A broad-minded, public spirited
citizen of Walkerville, a suburb of Butte, Ed
Mathews, now serving as mayor of, the city, has
long been associated with the "higher and better in-
terests of this section of Montana, advocating and
working for those enterprises that will be of lasting
good to the people therein. He was born January
14, 1865, in Rockland, Michigan, where he was
brought up and educated.
His father. John Mathews, was born in County
Down. Ireland, in 1836, and as a boy came with his
parents to this country, locating in Rockland, Michi-
gan. Beginning work for himself as a miner, he
remained in Rockland until 1887, when he came to
Montana to pursue his chosen occupation in the
mining fields of Butte. ' Returning to Michigan in
1895, he continued his residence in Rockland until
his death in 1899. He was a trustworthy citizen, and
an adherent of the democratic party. His wife,
whose name before marriage was Winifred English,
was born in County Tipperary. Ireland, in 1838, and
died in Walkerville, Montana, in 1890. There were
eight children born into their household, as follows :
John, a miner by occupation, died in Walkerville,
Montana, December 19, 1889, aged twenty-nine years ;
Anthony, a miner and business man of Butte, died
in Butte in 1900; Patrick, also a miner, died in
Calumet, Michigan, aged fortj'-five years; Ed, tlie
special subject of this brief biographical review;
Mary, wife of Tom Mennie. a millwright in Detroit,
Michigan ; William, who owned and operated a meat
market in Butte, died in that city at the compara-
tively early age of forty years ; George, whose death
occurred at the age of thirty-three years in Butte,
served on the police force of that city for six years;
and Agnes, unmarried, lives in Chicago.
Completing his studies in his native town, Ed
Mathews, anxious to try the hazards of new for-
tunes, came to Butte, Montana, in 1884. and engaged
in mining in this vicinity until i8q6, his home being
in Walkerville from that time until the present, since
.1893 having occupied the house at lor Dunn Avenue,
where he is enjoying all the comforts of life and
very many of its luxuries. An influential member
of "the democratic party, and a highly respected and
popular citizen, Mr. Mathews was elected county
commissioner of Silver Bow County in 1896, and
served in that capacity four years. In 1901 he opened
a cafe in Butte, and after operating it successfully
for eight years transferred his business in 1909 to
Walkervilfe, locating at 3 West Daly Street, where
he has established a well patronized cafe, which he
is managing with great success.
Mr. Mathews has served as alderman from the
Walkerville Third Ward four terms, and in .A.pril,
1919, had the honor of being elected mayor of the
city for a term of two years. Possessing excellent
business foresight and ability, Mr. Mathews has ac-
quired considerable property. Fraternally he is a
member of Butte Aerie No. 11, Fraternal Order of
Eagles.
In 1893. in Walkerville, Mr. Mathews was united
in marriage with Olivia, daughter of Jerry and Mar-
garet CHolland) Murphy, who settled in Butte in
1879, in pioneer days, and there spent the remainder
of their lives, the father having been a miner. Three
children have blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs.
Mathews, namely: Frank, who died at the age of
twenty-two years, on January 24, 1919, enlisted for
service in the World war in 1917, was sent as bugler
to Camp Lewis, where he was mustered out De-
cember 12, 1918; Pearl, born January 6, 1899, com-
pleted the course of study in the Butte High School,
and after her graduation from the State Ntirmal
College in Dillon accepted the position of teacher
in the Blaine School at Butte ; and Edward, born in
1901, was graduated from the Butte Business Col-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
lege, and is now time keeper for the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company.
Victor Siegel, superintendent of the Columbia
Gardens, founded by Senator William A. Clark, is
one of the representative men of Butte, and one who
is held in the highest respect. He was born at
Dresden, Saxony, Germany, on May lo, 1867, a son
of Adolph Siegel, and grandson of Adolph Siegel,
the latter being a manufacturer of textiles upon an
extensive scale. Adolph Siegel, the younger, was
born near Dresden, Saxony, Germany, in 1834, and
he died at Dresden in 1880, having spent his entire
life in that vicinity, and there developed into a
manufacturer of lumber and pulp, and later became
a merchant. He was a Mason and Lutheran, and a
most excellent man. His wife, who bore the maiden
name of Minnie Gunther, was born at Dresden in
1841 and died there in 1877. Their children were
as follows: Clara, who is the wiodw of a Mr.
Andreas a cattle buyer and butcher, lives at Leipsig,
Germany ; Otto, who died at the age of forty-three
years at Missoula, Montana, was engaged in the
hotel business in that city, to which he had come
in 1885, being one of the pioneers of Montana;
Oscar, who is foreman of large iron works at San
Francisco, California; Victor, who was the fourth
in order of birth ; Lizzie, who married Charles Heck-
ler, a retired hotel proprietor of Missoula, Montana ;
Walter, who came to Montana in 1888, was a pioneer
butcher of Missoula where he died in 1914; and
Jennie, who married Albert Nuhshag. is a bank of-
ficial of Strassburg, France.
Victor Siegel was educated in the public and
Real schools of Dresden, receiving the equivalent of
our high school course, and learned the trade of
a florist and landscape gardener, and then in 1890
came to the United States. After a short period
spent in San Francisco, California, he came to Butte,
Montana, reaching this city on October 25, 1890.
He first worked as an engineer in the old Centen-
nial Brewery, but after a year there went with the
Old Germania Mine, where he spent two years. Mr.
Siegel then began work at his calling in the employ
of Mrs. Jessie Knox, who owned the first green-
house in the State of Montana, and remained with
her for three years. Mr. Siegel then homesteaded
160 acres of land in the vicinity of Missoula, but
later sold it, and went into the ice business in that
city'. In 1899 he became connected with the Columbia
Gardens, which were then being developed, as a
foreman of construction, and two years later was
made superintendent of them, and has since then
held this responsible position and maintains his re-
sidence in the park. He is a republican, a Lutheran
and belongs to Silver Bow Lodge No. 48, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, and the Montana Florists
Association, which he is now serving as president.
In 1896 Mr. Siegel was married to Miss Helena
Leek at Missoula, Montana, who was born near
Bremen, Germany, Mr. and Mrs. Siegel have one
son, Victor, who was born on February 20, 1910.
The Columbia Gardens are located three miles
east of Butte, at the foot of the Continental Divide,
the beauty spot of Montana, and cover eighty-five
acres. The beauty, splendid arrangement and costly
proportions of these gardens staged amidst a vast
horticultural display, make them a veritable dream of
loveliness. Something like twenty or more years ago
the site now occupied by these gardens was a patch
of wild wood and bramble, with a few tumbledown
buildings and a dance-hall. Butte needed a park,
a place of recreation for the public and Senator W.
A. Clark, recognizing this fact, looked about him
for a proper location and found it, possessing a
broad enough vision to recognize the natural possi-
bilities of the spot he selected. .'Kn immense amount
of money has been expended on these gardens and
at least $50,000 are spent annually in their main-
tenance. Special attention has been paid to the pro-
vision of attractions for the children, including the
installing of roller-coasters, merry-go-rounds and a
score or more of entertaining devices to keep them
amused.
The landscape gardens, the work of Mr, Siegel,
are a wonderful achievement. Emerging from the
intricacies of cottonwoods, quaking asps, birch, ash
and kindred trees, one's view is met by a series of
beds of luxuriant flowers, caressed by the clinging
fingers of vines. Particularly noticeable is the ar-
tistic way in which the gardener has fashioned the
varicolored beds. Precision of detail and a fine
sense of the really artistic, speak forth from the
cheerful faces of the millions of pansies. These
are a most remarkable feature of the gardens,
where millions of plants vie with each other for
supremacy in the eyes of those beholding their
beauty. Any florist could well envy the beautiful
pansy beds, as they are unequalled in size or color
any place.
The whole garden landscape seems as if nature
had spread a huge green rug upon the surface and
flecked it with floral dots.
The great picnic grove is one spot in the gardens
which the families of Butte and its vicinity claim
as their own, and the management accords them all
the privileges of the place. Here on summer days
and evenings are to be found whole families enjoy-
ing nature in the rough. It is Butte's outing place,
and without it the gardens would be merely a beau-
tiful spot, made so by artificial means and improve-
ments. It is the custom of families to go out there
with their hampers and enjoy their dinners on the
grass. Rustic seats are everywhere, and water
gurgles through sanitary spouts placed here ' and
there for the convenience of visitors. Streams of
clear water course down the grass-fringed water-
ways and sing a sweet melody under the spreading
branches of the trees and underbrush. To sit for an
hour in this grove is better than a draught of the
most approved drug tonic on the market.
The surroundings of this grove are such as are
calculated to drive away the cares of men, women
and children. Testimony of men in Butte is to the
effect that to spend frequent afternoons in it, is to
enhance one's desire to live and to forget the rush
of business life.
The people of Butte take pride in the gardens, and
feel that the management of the resort and the street
car line is a part of their own business, in that every-
thing that pertains to them goes to make up a por-
tion of their daily routine of pleasure. A more
courteous and capable set of men, headed as they
are by Mr. Siegel, cannot be found elsewhere in the
United States.
Each year there is a special ceremony in which
Senator Clark participates, and that is "the one on
Arbor Day, when all of the school children of the
county assemble in the groves to observe the simple,
yet very impressive ceremony of planting the trees.
Appropriate exercises are held in connection with
this ceremony, and as mar*' as 12,000 children have
attended.
As one enters the gardens he hears the merry
laughter of children from the playgrounds and, fol-
lowing the sounds of joy, beckoning him, as it were,
he is amazed to see beyond the great pavilion the
spacious playground where thousands of children
are being entertained. Swinging, see-saws, shooting
the chutes, wading and swimming are to be_ found
among the numerous sources of pleasure for the
children as well as for those of more mature years.
554
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Trained men and women playground experts are
employed to organize the different games and sports
for the girls and boys, teach them folk dances and
other innocent and pretty forms of amusement. No
restraint is placed upon the children to get them to
take part in systematized play, but those who like
to join in with their little companions in siich or-
ganized pastimes do so of their own free will, and
the grownup instructors make themselves one with
their pupils and are dearly loved by them.
This pretty feature is a fitting introduction to the
visitors who make their first trip into the shady
grove beyond. Passing on, the paths diverge, one
leading across to the hillside flower-beds, and the
other over a rustic bridge to a large enclosure where
are found many of the wild animals.
The great dance pavilion is where the gay revel
in the delights of youth. The measures of the dance
are here charmingly stepped to the tune of the best
orchestral music obtainable. The floor space is ijo
feet by l8o feet, the floor being of the finest grained
hard-wood. There is a spring to the floor which is
an added charm. The spacious balcony affords an
excellent view of the dancers, and on the east end
is a refreshment hall, where ice cream, sodas- and
numerous soft drinks are served. The orchestra
platform is on the west side of the hall, raised to
the desired elevation. There are three large en-
trances. The hall is on the ground floor of the
grand pavilion, and is occasionally chartered by so-
cial parties, but every night in the summer it is open
to the respectable public.
Leaving the gardens with the multiplied attrac-
tions, and forgetting all else save the opportunity
to continue the journey after stepping off the car,
one is led by inclination to climb the mountain's
magnificent heights. "Mountain-climbing" parties
make the journey to the summit of the Continental
Divide of the Rockies, a distance of only one mile
from the gardens.
One has but to look back to see sights which well
repay him for the trip. Magnificent views open out
to the west, south and north. Away across the valley
are the white-crowned domes of the Highlands,
whose gorges are filled with snow, glittering like
powdered crystal. To the west are the ridges of
blue mountains that dim into the perspective to a
minute yet clearly traceable outline of white. To the
northwest lies Butte with all of its mines, works
and spires seen distinctly through the clear crystal-
line atmosphere of the high altitude. Along the
route are miniature dells, or benches, moss-covered
and shaded by shrubs and overhanging rocks, and
at the top are springs of cold, pure water to delight
the weary traveler. To climb the mountains back
of the gardens is a delightful excursion and one
that is enjoj-ed every day in the summer. Indeed
some of these excursions are made during the winter,
and then the scenes laid out before the eye are still
more beautiful in their cold and forbidding presence.
To return to the gardens, it is only just to give
special attention to the immense and magnificent
floral display which in its beauty, splendid arrange-
ment and costly proportions, is the overshadowing
feature. Columbia Gardens is famed from Labrador
to the Rio Grande as tht home of the finest collec-
tion of flowers in the IVorthwest. This feature is
indeed, a revelation, especiallj* to thousands of
people who have hitherto known but little of Butte.
The hot-houses at the gardens are just a few notches
ahead of anything of the kind in the West. Far-
famed is the beautiful collection of begonias, which
experts declare to be unsurpassed in brilliant and
varied coloring that is positively dazzling to the eye.
The original stock of these wonderously tinted
plants was obtained years ago in Holland. Most of
the species of this botanical order were originally
discovered in their wild state growing at high alti-
tudes and, as the elevation at the gardens is nearly
6,000 feet above sea level, these plants are well suited
there. This, with the long days and almost perpetual
sunshine of the Montana summer, has brought these
handsome flowers to their greatest perfection.
Visitors have marveled at the tropical buds to be
seen on all sides. But the culture of the tender
plants has demonstrated the possibility of floricul-
ture in the mountain resort near Butte. While to
behold them in their splendor is to inspire the
thought that the flower-beds are at the zenith of
their importance and glory, still Mr. Siegel and his
corps of able assistants feel that they have but com-
menced their work and plan many further develop-
ments. They have in the gardens and hothouses
more than 150.000 growing plants of over 200 va-
rieties, including the most delicate products of the
countries of the tropics, housed in the large glass
nurseries.
The hot-houses are on the list of attractions shown
and enjoyed by the visitors, for here are to be found
plants of the rarest character. In them are seeded
the thousands of pansies that ultimately adorn the
flower-plots throughout the gardens. The climate is
congenial to pansies, which in the gardens grow to
an enormous size, some measuring as large as three
inches in diameter. As many as 25,000 pansy plants
are transplanted every season, which yield millions
of vari-colored blooms.
Another remarkable feature of this wonderful re-
sort is the great zoo, in which are to be found a
variety of animals and birds which belong to Mon-
tana's fastnesses and plains in addition to those
gathered from the far corners of the world. These
specimens of the fauna of Montana are especially
valuable, inasmuch as some of them are becoming
extinct outside of collectioiTS such as these. Among
other animals here may be mentioned bears, wild
cats, lynx, coyotes, rabbits, deer, Rocky Mountain
goats, buffalo, catalo, black and gray wolves, beavers,
badgers, chipmunks, pine squirrels, porcupines,
guinea pigs, ferrets and a young mountain lion.
Among the birds are the bald-headed eagle, pea-
. cocks, swans, other varieties of eagles, owls, fan-
tailed and other pi.geons, and "Mike," the pet parrot,
is well known to the visitors of the hot-houses.
Over $250,000 have been spent in improving these
gardens, although they would be delightful \vlth-
out them, for no more beautiful natural spot could
be imagined, but they would not be as comfortable.
There is a practical side to the gardens as well, for
in addition to the successful experiments in horti-
culture are those made in the fish hatcheries, which
alone afford a great study, interesting thousands
upon thousands of visitors. Here are hatched mil-
lions of fish, which are used to fill the streams of
Montana with a bountiful supply of the best ob-
tainable fish. The magnificent herbariitm contains
specimens of every flower and plant growing in Mon-
tana. This collection has been a source of much
pleasure and interest to those students who desire
to familiarize themselves with the wonders in the
plant kingdom of the state.
A summary of the attractions of the gardens in-
cludes the shooting-gallery, the moving pictures, the
play-grounds, the lake, over a score of sanitary spring
fountains, the walks leading through bowers of
beauty both natural and 'artificial, the wonderful
rocks, the exquisite flower-beds, the apple, plum and
pear trees and the pavilion.
The people of Butte are highly favored in having
within a few minutes' ride of the center of their
city such a desirable lounging place, where the urban
comforts are admirably combined with the beauties
HISTORY OF MONTANA
of the mountain wilds, and where they can associate
with their fellows amid such remarkable surround-
ings. Few indeed of the people of Butte, or those
who are but transients in the city, miss coming to
Columbia Gardens, and once they have enjoyed these
delights they never forget them, or fail to repeat
their visit at the first opportunity.
From the start there has been no intention of con-
ducting the gardens as a money-making project, but
rather as a public-spirited enterprise by a philan-
thropist of rare character, who has imbued his as-
sistants with his own spirit. No wonder that Mr.
Siegel is entirely wrapped up in his work, and feels
proud of the fact that he has been connected with
this enterprise almost from the beginning. An artist
to the fingertips, he finds expression for his beauty
of thought and soul in his flowers, and through them
raises humanity above the ordinary ruck and places
them on a plane not always reached in this hum-
drum, workaday age. The millions of almost human-
faced pansies which look up into the eyes of the
hordes who throng these gardens deliver messages
of wholesome living, kindly thoughts and duty well
performed, as perhaps nothing else could do, and in
bringing them and the other wonderful features of
Columbia Gardens to perfection Mr. Siegel is as
great an artist as one whose masterpieces are hung
on the walls of national galleries.
Coming from the constant hum, heat, dust and
increasing activity of the greatest mining center of
the world, .jaded and pessimistic, the visitor to Co-
lumbia Gardens passes into an earthly paradise of
pure air, green grass, wonderful flowers and the un-
flecked, placid, serene realm of genuine rest that
cannot help but have its lasting influence upon his
character. It is unnatural for anyone accustomed to
make frequent visits to these gardens to continue to
indulge in evil habits of thought or action, while it
is safe to predict that the children brought up within
the influence of such wholesome and delightful
pleasures will be saved from active participation in
those of a doubtful nature. Therefore, in every way,
the founder of these gardens and those who have
aided him in making them possible, are public bene-
factors and factors for great moral good in the
world.
Montana Mercantile Company. Many of the
old business houses of Montana trace their his-
tory back to the days of the pioneers and the
gold seekers. Through successive stages of devel-
opment the Montana Mercantile Comoany has grown
to its present importance from most humble be-
ginnings.
While Montana was still united with Idaho the
territorial legislature at Boise City granted a char-
ter to Jim Ryan and others to permit them to build
and operate a toll road across the mountains. As
an outcome of the authority granted by this charter
Ryan's Toll Road down the Red Rock and Beaver-
head rivers was later constructed. Where this road
entered Beaverhead Valley proper, at the Beaverhead
Rock, was the Sim Estes stage station on the stage
line between Corinne, Utah, and Helena. At this
point at the head of the valley a pioneer store was
established by Jim Barrett. In the old placer mining
days tliis picturesque spot, now called Barrett's Sta-
tion, was on the direct line of travel between Ban-
nack and A'irginia City. Henry Plummer. Slade and
other worthies of those days often tarried there
while passing back and forth between the two popu-
lous mining centers.
Soon a new era began. In 1880 the railroad was
built down the canyon, following Jim Ryan's Toll
Road. The Town of Dillon was started ten miles
below, in the heart of Beaverhead Valley. L. C.
Fyhrie, who was conductmg the Barrett store, moved
his stock to Dillon and in partnership with Burfeind
Brothers carried on the business under the firm name
of L. C. Fyhrie & Company. Later Burfeind
Brothers succeeded this partnership and in 1893 the
Montana Mercantile Company was incorporated.
This brief survey indicates how intimately this
mercantile establishment has been connected witli
the growth of the community which it serves. Not
only has the Mdntana Mercantile Company pros-
pered with the growing prosperity of I3eaverhead
County — it has fostered the development of the com-
munity, it has shared in the hopes, success and dis-
appointments of the people of Beaverhead.
The present directors of this firm are as follows :
Leonard Eliel, president; Adolph Eliel, vice presi-
dent; Frank Eliel, secretary and treasurer; Alfred
I. Cashmore, sales manager; and S. F. Erwin, mana-
ger of the grain department.
Alfred Cave was a Montana pioneer of the '60s,
and his activities especially identify him with Mis-
soula, where he lived for over thirty years. _ He
was frequently honored by offices of responsibility
and trust, and his name is closely associated with
the pioneers who laid the foundation of Montana's
greatness.
He was born near Columbia, Missouri, October 5,
1829, son of Richard and Colma B. (Williams)
Cave. His parents were natives of Kentucky and of
Virginia ancestry. Richard Cave had a farm and
flour mill in Kentucky and in 1820 moved to Boone
County, Missouri. In 1850 Alfred Cave, part of
whose early life had been spent at Florida. Missouri,
where he was a playmate of Mark Twain, set out
for California in company with his father and others.
They made the trip overland and spent their first
winter near Nevada City, California. Richard Cave
lost his life at the hands of highwaymen in Northern
California in 1859.
In California Alfred Cave followed placer mining,
but was especially interested in pioneer forms of
transportation, packing supplies over ' the rough
mountain trails to the isolated mining camps. In
1865 he came to Montana, bringing provisions by
pack train to Helena, and supplying several of the
well known mining camps of that day. In 1869 the
Cedar Creek stampede started, and' he packed in
general supplies and opened a store at Forest City.
Later he also had a similar business on Nine Mile
Creek, having moved his family to Missoula in 1873.
For many years he kept in operation a pack train.
This train was captured by Nez Perce Indians at
Henry's Lake during General Howard's campaign of
1877. While a resident of Missoula he acquired some
landed interests and engaged in ranching. He also
handled contracts to supply wood and telegraph
poles to the government. At one time he was man-
ager of the waterworks of Missoula. In 1876 he
was elected from Missoula County to the Territorial
Legislature. In 1894 he was elected county treas-
urer, and re-elected in 1896. He was also a valued
member of the Building Committee of the Montana
State University. Alfred Cave was one of the first
men in Montana to engage in the raising of fruit,
and his efforts did much to prove Montana's special
facilities in horticulture.
The death of this honored old timer occurred at
Missoula in February, IQOQ- He had married in
1871 Mrs. Carrie (Nicol) Hackleman. She was the
mother of one son by her former marriage, who now
bears the family name of his stepfather, and has
long been a permanent resident of Missoula.
Will Cave is at present filling the office of state
deputy humane officer. He was first to hold the
ofiice" of county auditor of Missoula County, in
556
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1891 ; served as deputy county treasurer and during
the late 'gos made two trips' to Alaska. In 1898 he
volunteered in the Spanish-American war, organ-
izing a local company which was tendered to Gov-
ernor Smith as a Montana organization, but which
was accepted by the United States Government and
which became a troop in the Third United States
Volunteer Cavalry. He was in service, chiefly in
camp at Chickamauga, Georgia, four months. After
his return he was deputy county 'clerk four years,
was county assessor two years and then deputy coun-
ty clerk again some four years.
Walter Cooper. The name of Walter Cooper is
certainly entitled to special mention in a compendium
of the nature of the one at hand, for he has long
been one of the influential citizens of Montana.
Through his personal efTorts, this section of the
west has reaped lasting benefits, which will continue
to accrue to the people long after he has passed from
the scenes of his • former activities, for his excep-
tional capacities have been directed along lines calcu-
lated to be for the general good. A man of forceful
individuality and marked initiative power, he has
been well "equipped for the duties of citizenship,
while his probity of character and his genial person-
ality have gained for him universal esteem and
friendship in the locality where he has spent the
major portion of his active and useful life.
Walter Cooper was born in Sterling, Cayuga
Count}'. New York, on July 4. i843- He is descended'
from rugged old English stock, his emigrant
ancestors having come to America in the days of
the colonies. Their descendants are later found in
New York State, where the subject's grandfather,
George Cooper, was born in Washington County.
He spent his entire life in that state, following the
vocation of a farmer, and he died in Cayuga
County, that state. He was a soldier of the War
of 1812, holding a commission as captain. He was
compelled to surrender at Fort Oswego to Com-
modore Yeo, whose fleet was afterwards destroyed
by Commodore Perry. Among the children of
George Cooper was the subject's father, Andrew
H. Cooper, who was born in Washington County,
New York, in 1812. He remained in his native state
until 1849, having followed the occupations of farm-
ing and stockr'aising. In the year last mentioned
Mr. Cooper went to the State of Michigan, locat-
ing in Shiawassee County, where his death occurred
in 1857. He was a Presbyterian in his religious
belief. He married Sarah E. McGilvary, a native
of New York State, and whose death occurred in
Tuscola County, Michigan. To them were born the
following children : Alexander H., a retired lum-
berman, lives at Whatcomb, Washington ; George
H., a retired dentist, lives in Spokane, Washing-
ton; Walter, the subject of this sketch, is the next
in order of birth ; David is in the insurance busi-
ness in Syracuse, New York ; William, who was in
the implement business in Tuscola County, Mich-
igan, died at the age of forty-five years ; Ransom
is an attorney in Great Falls, Montana.
Walter Cooper remained at home and attended
school until he was fifteen years of age. when he
began work on his own account, applying himself
to anything he could find to do. Mrs. Cooper, the
mother, had in the meantime returned to New York,
taking her second and three younger sons.
In the fall of 1858 Walter started West, reaching
Leavenworth, Kansas, in the month of November,
where he passed the winter doing such work as he
could find to do, until February, 1859, when he
crossed the plains to Pikes Peak. In the spring
of i860, he joined a prospecting expedition to the
San Juan Mountains. The party left Denver, Colo-
rado, early in May, and visited Old Mexico. Re-
turning to Colorado in the winter of 1861, our
subject spent the summer and fall of 1862 near
Colorado Springs, acting at times as scout for tin-
First Colorado Regiment. In November, 1863, lu
started for Montana (then Idaho), arriving at \'ir-
giniaCity in February, 1864, and engaging in min-
ing in Alder Gulch. In May he became interested
in a freight train, with which he started for Fort
Benton to meet the steamboats, expecting to return
to Virginia City with freight. During 1864 tlie
water was so low in the Missouri River that littlt
freight reached Fort Benton, and he was forced to
return with his teams empty. Arriving at \'ir-
ginia City in August, he disposed of his train, fitttd
out a team with supplies for the winter, and passed
the winter of 1864-5 in the Missouri River Valley,
spending his time hunting. In the spring of i8'';
he engaged in mining and continued with varying
success until the fall of 1869, when he settled in
Bozeman, Gallatin County, Montana.
On the 19th of .\pril, 1870, Mr. Cooper married
Miss Mariam D. Skeels, only daughter of Nelson
Skeels, of Boulder Valley, Jefferson County, Mon-
tana. Nelson Skeels, father of Airs. Cooper, wa-
born at Columbus, Ohio, in 1822. His father,
Reuben Skeels, was born in the State of New York.
Truman Skeels, father of Reuben Skeels, a Revolu-
tionary soldier, was born in the State of New York
in 1753. and died near Columbus, Ohio, in 1804.
The family has since resided at Bozeman. Mr. and
Mrs. Cooper have had one son and two daughters
born to them, the son and one daughter having died
in infancy. They have one daughter, Mariam Coop-
er Bunker, wife of E. F. Bunker, an attorney at
Bozeman, and thej* have two little daughters, \'ir-
ginia Mariam and Elizabeth Frances, with their
parents.
In the year 1876 Mr. and Mrs. Cooper took what
they called their wedding trip, to the Centennial
Exposition at Philadelphia, Mr. Cooper having
loaned P. A. Largey and J. P. Woolmoan, com-
missioners for the Territory of Montana, a very
large collection of minerals. National Park petri-
fications, Indian weapons, ornamental work to-
gether with a fine collection of Indian wearing
apparel, all of which were exhibited in the Gov-
ernment Building, the use of which our territory
had. Mr. Cooper had to return to Philadelphia to
repack the collection, which he did, and it was later
presented to the Syracuse University and was known
as the "Cooper Collection."
In 1870 Mr. Cooper engaged" in mercantile pur-
suits at Bozeman. He also engaged extensively
in the fur business in 1872, giving this branch of
business such energy and attention that, as a result
of his efforts, Bozeman in three years became sec-
ond in importance in Montana as a shipping point
for fur robes, furs and skins. While thus engaged
Mr. Cooper made use of many steamboats for the
transportation of his large collections of furs, robes
and skins on the Yellowstone River, and was among
the first to use them on this great highway ot na-
ture for strictly commercial purposes. Referring
to the importance of future navigation of this great
water highway, his forceful letter, dated March i,
1911, protesting against the action of the board for
refusing to recommend the construction of a lock
in the concrete dam at Glendive, Montana, was
sent to the board of engineers for "Rivers and
Harbors." This letter was republished by the
Secretary of War in his report of June 30, 191 1, on
the Yellowstone River, Mq,fitana.
This letter was written while Mr. Cooper was
president of the Bozeman Chamber of Commerce
in 191 1, and shows a perfect knowledge of this
HISTORY OF MONTANA
557
great water highway with a clear insight into the
danger whicli the State of Montana was facing in
having the only safeguard swept away against fu-
ture exorbitant freight charges demanded by power-
ful and selfish railroad organizations, pointing out
the fact that he loaded the Steamer Helena, in 1881,
at Huntley, 213 miles west of Glendive, the point
where it was proposed to close navigation.
Mr. CoopQr invented and patented many improve-
ments in firearms, and at one time manufactured
the most famous long-range hunting rifle ever used
in the West.
He was selected as one of the incorporators of
the City of Bozeman in 1883, and was a member of
the first city council. He was nominated for mayor
of the City of Bozeman in 1888, but declined for
business reasons. On the organization of the Board
of Trade of Bozeman in 1883, Mr. Cooper became
its first president, serving two years. In 1884 he
was elected to the constitutional convention as dele-
gate at large, and was made chairman of the com-
mittee on privileges and elections. He was again
elected to the constitutional convention in 1889, on
the admission of Montana into the Union, and was
made chairman of the committee on appointment
and representation. As chairman of this commit-
tee Mr. Cooper reported and advocated the adop-
tion of an article giving one senator to each county.
This article was ratified by the convention, and
became a part of the constitution, and is appre-
ciated, being considered a safeguard against reck-
less legislation.
Mr. Cooper was' selected as a delegate at large
to the national democratic convention held at Chi-
cago in 1892, and served on the committee on cre-
dentials. Mr. Cooper was nominated as an elector
on the democratic ticket in 1892. He was elected
president of the State Pioneer Society in 1892, serv-
ing two years, and was president of the Pioneer
Society of Gallatin County in 1893. He served as a
member of the Legislature of 1895, and secured the
passage of an act which made possible the erection
and equipment of the buildings now occupied by
the Montana State College of Agriculture and
Mechanic Arts. He was appointed in 1892 as a
member of the executive board of the Agricultural
College, serving six years.
When, in' 1889, the City of Bozeman wanted a
supply of fresh water for fire protection and domes-
tic use, Mr. Cooper organized the Bozeman Water-
works Company, and caused the construction of the
most perfect system of waterworks in the North-
west. He became vice president and one of the
largest stockholders of the company. In 1884 he
secured control of the coal fields on Rocky Fork,
and, with his associates, brought about the building
of the Rocky Fork & Cooke City Railway, and the
development of this great coal field, with its limit-
less supply of coal. As an enterprise bearing upon
the general welfare of the state, it will doubtless
rank among the most important achievements of
the last three decades.
Mr. Cooper has, among other things, devoted
some of his attention to mining, making extensive
development in several important properties. He
was also largely instrumental in organizing the
Bozeman Milling Comoany, operating one of the
largest flouring mills, in its time, in the state, and
was its first president, as well as its largest stock-
holder.
Mr. Cooper is identified with many other enter-
prises of a public and private nature. In politics
he is a democrat, and has taken a prominent part
in the councils of his party since the formation of
Montana as a territory. Mr. Cooper took an active
part in the political aiifairs which agitated Montana
in 1898 and 1900. He conducted the preliminary
campaign which culminated in seating the regular
democratic delegates at the Kansas City convention
July 4, 1900. Later he successfully conducted the
prelirninary contest against powerful corporate
combinations, and secured for the regular democratic
party control of the state convention, and was made
Its chairman. He was elected by the state con-
vention chairman of the state central committee,
and conducted the great campaign of igoo against
the united republican and independent democratic
forces of Montana, resulting in a complete victory
for the regular democratic national and state tickets,
and the election of a large majority of the Legis-
lature, insuring the election of two democratic
United States senators.
In 1902 Mr. Cooper organized the Walter Cooper
Company and prosecuted lumbering operations on
a large scale, manufacturing and furnishing to the
Burlington and other railroads some 2,500,000 rail-
vvay ties, together with large quantities of other
timber products. These extensive operations were
interrupted by the great panic of 1907, which lasted
several years, absolutely destroying the lumber in-
dustry from coast to coast, from the results of
which this great industry is now slowly recovering.
At present Mr. Cooper is looking after his mining
interests, which since the close of the war are gen-
erally beginning to assume satisfactory stability,
carrying with it the assurance that Montana will
soon assume its position as one of the greatest of
our mineral producers.
Eugene F. Bunker. An enumeration of the en-
terprising and successful men of Southern Montana
who have won recognition and success for them-
selves and at the same time have conferred honor
upon the locality where they reside would be in-
complete were there failure to make specific men-
tion of Eugene F. Bunker of Bozeman, who, though
yet comparatively young in years, has achieved an
enviable position in his profession, being now recog-
nized as one of the leading lawyers of the state.
Eugene F. Bunker was born in Woodstock, Illi-
nois, on February 4, 1888, and is the son of Frank
M. Bunker. The latter was born in Ridgefield, Mc-
Henry County, Illinois, in 1854, and died at Wood-
stock, Illinois, in 1917. He folk ved the mercantile
business, in which he was successful. He was a
republican in politics and was a member of the
Illinois National Guard. He married Elizabeth
Johnston, who was born in 1859 '" Illinois and now
resides at Woodstock, that state. To these parents
were born the following children : George T., a
mechanical engineer, who resides at LaGrange, Illi-
nois ; Blanche C, an osteopathic physician at Aber-
deen, South Dakota; Park J., who is cashier of the
First National Bank at Forsyth, Montana; Alice,
who is the wife of John B. Romans, a capitalist of
Aberdeen, South Dakota; Eugene F. ; and Donald,
who died at the age of four years.
Eugene F. Bunker received his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of Woodstock, Illinois, in-
cluding attendance in the high school. He then
entered Morgan Park Preparatory School, where
he graduated in 1907. He then entered the law
department of the University of Wisconsin, where
he graduated in 1912, with the degree of Bachelor
of Laws. While in that institution Mr. Bunker be-
came a member of the Greek letter fraternities,
Sigma Chi and the Phi Delta Phi.
Immediately after the completion of his technical
training Mr. Bunker came to Bozeman and entered
upon the practice of his profession, in which he has
since been engaged, including both civil and crim-
inal practice. Years of conscientious work have
558
HISTORY OF MONTANA
brought with them not only increasp of practice and
reputation, but also that growth in lepal knowledge
and that wide and accurate judgment the possession
of which constitutes marked excellence in the pro-
fession.
Politically Mr. Bunker is a republican and has
been active in the support of his party, having
served as secretary of the republican county central
committee since 1914. Fraternally he is a member
of Bridger Camp No. 62, Woodmen of the World.
He is also a member of the County and State Bar
associations. Mr. Bunker is keenly interested in-
everything that promises to benefit the community
in any way and has some investments in mining
operations and in construction works.
On December 27, 1913, at Bozeman, Mr. Bunker
was married to Mariam Cooper, the daughter of
Walter and Mariam (Skeels) Cooper, who are
mentioned specifically elsewhere in this work. Mrs.
Bunker is well educated, being a graduate of the
National Park Seminary at Washington, D. C. Mr.
and Mrs. Bunker have one child, Mariam Virginia,
born on August 20, 1918. Because of his fine per-
sonal qualities and alDilities Mr. Bunker enjoys a
well deserved popularity in the city and county of
his choice.
Allen Pierse. Biographies should not be pub-
lished unless there is something in the life and char-
acter of the individual worthy of emulation or imita-
tion by others under like circumstances — certainly
not for self-aggrandizement. However, sufficient has
been gleaned from the life history of Allen Pierse.
one of the well-known and energetic business rnen of
Great Falls, to show that there is something in the
life of this man worthy of more than mere incidental
mention. He began life practically at the bottom
of the ladder, which he has climbed to the top with
no help but industrious hands and an intelligent
brain, and is a living example of what may be ac-
complished in this nature-favored country of ours
by thrift and perseverance.
Allen Pierse was born at St. Paul, Minnesota, on
March 26, 1856, and is the son of Allen and Annie
(Corbin) Pierse. These parents had four children,
two sons and two daughters. The father was a
lawyer by profession and while a resident of Kansas
served as a member of the State Legislature. Dur-
ing the Civil war he enlisted in the Union army and
gave up his life on a Southern battlefield.
Allen Pierse received his educational training in
the public schools of Leavenworth, Kansas, and
Buffalo, New York, to which city the family had
moved during his boyhood. In 1873 he went to
Corinne, Utah, thence by overland stage to Deer
Lodge, Montana. There he engaged in driving a
stage for Oilman & Salisbury for two years, and
then he established the old Buffalo Hump Station,
between Butte and Deer Lodge, to the operation
of which he devoted himself for the following ten
years. He then located in the Judith Basin, where
he engaged in the sheep business from 1885 to 1890.
In the latter year he went to Neihart and engaged
in mining and merchandising. In the fall of 1894
Mr. Pierse was elected county treasurer of Meagher
County, Montana, and in 1896 was re-elected to that
office, thus serving two terms, to the entire satisfac-
tion of the voters of that county. In 1898 he was
elected county clerk, and served one term. He
then spent about one and a half years in California,
but is now and has been for several years a resident
of Great Falls, where he is conducting a successful
automobile agency, under the name of the Pierse
Auto Company. He owns mining interests in Nei-
hart, Butte and the Little Rockies, which are prov-
ing good investments. He is well informed on the
automobile business and is proving an efficient dis-
tributor for the cars he handles. He is a member of
the Great Falls Chamber of Commerce. Politically
he is a democrat.
On June 27, 1880, Mr. Pierse was married to
Carrie M. Woods, a native of Missouri, and they are
the parents of one son, Edwin A., who is a graduate
of the School of Mines and is an acknowledged
authority on questions pertaining to ore and mining
prospects. He was married to Marie Lyon. They
have two children, Edwin A., Jr., and Thomas L.
Though Mr. Pierse has never sought to be a leader
of men, merely striving to live up to the standard
of good citizenship, he has, nevertheless, taken a
commendable interest in local public affairs and has
been an earnest supporter of every movement for
the advancement of the best interests of the com-
munity, thereby winning the confidence and good
will of all who know him.
.1
Daniel Hanley, formerly of Helena and Butte
and now of Lewistown, has been in Montana for
over thirty years. His experiences and achieve-
ment, about which he is personally very modest,
must be allowed to speak for themselves in a
straightforward narrative.
He was born at Lowell, Massachusetts, December
3, 1857, son of Jeremiah and Hannah (Leahy)
Hanlev. His parents were born in County Cork,
Ireland, coming to the United States at an early
age. They were married at Lowell in 1856. Jere-
miah Hanley was a practical miner, had worked in
the mines in Berehaven, County Cork, and in 1859,
removing from Lowell to Hancock, Michigan, was
employed for several years in the copper mines
there. He enlisted as a Union soldier in 1864, serv-
ing until mustered out in 1865. From Upper Mich-
igan in 1870 he w-ent West and was in the silver
mines of Nevada, California, .Arizona and New-
Mexico, and died at Sante Fe at the age of seventy-
five, his wife passing away aged eighty-six.
Daniel Hanley was the oldest of four sons. Alto-
gether he probably never attended school more than
six months. His schooling was acquired at Copper
Harbor, Michigan, during the year 1868. At that
time educational facilities were practically unavail-
able in the copper mining districts. At the age of
twelve he began work in the mines, at first in Mich-
igan and later in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
He worked as a waterboy on the Marquette, Hough-
ton & Ontonagon Railway in the summer of 1870.
After running a hoisting engine and performing
other practical duties in the mines, including clerk-
ing in a company store, in the fall of 1877 he started
for the Black Hills countrj'. The first railway
engine he ever saw was on the Mineral Range Rail-
way, a narrow gauge line between Hancock and
Calumet, Michigan. On going West a stage took
him from Houghton to L'Anse, Michigan, thence by
the Chicago and Northwestern Railway to Chicago
and to Omaha, by the Union Pacific to Sidney,
Nebraska, and thence overland by stage coach 300
miles to Dead wood. After three years as a mining
prospector around Deadwood he started for Lead-
ville, Colorado, in 1880, and had some varied ex-
periences in the mining regions of Colorado, both
at Leadville and in the Gunnison Vallej'.
Mr. Hanley removed to St. Paul, Minnesota, in
1880, for several years was employed in a whole-
sale fruit and produce house and in 1887 engaged
in the wholesale fruit and produce business at
Helena, Montana. He was in business at Helena
under the name Daniel Hanley & Company until
1896, and for fourteen succeeding years was in a
similar business at Butte. In 1910 he moved to
Lewistown and during the past ten years has looked
I
HISTORY OF MONTANA
559
after his mining interests and has been in the real
estate and insurance business as "resident of the
Montana Land Company, his two sons Marcus and
Roy being his business associates.
Mr. Hanley has always been a democrat in poli-
tics. He served as citv alderman of Helena four
years, from lS88 to 1892, and was chairman of the
democratic county central committee of Lewis and
Clark- County in 1892. He served two years as
city treasurer of Levvistown, beginning in 1915.
July 26, 1910, he was appointed United States com-
missioner, and has held that office three consecutive
terms. Fraternally he has been an Elk since 1896
and is affiliated with the Knights of Columbus since
1917. He is a member of the Catholic Church.
At St. Thomas, Minnesota, August 2, i88r, he
married Margaret Harrington, who was born in
■ Northern Micliigan, daughter of Jeremiah Harring-
ton. To :Mr. and Mrs. Hanley were born ten chil-
dren : Marcus R., who married Hazel Berkin ;
Daniel John, who married Olive Threlkeld; May
Ethel, who became the wife of John R. Bartlett, a
mining engineer of Butte ; Edward Jeremiah, who
died in 1914, aged twenty-si-x ; Earl Richard, who
died in 1916, at the age of twenty-four; Paul Wil-
liam, unmarried and living in New York City:
Helena Catherine, at home ; Roy W., who married
Ruth Howser; Clement, who died in 1910, aged
eight years; andMarv, who died in 1886, aged six-
teen months.
The son Paul registered at Lewistown, June 5,
1917, in September enlisted in the air service in
New York, reached France in November, 1917, and
spent considerable time in the American Army
Headquarters at Chaumont. He was promoted to
the rank of sergeant, and after eighteen months
abroad returned to America in April, I9I9- The son
Roy joined the Student .\rmy Training Corps at
Missoula, September 27. 1918, and was discharged
December 18, 1918.
Marcus R. Hanley. secretary of the Montana
Land Company at Lewistown, is a son of that vet-
eran Montanan, Daniel Hanley. a record of whose
career is found on other pages. Marcus R. Han-
lev has been an active business man in this state
lor fifteen years or more.
He was "born at St. Paul, Minnesota, July 25,
1882, the oldest child of Daniel and Margaret (Har-
rington) Hanley. He acquired his education in the
public schools of Helena and But'e. and his first
business experience was in the wholesale and re-
tail coal business at Butte. He remained in that
city until 1916, when he came to Lewistown and as-
sumed his present duties as secretary of the Mon-
tana Land Company. Mr. Hanley is a democrat
and is affiliated with" Butte Council No. 664, Knights
of Columbus, and is a member of the Catholic
Church. He belomrs to the Judith Club and the
Chamber of Commerce in Lewistown.
May 18, igo6, he married Miss Hazel Berkin.
She was born at Boulder, Montana, daughter of
John and Hallie (Wolgamoth) Berkin, the former
a native of England and the latter of Illinois. Mrs.
Hanley was the second of their four children. John
Berkin was a Montana pioneer, having come to
Boulder Valley with his parents and having received
his early education in this state. He is a veteran
mining man and is still active at Butte as one of the
superintendents of the Anaconda Copper Company.
He has also been a leading figure in the democratic
party and twice represented his district in the State
Legislature. Mr. and Mrs. Hanley have three chil-
dren: John Berkin, Mary Isabel and Edward
Daniel.
Vol. n— 38
Lee W. Crutcher, of Butte, sales manager of the
Simmons Company, spent his early life on an Illi-
nois farm. About the time wlien most young men
make a choice of some definite vocation he was
stricken with typhoid fever and spent a number of
weeks in bed, with plentv of time to think over and
canvass thoroughly his individual talents, his in-
clinations and tastes. The fever left him incapaci-
tated for hard physical labor, and thus the door was
shut to any idea of becoming a farmer. He decided
that he could sell goods, and that youthful decision
has been justified by a career that proves Mr.
Crutcher of the supreme class of salesmanship.
He was born at Chicago, Illinois, August 28,
1881. His grandfather, James Crutcher, was born
in Kentucky in 1801, of Scotch and English ancestry.
James Crutcher moved from Kentucky to the vicin-
ity of Leavenworth. Kansas, in pioneer times, Iiad
a farm in Eastern Kansas and died at Leavenworth
in 1888. Everard H. Crutcher, father of the Butte
business man. was born in Kentucky in l8s8, and
was a small boy when his parents moved to Kansas.
He was reared and educated in the vicinity of
Leavenworth, was married there and then rernoved
to Chicago, where for a time he was in railroad
work. In 1882 he established his home at Plainfield,
Illinois, and from that time until his death in 1897.
was busy with the cares and responsibilities of
farming. His farm was a half mile west of Plain-
field, and he enjoyed the reputation in that com-
munity of bein? a thorough farmer and expert judge
of livestock. He was a democrat in politics and was
affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and
was a member of the Masonic fraternity, the Modern
Woodmen of America and the Home Forum. Ever-
ard H. Crutcher married Lyda A. Thomas, who was
born at Plainfield. Illinois, in 1861. and is now living
at Lincoln. Nebraska. Her children are four in
number: Lee W. ; .Mian T., who lives at San Fran-
cisco and is general ^ales manager on the coast for
the Simmons Company; Rebecca, wife of Cyril M.
McKee, a farmer living at Lincoln, Nebraska : and
Elizabeth, wife of C. E. Ayer, a promoter, whose
home is at Lincoln.
Lee W. Crutcher attended the public schools of
Plainfield. Illinois, and was sixteen years of age
when his father died. He continued to live on the
home farm for about a year after that, when he
was stricken with typhoid. After recovering some-
what his health and strength he mad^ his first essay
at salesmanship, in a house to house canvass at
Plainfield selling household novelties. He went
through that difficult test of salesmanship success-
fully for two years. Leaving Illinois he went to
Lincoln, Nebraska, worked six months in a grocery
store as a salesman, and then in the carnet and
draperv department of the Herpolsheimer Company
until the spring of 190,^. The following three years
he was on the road representing the Lincoln LTp-
holstering , Company, covering the territory of
Southern Nebraska and Kansas. He also became a
stockholder in that comp^nv and at the present time
is assistant secretary of the business.
While on the road for the Lincoln Upholstering
Company Mr. Crutcher took as a side line the
famous Hoosier Kitchen Cabinet, manufactured at
Newcastle,- Indiana He sold those cabinets on a
commission basis until iqo6. The Hoosier Com-
pany then attracted him into their exclusive service
on a straight salarv proposition, and for over ten
vears. until January i. 1017, his salesmanship was
'relied upon as the chief instrument in building up
the tremendous business of this company in many
of the western states. For several years he covered
the territory of Nebraska. Kansas. IMissouri, Okla-
homa, Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas. In 1912 he
560
HISTORY OF MONTANA
was assigned the task of opening new territory into
which the Hoosicr cabinets had not yet been car-
ried on an organized scale. This territory included
part of Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Mon-
tana, Idaho. Wyoming, Washington and Oregon.
During 1915-16 Mr. Crutcher made his home and
headquarters at Portland, Oregon. His success in
opening and establishing business in the new terri-
tory was such that he was appointed district man-
ager in charge of the sales organization over part
of Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Wyoming,
Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon. Mr.
Crutcher paid his first visit to Montana in the fall
of 1912.
He resigned from the Hoosier Company and on
January i, 1917, became sales manager of the Butte
branch of the Simmons Company. For many years
the Simmons Company at Kenosha, Wisconsin, has
been one of the largest plants in the world manu-
facturing "Simmons" beds, springs and similar
equipment. The quality and design of the Simmons
beds are unsurpassed, and in recent years as a re-
sult of a nation-wide publicity campaign these beds
have enjoyed a tremendous sale and are handled
by some of the most exclusive department stores
in the country. The Simmons Company also manu-
factures a large line of supplies for camp equip-
ment, including double deck bunks, folding chairs,
etc. The company has branch houses in every
prominent city in the United States and Canada, the
plant and offices at Butte being at 843 East South
Montana Street. From the returns now available
it is estimated that the business of the Simmons
Company for 1920 will average more than a million
dollars a week.
Mr. Crutcher very appropriately has enjoyed a
modest share of the prosperity which he has helped
create for this great business institution. .'Kmong
other interests he owns a modern home at 2710
Edward Street in Butte, also a large residence at
Kansas City, Missouri, and a farm in Texas. He
is an independent voter, is affiliated with the Meth-
odist Episcopal Church, and is a member of the
Rotary Club, Silver Bow Club, Chamber of Com-
merce, South Side Club of Butte, and is affiliated
with Lincoln Lodge, Ancient Order of United
Workmen. In 1905, at Chicago, he married Miss
Laura M. Kidd, daughter of W. A. and Emma
Kidd, residents of Portland, Oregon. Her father is
now retired on a pension after a long service for
the Northwestern Railroad. Mr. and Mrs. Crutcher
have three children : Lee W., Jr., Genevieve E.
and Mercelia.
H. B. PuLsiFER as research professor of the
Montana State School of Mines and metallurgist
to the State Bureau of Mines and Metallurgy, oc-
cupies a peculiarly responsible position with refer-
ence to the great mineral resources of Montana.
His experience has been a broadly practical one
and his technical training has also been derived
from association with some of the leading scientific
institutions of America and abroad.
Mr. Pulsifer was born at Lebanon, New Hamp-
shire, December 2X 1879, and represents a family
of sterling New England farmers. He is in the
ninth generation of the Pulsifer family in America.
His first American ancestor was Joseph Pulsifer,
whose father was probably an English sea captain,
and who lived at Ipswich, Massachusetts, from 1705
to 1749. The grandfather of H. B. Pulsifer was
George Baxter Pulsifer. who was born at Danbury,
New Hampshire, April 7, 1824, and snent all his life
as a New Hampshire farmer. He died at Lebanon,
May 26, 1904. His wife was Elizabeth Jane Taylor,
a native of Danbury, who died November 26, 1903.
Two of their children are still living: C. E. Pulsi-
fer and George, the latter a business man at Leb-
anon.
C. E. Pulsifer was born at Danbury, New Hamp-
shire, in 1846, and has spent all his life in his na-
tive state. As a young man he learned the carpenter
and cabinet maker's trade, but for the past twenty-
five years has been a merchant and a leading and
substantial citizen of Lebanon. He is a republican,
a member of the Baptist Church, and an Odd Fel-
low. In 1872 he married Clara A. Clay, a native
of New Hampshire, who died in 1873. C. E. Pulsi-
fer married for his second wife Ellen D. Bridgman
in 1877. She was born at Hanover, New Hamp-
sjiire, in 1850, and died at Lebanon in 1904. Her
two sons were H. B. and F. Ernest. The latter is
in business with his father at Lebanon.
H. B. Pulsifer attended public school at Lebanon,
graduating from high school in 1898, spent one year
in the Colby Academy at New London, New Hamp-
shire, and in 1903 graduated from the Massachu-
setts Institute of Technology with the Bachelor of
Science degree. The following year he spent as
instructor of chemistry in the New Hampshire State
College, and in 1904 became chemist in Henry
Souther's engineering laboratory at Hartford, Con-
necticut. During 1905, and until the fall of 1906,
he was assayer and employed in metallurgical work
in Old Mexico. The next year he added to his
qualifications by a course of study in the University
of Munich in German^', specializing in physics,
chemistrv and other sciences. From 1907 to 1909
he was engaged in various technical capacities in
the mining districts of Missouri, Oregon and Old
Mexico, and from 1909 for two years was con-
nected with lead smelters in Utah. 'Since 191 1 Mr.
Pulsifer has given most of his time and talents to
technical education. In 191 1 he became instructor
of metallurgy at the Armour Institute of Tech-
nology in Chicago, and later was appointed assistant
professor, remaining with that institution until 1917.
In the latter year he came with the Montana State
School of Mines at Butte as professor of metal-
lurgy, and in 1919 was made research professor
and when the State Bureau of Mines and Metal-
lurgy was established in that year was appointed
metallurgist. His offices are in the Administration
Building in the School of Mines. Mr. Pulsifer
affiliates as a republican in politics.
September 0, 1909, at Salt Lake City, Utah, he
married Sarah Cecilia Cantlion, daughter of Daniel
and Elizabeth Cantlion. The latter makes her home
with Mr. and Mrs. Pulsifer. Her father was a
miner. Mr. and Mrs. Pulsifer have three children :
Carmen, born June 15, 1910; Phyllis, born October
II, 1911: and Verne, born July 5, 191.';.
Arthur Ernest Adami, a mining engineer, as-
sistant professor of mining engineering in the Mon-
tana State School of Mines at Butte, is a native
Montanan, and his father was a pioneer at Helena.
Mr. Adami was born at Helena, May 2, 1886. His
father, Henry Adami, was born in Germany in 1852,
came to the United States at the age of fourteen,
and has lived at Helena and other points in Mon-
tana since 1870. He grew up with the capital city
and spent his active life as a contractor in road
building and other lines of construction and also in
stock raising. He has served as a councilman at
Helena, is a republican and a member of the Lu-
theran Church. Henry Adami married Elizabeth
Maas, who was born at Neiderweisel. ^-ermany, in
1854. They have six children : Charles J., general
manager of the St. Joe Lead Company at Bonne
Terre, Missouri; Henry C. an assayer and chemist
at Wallace, Idaho ; Louise, wife of D. J. Ragen, a
d-9i. #^^
\Uyu^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
rancher at East Helena; Elizabeth K.. wife of L. W.
Williamson, a real estate and insurance man at
Helena; Arthur E. ; and Bertha E.. wife of J. S.
Higgins, cashier of an oil company at Great Falls.
Arthur Ernest Adami was educated in the public
schools of Helena, graduating from high school in
1903 and received his degree Mining Engineer from
the Montana State School of Mines in igo/. The
four months following he spent as an assayer with
the Red Metal Mining Company. The following
two years he was an instructor in the Montana
State School of Mines. During igo8 he W'as again
employed for four months as "an assayer for the
Boston and Montana Mining Company, after which
he assumed his duties as Assistant Professor of
Mining Engineering. He is also mining engineer
for the Montana State Bureau of Mines and Metal-
lurgy.
Mr. Adami is an independent in politics and a
member of the Episcopal Church. August 9, 191 1,
at Butte, he married Miss Alma Erickson, a native
of Butte and daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Alex Erick-
son. Her parents were pioneers in the mining dis-
trict of Butte. Mrs. .Adami is a graduate of the
Butte High School. They have two children, Jane,
born December 6, 1912, and .\rthur E., Jr., born
June 6, 1915.
I. N. Walker has been in business in Montana.
North Dakota and other sections of the Northwest
for a number of years, has a host of loyal friends
in all these communities, and that fact alone speaks
better than anything else for his sterling ability and
integrity. His home for a number of years has been
in Great Falls, 'where he is a member of the Wil-
liams-Walker-Purdy Company, real estate and loans.
As the people of Montana are now aware, Mr.
Walker has for several .years been doing more than
anyone else to make real history in this state. He
supplied the faith, the hope, the energy and by his
contagious influence among his friends also much
of the capital for the first important oil development
in the state.
The culmination of his history making enterprise
as an oil developer came in July. 1919, when a well
pumped to the depth of 1850 feet flowed full of oil.
This event was heralded far and near as the first
important oil strike in Montana. It is known as the
Tri-City well and is located near Franklin west of
Roundup in the Musselshell oil district. Experts
and doubters of all kinds steadily discouraged the
idea that Montana had oil in commercial quantities.
It was the insistent enthusiasm and efforts of Mr.
Walker that disproved this theory. Mr. Walker was
the man who first secured the leases on which the
Tri-City well was sunk.
The Great Falls Daily Tribune in commenting
upon the oil strike gave some historical facts con-
cerning the enterprise that may be properly quoted
here:
"The company was formed in Great Falls about
three years ago by S. S. Hobson. I. N. Walker,
Frank Mitchell, J. B. Elliott and others. More than
60,000 of the 150,000 shares issued by the company
are held by local parties. Some time after the
formation of the local company Billings residents,
including A. L. Babcock and J. E. Logan, joined
the Great Falls men in financing the proposition.
Directors of the company at the present time include
S. S. Hobson and J. B. Elliott of Great Falls; T. C.
Power of Helena and L. C. Babcock of Billings.
"Besides the property near Franklin the Tri-City
Company has large holdings in the Devil's Basin
country north of Roundup. By assuming leases to
12,000 acres of oil land held by the Roundup Gas and
Oil Company, the Tri-City Company acquired leases
to 6,000 acres. A sub-contract to the Van Dusen
Oil Company granted the Van Dusen Company
1,500 acres in return for drilling a well in the Devil's
Basin Country. This company is now preparing to
drill the well. In the well which produced the flow
near Pranklin the Tri-City Company financed the
drilling to 1,500 feet and beyond that depth the Van
Dusen Cornpany agreed to meet half the expenses of
the drilling, which is being carried on by the Tri-
City Company.
"I. N. Walker of Great Falls, a large stockholder
in the Tri-City Company, returned to this city re-
cently after a visit to the strike at Franklin.''
Mr. Walker was born at Lestard, Ontario. Canada,
January 20. 1866, a son of James and Martha (Brad-
ley) Walker. His parents were both natives of On-
tario. His father was born in 1845 and died in 1897,
while the mother is still living in her eighty-first
year. I. N. Walker was the seventh of eleven chil-
dren, seven of whom are still living. His father was
a blacksmith by trade, and for several years worked
as a tool dresser in the oil fields of Western Penn-
sylvania. He then went back to Lestard, Ontario,
and was in business until his death. He and his wife
were members of the Methodist Church.
I. N. Walker attended the public schools of On-
tario, and when about twenty-one years of age he
was attracted to the newly developed country of the
Dakotas. He took up a homestead near the present
City of Devil's Lake, and used ox teams to break
his land. He had poor crops, and in order to make
a living he taught school at Grand Harbor, North
Dakota. About 1887 he engaged in the loan business
and for several years he was employed as an ex-
aminer of loans, representing twenty-one banks in
this capacity throughout North Dakota. When sev-
eral banks in that section were thrown into receiver-
ship Mr. Walker was appointed to clear up their
affairs, and it is said that no one ever lost a single
dollar from his management and administration. Mr.
Walker had about a year of experience and residence
in Old Mexico, and then going back to Devil's Lake
he engaged in the real estate and loan business with
Eaton & Higbee. This firm later, in 1896, sold out
to the William H. Brown Land Company, now of
Chicago. From i8g6 to 1904 Mr. Walker had full
charge of the business of this concern as its out-
side manager. From 1904 to 1908 he was in the land
business and also personally engaged in the coloniza-
tion of the Province of Southern Alberta, Canada.
On coming into the Judith Basin of Montana in
1908 Mr. Walker resumed the management of the
local affairs of the William H. Brown Land Com-
pany, and in 1911 moved to Great Falls and for the
greater part of the time since then has been a mem-
ber of the Williams-Walker-Purdy Company, han-
dling lands and city property. Mr. Walker handles
all the loans made by this company, and is regarded
as one of the best posted men in the state on land
values in general.
He has been too busy with other affairs to take an
interest in politics as a matter of personal advantage.
He was made a Mason in the lodge at Devil's Lake,
North Dakota, and is now affiliated with Euclid
Lodge No. 58 at Great Falls. He was also a mem-
ber of Devil's Lake Chapter, Royal Arch Masons,
and now belongs to Great Falls Chapter No. 9 and
is affiliated with Black Eagle Commandery No. 8,
Knights Templar, and belongs to the Odd Fellows.
He is a republican in politics.
June 4, 1892. Mr. Walker married Anna L. Lyn-
den. She was born in Iowa. They have three daugh-
ters, Ruth, Martha and Esther.
Oswald M. Gerer is one of the prominent fruit
growers in the western part of the state, having
562
HISTORY OF MONTANA
cultivated and developed a fruit ranch near Ham-
ilton for a number of years. His prominence in
fruit growing circles makes him a highly qualified
member of the State Board of Horticulture. He is
also one of the leading men in the Equity Co-
operative movement in the Northwest, being presi-
dent and manager of the association's stpre at Ham-
ilton.
Mr. Gerer was born at Vorarlberg, Austria, Feb-
ruary 4, 1875'. His father, Matthews Gerer, was
born in the same locality in 1844 and in 1884 came
to America and located at Helena, Montana, where
he lived the last ten years of his life. He died in
1894. He was a gardener by occunation. He was
a Catholic in religion. He married Josephine Hell-
buck, who is still living in Austria, near the Swiss
border. They had three children: Hirlanda of
Helena, Montana, widow of John Kauzman, who
for many years was connected with the Kessler
Brewing Company; Albina, wife of J. H. Bierman,
operator of the stage and mail route and a resident
of Helena: and Oswald M.
Oswald M. Gerer attended public school in Aus-
tria, and was fourteen years of age vv-hen in 1889
he came to Helena, Montana. He worked at vari-
ous occupations there for seven or eight years, and
in 1897 learned and engaged in the bakery business.
He operated a bakeshop at Helena until 1903, in
which year he located at Hamilton and engaged in
fruit farming. His fruit ranch is three miles
northwest of town. He has made a special study
of horticultural conditions in this section of the
Northyvest and has made the business profitable.
His chief crops are apples and cherries. He owns a'
modern residence on his home ranch.
Mr. Gerer became president and manager of the
Equity Co-operative Association of Hamilton in
1917. He is also a director in the Equity Co-opera-
tive Association of Montana. _ There are many
branches of the Equity Association of Montana and
the history of the enterprise as a whole is a sub-
stantial demonstration of the power and vitality of
the cooperative principle. The business at Hamil-
ton sells and handles for the growers produce and
fruit and also contributes groceries and other sup-
plies to its members.
Mr. Gerer is an independent in politics. He is
affiliated with Ionic Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, Hamilton Chapter No. 18,
Royal Arch Masons. He married at Helmville,
Montana, Miss Elsie Peterson, who was born at
Breslau, Germany. They have three children :
Rudolph, born May 13, 1902, a sophomore in the
Hamilton High School ; Mildred, born February
II, 1904, also in her second year of high school: and
Dorothy, born June 5, 1910, in the fifth grade of
the grammar school.
John F. Mair is an expert millwright and lumber-
man, a profession he learned in the lumber districts
of Eastern Canada, and has followed it since early
manhood. He has been identified with the construc-
tion of mills and their operation in nearlv every state
and province of Western Canada and the northwest-
ern states. Mr. Mair is now general superintendent
of the lumber department of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, with headquarters at Bonner. He
was born at Campbellton. New Brunswick. January
IS, 1874. He is of Scotch ancestry. His grand-
father, John Mair, was born near Aberdeen, Scotland.
and was one of the first three emigrants from Scot-
land who settled the village of Campbellton. New
Brunswick. He spent the rest of his life in that
province as a farmer and ship carpenter. His wife
was Margaret Adams, a native of Halifax, Nova
Scotia. Thev were married at Campbellton. and both
of them died there. John Mair, father of John F.
Mair, was born at Campbellton in 1834, and spent all
his life there. He was a lumberman, farmer and
also had interests in the salmon fisheries. He died at
Campbellton in 1916. He was a sturdy type of citi-
zen, in whom his fellows reposed the utmost con-
fidence, and he exercised much influence in local
afifairs. For more than forty years he was a trustee
of the public schools of Campbellton. He was an elder ,
in the Presbyterian Church forty-five years and in ^
politics was a liberal. He married Katherine Firth,
who was born in the Province of Quebec at Escum-
inac in 1847 and d*ied at Campbellton. New Bruns-
wick, in 1903. John F. Mair is second in a family of
seven children. Elsie, the oldest, is the wife of
Alexander Miller, a farmer at Campbellton ; Edgar
\M ic Q druggist at Woodstock, New Brunswick;
W.
Mary died at Campbellton in 1914; Katherine, who
died at Ham Heung, Korea, April 4, 1919, was a
missionarj", and was married in Korea to L. L.
Young, also a missionary there but at present in
Nova Scotia ; Marjorie, wife of Donald McLean, a
prominent land and property owner at Campbellton ;
and Douglas J., a banker at Vancouver, Brhish Co-
lumbia.
John F. Mair received his education at Campbell-
ton, and though he left school at the age of fourteen
he had completed the work of the twelfth grade and
was well advanced in his school studies. The next
four years he worked on a farm and at the age of
eighteen he began a practical apprenticeship in the
lumbering business in his father's sawmill at Camp-
bellton. He continued to help operate that plant
until the mill was sold. Then, at the age of twenty-
six, with an expert knowledge of lumber manufac-
ture, he started out as a journeyman, and his experi-
ence in the building and operation of mills has taken
him all over the West, through Ontario, Canada,
and other provinces and states. For many years he
was a foreman for W. A. Wilkinson in building saw-
mills in Ontario as far west as Nelson, British Co-
lumbia, at Boise and Potlatch, Idaho, at LaGrange,
Oregon, then again for a time in British Columbia,
following which, he was at Sand Point and Spirit
Lake, Idaho, Park Falls, Wisconsin, and at Bonner's
Ferry, Idaho. In the fall of 1909. Mr. Mair left the
service of Mr. Wilkinson, and as foreman for H. W.
Huffman built a sawmill at Winchester, Idaho. Dur-
ing the spring of 191 1 he was employed in repairing
the A. C. M. Company's mill at St. Regis, Montana,
and continued the same line of work during the
winter of 1911-12 at Somers, Montana. Following
that he entered the employ of the A. C. M. Company
and was again at St. Regis until August; 1914, when
he came to Bonner as superintendent of construction
at the Bonner plant of the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company. Later he was promoted to general super-
intendent in the lumber department of this corpora-
tion and has under his direction 300 employes.
Mr. Mair takes an active part in local affairs, is
scout master of the Boy Scouts of Bonner, is super-
intendent of the Sunday school of the American
Sunday School L^nion at Bonner and is a member of
Campbellton Lodge of Masons in his native province.
Politically he is independent. Mr. Mair married at
Sand Point, Idaho, in 1907. Miss Nellie Mahoney,
daughter of Charles and Margaret Mahoney, both
deceased. Her father was a Wisconsin farmer. Mrs.
Mair died March 5, I9i7-
Charles M. Johnson. It is the good old adage
which tells us that "onportunity knocks once at each
man's door," that at least one time in a man's life
he is given the chance to grasp advantitious circum-
stance and through it places himself in a position to
rise to recognition in the field opened up before him.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
This is undoubtedly true, as can be proved by thou-
sands of successful careers, but the man who waits
for the knock of opportunity will be found far in the
rear of the individual who has the ability to make
opportunity while his less ambitious fellows have
allowed it to slip through tlieir grasp. The modern
man of business has little use for the man who waits
for something to "turn up. " fie realizes that it takes
but mediocre abilitv to take sometliing that has al-
ready been developed; and it is, therefore, that the
man who makes a place for himself, not the man
who takes a place vacated by otliers, is the one who
creates the greatest demand for Iiis services. Some
men there are who can follow Init one line ; their
abilities seem to have been developed in but one direc-
tion, and oftentimes they never discover their proper
field of activity until it is too late, until the best of
their power has been contributed to a vocation upon
which their inclination and inherited abilities have
been wasted. It is the man who realizes his proper
field, who is possessed of the courage to grasp the
opportunity presented in that direction, who rises
above his fellows and eventually attains distinction,
just for the reason that he has these qualities.
The above statements review in brief the reasons
for the successful career of Charles M. Johnson, one
of the leading builders and contractors of Anaconda,
who has to his credit practically one-third of the
residences and other buildings of the city, as well
as other work in the surrounding district. Mr. John-
son was born at Wexio, Sweden, July 26, 1836, a son
of Magnus Johanson, also born at Wexio, Sweden,
in 1820. There he spent his useful life, occupying
himself with farming, and died in 1872. He married
Joanna Magnuson, who was born at Wexio in 1834,
and died there in 1902. Their children were as fol-
lows : Mary, who is deceased, married a Mr. Till-
strom, a soldier in the regular Swedish army, and
died near Wexio, Sweden ; Sophia, who married a
Mr. Skon, a carpenter and builder, lives at St. Paul,
Minnesota ; Sara, Annie and Emma, all of whom still
live in Sweden; and Charles M., who was the third
in order of birth.
Growing up in his native place, Charles M. John-
son attended its schools until he was eleven years
old, at which time he had to begin working, and
alternated in assisting his father on the farm with an
apprenticeship to the carnenter trade. Coming to the
United States in 1879 he found work in a lumber
yard at Minneapolis. Minnesota, for a season, and
then for four months was employed by a contractor
in installing water pumps. For the next two and
one-half years Mr. Johnson was engaged in operating
an old wood sawing machine on the Saint Paul &
Sioux City Railroad. For the next three years he
worked completing his apprenticeship at the car-
penter trade at Duluth, Minnesota, and upon finish-
ing it he engaged in contracting in that city for four
years. It was his ambition to go further west, and
in 1889 he came to Montana, and for a time was at
Butte, where he built two large residences, a big
business block and some smaller buildings. He then
came to Anaconda, where he has since remained, and
when he located in the city he was the pioneer in
his line. He is now assisted by Mr. W. A. Law,
whom he has taken into partnership. Mr. Johnson
has erected the courthouse, the Elks Hall, the Alpine
Apartments, the Durston Block, the high school
and many residences and business buildings, all of
which stand as monuments to his skill and faithful
attention to detail.
In politics Mr. Johnson is a democrat. The Pres-
byterian Church holds his membership and through
it he finds expression for his religious faith. Frater-
nally he maintains connections with Anaconda
Lodge No. 239, Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks, while in the Anaconda Club and the
Anaconda Country Club he finds social relaxa-
tion. In addition to his other interests Mr. John-
son is a director of the Hidden Lake Mining
Company. He is not married, and resides at 212
East Fourth Street. During the long years of his
residence here Mr. Johnson has championed every
rnovement designed to promote the general welfare,
has supported every enterprise for the public good,
and has materially aided in the advancement of all
social, educational and moral interests, and there
are few men who stand higher in the opinion of
their fellow citizens than he.
Arthur Halleck Browx. Among all the pro-
fessions the law perhaps requires the greatest amount
'of study along lines generally accepted as uninter-
esting, for the physician in the greater majority of
cases becomes absorbed in scientific investigation at
the beginning of his reading, the educator's interest
is quickened by the possibilities which lie before him
in the field of instructing the minds of youth, and
the minister enters upon his labors with mind il-
lumined and heart attune. The hard facts of law
that have to be learned by themselves, and so learned
that the understanding is quickened into the com-
prehension that may later be drawn upon before
judge and jury, have very often discouraged a stu-
dent at the outset and have resulted in his turning
to a much easier vocation. Not so, however, with
Arthur Halleck Brown, one of the leading members
of the Billings legal fraternity, and senior member
of the firm of Brown & Tilford. Mr. Brown did not
commence his career as a lawyer, but once he had
entered upon his profession he became an interested
devotee of his difficult vocation, and since his ad-
mission to the bar has maintained and even further
developed this interest with the passing of each
year.
Mr. Brown was born November 12, 1880, at Win-
amac, the county seat of Pulaski County, Indiana,
a son of E. R. and Emma (March) Brown. The
Brown family originated in England, from whence
the original immigrant came to America during the
colonial days and settled in New Jersey, and the
great-great-grandfather of Arthur H. Brown en-
listed from that colony for service as a soldier of
the Continental Line during the Revolutionary war.
Ira Brown, the grandfather of Arthur H., was born
in Salem County, New Jersey, and was a pioneer
into Pulaski County, Indiana, where he followed
agricultural pursuits throughout a long and honor-
able career, and died at the age of fifty-eight years,
prior to the birth of his grandson. He married
Sophia Blew, a native of Indiana, born near Brook-
ville, Pulaski County, who died at the age of eighty-
four years.
E. R. Brown was born in 1846, in Pulaski County,
Indiana, and during the past twenty-five years he
has been a resident of Monticello, that state, where
he is a prominent merchant and banker, a leading
and public spirited citizen, an elder for many years
in the Presbyterian Church, and a republican and
member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
During the Civil war he served as a soldier of the
Union for four years, during which time he partici-
pated in twenty-seven of the leading battles. He
was a member of the Twenty-seventh Regiment, In-
diana Volunteer Infantry, and among his engage-
ments were Chancellorsville, Antietam and Gettys-
burg, following which his regiment was transferred
from the Army of the Potomac to the Army of the
Cumberland, and with the latter took part in Gen-
eral Sherman's famous March to the Sea. The
Twenty-seventh Regiment was one of the hardest-
fighting units of the Union Army and had the third
564
HISTORY OF MONTANA
highest percentage of casualties sustained by any
regiment during the war. Mr. Brown was a brave
and valiant soldier and always at his post of duty,
and during the fierce fight at Antietam received a
severe wound, and still carries this honorable scar.
For many 3-ears he has been prominent in the Grand
Army of the Republic, and in 1906 was department
commander for the State of Indiana. Mr. Brown
married Emma March, who was born in 1859, i"
Pulaski County, Indiana, and they became the
parents of two children: Arthur Halleck; and
Genevieve, who is unmarried and makes her home
with her parents.
Arthur H. Brown attended the public schools of
Monticello, Indiana, where he finished his junior
year in high school. He left school to engage in
the furniture business in partnership with his father,
but after a short experience enlisted in the volunteer
army for service during the Spanish-.\merican war,
in the spring of 1898, as a member of the One Hun-
dred and Sixty-first Regiment, Indiana Volunteer
Infantry. With his command he was sent to Jack-
sonville. Florida, and then to Cuba, where he took
part in a number of engagements, and in May, 1899,
received his honorable discharge and was mustered
out of the service, with an excellent record. Re-
turning to Monticello, he again took up his studies
as a student at Wabash College, Crawfordsville, In-
diana, which he attended from the fall of 1900 to the
fall of 1902. Next Mr. Brown took a course at In-
diana College, Bloomington, Indiana, being grad-
uated with the class of 1903. and the degree of
Bachelor of Arts, and during his college career
joined the Phi Gamma Delta Greek letter social fra-
ternity. When he returned to Monticello he was
associated with his father for three and one half
years in the furniture business, and then re-entered
"Indiana University as a law student. He was duly
graduated in June, 1909, with his cherished degree
of Bachelor of Laws, and as a member of the legal
fraternity of Phi Delta Phi. In the same year he
began practice at Monticello, but in September came
to Billings and formed the law firm of Hathhorn
and Brown. In 1912 he was made receiver for the
First Trust and Savings Bank of Billings, a work
which required his undivided attention until the
spring of 1919, when his task was completed. In
the meantime his partner, Mr. Hathhorn, had died,
and in 1913 there was formed the present firm of
Brown & Tilford, considered one of the strong and
skilled legal combinations of the city. The firm
maintains office at 319 to 322 Securities Building,
and has a long list of prominent concerns upon its
books, its connections as counsel and adviser being
a prominent, formidable and representative one. In
many cases of vast importance the members of this
combine have demonstrated their ability, and both
members are prominent in legal circles.
Mr. Brown is the owner of a modern residence
at -321 Yellowstone .Avenue, a dwelling at 308
N. Lewis Avenue, farms in the Crow Indian
Reservation, and 160 acres of valuable land near
Billings. His political faith causes him to support
the republican party. Mr. Brown is prominent in
fraternal affairs, being a member of Libanus Lodge
No. 154. Ancient Free and .'Accepted Masons, of
Monticello, Indiana ; Billings Chapter No. 6. Royal
Arch Masons ; Aldemar Commandery No. 5, Knights
Templar; Billings Consistor\-. thirty-second degree:
and Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of
the Mystic Shrine, Helena; and of Monticello Lodge,
Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He also be-
longs to the Spanish-American War Veterans and
the Billings Midland Club, and he and Mrs. Brown
hold membership in the Congregational Church.
Mr. Brown was married June i. 1910, at Indianap-
olis, Indiana, to Miss Helen Norris, a graduate of
the Shortridge High School of Indianapolis, and
subsequently a student at Indiana University. She
is a daughter of James C. and Carrie (Vawter) Nor-
ris, the former of whom was engaged in the whole-
sale millinery business at Indianapolis up to the time
of his death. Mrs. Norris still survives and is a
resident of that city. Two children have blessed the
union of Mr. and Mrs. Brown; Edmund Vawter,
born April 19, 1914, and Elizabeth Ann, born March
13, 1918, both at Billings.
George H. Asselstine. The true Western spirit
of progress and enterprise is strikingly exemplified
in the lives of such men as George H. Asselstine, one
of Great Falls honored citizens, whose energetic
nature and laudable ambition have enabled him to
conquer many adverse circumstances and advance
steadily. He has met and overcome obstacles that
would have discouraged many men of less deter-
mination and won for himself not only a comfortable
competency, but also a prominent place among the
enterprising men of this section of the great Treas-
ure State. Such a man is a credit to any community,
and his life forcibly illustrates what energy and con-
secutive effort can accomplish when directed and
controlled by correct principles and high moral re-
solves, and no man is worthier of conspicuous men-
tion in a volume of the province of the one at hand.
George H. Asselstine was born in Kingston, On-
tario, Canada, on April 16, 1875, and is the eldest of
the three children born to his parents, Henry and
Hattie (Bliss) Asselstine. The father, who was
born June 7, 1837, died May 28, 1920, at the age of
eighty-two years, and his wife, who was born in
Louisville, Kentucky, died at the age of twenty-nine
years. Henry Asselstine was first a carpenter by trade,
and subsequently became a railroad contractor, hav-
ing constructed all the bridges on the Northern
Pacific Railroad from the North Dakota state line to
Missoula, Montana, and did other extensive railroad
construction work in the latter state. He retired
from active business when about sixty years of
age.
George H. Asselstine began the serious program
of life at an early age, for when only nine years old
he engaged in selling newspapers on the streets of
Chicago. When eleven years of age he obtained
employment in a book store, at twenty-five cents a
day, but subsequently he again sold newspapers and
shined shoes. In 1890 Mr. Asselstine came to Great
Falls and obtained employment as a clerk in Strain
Brothers' general store, at what then seemed to him
the big salary of ten dollars a month. However,
to Mr. Asselstine the size of the salary was not the
big thing. He was looking ahead, and here he found
the opportunity for which he had been looking, for
here he gained experience o^ the best kind, and so
well did he avail himself of his opportunities and
so efficient did he prove himself in every position
in which he was placed that he was promoted frorh
time to time until eventually he became manager of
the store. He remained identified with that store
for nearly twenty-seven years, enjoying during that
period the fullest measure of confidence on the part
of his employers and the good will of the patrons
of the store. After severing his connection with
Strain Brothers, Mr. Asselstine engaged in the
wholesale fruit and produce business, under the firm
name of Devine & Asselstine. Success attended the
enterprise from the beginning, and now this firm is
the leading concern in its line in this section of the
state. They handle oranges, lemons, strawberries in
season and all other fruits and produce for which
there is a local demand in carload lots and distribute
to practically this entire district.
^. ^ ^2d^te4t5^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
On the 30th of August, 1905, Mr. Asselstine was
married to Nell Short, who was born in Kansas, and
they are the parents of two children, Ruth and
George H.. Jr.
Politically Mr. Asselstine is a stanch supporter of
the republican party and his fraternal relations are
with Great .Falls Lodge No. 214. Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks. He also belongs to the
Commercial Club and the Employers' .Association.
In every relation of life Mr. Asselstine has per-
formed his full duty and because of his faithfulness
and integrity, as well as his perseverance and indus-
try, he has richly earned the high standing which he
now enjoys, his friends being in number as his ac-
quaintances.
Thomas Matthews, M. D. Some one has aptly
said, "He serves the Master best who serves
humanity most." There is no class to whom we
owe more gratitude than the self-sacrificing, self-
denying, noble-minded men whose life work is the
alleviation of suffering and the ministering of com-
fort to the afflicted, to the end that the span of
human existence may be lengthened and a greater
degree of satisfaction enjoyed during the remainder
of their sojourn. Among the physicians and sur-
geons of Western Montana who are proficient in
their chosen calling and are conscientious workers
in the sphere to which their life energies are de-
voted, the name of Dr. Thomas Matthews, of St.
Ignatius, who, while yet comparatively young in
years, has shown a profound knowledge of his
profession.
Thomas Matthews was born at Calumet, Michi-
gan, on December 5, 1881, and is a son of John R.
and Martha (Moreshead) Matthews. John R. Mat-
thews was born in England in 1847 and died at
Calumet, Michigan, in 1892. He came to the United
States in young manhood and settled in Calumet,
Michigan, where he at length became a foreman in
the mines. He was a republican in his political
views. His wife also was a native of England,
born in 1849, and her death occurred in Los An-
geles, California, in 1914. The children born to
this worthy couple were as follows ; John, who
died at Calumet at the age of twenty-one years ;
Elizabeth, who is the wife of Alfred James, chief
mining inspector for the Calumet and Hecla Mining
Company at Calumet ; William, who is a paymaster
in the mines at Calumet ; Anna, who is the wife of
Amos Snyder, who is manager of orfc of the de-
partments in a big store in Los Angeles, California ;
Rhoda is unmarried and lives in Los Angeles ;
Thomas is the immediate subject of this sketch.
Thomas ^latthews received his elemental educa-
tion in the public schools of Calumet, and then was
a student in Ferris Institute at Big Rapids, Michi-
gan, where he was graduated in 1906. Having de-
cided to make the practice of medicine his life
work, Mr. Matthews then matriculated in the med-
ical department of the University of Michigan at
Ann Arbor, where he was graduated in 1910 with
the degree of Doctor of Medicine. He then became
interne in the Northern Pacific Hospital at Mis-
soula, where he remained one year, but in 191 1
he came to St. Ignatius, where he has since re-
mained, engaged in the general practice of medicine
and surgery. Doctor Matthews is also surgeon at
the St. Julian Hospital at St. Ignatius. Doctor
Matthews has built up a large and lucrative prac-
tice, being numbered among the representative cit-
izens of this locality, and known as an able, reliable
and progressive physician. He is esteemed for these
commendable traits, together with his cordial dis-
position and genuine worth, and, although he has
been more or less active in various relations with
his fellow men, his name stands out more prom-
inently in connection with the medical profession,
in which he is a prominent figure.
Politically Doctor Matthews gives his support to
the democratic party. He is a member of the Mis-
soula County Medical Society, the Montana State
Medical Society and the American Medical Associa-
tion. He owns a modern and conveniently arranged
residence in St. Ignatius, and is also the owner of
a splendid ranch located about iJ/S miles north of
St. Ignatius.
Edward O. Sisson. who from 1917 to July, 1921,
was president of the State University of Montana,
has had an exceptional experience in educational
affairs during the past thirty years.
Mr. Sisson was born at Newcastle-on-Tyne, Eng-
land, May 24, 1869, and came to the United States
in 1882. His father, George Sisson, was born at
Lanchester, England, in 1828, and though he also
came to America in 1882 and lived for two years
in Kansas, the rest of his life was spent in Eng-
land.
Edward O. Sisson received his early schooling in
the Royal Grammar School at Morpeth, England.
In 1882 he entered the Kansas State Agricultural
College at Manhattan, graduating with the degree
Bachelor of Science in 1886. The following five
years he taught, two years in rural schools, two
years in the Manhattan High School, and one year
as superintendent of schools at Mound City, Kan-
sas. In the fall of 1892 he enrolled as one of the
first students of the University of Chicago, and
graduated with its first class in 1893, with the A. B.
degree. He is a member of the Beta Theta Pi
college fraternity. In 1892 Mr. Sisson founded the
South Side Academy, which became one of the
best preparatory schools in Chicago. He remained
as its principal until 1897, and at the same time
carried on post-graduate work in psychology and
philosophy at the University of Chicago.
In 1897 Mr. Sisson became director of the Bradley
Polytechnic Institute at Peoria, remaining in charge
until 1904. During 1903 Mr. Sisson spent some
months abroad in Germany on a leave of absence,
doing special work in the University of Berlin and
making a study of the German school system. In
1904 he entered Harvard University, and received
his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1905. His thesis
was "The Protestant Religious Instruction in the
Prussian Schools."
During 1905-06 Doctor Sisson was assistant pro-
fessor of education at the University of Illinois,
and in 1906 came to the Northwest as head of the
Department of Education at the University of
Washington. He remained there until 1912, and
during 1912-13 was head of the Department of Edu-
cation of Reed College in Portland. From 1913 to
1917 he was commissioner of education for the
State of Idaho, and in the latter year entered upon
his duties as president of the State University of
Montana.
Doctor Sisson has served as a member of the
Advisory Council to the Simplified Spelling Board ;
the Revision Committee on Secondary Education
of the National Education Association; is a member
of the American Association for the Advancement
of Science ; the College Teachers of Education ; and
the Religious Educational Association. He is also
a member of the Montana State Educational Asso-
ciation and is president of the Inland Empire Teach-
ers' Association. He is author of "The Essentials
of Character," published in 1910. and is joint author
of The Social Emergency, published in 1913. and
Principles of Secondary Education, published in
1014. He has also published many articles in educa-
tional journals. For a number of years he has
been a popular speaker on educational and other
566
HISTORY OF MONTANA
subjects. At Missoula he is a member of the Cham-
ber of Commerce, the Rotary Club and other local
organizations. In the year 1917 he entered upon
his duties as president of the State University of
Montana, his resignation of that office taking effect
in 1921.
November 29, 1899, at Lawn Ridge, Illinois, Doctor
Sisson married Miss Nellie Stowell, daughter of
Calvin and Priscilla (GreenhalghJ Stowell. Her
mother resides in Los Angeles. Her father was
an Illinois farmer and died at Boise, Idaho, in
1917. Mrs. Sisson is a graduate of the Art De-
partment of Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois, and
also pursued the study of art in Berlin. Doctor and
Mrs. Sisson have two children : Margaret, born
February 19, 1908; and Calvin Richard, born July
12, 1910.
Preston R. Felker is superintendent of schools
at Superior, Montana. He is a graduate of the
University of Montana and has made school work
his profession and was superintendent of schools
in Dakota before he came to Montana.
Mr. Felker was born at Meriden in Jefferson
County, Kansas, December 15, 1887. His paternal
ancestors were Holland Dutch and were colonial
settlers in Pennsylvania. His grandfather, Jacob
Felker, was born in Pennsylvania in 1823 and spent
his life as a farmer in his native state and near
Martinsburg, West Virginia, where he died. He
was a Union soldier in the Civil war. C. H. Felker,
father of the superintendent of public schools at
Superior, was born at Pennsylvania in 1854 and
was reared at Hagerstown, Maryland, and Martins-
burg, West Virginia. After his marriage in Illinois
he moved to Jefferson County, Kansas, where he
developed a farm, and since 1890 has lived in Jack-
son County, Kansas. He is now a retired resident
of Hoyt in that county. He is a republican and a
member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. C. H.
Felker married Agnes V. Fairchild, who was born
at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in 1856. Of their five
children Preston R. is the youngest. Mabel, the
oldest, is the wife of A. B. McCoy, a resident of
Meriden, Kansas ; Horace W. lives on the old home-
stead in Kansas ; Florence is the wife of Charles
Diehl, a funeral director at Emporia, Kansas; and
Calvin died in infancy.
Preston R. Felker attended the rural schools of
Jackson County, Kansas, and graduated in 1912
from the State Normal College at Emporia. The
following two years he was superintendent of
schools at Emarado, North Dakota, and spent three
years in a similar capacity at Egeland, that state.
One year of residence, 1917-18, at the University
of Montana in Missoula gave him the A. B. degree,
and in the fall of 1918 he came to his present duties
as superintendent of schools at Superior. Mr. Fel-
ker has the local school system thoroughly well or-
ganized, with seven teachers conscituting his staff
and an enrollment of 125 pupils. Mr. Felker is also
owner of a farm three miles south of Superior.
He is a member of the Montana State and the
Inland Empire Teachers' Association, is an inde-
pendent voter, a member of the Baptist Church, and
is affiliated with Mountain Lodge No. no. Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, at Superior, Western
Sun Chapter No. 11, Royal Arch Masons, at Mis-
soula, and Coral Chapter No. 70 of the Eastern
Star at Alberton.
August 14, 1912, at Rossville, Kansas, he married
Miss Jessie Doud, daughter of E. S. and Rose
(Stamp) Doud, her mother still a resident of Ross-
ville. Her father, who died in 1909, was a Union
soldier and for many years a mail carrier and pen-
sioner. Mrs. Felker is a graduate of the Rossville
High School, also attended the Kansas State Nor-
mal College at Emporia and the State University
of Montana, and as a teacher spent three years in
the rural schools of Wabaunsee County, Kansas,
two years in the grade schools of Ogden, Kansas,
and one year at St. George, Kansas. Mrs. Felker's
brother, Eventus S. Doud, was in the first draft,
standing fourth on the roll, and was sent overseas
in June, 1918. He was among the American sol-
diers who gave up their lives in October, 1918,
during the Argonne Forest battle. He was awarded
a distinguished service medal.
Frank B. Campbell. One of the worthy native
sons of the thriving city of Missoula is Frank B.
Campbell, secretary and treasurer of the Independ-
ent Oil Company of that city. He is easily the
peer of any of his fellows in the qualities that con-
stitute correct manhood and good citizenship. He
possesses not only those powers that render men
efficient in the material affairs of the community,
but also the gentler traits that mark genial and
helpful social intercourse. In his daily affairs he
manifests a generous regard for his fellows, and
he therefore commands the good will of the people
of the southwestern part of the state, where he has
spent his life.
The Campbell family from wliicli the subject of
this sketch is descended is probably originally of
Scotch origin, though the family eventually became
located in Ireland, whence the subject's great-grand-
father immigrated to the United States, settling in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he spent the re-
mainder of his life and died. Among his children
was Bartley Campbell, who was born and spent his
entire life at Pittsburgh. He was a contractor and
builder by vocation and was a veteran of the Civil
war. He married Bridget Lavey, a native of County
Clare, Ireland, and to them was born Hugh B.
Campbell, father of the subject of this review.
Hugh B. Campbell was born in 1868 at Pittsbiirgh,
Pennsylvania, and accompanied his parents on their
removal to Montana in 1876. They finally settled
in Missoula, and here he was reared and educated.
For twenty years he was successfully engaged in
the transfer business, and then, from 1907 to 1909,
he served as sheriff of Missoula County, to which
office he had been elected on the democratic ticket.
Upon the expiration of his official term, Mr. Camp-
bell bought from Mentrum & Briggs the Western
Montana Electric Company, which he owned and
operated up to 1914. In the following year he es-
tablished the Independent Oil Company, of which
he is still the owner and which is now incorporated.
The company does a wholesale oil business, sup-
plying the trade of Missoula and the neighljoring
country. The Independent is one of the leading
oil companies of Western Montana and is enjoying
a well deserved prosperity. The officers of the
company are as follows: President. Hugh B. Camp-
bell ; vice president, Hugh Campbell, Jr. ; and secre-
tary and treasurer, Frank B. Campbell.
Politically Mr. Campbell is a stanch supporter of
the democratic party, in the ranks of which he has
been an active worker for many years, and he
served as a member of the city board of aldermen
for fourteen vears. He is a member of the Roman
Catholic Church, of Hell Gate Lodge No. 383,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and of
the Missoula Chamber of Commerce. Hugh B.
Campbell was married to Mary Kelley, of Provi-
dence, Rhode Island, where her birth occurred in
1872. To them have been born the following chil-
dren: Frank B., the immediate subject of this re-
view : Hugh, Jr., who is now a student in the Mon-
tana State University, at Missoula, and who is a
senior member of the Iota Nu Greek-letter college
^ ^ l/t^ff-^^^--^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
567
fraternity; Ursula is a graduate of the Sacred Heart
Academy at Missoula, and is now teaching at the
Target Range School in Missoula County; May is
a student at Sacred Heart Academy ; and Charles
H. attends St. Joseph's Academy.
Frank B. Campbell, who was born at Missoula
on July 8, 1892, was reared at home and secured a
good elementary education in the public schools of
Missoula, graduating from the high school. He
then became a student in Notre Dame Universitj',
Notre Dame, Indiana, where he was graduated in
1914, with the degree of Bachelor of Laws. The
following year he became actively identified with
the Independent Oil Company, which was. at that
time organized by his father, and he has since de-
voted himself to that company.
Politically Mr. Campbell is an independent dem-
ocrat, and his religious connection is with the Roman
Catholic Church. Fraternally he is a member of
Missoula Council No. 1021, Knights of Columbus,
and of Hell Gate Lodge No. 383, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks. He is also a membefr of
the Rotary Club and the Chamber of Commerce.
In September, 1916, at Sioux City, Iowa, Mr.
Campbell was married to Helen Coen, daughter of
M. J. and Naomi (Weber) Coen, of Spokane, Wash-
ington, where Mr. Coen is manager of the Crescent
store. Mrs. Campbell is a graduate of St. Mary's
Academy and of Notre Dame University at Notre
Dame, Indiana. Mr. and Mrs. Campbell are the
parents of one child, Frank, Jr., born on September
16, 1917-
Mr. Campbell has succeeded in his work because
he has labored earnestly and honestly, doing well
whatever he has undertaken and keeping himself
well posted on the trend of the times in material,
civic and moral evolution. His conduct has been
such as to inspire the confidence and respect of his
fellow men.
Simeon S. Hobson. The best title one can estab-
lish in the high and generous esteem of an intelligent
communitv is a protracted and honorable residence
therein. Simeon S. Hobson, one of the best known
and most highly esteemed citizens of Central Mon-
tana, has resided here for many years and his career
has been a most commendable one in every respect,
well deserving of being perpetuated on the pages
of an' historical work of the nature of the one in
hand. He has been a man of well defined purpose
and has never failed to carry to successful comple-
tion any enterprise to which he has addressed him-
self. Coming to Montana when it was a compara-
tively new country and under many unfavorable
auspices, but knowing that the country was destined
to take a very high rank in the productive localities
of the North, he applied himself closely to his work
and waited for the future to bring .its rewards, so
that today he is one of the substantial and influential
men of the locality.
Simeon S. Hobson was born in Yor'k County,
Maine, on the 29th of April, 1839, and is the son of
Enoch and Nancy (Strout) Hobson, both of whom
were also natives of the State of Maine. They are
both deceased, the father dying at the age of seventy-
five years, and the mother when sixty-five years of
age. " Of their eight children, the subject of this
sketch is the second in order of birth and is also
the only survivor. Enoch Hobson devoted his entire
active life to agricultural pursuits. He was a faith-
ful member of the Free-will Baptist Church and in
politics was an old-line whig.
Simeon S. Hobson received his educational train-
ing in the district schools of his home community
and in Limerick Academy. When but fifteen years
of age he obtained employment as clerk in a general
store for one year, for which he received his board
and forty dollars. For his second year's service he
received his board and one hundred and twenty-five
dollars. In 1865 Mr. Hobson went to Davenport,
Iowa, and obtained employment with W. C. Words-
worth & Company, a wholesale dry goods firm.
Starting in as an inside man, he soon afterward be-
came a traveling salesman for the company, and
eventually acquired an interest in the business, with
which he was connected up to 1879. In the spring
of the following year Mr. Hobson went west as far
as Ogden, Utah, thence by rail to the end of the
narrow-gauge railroad in Idaho, thence by stage to
Helena, Alontana. Here he engaged in the cattle
business, being one of the pioneers in that business
in the Judith Basin. He had many herds of cattle
in the mountain ranges and in North Dakota. He
also gave considerable attention to the raising of
sheep in Fergus County. He had altogether many
thousands of both kinds of animals, in the handling
of which he was very successful. During this same
period he was also interested in farming. He con-
tinued the stock business over twenty-five years, but
of late he has cut down the cattle and sheep herds
to a comparatively small size, and has turned his
attention to the raising of wheat, having put out
7,000 acres to wheat in 1918 in Fergus, Cascade and
Teton counties. Because of the drought in that year
he did not get his seed back in the next crop, but,
nothing daunted, he repeated the same planting the
following season. Again the weather conditions were
unfavorable and the results were the same, but Mr.
Hobson feels that the tide is bound to turn in his
favor, so does not feel discouraged with his experi-
ence so far as a wheat raiser. Mr. Hobson has
taken a keen interest in the general development of
the communities where he has been interested in a
business way, and has contributed in various ways
to the development of the country. He was the
organizer of the Fergus County Bank at Lewistown
and was president of that institution for twenty-two
years. He has been eminently public spirited in his
attitude on the vital questions of the day and ren-
dered appreciated service as a member of the State
Constitutional Convention. He also served as a
state senator from the Twelfth (Lewistown) Dis-
trict in the sixth session. Mr. Hobson usually
spends the rigorous months of mid-winter in Cali-
fornia and expects hereafter to spend the mid-sum-
mer months in Maine.
Politically Mr. Hobson has been a life-long sup-
porter of the republican party. Fraternally he is a
member of Lewistown Lodge, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons. He is also a member of the
Great Falls Commercial Club. He has never sought
to be a leader in the aiifairs of the locality, merely
striving to live up to the standard of good citizen-
ship. _ Because of his sterling qualities of character,
his kindly manner and his business success he has
richly earned and today -enjoys to a remarkable de-
gree the friendship and good will of the entire popu-
lace.
John G. Howe is a graduate dairyman from the
agricultural school of the University of Minnesota,
and for twenty years has been successfully engaged
in the creamery business. He has managed plants
in several communities in Minnesota and Washing-
ton, and for over ten years has been manager of
the Bitter Root Co-operative Creamery Company,
one of the largest establishments of its kind in
Western Montana.
Mr. Howe, who is also a banker of Stevensville,
was born in Kellogg, Minnesota, February 9, 1879.
His grandfather Howe came from Germany and
settled at an early day in Illinois. Peter Howe
HISTORY OF MONTANA
was born in Illinois in 1841 and was a pioneer
farmer at Kellogg, Minnesota. He is still living
there, and is a prominent and widely known citizen
of that section. He is president of one of the
leading banks of Kellogg. He is a republican and
member of the Catholic Church. Peter Howe mar-
ried Elizabeth Baker, who was born in Illinois.
Their children are: Kate, wife of Peter Schierts,
connected with a feed and coal company at Helena,
Montana; John G. ; Elizabeth, wife of Peter Steiber,
a farmer at Kellogg, Minnesota ; Marie, a teacher
in the schools of Stevensville, Montana; Celia, wife
of Lynn Efilsticker, a farmer and pure bred cattle
raiser at Wabash, Minnesota.
John G. Howe attended the public schools near his
home at Kellogg, and was graduated in the dairy
course from the Minnesota Agricultural College
at St. Anthony's Park in 1899. He left college to
become assistant manager of the creamery at Man-
kato, Minnesota, remained there a year, filled a sim-
ilar position for a year at Belle Plaine, another year
at Detroit, Minnesota, and four years at Oakland,
Minnesota. Prior to coming to Montana he was
assistant manager of a large creamery at Spokane,
Washington, three years. Mr. Howe was called to
the management of the Bitter Root Co-operative
Creamery Company of Stevensville in 1908. This is
a highly successful concern, the president of the
company being George Kinneman, the vice presi-
dent P. B. Liddell, the secretary Mr. Howe and
treasurer Ben Wood. The plant is located a quar-
ter of a mile east of Stevensville.
Mr. Howe is also vice president of the First Na-
tional Bank of Stevensville. He owns a modern
home in the town on Park Street. He has served
as alderman, is a republican in politics, and is a
citizen who works for the good of the community
at every opportunity. May 4, 1904, at Oakland, Min-
nesota, he married Miss Ruby Parsons, a native of
Mankato, Minnesota. They have three children:
Warren, born October 13, 1905; John George, Jr.,
born September 21, 191 1; and George Quinton, born
May 14, 1919.
Lillian G. Miller, M. D. While Montana has
had a number of women physicians, and is justly
proud of their record, two interesting distinctions
belong to Doctor Miller, one in the fact that she was
the first woman physician to hold the office of county
physician in the state. She also established the first
and only hospital at Hamilton, now a city institution.
Doctor Miller is a thoroughly trained and com-
petent member of her profession. She was born
at Baltimore, Maryland, and when she was a small
girl her parents moved to Emporia, Kansas, where
her father became a farmer. She is a daughter of
August and Julia (Baker) Miller, both natives of
Germany. Her father was born in 1843 and came
to this country at the age of seventeen, living for
a number of years in Baltimore, where he followed
the trade of shoemaker. Soon after he came to
this country the Civil war broke out and he joined
a New York regiment of infantry and was all
througb the struggle. At Gettysburg he was shot
through both cheeks. He followed farming at Em-
poria, Kansas, for twelve years, and in 1893 moved
to Milwaukee, where he engaged in the real estate
and grain business. He died at Milwaukee in 1902.
He was a republican. His widow is still living at
Milwaukee. Doctor Miller had six brothers and
sisters: Margaret, wife of George S. Kelley, a re-
tired resident of Ontario, California; George
Edward, who was a broker and died at Milwaukee
at the age of forty-nine ; Carrie M., living at Hamil-
ton, Montana, widow of Perry Baker, an attorney
of that city; Rose, wife of Charles Hoffbauer, who
is a ranch owner near Billings, Montana, and lives
in Milwaukee, Wisconsin ; Emma, wife of George
Mayne, in the steel business at Brooklyn, New York;
and Nellie, wife of J. M. McGill, of Louisville, Ken-
tucky.
Doctor Miller acquired her early education in the
public schools of Emporia, Kansas. She completed
her freshman year in the high school, and finished
her high school course at Milwaukee. Preliminary
to her medical work she was a professional nurse.
She took the nurses' training course at the Hahne-
mann Hospital Training School in Chicago, and
was a graduate nurse in Chicago for four years.
She then entered the Woman's Medical College at
Baltimore, where she received her M. D. degree in
1906. For I J/2 years she was resident physician
at the Endowood Sanitarium for Tuberculosis.
Then after a vacation and a period of considerable
travel she located at Billings in 1909 and engaged
in active practice there for three years. While at
Billings she was appointed county physician, being
the first woman in Montana to receive that honor.
She moved to Hamilton in 1912 and established the
Hamilton Hospital, but six months later turned the
institution over to the city. Since then she has been
busy with a general medical and surgical practice
and has offices in the First National Bank Build-
ing. She has served as county physician of Ravalli
County. Doctor Miller is a republican, a member of
the Presbyterian Church, is affiliated with the Re-
bekahs at Hamilton and is also a member of the
Women's Benefit Association, formerly the Ladies
of the Maccabees. She belongs to the Woman's
Club. Her home is in the Coulter Block.
C.\PT. Earl Mathias Welliver, who is county
contractor for Ravalli County, has been a resident
of Hamilton since 1908. He served with the rank
of captain in the National Army during the World
war, and for a number of years was an officer in
the New York National Guard. He has had a
widely diversified experience as a teacher, public
official, merchant and is an all around business man.
Captain Welliver was born at Muncy, Pennsyl-
vania, January 3, 1872. His paternal ancestors came
out of England and were colonial settlers in New
York and Pennsylvania. His father, Mathias Wel-
liver, was born in Pennsylvania in 1827, and spent
all his life in that state. He married at Lairdsville
and after his marriage moved to Muncy, where
he was a hotel proprietor and real estate dealer.
He was also a breeder and owner of trotting horses.
His experience and qualifications as a horse man
made him valuable to the Confederate Government
during the Civil war. For two years he was cap-
tain of a company of Pennsylvania cavalry on active
duty at the front. The last two years of the war
his services were even better placed in the remount
department, where his knowledge of horses made
him especially useful. He was a democrat in poli-
tics. Math'as Welliver married for his first wife
a Miss Crawford, a native of Pennsylvania. Her
children were : Mrs. Jane Maniville, of Pennsyl-
vania : James, who owned a flouring mill and died
at Williamsport, Pennsylvania, at the age of thirty-
two; Florence, of Williamsport, Pennsylvania, widow
of Sam Lehman, who was a foreman in the machine
shops of that city; and McClelland, a hotel proprie-
tor at Williamsport. For his second wife Mathias
Welliver married Julia Gregory, who was born in
New ^'ork State in 1843 and is still living at Ham-
ilton, Alontana. Her ancestors were Scotch-English.
Both the Welliver and Gregory families were repre-
sented by soldiers in the American Revolutionary
HISTORY OF MONTANA
569
War. Mrs. Julia Welliver had two children : Myrtle,
wife of F. H. Bailey, a civil engineer at Hamilton,
Montana, and Earl Mathias.
Earl Mathias Welliver acquired his early educa-
tion in the public schools of Muncy, Pennsylvania,
graduating from high school in 1887. In 1889 he
graduated from the State Normal School at Mans-
field, Pennsylvania, and for one year was a teacher
in Lycoming County. In 1891 he engaged in mer-
cantile business at Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, was
there two years, and was a merchant at Elmira,
New York, until 1896. He continued in business
at Buffalo, New York, until 1908. Captain Welliver
came to Hamilton, Montana, on July i, 1908. His
first duties here were as purchasing agent for the
L. E. Myers Company, a Chicago contracting firm
which constructed the big ditch of the Bitter Root
Valley. He was with that firm six months, and then
became department manager of the Valley Mer-
cantile Company, a post of duty he held until Au-
gust, 1917.
On February 21, 1892, Captain Welliver enlisted
as a private in the Thirtieth Separate Company of the
New York State Guards at Elmira. He was trans-
ferred to the Seventy-fourth Regiment at Buffalo in
April, 1896. He was promoted from private to cor-
poral, sergeant, first sergeant, first lieutenant and
captain, and resigned his captain's commission when
he came west in 1908.
Though not subject to the draft, Mr. Welliver on
account of his previous military experience en-
tered the Officers' Training Camp at The Presidio,
California, in August, 1917. He was commissioned
a captain of infantry and was on duty at Camp
Lewis, Washington, as instructor in the officers'
training camp and assistant inspector and instructor
for the school of small arms. Captain Welliver was
mustered out and given his honorable discharge
February 5, 1919. He then resumed his residence
at Hamilton, where as county contractor he is
engaged in the important work of classification of
lands in Ravalli County. His offices are in the
courthouse.
Captain Welliver is a republican, is past master
of Ionic Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, is affiliated with Hamilton Chapter No.
18, Royal Arch Masons, with Crusade Commandery
No. 17, Knights Templar, and is inspector general
of the Knights Templar for the State of ^lontana.
He is also a member of Algeria Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Helena. His home is at 516 Sixth
Street.
In 1896, at Elmira, New York, Captain Welliver
married Miss Ida McNeal Rockwell, a daughter of
Andrew and Julia (McNeal) Rockwell, both deceased.
Her father was a contractor and builder at Elvira.
Mrs. Welliver is descended from the first white
child born in Chemung County, New York. Captain
and Mrs. Welliver have five children. Two of their
sons were members of the military establishment of
the Government during the late war. The oldest
son. Earl R., was born October 2, 1896, attended the
Hamilton High School through his junior year, and
for two years, 1916-18, was in Alaska with the Alas-
kan Engineering Commission. He is now assisting
his father. The son Julian, born October 29, i8g8,
also at home, enlisted April 17, 1917, spent one year
in Texas, six months in England and six months
in France, as a member of the Aviation Corps.
Edwin, born July 5, 1902, was sixteen years of age
when he joined the navy at San Francisco in March,
1918, and was on duty with a submarine chaser until
mustered out January 20, 1919. The two younger
children, twins, are Frank and Harrison, born Sep-
tember 8, 1915.
F. R. FuLSHER, M. D., C. M. Present coroner
of Mineral County, a physician and surgeon at Sal-
tese. Doctor Fulsher has had wide experience and
possesses the finest talents and has spent many
}'ears in the service of various large corporations,
particularly railroads, organizing and building up
hospitals
Doctor Fulsher was born in the City of Winni-
peg, Canada, June 19, 1881, at a time when Winni-
peg consisted largely of a small settlement around
old Fort Garry. His grandfatlier, William Fulsher,
was a native of England and an early settler at
Port Hope, Ontario, where he died. Fred Fulsher,
father of Doctor Fulsher, was born at Port Hope,
Ontario, in 1828, and as a young man moved to
Western Canada, to Winnipeg, where he married
and where he kept his residence the rest of his
life. For several years he had some successful ex-
perience as a placer miner in the Caribou District
in British Columbia. He died at Winnipeg in 1890.
He was a conservative in politics and a member of
the Masonic fraternity, and as a youth had served
in the Canadian Militia in Ontario. Fred Fusher
married Jean Gibson, who was born at Kildonan,
Manitoba, Canada, in 1833, and is still living, a resi-
dent of Winnipeg. The date of her birth shows that
her family was one of the very first in the western
wilderness of Canada. Her father, William Gibson,
came over with the original Lord Selkirk colony of
Highland Scotch, who made the first settlements in
the Red River Valley of what is now the Province
of Manitoba.
Dr. F. R. Fulsher was educated in the public
schools of Winnipeg, graduated from the Collegiate
Institute there in 1898 and received his A. B. degree
from the University of Manitoba in 1900. He took
his medical studies at McGill University in Mon-
treal, graduating M. D., C. M. in 1904. Doctor Ful-
sher spent two years as an interne in the Du Brett
Sanitarium at Banff, British Columbia, and for two
years was provincial health officer of the Province
of Alberta. For eighteen months he was associ-
ated in practice with Dr. M. D. McEwen at Head-
ley, British Columbia. In order to restore his
health, seriously impaired by overwork, he spent two
years traveling in Europe, Japan and throughout
the Orient. Returning to Seattle, Washington,
in igo8. Doctor Fulsher was given the responsi-
bility of handling the construction work for the
D. & R. Hospital Association for the Great North-
ern Railway at Wellington, Washington. He was
engaged in that work one year, and then at the
Dalles, Oregon, was chief surgeon for construction
work of the D. & R. Hospital Association, and also
for the S. P. and S. and Oregon Trunk Railways.
For a short time Doctor Fulsher was located at
Marysville, Montana, and since then has been en-
gaged in a general medical and surgical practice at
Saltese. With that town on the western border
of Montana as his home and headquarters he is
surgeon for the Milwaukee Railway System, the
Mann Lumber Company, the Cooper Monihan Lum-
ber Company, and the Richmond Mine and Milling
Company. He is also coroner of Mineral County.
Doctor Fulsher votes as a democrat, and is affili-
ated with La Combe Lodge, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, in Alberta, Canada, and with Hell
Gate Lodge No. 383 of the Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks. He married at Helena in
191 1 Miss Rachel Pepworth, daughter of William
and Margaret (O'Hara) Pepworth. Her parents
are residents of Cascade, Montana, where her father
is police judge of the City Court and city clerk.
Doctor and Mrs. Fulsher have one daughter, Mar-
garet Jeane, born September 28, 1913.
570
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Gust Moser has been identified with the country
of Western Montana over thirty-five years. His
present home is at Saltese, almost on the western
line of the state, but as a lawyer, business man,
miner and public official his name is widely known
and esteemed throughout several of the counties m
that part of the state.
Mr. Moser was born at Alma, Wisconsin, Sep-
tember 17, 1863. His grandfather, Conrad Moser,
was born at Zurich, Switzerland, in 1805, and came
to this country with members of his family. He
was a Lutheran minister and he also developed a
vineyard at Alma, Wisconsin, and spent many years
in caring for that property. He died there in 1899.
Conrad Moser, Jr., father of the Montana lawyer,
was born in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1832, was reared
and married in his native land, and shortly after
his marriage he and his wife, Verona, came to the
United States. They lived for a time at St. Louis,
Missouri, where he was a teacher in the public
schools. He also studied law and was admitted to
the bar at St. Louis. For a number of years he
practiced law successfully in Wisconsin, at Alma
until 1872 and at Eau Claire until 1888. Conrad
Moser moved to San Francisco in 1888, and had a
good practice as a lawyer in California until his
death, which occurred at San Francisco, July 4.
1904. While in Wisconsin he represented Buffalo
County in the Legislature and was also probate
judge. He was a republican and a member of the
Masonic order. His wife was born at Grabunden,
Switzerland, in 1827, and died at Alma, Wiscon-
sin, in 1869. She was the mother of four children:
Louise, of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, widow of Carl
Ulrich, who was a teacher in the public schools of
that city; Gust; Robert, a Government employe at
Duluth, Minnesota, and Magdalene, a teacher at
Monrovia. California.
Gust Moser was educated in the public schools
of Alma and Eau Claire, Wisconsin, graduating
from high school in 1883. On the first of October
in the same year he arrived in the Bitter Root Val-
ley of Montana, and for four years was engaged in
the real estate business. Following that he was sec-
retary until 1895 of the Missoula Mercantile Com-
pany. In the meantime he had studied law, and
after his admission to the bar in June, 1895, prac-
ticed with home and offices in Missoula until Sep-
tember I, 1898. At that date he was appointed super-
visor of the Lewis and Clark Forest Preserve. This
was the first preserve in Montana taken over by the
United States Government. He continued as a
supervisor until 1904, and the following year he
served as timekeeper for the Montana Ore Pur-
chasing Company at Butte. Removing to Thomp-
son Falls in Sanders County, he was the first county
clerk of that county, from February I to December
31, 1905.
For the past fifteen years Mr. Moser has been
a resident of Saltese, and has handled many cases
in civil and criminal law arising in this section of
the state. He maintains offices in Saltese, while his
home is at the head of Packer Creek, five miles
northwest of Saltese. He has a mining claim there
and through many years has been interested in min-
eral production. Mr. Moser is chairman of the
Board of Trustees of the local government of Sal-
tese. He is a republican and is a past chancellor of
Laurel Lodge No. 11, Knights of Pythias, at Mis-
soula, and a member of the Fourth Judicial Bar
Association, being vice president for Mineral County.
In 1896, at Missoula, he married Miss Tessie Mor-
ris, a native of Oregon. They have three children :
Gust, Jr., born March 17, 1902, was educated for
two years in the Lewis and Clark High School, has
also taken a course in electrical engineering with
the International Correspondence School, and is em-
ployed by the Montana Power Company at Taft,
Montana ; Edith, born April 23, 1903, is in the first
year of the high school at Saltese ; Dan, born Janu-
ary 28, 1908, is a pupil in the country schools.
Charles D. Eliot. There can be no impropriety
in scanning the acts of any man as they affect his
public, social and business relations. In this work
will be found mention of worthy citizens of all vo-
cations, and at this juncture we are permitted to
offer a resume of the career of one of the sub-
stantial and highly esteemed citizens of Great Falls,
where he has not only attained a high degree of
success in his chosen field of labor and enterprise,
but also established a splendid reputation for upright-
ness in all the relations of life.
Charles D. Eliot was born on a farm in Andros-
coggin County, Maine, on July 2, 1855, and is the
son of Rev. John and Arabella (Berry) Eliot. The
father was born in West Nottingham, New Hamp-
shire, October S, 1800, and his death occurred in
1877. After completing his common school studies
he became a student in Gorham (Maine) Seminary.
Then, having decided to devote his life to the min-
istry of the Gospel, he became a student in Troy
Theological Seminary, and pn the conclusion of his
studies he was ordained a minister in the Congre-
gational Church. He became a successful missionary
among the Indian tribes in the western part of New
York State for a number of years. Later he be-
came pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Lewis-
ton, New York, where he remained for ten years.
Then for the long period of thirty years he was
pastor of the First Congregational Church at Rum-
ford Point, Maine, where his death occurred. He
was a man of scholarly attainments, ripe experi-
ence and fine pulpit ability, being remarkabl}'. suc-
cessful in his ministerial labors. Politically he was
first a whig and later a republican. Mrs. .A.rabena
Eliot was born in Lisbon, Maine, on December 25,
1820, and died in 1889. She became the mother of
five children, of whom two are living.
Charles D. Eliot received his elementary education
in the public schools, after which he became a stu-
dent in North Bridgewater Academy, completing
his educational training in Kent's Hill Seminary,
Maine. His first independent employment was at
farm work, at which he was employed during two
summers, at seven dollars per month. He then
•went to Boston, where he became bookkeeper for
the Barstow Stove Company, which position he filled
for about ten years. In 1884 Mr. Eliot came to Mon-
tana, locating at Oka, where he was employed in
herding sheep for Charles E. Severance. A year
later he engaged in the sheep business on his own
account, about eight miles from Belt, Cascade
County. He was engaged in the sheep business there
for about fifteen years, when he sold out there and
located on the American Fork in that part of
Meagher County which is now Wheatland County,
where he again became extensively engaged in the
raising of sheep. In 1909 he sold out his interests
there and going to Great Falls engaged in the fire
insurance business. He has been very successful in
this line and is representative here for five of the
leading fire insurance companies of the country.
He is energetic and a good business man, which,
with the innate courtesy which always characterizes
his business dealings have gained for him the good
will and esteem of all who know him. Mr. Eliot is
vitally interested in the growth and development
of the city of his adoption and is a stockholder and
director in the Commercial National Bank and treas-
urer of the Great Falls Cemetery Association and
director in the Great Falls Building Association.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
On the 5th of December, 1900, Mr. Eliot was mar-
ried to Eleanor L. Tracy, who was born in Phila-
delphia, Pennsylvania. They are the parents of one
daughter, Eleanor, who is the wife of Seldon S.
Rodgers and the mother of three children, Seldon
T., Oliver Eliot and Eleanor Lind.
Politically Mr. Eliot has always been an ardent
supporter of the republican party, and has taken
an intelligent interest in local public affairs. In
1892 he was elected county assessor of Cascade
County, and was re-elected to the office in 1894,
serving two terms. For the past ten years he has
been a member of the school board and rendered
effective service in the cause of the school system of
this city. His religious membership is with the
Congregational Church, of which he is a generous
supporter. Such men as he are a credit to any
comm.unity, and his life forcibly illustrates what
energy and consecutive effort can accomplish when
directed and controlled by correct principles.
J. L. Hartman has been in Montana over thirty
years, was long identified with timber contracting
and ranching, and still has much valuable property
in the western part of the state, but his time for
the past six years has been given to his official duties
as sheriff of Sanders County.
Mr. Hartman was born in Summit County, Ohio,
near the City of Akron, February li, 1865. His
people have been Americans for nearly a century.
His father, John Hartman, was born in Bavaria,
Germany in 1817, and in 1826, at the age of nine
years, came to this country with his parents and also
his grandfather, all of whom thenceforth were
thrifty American citizens. The family located at
Buffalo, New York, where John Hartman lived until
he was sixteen years of age. For a number of years
he lived at Akron, Ohio, where he married and
where he followed the cooper's trade. From 1878
to 1898, twenty years, he was a farmer at Chanute
in Neosha County, Kansas, and at the latter date
retired and came to Plains, Montana, where he
died in 1901. He was a democrat and a member
of the Catholic Church. His wife was Barbara
Geugel, who was born in Germany in 1832 and
died at Portland, Oregon, in 1908. They had a
large family of children : Barbara, of Portland,
Oregon, widow of Anthony Metzler, who was a
sawmill foreman ; John, who for the past twenty
years has been foreman of the track department
of the Street Railway Company at Grand Rapids,
Michigan ; Mary, who died in childhood ; Chris, a
retired railroad man living at Thompson Falls, Mon-
tana ; Frank, road master for the Chicago, Mil-
waukee & St. Paul Railway at Avery, Idaho; J._L.
Hartman, who was the sixth in age ; Henry, section
foreman for the Northern Pacific Railroad living
at Frenchtown, Montana ; Mrs. Mattie Ellinger, wife
of a hotel man at Portland, Oregon ; Laura, wife of
Phil Sheehan, their home being on a farm ten miles
out of Portland ; and Arithony, who is a traveling
engineer for the Canadian Pacific Railway, with
home and headquarters at Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
J. L. Hartman received his early advantages in
the public schools of Ohio, and after he was thirteen
years of age attended school at Chanute. Kansas. He
"lived on his father's farm to the age of twenty-one,
and on March 9, 1887, coming to Montana, located
at Thompson Falls. The following year he was a
brakeman with the Northern Pacific Railway. Leav-
ing the railroad service he became a timber con-
tractor, and for about twenty years most of his
time was spent in the lumber districts of Western
Montana. He then located on his ranch and began
farming, which he continued until 1911, when he
sold most of his ranches. He now owns 160 acres
of valuable irrigated land on Trout Creek, and has
much real estate, including a modern home at
Thompson Falls, two dwelling houses in the same
city and a dwelling at Plains. When he left his
ranches in 191 1 he retired to Plains, but not being
satisfied to have no regular business he established
a stage route from Plains to Camas and from Plains
to Elmo. He sold that two years later, and in the
fall of 1914 was elected sheriff of Sanders Count}'.
Mr. Hartman was re-elected in 1916 and 1918, and
has given an administration of his office of which
his friends are deservedly proud.
While living on his ranch Mr. Hartman also served
on the School Board at Whitepine. He is a re-
publican in politics, is affiliated with Ponemah Lodge
No. 63, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and
Plains Lodge of Odd Fellows, and is a former mem-
ber of the Modern Woodmen of America. ^
In 1886, at Fredonia, Kansas, he married Miss
Ida Cowen, daughter of David and Caroline (Har-
ney) Cowen. Her parents are now deceased. Her
father was a farmer in Kansas and afterward in
Missouri.
William H. Shipley for the past eleven years has
been superintendent of public schools at Plains. ^ He
has spent the greater part of his active life as a
teacher and school administrator but has also had a
varied experience in business and other affairs.
Mr. Shipley was born at Boscobel, Wisconsin,
April 27, 1875. He is of English ancestry, the Ship-
ley family having first settled in the State of Dela-
ware. His father, John T. Shipley, was born in
Pennsylvania in 1849 and as a young man went to
Branch Cou"ty. Wisconsin, and is still living in
that section of the Badger State. For over forty
years he has been a leading merchant at Boscobel
and is still active and looking after his business
affairs every day. He has served as member of
the town council many years and in politics is a
democrat. John T. Shipley married in Grant County,
Wisconsin, Mina Josephine Miles, who was born in
Kansas in 1854. William H. is the oldest of their
children. Cora is the wife of George W. Rice, a
traveling salesman living at Onalaska, Wisconsin.
Albert and John T., Jr., are both traveling salesmen
and live at Madison, Wisconsin. Josephine is the
wife of John R. Mufiley, Jr., a printer at Rochester,
Minnesota. Walter Evan, the youngest, is a busi-
ness man of Madison.
William H. Shipley attended school at Boscobel,
graduating from high school in 1894. He then ac-
quired a year of experience teaching in rural schools
of Crawford County, Wisconsin, and for two years
was principal of the graded schools at Seneca, that
county. For another two years he was principal
of the Ljmxville schools in Crawford County. Leav-
ing school work, Mr. Shipley engaged in the mercan-
tile business at Hurlbut in Crawford County, Wis-
consin, but at the end of two years sold out and
entered the State Normal College at Whitewater,
Wisconsin, graduating in 1903. He did a year of
post-graduate work in the University of Wisconsin,
and from there came to Montana and took special
studies in the Montana State College at Bozeman
during 1906. During that year he was also principal
of the Irving School at Bozeman. Mr. Shipley had
charge of the department of physics and chemistry
in the Gallatin County High School at Bozeman
in 1907, and in 1008 came to Plains as superintend-
ent of schools. The splendid school system of this
town owes much of its advancement to the wise
guidance of Mr. Shipley during the past eleven
years. Plains has two school buildings, a staff of
ten teachers, and an enrollment of 200 scholars. Mr.
Shipley owns a modern home at Bozeman. He is
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a member of the State Teachers' Association, is
past master of Ponemah Lodge Xo. 63, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, and is a republican and be-
longs to the Methodist Episcopal Church.
In 1897, at Boscobel, Wisconsin, he married Miss
Katherine M. Roan, daughter of Martin W. and
Mary (Fitch) Roan, both deceased. Her father was
a farmer in Crawford County. Wisconsin. Mr. and
Mrs. Shipley have two children: Leila JiL, born
July 16, 1900, is a graduate of the Plains High
School and is now in the second year of the State
University of Montana at Missoula ; Josephine, born
December i, 1906, is in the eighth grade of the gram-
mar schools at Plains.
Frank Dallin, proprietor of the Montana Tent
and Awning Company, is one of the prosperous and
enterprising business men of Butte, and one who
stands very high among his associates because of
his honorable methods and prompt service. He was
born at Spring\'ille, Utah, on May 19, 1885, a son
of Cyrus Dallin, also a native of Utah, born at Lehi
City, that state, in 1857. His death occurred at
Eureka, Utah, in 1907. Reared at Spring^-ille, Utah.
Cyrus Dallin attended its schools and lived there
uiitil after his marriage, when he went to Idaho and
did' some ranching as one of the pioneers in that
industry there. During the pioneer days of Montana
he came to Deerlodge County, and followed mining
in the old Cable Mine, being one of the first to
work it. Becoming very prominent in politics, he
held the oilfices of constable, road supervisor and
others of a local character, and never lost his interest
in civic afTairs. He belonged to the Ancient Order
of United Workmen.
Cyrus Dallin was united in marriage with Ella
Fuller, born in Springville, Utah, in 1859, who died
at Thousand Springs, Idaho, in 1893, having borne
her husband the following children : Mabel, who
married William Hardy, now deceased, a railroad
man. later became the wife of Earl Bradshaw, and
they live at Salt Lake City, LTtah, where he has a
laundry delivery business ; Frank, who is the second
in order of birth ; Guy, who is a veteran of the
great war, was trained at Camp Lewis, became a
sergeant, and was mustered out in the spring of
1919. following which he went to Seattle, Washing-
ton, where he is now employed in a shipyard ; and
Ella, who married A. W. Young, of Salt Lake City,
Utah, where he is employed in Walker's Bank of
that city.
Frank Dallin attended the Eureka High School
through the freshman year, and then, when between
the ages of seventeen and eighteen years, he left
school and enlisted in the United States navy, serv-
ing from January, 1903, to May, 1906, along the
coast in Atlantic and Mexican waters and among
the West Indies, and also along the Pacific coast.
He was at Panama several times. Entering the
service as a third class apprentice, he was mustered
out as a first class seaman, .•'ifter receiving his
honorable discharge he returned to Utah and fol-
lowed mining until 1909. in which year he became
fireman for the Rio Grande Railroad, with head-
quarters at Salt Lake City, L'tah, and held that
position until 1912. For tlie next year Mr. Dallin
was engaged in mining at Park City, Utah, and then,
becoming interested in the tent and awning business,
he went to Los Angeles, California, and learned the
trade, located at Butte, Montana, in 191 5. and alter-
nated working at his new trade and mining for a
year. Then, in 1916, he established his present busi-
ness, under the caption of the Montana Tent & .Own-
ing Company, and since then has developed it into
the leading business of its kind in Silver Bow
County. The offices and plant are located at 17
North Arizona Street, Butte. Mr. Dallin is a re-
publican. Formerly he belonged to the Odd Fellows.
His modern residence, which he owns, is at 1125
Stewart Street.
In the spring of 1913 Mr. Dallin was married at
Salt Lake Citj', Utah, to Miss Eva Mitchell, a daugh-
ter of William and Minnie (Thayer) Mitchell, and
they have one daughter, Dorothy Romana, who was
born on April 3, 1914.
Mr. Dallin is a real American, his family having
been established in this country by his great-grand-
father, Tobias Dallin, born in England in 1807, who
died at Springville, Utah, in 1892. While living in
England he owned and operated a large ship
rigging establishment at Liverpool, but after he
came to the United States he lived in retirement.
His son. the grandfather of Frank Dallin, was John
Dallin, and he was born at Liverpool, England, and
died at Springville, Utah, in 1917. During his
younger days he was a sailor, and it was through
his influence that Frank Dallin decided to enlist in
the navy. As a young man he accompanied his
father to the United States, and located at Spring-
ville, Utah, where he was married to Mary Llewel-
lyn, a native of Wales, who died at Springville, LTtah.
.\t first after coming to Utah John Dallin was a
railroad contractor, but later, during their pioneer
period, he engaged in merchandising at Silver City
and Nanti, Utah. His next venture was conducting
a summer resort on the lake at Geneva, Utah, but
he finally settled at Springville, Utah, where the re-
maining years of his useful life were spent in honor-
able retirement.
Frank Dallin is still in the very prime of vigorous
manhood, and yet he has had many experiences and
learned through them to take a broad view of life,
realizing that different surroundings produce other
conditions from those of his immediate vicinity. His
business is now absorbing him, but with his varied
knowledge and keen judgment, especially with refer-
ence to men and their motives, he no doubt will in
time interest himself in public affairs, and when he
does it is safe to predict he will act in the same
capable manner that has characterized him hitherto.
Judge P.\trick James Whittv. While for the
past five years he has performed some important
official duties at Butte as police magistrate. Judge
Whittj's career from boyhood has been identified
with the mining industry, and he was a mine worker
when he first came to Butte more than thirty years
ago.
Judge Whitty was born in Schuykill County, Penn-
sylvania, May 30, 1858, and had a public school edu-
cation. He was a boy worker in the mines of Penn-
sylvania and in 1887 came into the mining district
of Montana. He has performed all the labor in-
cident to mining precious minerals, from under-
ground worker to shift boss and siiperintendent of
mines. He was elected police magistrate of Butte
in May, 1915, and was re-elected in 1917. He has
also held the offices of assistant city clerk, deputy
clerk and treasurer of Silver Bow County. Judge
Whitt\- and family are members of the Church of
the Immaculate Conception.
June 26, 1880, at Williamstown, Pennsylvania, he
married Miss Mary Ann Courtney (sister of the
late Senator Courtney, one of the framers of the
Constitution of Montana). They have two children.
Mary Frances is the wife of Bernard Noon, a prom-
inent Butte attornej'. Margaret is the wife of Wil-
liam Harrison Shannon, also a resident of Butte.
John D. McDonald. The gentleman whose life
history is here taken under consideration is one
of the strong, sturdy characters who have con-
^-^^du^^7U/'^0<n^^cut^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
573
tributed largely to the material welfare of the com-
munity where he lives, being a business man of
more than ordinary sagacity and foresight, and as
a citizen, public-spirited and progressive in all that
the term implies. He is ranked as one of the lead-
ers in business circles in Great Falls and one of the
most representative citizens of that community, and
yet a plain, unassuming, straightforward gentleman
whom to know is to admire and respect.
John D. McDonald was born in Green Valley,
Glengary, Ontario, Canada, on January 23, 1865,
and is the son of Donald S. and Mary (McLach-
lan) McDonald. Donald McDonald was born in
Canada and died in 1914, in the eighty-sixth year of
his age. He was enga.ged in the lumber business
and was one of the pioneers in that industry in
Alcona County, Michigan. There he engaged in
farming and stock raising, which occupied his at-
tention until his death. Politically he was a sup-
porter of the democratic party and his religious
membership was with the Roman Catholic Church.
His wife, who was born in Scotland, passed away
in Michigan, May 14, 1920, at the age of eighty-four
years. Of the seven children born to them two are
still living.
John D. McDonald received his education in pri-
vate schools and early learned the meaning of labor,
for at fourteen 3'ears of age he found employment
in a mill, piling staves, at a wage of fifty cents a
day. During the following summer he picked ber-
ries and then spent the following winter in a lumber
woods. After spending the following summer driv-
ing teams. Mr. McDonald became a clerk in a general
merchandise store, where he remained until 1893, the
summer of which year he spent in Chicago. In the
fall of that year he came to Great Falls, Montana,
and engaged as a clerk with Strain Brothers. Two
years later, in 1895, Mr. McDonald engaged in busi-
ness on his own account, opening a boot and shoe
store, and he has been so engaged continuously to
the present time. He carries a large and well
selected line of shoes, and his store is today con-
sidered one of the leading houses of the kind in Great
Falls. Because of the quality of his goods, the fair-
ness of his prices and the courteous and prompt
service he extends to his customers, he has built up
and retains a large and satisfied list of patrons.
Politically Mr. McDonald is a democrat, but is
not a seeker after public ofiice, though while a resi-
dent of Michigan he served five successive years as
township clerk. Fraternally, he is a life member of
the Great Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks.
On February 4, 1901, Mr. McDonald was married
to Anna Dolliver, who was born in Gloucester, Mas-
sachusetts. To them have been born five children,
three sons and two daughters, namely: John D.,
Jr., Mary, Lydian, Donald P. and Joseph. Mr. and
Mrs. McDonald are justifiably proud of the school
record of their eldest child, John, who in May, 1919,
won the state declamatory championship in the
annual contest between the high schools of the state.
The Great Falls Daily Tribune of May 19, 1919,
had the following mention of this event : "Great
Falls high school is rejoicing that for the second
time in two consecutive 'years students from the
local school have won state honors in the declam-
atory contest. Thursday night, at the State Uni-
versity in Missoula, John McDonald of this city and
Eloise Wilson of the Gallatin County high school
won the title of state champions in declamation
in their respective classes, following the elimination
of nearly half a hundred of the picked speakers in
the state. John McDonald, who is a prominent
member of the junior class at Central higl^ school
here, is sixteen years of age and is the son of Mr.
and Mrs. John D. McDonald. His subject was 'The
Cremation of Sam McGee,' the fa.mous poem by
Robert \V. Service."
Because of his high personal character and his
genial manner, Mr. McDonald has won and retains
the confidence and esteem of the people of Great
Falls. He stands stanchly for the best things in
community life, giving his support to every measure
looking to the upbuilding of the community in any
laudable way.
Walter J. Sewell. Among the men who have
attained to deserved distinction among the honor-
able business men of Butte is Walter J. Sewell,
hardware merchant and public-spirited citizen. He
was born in New Brunswick, Canada, on June 3,
1876, a son of George H. Sewell, and grandson of
Thomas Sewell. The Sewell family came originally
from Wales to the American Colonies, from whence
they emigrated to Canada.
Thomas Sewell was born in New Brunswick,
Canada, in 1816, and died in that province in 1880,
having spent his entire life there, and during all of
his mature years he carried on farming. George H.
Sewell was also born in New Brunswick, Canada, in
1841, and he died at Helena, Montana, in Decem-
ber, 1913. He was reared, educated and married
in New Brunswick, and there all of his children
were born. In 1883 he began working for the
Canadian Pacific Railroad, and was employed as a
carpenter on bridge construction through British
Columbia. In 1885 he came to Anaconda, Montana,
and worked at the old smelter and then in different
parts of the state as a miner and lumberman. With
the discovery of gold in Alaska he went to the new
gold fields and remained there for two years. Re-
turning to Anaconda in 1898, he was employed as a
carpenter in the Washoe Reduction Works until
1913. In the latter year he went with a crew of car-
penters to Hurley. New Mexico, and was employed
in the construction of a new smelter plant and for
the Chino Copper Company for a year, when he was
stricken with apoplexy. His son, Walter J. Sewell,
went after him and brought him back to Montana,
and after a short stay at Butte, took him to a hos-
pital at Helena, where he died. He was a republican
in his political faith, and a very active member of
the Masonic fraternity.
Walter J. Sewell attended the parochial schools of
New Brunswick, Canada, until he was twelve years
old, when he began to be self-supporting and ob-
tained employment rafting logs on the Saint John
River and followed that for two years. For the
subsequent years he was a clerk in a dry-goods
store at Fredericton, New Brunswick, and then
spent two years in a plumbing business. For five
years he worked as a carpenter at Fredericton, and
then, in 1898, went to Vancouver, British Columbia,
Canada, and spent two months. In M-ay, 1898, he
came to the United States and for six years worked
as a journeyman carpenter at Butte. At the expira-
tion of that period he began contracting and build-
ing on his own account and was engaged in this
line of industry for seven years, during that time
erecting Saint Mary's Parochial School and Holy
Saviour Parochial School and a number of resi-
dences and other buildings. In 1911 Mr. Sewell en-
tered the hardware business, establishing his present
store at 221 East Park Street, which he has de-
veloped into a very prosperous enterprise, and ex-
panded his lines until he now carries hardware,
paints, plumbing material, sporting goods and auto-
mobile accessories. Mr. Sewell owns the building
in which his business is located and a modern resi-
dence at 524 Caledonia Street.
As a democrat Mr. Sewell casts his vote and ex-
574
HISTORY OF MONTANA
ercises his influence. He belongs to the Roman
CathoHc Church and Butte Council No. 668, Knights
of Columbus, in which he has been made a Fourth
Degree Knight. In addition to these connections he
is a member of the Robert Emmett Literary Asso-
ciation, the Ancient Order of Hibernians and the
Friends of Irish Freedom.
In igoi Mr. Sewell was married at Seattle, Wash-
ington, to Miss Agnes Kelly, a native of Iowa.
Mr. and Mrs. Sewell have the following children :
Walter J., who was born on July 6, 1902, and Bar-
'bara, who was born on December 31, 1903, one of
triplets and the only survivor, the others having
died in infancy.
Mr. Sewell is a man who has advanced because
he set a goal and worked steadily toward it. He
is recognized as an honorable man and a citizen who
is interested in the further development of large
interests of Butte and Silver Bow County, and will-
ing to do his full part toward bringing this about.
Daniel R. Fisher. Throughout an active and
interesting career duty has ever been the motive of
action of Daniel R. Fisher, one of the representa-
tive business men of Great Falls. He has performed
well his part in life, and it is a compliment worthily
bestowed to say that his locality is honored in his
citizenship, for he has achieved definite success
through his own efforts. He is thoroughly deserv-
ing of the proud American title of self-made man,
the term being one that, in its better sense, cannot
but appeal to the loyal admiration of all who are
appreciative of our national institutions and the
privileges afltorded for individual accomplishment.
It is a privilege to meet a man who has had the
courage to face the battles of life with a strong
heart and steady hand and to win in the stern con-
flict by bringing to bear only those forces with
which nature has equipped him, self-reliance, self-
respect and integrity.
Daniel R. Fisher was born in Humansville, Polk
County, Missouri, on the sixth day of July, 1878,
and is a son of Oliver W. and Euphemia (Robin-
son) Fisher, both of whom are still living. Oliver
W. Fisher was born in Ohio in 1842, and was there
reared and educated. In young manhood, fired by
the stories of fortune to be found in the great West-
ern Eldorado, he started overland with cow teams
for California. The journey was a long and tire-
some one and was not without its thrills, one of
which was an attack by Indians near Salt Lake.
After his arrival in California he engaged in pros-
pecting and teaming. Meeting with only ordinary
success in California, Mr. Fisher returned to Ohio
by way of the Isthmus of Panama, landing at New
York City. Later he went to Canada, where he was
engaged in the operation of a flour mill, and while
living there he was married. Some time later he
returned to the States, locating first in Kentucky,
whence he went to Missouri, locating at Orleans,
where he ran a mercantile business and operated a
grist mill for some time. Later he located at Hu-
mansville, where he also engaged in the flour mill
and mercantile business. He was one of the or-
ganizers of the Farmers and Merchants Bank, of
which he became president. He also operated a
flour mill at Bolivar, Missouri. He became inter-
ested in construction work as a contractor, erecting
many bridges on the line of the Kansas City, Clin-
ton & Springfield Railroad. He also established a
sawmill and lumber business at Winona. Missouri,
and afterward took over the Cordy-Fisher Lumber
Company at Birch Tree, Missouri. Later he moved
to Springfield. Missouri, and established a sawmill
at Fisher, Louisiana, where he established and laid
out a town site. He was one of the organizers of
the Louisiana Central Lumber Company and a num-
ber of other lumber companies in the South, includ-
ing a number of large sawmills at different points.
In igo6 Mr. Fisher came to Montana, locating at
Bozeman, where he had a mercantile establishment
and also constructed a large flour mill at Belgrade,
Montana. He became interested in a string of
thirty elevators and was numbered among the larg-
est handlers of grain in this part of the state. He
helped to organize the Gallatin Trust and Savings
Bank at Bozeman, and became president of the
Fisher Mercantile Company, which had stores lo-
cated at Bozeman, Missoula, Red Lodge and Great
Falls, under the name of the Golden Rule Stores.
In 1912 Mr. Fisher removed to Seattle, Washington,
having established at that place tlie Fisher Flour
Mills, with a daily capacity of 6.000 barrels of flour,
making it the largest flour mill west of Minneapolis.
He was also interested in the organization of one
of the largest lumber companies in the West, oper-
ating its own mill. He_ is also financially interested
in a number of banks in Washington. Among the
companies in which he is interested is the Snoqual-
mia Falls Lumber Company, which has at Sno-
qualmia Falls one of the largest and most complete
lumber plants in the world. Associated with Mr.
Fisher in all these industries are his five sons. Will
P., Burr, O. D., Daniel R. and O. W., Jr., and his
daughter, Lulu, the wife of W. W. Warren. He is
a republican in his political views, and is a member
of all the different Ijodies of the Masonic order, in-
cluding the thirtj'-second degree of the Scottish
Rite.
Daniel R. Fisher was reared and educated at Hu-
mansville, Missouri, after which he became a student
in Colorado University. He was also a student in
Wentworth Military Academy at Lexington, Mis-
souri. His first employment was in a lumber camp
in Southwestern Missouri, near Birch Tree, where
he worked in the capacity of bookkeeper in a store
operated by his father. He then went to Boulder,
Colorado, and assumed the management of a store
owned by Fisher Brothers, himself and brothers
being the co-partners in the enterprise. Later lie
went to Missoula, Montana, where he helped to or-
ganize the Fisher Mercantile Company.
Some time afterward he went to Red Lodge,
where he was in charge of a large mercantile es-
tablishment for a time. In 1902 he came to Great
Falls, where he operated the Fisher Mercantile Com-
pany's store for about a year, following which he
located at Belgrade, Montana, and served as man-
ager of the Gallatin Valley Milling Company. In
1916 Mr. Fisher returned to Great Falls in order
to be better in touch with a string of about thirty
elevators operated by the Gallatin Valley Milling
Company. This is a large enterprise and requires
administrative ability of a high order, but Mr,
Fisher has demonstrated his ability in no uncertain
way and enjoys a well-earned reputation as a strong,
sensible and shrewd business man. He was made
president of the Farmers Bank of Belgrade at the
time of its organization, holding that office until he
changed his residence to Great Falls. He is a direc-
tor of the Gallatin Trust and Savings Bank and is
vice president and general manager of the Gallatin
Valley Milling Company. He is also secretary and
treasurer of the Chambers-Fisher Mercantile Com-
pany at Bozeman.
On June 23, 1908, Mr. Fisher was married to May
B. Bennett, who was born in Butte. Montana, the
daughter of Rev. and Mrs. J. W. Bennett. To this
union have been born three children, Daniel R., Jr.,
Bennett I. and George O.
Politically Mr. Fisher takes an independent atti-
tude, preferring to vote for the men and measures
HISTORY OF MONTANA
575
which meet his approval. Fraternally hf is a mem-
ber of Great Falls Lodge, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons ; Bozeman Chapter No. 12, Royal
Arch Masons; St. John Commandery No. 12,
Knights Templar; Great Falls Consistory, Scottish
Rite; Algeria Temple; Ancient .Arabic Order Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine at Helena ; Bozeman Lodge
No. 463, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks,
as well as the Commercial Club of Great Falls.
Mr. Fisher has realized a large and substantial
success in the business world, and is known as a
man of action rather than words. He is eminently
utilitarian, and energy of character, firmness of
purpose and unswerving integrity are among his
chief characteristics. He occupies a large place in
connection with the productive energies and activi-
ties of life and is eminently worthy of specific men-
tion in a work of the character of the one in hand.
John J. Greene. Judge of the Nineteenth Dis-
trict Court, and though one of the youngest of
si.x judges in Montana, has behind him ample
e.xperience and qualifications for the varied duties
of his office, and his work on the bench has
thoroughly justified the confidence of members of
the bar and general citizenship who recommended
and supported the recommendation of the governor
when Judge Greene was allotted these responsi-
bilities.
Judge Greene was born on his father's farm in
Allamakee County, Iowa, December 4, 1887, son of
Levi N. and Alice B. (Bulman) Greene. His father
was born in Pennsylvania in 1844, and at the age of
seventeen, in 1862, enlisted in Company H of the
Ninth Iowa Infantry. He was with his regiment
in every skirmish and battle in which it partici-
pated, and was all through the Atlanta campaign
and the march to the sea under Sherman. At the
close of the war he was mustered out in 1865, and
soon afterward engaged in farming on what is
known as the New Galena Farm in Allamakee
County, Iowa. He farmed successfully, and when
well advanced in years, in 1892, he was ordained a
minister of the Methodist Church. He then sold
his farm, and during the rest of his life devoted his
time to the church and the cause of humanity. He
died at Delhi, Iowa, in 1906. He was a member of
the Grand Army of the Republic and a republican
in politics. Levi N. Greene's wife was born in Alla-
makee County, Iowa, was married there and is still
living in that community. Of her si.x children one
died in infancy. The others are: Marion, wife of
Arthur Moorehouse; Grace, wife of Edward Bar-
gendale ; Carrie M. ; Leonard, who married Ger-
trude Reiner; and John J.
Judge Greene grew up a minister's son, graduated
from the Delhi High School in Iowa in 1906, then
attended Upper Iowa University at Fayette, and pur-
sued his law studies in the law department of the
University of Minnesota. He was graduated in law
in 1912 and was admitted to the Minnesota bar. In
the spring of 1913 he came to Montana, was ad-
mitted to the bar in March of that year, and at once
began making himself known in his profession at
Conrad. He was soon elected county attorney in
the fall of 1914, and served one term in that office.
In the spring of 1917 he became associated with
George Cofltey, Jr., under the firm name of Coflfey
& Greene. They had a large law practice in Teton
County until Mr. Greene was called from active
practice by the appointment of Governor Stewart
as judge of the Nineteenth District on March 8,
1919.
Judge Greene is a member of the Delta Phi Delta
law fraternity, Choteau Lodge No. 44, Ancient Free
Vol. u— 37
and -A.ccepted Masons ; Choteau Chapter No. 25,
Royal Arch Masons, and Bethany Commandery No.
19 of the Knights Templar.
.'\ugust I, 1914, he married Miss Alice Timmis.
Their three children are Alice Joan, Frank Timmis
and John J., Jr.
Nick Ba.\tz. The business career of Nick Baatz,
a popular and successful business man of Great
Falls, is one that should encourage others to press
on to greater achievements ; for when a boy he set
to work to overcome all difficulties that might lay
in his path to success and the high standing which
he now enjoys is the result. Earnest labor, un-
abating perseverance, a laudable ambition and good
management are the elements by which he has as-
cended the steppes.
Nick Baatz was born on Mach 17, 1861, in Haller,
LaRochette, Luxemburg, and is the son of John
and Annie (Kessler) Baatz. The father, who also
was a native of Haller, died in 1902, at the age of
eighty-eight years. He was a distiller and foreman
on the banks of the Rhine for twenty-five years, and
was also engaged in getting out ship timbers and in
farming. His wife, who was born in Bayford, died
on August 19, 1903, at the age of seventy-six years.
The subject of this sketch is the third child in order
of birth of the seven children born to this worthy
couple, five of the children being still alive.
Nick Baatz left his native country when eleven
years of age, immediately after the close of the
Franco-Prussian war, and located in Verdun,
France, where he was employed as a hotel clerk.
In 1880 he came to the United States and managed
to obtain six months' school training in Ohio. In
1881 he made the long overland journey to Mon-
tana, locating at Helena, where he engaged in the
manufacture of brick for Nick Kessler. Some time
later Mr. Baatz went to Marysville, Montana, and
engaged in contracting as a hauler, carting wood
for the Drumline Mine Company. Then he em-
barked in the wholesale liquor business, in addition
to which he gave some attention to mining, running
the Belmont Quartz Mill, in all of which enterprises
he was fairly successful. In 1890 Mr. Baatz moved
to Flathead County, Montana, and established a
brick yard at Columbia Falls, manufacturing the
first brick made at that place. Two years later he
moved to Great Falls and engaged in the manufac-
ture of carbonated drinking waters, in connection
with the sale of which he also conducted a 'whole-
sale liquor and cigar business. During the same
period he was also engaged in the real estate busi-
ness, handling a great deal of land and improved
properties in Great Falls and vicinhy. In 1919 Mr.
Baatz quit the liquor business and engaged in the
liquid carbonated gas business in Billings, this state.
He soon sold that business, however, and organized
a company with a capital stock of a quarter of a
million dollars, known as the Washington Liquid
Gas Company. They are now engaged in the erec-
tion of a building and the completion of a plant,
which is to go into operation in the winter of 1919.
Of this company Mr. Baatz is the president and
controlling spirit, and, being a man of practical ex-
perience and good business judgment, no doubt the
business will prove a wise investment.
On August 29, 1898, Mr. Baatz was married to
Elizabeth Zimmerman, a native of Cincinnati, Ohio.
Politically Mr. Baatz is an earnest supporter of the
republican party and takes a keen interest in public
affairs, though in no sense is he a seeker after public
office. Fraternally he is a member of the Knights
of Pythias and the United Commercial Travelers*
-Association. Genial and whole-souled, Mr. Baatz
is very approachable and makes friends easily, en-
576
HISTORY OF MONTANA
joying a large and varied acquaintance, among whom
he is deservedly popular.
Mathias Kranz is the veteran florist and green-
house man in Montana, having been in that business
continuously at Great Falls nearly thirty years. It
has been a lifelong pursuit with him. As a boy he
learned floriculture and gardening while working
on the grounds of the ex-Kaiser William in Ger-
many. He has what is probably the largest business
of its kind in the state.
Mr. Kranz, whose name has long been a synonym
of integrity and good citizenship in Great Falls, was
born in Prussia November i8, 1864, youngest of the
eight children of Mathias and Lucille Kranz. His
parents spent all their lives in Germany. His father
was a soldier and died in 1869, at the age of seventy-
one, his wife passing away two years later.
Mathias Kranz attended the common schools of his
native land to the age of fourteen, and then served
four years apprenticeship in the landscape depart-
ment of the Imperial Government. At eighteen he
came to America, and for a year or so lived at
Minneapolis, where he was associated with his
brother Peter in the truck gardening business. Sell-
ing out his interests to his brother he came to Great
Falls April 7, 1890, but during the greater part of
that year found employment at Helena. In Decem-
ber he returned to Great Falls, and soon afterward
bought some lots and during 1891 started the first
hothouse in Great Falls. At first his line of produc-
tion was Tettuce and other vegetables, but gradually
he enlarged his enterprise for the growing of flowers
exclusively. He now has an immense plant, 40,000
square feet under glass, and the fame and ap-
preciation of his productions are by no means con-
fined to the community of Great Falls, though that
city gives him his chief market.
Mr. Kranz is a democrat, a Catholic, a member
of the Catholic Order of Foresters, Woodmen of
the World, Modern Woodmen of America, of The
Eagles, and a member of Great Falls Lodge No. 214
of the Elks.
February 11, 1896, he married Miss Annie Ster-
gart, of Great Falls, daughter of Charles and Lizzie
Stergart. They have two children : Charles M.,
born June 9, 1898, and Lillian Dorothy, born No-
vember 15, 1899.
Arthur Perham. proprietor of the Montana
Cadillac Company at Butte, has been a figure in the
automobile business in Montana for the past five
years, and for a number of years prior to that time
had enjoyed places of trust and responsibility in
banking and other business institutions.
Mr. Perham represents a pioneer family in the
Northwest. He was born at The Dalles, Oregon,
August 25, 1876. His father, the late Judge Eugene
L. Perham, was one of the prominent pioneers of
the State of Oregon. He was born in the State of
Maine in 1828. of Scotch and English ancestry. The
Perhams settled in Massachusetts in colonial times.
Judge Perham came overland to Oregon at the age
of twenty-one. During his residence at The Dalles
he was associated with the Oregon Steam Naviga-
tion Company. He also studied law. was admitted
to the Oregon bar, and served two terms as judge
of Wasco County. He enjoyed much influence
among the pioneers on account of his exceptional
education and his many versatile talents. In 1888
he retired from business and removed to Portland,
where he died in 1893. He was a member of the
Masonic fraternity. Judge Perham married Martha
Lona Geary, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1840
and is living at Portland in her ninetieth year.
There were seven children in the family. Harriet,
the oldest, is a resident of Portland, widow of Hon.
J. F. Van Name, a prominent attorney and judge of
Cowlitz County. Washington. H. \\'. Perham is a
contractor and builder at St. Anthony, Idaho. Edwin
Geary is a general contractor at Marshfield, Oregon.
W. T. Perham is a resident of Glendive, Montana,
and a general contractor. Arthur is the fifth in
age. Margaret is the wife of George E. Waggoner,
of Portland Oregon, but a prominent oil operator in
^yyoming and Texas. Benjamin A., the youngest,
lives at North Yakima, Washington, and is pro-
prietor of the Perham Fruit Company, an organiza-
tion that ships a large volume of northwestern fruit
over the United States.
Arthur Perham attended the public schools of
Portland to the age of fifteen. In 1893 he graduated
from the Portland Business College and subse-
quently took a course in higher mathematics at the
Holmes Business College. His first regular employ-
ment was with the Northwest Loan and Trust Com-
pany, remaining there four years. For three years
he was associated with his brothers, E. G. and H. W.
Perham, in the contracting business. Mr. Perham
came to Butte in 1896, and for a time was employed
as a laborer under W. A. Clark. He was advanced
to timekeeper, and for three years was foreman of
the Mine Timber Framing Plant. For one year Mr.
Perham was employed as foreman at White Sulphur
Springs, Montana, under his brothers, the contrac-
tors. Returning to Butte he entered the State Sav-
ings Bank, beginning as head bookkeeper, and re-
mained with that institution for twelve years,
eventually being its cashier. In the meantime he
served seven months as state manager of the Pru-
dential Life Insurance Company. When the bank
was closed in 1914 he assumed the responsibility of
looking after the interests of two business concerns,
the Tuolumme Copper Mining Company and as
manager of the State Savings and Realty Company.
In March, 1915, Mr. Perham entered the automo-
bile business. At first he owned an interest in the
Barry Motor Company and later bought out the
other stockholders and reorganized as the Montana
Cadillac Company, of which he is now sole pro-
prietor. This company has the state agency for the
Cadillac cars, and under Mr. Perham are sub-dealers
in Montana. Fifteen men are in the service of his
personal organization at Butte. The offices and
garage and service station are at 22-26 East Quartz
Street, while the salesrooms are at the corner of
Granite and Alaska streets. In recent years Mr.
Perham has turned over an immense volume of
business in Montana to the Cadillac Company.
In politics he is a democrat, and is a member of
Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, and Oswego Lodge No. 9, Knights
of Pythias. He is very prominent in the Knights
of Pythias order, being past chancellor commander
of his lodge, past grand chancellor of the State of
Montana, and for the past twelve years has been
grand master of the exchequer. Other interests and
avocations are indicated by his membership in the
Rotary Club, the Silver Bow Club, the Country
Club of Butte, the Butte Curling Club, Butte Ad-
vertising Club, Rocky Mountain Rifle Club, Butte
Rod and Gun Club and the Young Men's Christian
Association.
Mr. Perham owns a modern home at 1009 West
Platinum Street. August 29, 1907, at Butte, Mr.
Perham married Miss Anna Louise Dee, daughter
of Thomas and Mary Dee. Her mother resides at
Butte and her father, deceased, was one of the
early blacksmiths in this city. Mr. and Mrs. Per-
ham have three children : Margaret, Elizabeth and
Ruth.
^^^^.t^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
577
John Edward Foley. The development of the
oil interests of the country forms one of the most
important chapters in its industrial history. Asso-
ciated with this remarkable expansion are the names
of those men who have assisted in bringing about
present day conditions, and one of them is that
borne by John Edward Foley, division manager of
the Continental Oil Company of Great Falls, Mon-
tana, who makes his headquarters at Butte. Mr.
Foley was born at Ottawa, Illinois, on April 25,
187S, a son of James Foley, and grandson of John
Foley, the latter having been born in Ireland in
1796. John Foley founded the family in the United
States, coming to this country in young manhood
and locating at Ottawa, Illinois, during its pioneer
period, and assisting in bringing it out of that con-
dition and into one of settled business interests.
After arriving at Ottawa, the alert young Irishman
was married to one of the native daughters of Ire-
land, Marv Lvnch, who had also settled in that
village.
James Foley was JMrn at Ottawa, Illinois, in
1852, and is still a resident of his native city, where
he was reared, educated and married, and where
he was engaged in blacksmithing until his retire-
ment. He is a democrat in politics and a Roman
Catholic in his religious convictions. James Foley
was married to Elizabeth Kendrick, born at Ottawa,
Illinois, in 1855, and they became the parents of the
following children; John Edward, vi-ho is the eldest;
Dennis J., who died at Leadville, Colorado, in 1904,
was connected with the Continental Oil Company;
W. H., who lives at Salt Lake City, Utah, is asso-
ciated with the Continental Oil Company; James J.,
who lives at Albuquerque. New Mexico, is also as-
sociated with the Continental Oil Company ; and
Clara Elizabeth, who married R. I. Wills, lives at
Ottawa, Illinois, her husband being associated with
the Chicago. Burlington & Quincy Railroad.
John Edward Foley was educated in the public
schools of Ottawa, Illinois, being graduated from
its high scliool course in June, 1896. following
which he went to Denver, Colorado, for a few
months, and thence to Grand Junction. Colorado,
where he began to work for the Continental Oil
Company as one of its agents, and so continued
until October, 1897, when he left for Leadville,
Colorado, to assume the responsibility of utility
clerk for the same company. So capable did he
prove himself that further confidence was shown
in him by his promotion to be special agent, and he
held that position until May, 1904. At that time he
was made a traveling salesman for the c6mpany,_
covering Eastern Montana, with headquarters at"
Butte, and this continued to be his work until in
October, 1907, when he was called to Denver, Col-
orado, to become chief clerk for the company. In
September, 1913, Mr. Foley was returned to Butte
as assistant division manager. He received his final
promotion on January i. 1920, when he was made
division manager of all the northern section of
Montana. His rise has been remarkable, and en-
tirely through his own merits. From the start he
displayed such a grasp of the business, such capa-
bility for handling details that his superiors ad-
vanced him from one position to another until he
has now reached the top of his division. Mr. Foley
is not a man easily deceived in men or their motives,
and one of his qualifications for his continued pro-
motion has been his ability to handle his men. His
knowledge of the oil business, and particularly the
field covered by the Continental Oil Company, is
thorough, and gained through personal experience,
so that his judgments are authoritative and so rec-
ognized.
In his political views Mr. Foley is a democrat, but
he has not had the time to do more than exercise his
right of suffrage. The Roman Catholic Church
holds his membership, and he belongs to Butte
Council No. 668, Knights of Columbus, of which
he is a Fourth Degree Knight; and Leadville Lodge
No. 236, Benevolent Protective Order of Elks.
The offices of the Butte plant of the Continental
Oil Company are located at No, 1321 Kaw Avenue,
and those of the Great Falls plant are on Eighth
Avenue, South, Butte.
In April, 1910, Mr. Foley was married at Ottawa,
Illinois; to Florence Sinon, a daughter of W. J. and
Julia (Bossenin) Sinon, both of whom are living
and reside at Ottawa, Mr. Sinon being a retired mer-
chant. Mrs. Foley was graduated from the Ottawa
High School. There are no children in the Foley
family. Mr. Foley has had the brain and initiative
to rise, and has always been a sound, conscientious
and honorable man in every position which he has
occupied, and always felt that the experience he
gained in one was a great advantage to him in dis-
charging the duties of the one next farther up. In
dealing with other men Mr. Foley has always
claimed that the question of character is more es-
sential than that of talent, and that unless he is
certain that a man is at heart one who has the stay-
ing power, he would rather not take the trouble to
advance him. no matter how brilliant he might ap-
pear. Stability, steadfastness, uprightness in the
smallest detail, and an untiring industry are some
of the characteristics which have raised Mr. Foley
from obscure agent to division manager for one of
the big oil corporations of the country, and they
are ones every man ought to cultivate, even if some
appear to be lacking in his nature, if he desires to
advance beyond the everyday routine and beconie
a worth-while man in his line of business.
Adolph H. Heilbronner. The functions of the
dealer in real estate are' varied and he has many
responsibilities resting upon him. If he lives up to
the highest conceptions of his calling he will en-
deavor at all times to foster a local pride so as to
awaken an interest on the part of the citizens in
their community and make them realize that they
are part and parcel of it, thus starting them on the
right road. When he has accomplished this the
public-spirited realty operator stretches out for
wider fields and endeavors to attract to his city new
blood and capital, so that, in a measure, he develops
the policies of his community, popularizes it and
directs the investment of its revenues and manage-
ment of many of its afifairs, and much of this is
accomplished through individual effort that is never
relaxed. In Butte the part played by the real estate
men is of so important a character that they com-
mand respect and admiration, and one of the men
who has gained a strong position here is Adolph H.
Heilbronner. known to his friends as "Dolph."
Adolph H. Heilbronner was born at Salt Lake
City, Utah, on July 6, 1880, a son of Henry Heil-
bronner, a native of Bavaria, Germany, who died at
Butte, Montana, in 1882. He came to the United
States in young manhood and lived in various west-
ern states coming to Butte in the spring of 1882,
and in all of the places in which he lived he carried
on merchandising. He had just succeeded in open-
ing a crockery and furniture establishment when his
death occurred. Like all young men of his native
land, he served the stipulated time in the Bavarian
army. After coming to the United States he took
out his citizenship papers and supported the candi-
dates of the republican party. In religious faith he
was a Hebrew. For many years he belonged to the
Masonic fraternity. Henry Heilbronner was mar-
ried at Portland, Oregon, to Henrietta Steinhauser,
oil
HISTORY OF MONTANA
born on May I, l8j8, in Bavaria, Germany. She
survives him and makes her home at Butte. Their
children were as follows : Theressa, who married
I. N. Symons, a member of the Symons Dry Goods
Company of Butte; Max, who is a jeweler of Prince
Rupert, British Columbia, Canada; 1. A., who is a
broker of Butte; J. H., who is a partner of Adolph
H. ; Adolph H., whose name heads this review.
Growing up at Butte, Adolph H. Heilbronner at-
tended its schools, and was graduated from the
high school course in 1899. His first business expe-
rience was gained with the Butte Electric Railway
Company, which he served as press agent for the
advertismg department, and although not much
more than a boy displayed what was almost genius
in his handling of the at?airs placed in his hands.
He was one of the prime movers in having Butte's
magnificent playground, Columbia Gardens, estab-
lished and developed. His success in this line en-
couraged him to branch out for himself and in
1910 he left his company and established himself in
the Daly Bank Building as general agent for the
Salt Lake Route, one of Senator Clark's railroads,
and held that position until the road was taken over
by the Government in 1918.
In the meanwhile, Mr. Heilbronner, together with
his brother, J. H. Heilbronner, had established and
built up a large business in real estate and insurance.
Mr. Heilbronner is manager of the Butte Electric
Car Advertising Company; has been the represen-
tative of the Yellowstone Trail, and it is largely
through his efTorts that this trail has been preserved
through Butte ; he has for years been a consistent
"good roads" booster, and inaugurated and operated
the first tourist cars in Silver Bow County. These
cars are specially designed to boost Butte and the
surrounding territory, and through their operation
Mr. Heilbronner has rendered this region a great
service, for by means of them visitors to the city
are enabled to gain some idea of the advantages of
the locality as they could in no other way, and many
are so impressed that they later invest in homes or
business ventures and become valuable adjuncts to
Butte. Mr. Heilbronner is a member of the Rotary
Club, was its first president and helped to organize
the club and is still one of its aggressive members.
He also belongs to Butte Lodge No. 240, Benevo-
lent Protective Order of Elks, and the Silver Bow
Club, and the Butte Ad Club of the Good Roads
Organization. His modern residence at the corner
of Quartz Street and Excelsior Avenue is his prop-
erty, and he is interested in mining. During the
great war Mr. Heilbronner took a very active part
in all of the war work, and as president of the Butte
Ad Club took charge of all of the advertising for
the various drives, generally serving as chairman
of the several committees. Needless to say, all of
the quotas were oversubscribed in each of the
drives.
On October 21, 1907, Mr. Heilbronner was mar-
ried at Portland, Oregon, to Miss Fay Lavenson, a
daughter of Mr. and Mrs. M. Lavenson of that city.
Mr. Lavenson was a pioneer of California and Ore-
gon, and for many years was a merchant of Port-
land, but is now retired. Prior to her marriage
Mrs. Heilbronner was a public school teacher of
Portland. Mr. and Mrs. Heilbronner have three
children, namely: Keith, who was born on January
23, 1910; Julian, who was born October 27, 1912;
and Carol, who was born November 27, 1918.
Mr. Heilbronner has risen through his talents and
efforts to the position in his community to which he
is entitled because of his constructive achievements.
He possesses in marked degree the characteristics
of stability, power of concentration, personality.
general ability and a working knowledge of human
nature which enable him to attain in full measure
the popular heart and confidence, and in all of his
undertakings reaches the understanding of the
public directly and surely. In his business he dis-
plays tact, courtesy, intelligence and sound judg-
ment, while as a citizen he shows in every action
that he possesses that broader sense of responsi-
bility which urges him constantly to forward new
measures for the improvement and expansion of
Butte and Silver Bow County, and he is universally
recognized as a useful and valued representative of
the best interests of this region.
William H. Taylor. Now living retired at Great
Falls, William H. Taylor was on the ground when
this now thriving city was a mere village, and for a
quarter of a century had an active career as a
rancher,^ miner, stock raiser and contractor.
Mr. Taylor, who before coming to Montana was
a veteran English soldier, was born in Lancashire,
England, March 22, i860, a son of William and
Ellen (Ellison) Taylor. His father was a farmer
and died in England in 1866, at the age of thirty-
seven. He was a member of the Church of Eng-
land. Of his five children two died in infancy.- His
widow came to Montana in 1878, and was one of
the early women to domicile in this territory. She
came up the Missouri River as far as Fort Benton.
For several years she was employed at Fort Benton
while the Eighteenth United States Regulars were
stationed there. In 1884 she moved to the present
site of Great Falls and built one of the first homes
in the town, on Second Avenue, South, and Third
Street. Here she lived the rest of her life with her
daughter, Mrs. Martha Jane Wright, and died in
1912, at the age of eighty.
William H. Taylor secured his early education in
the schools of England and at the age of sixteen,
on July 26, 1876, joined the British army in the Two
Hundred and Seventy-third Manchester Regiment.
He was in service for eight years, being honorably
discharged on December 5, 1884. He saw a great
deal of service in the British Empire and partici-
pated in the bloody Egyptian campaign in 1882.
Air. Taylor came to Great Falls, Montana, in
1887, and for some months was employed by the
Sand Coulee Mining Company. In the spring of
188S he went on a ranch for himself in Meagher
County, but subsequently sold his preemption there.
In 1891 he homesteaded and engaged in cattle rais-
ing until July, 1903. He then returned to Great
Falls and became a contractor for city sewer con-
struction. In 1908 he and B. P. McNair bought the
S. H. Ranch and Mr. Taylor had the active man-
agement of this property until December, 1913,
when he sold his interests and retired.
He is affiliated with Cascade Lodge No. 34, An-
cient Free and Accepted Masons ; Great Falls Chap-
ter, Royal Arch Masons ; Black Eagle Commandery
No. 9 of the Knights Templar, and in politics is a
republican.
March 4, 1885, at Standish, England, he married
Miss Ellen Simm, a native of Lancashire, England,
and daughter of John and Mary (Pennington)
Simm.
John Valentine Carroll, for many years a prac-
ticing physician and Government surgeon at Fort
Benton, now a resident of Great Falls, owns some
of the largest stock and ranching interests in North-
ern Montana. He is one of the principal owners
and managers of the Benton Sheep Company and
the Northwestern Livestock Company, which, to-
gether own about twenty-five thousand acres of land
^^--7^^ fr^oAyuM^^. tr
HISTORY OF MONTANA
579
in Chouteau County. These companies have oper-
ated on an extensive scale the sheep and cattle in-
dustry for over a quarter of a century.
Doctor Carroll is an interesting example of the
man of contemplative thought, of scholarly tastes,
who has made a big success in practical business. As
a young man he was attracted to the Northwestern
frontier, and the fascination exercised by the coun-
try is still strong and he is one of Montana's real
enthusiasts.
He was born at New York City February 14,
1854, son of James and Mary B. (Welsh) Carroll.
His parents were born in Ireland and were married
in New York in 1853. His father came to this coun-
try in 184O and followed the trade of merchant tailor.
He died in 18S8, and his wife died in the same
year. James Carroll was at one time an officer
in the old Ninth New York Militia, which later be-
came the Sixty-ninth. Its membership was almost
entirely Irish, and during the visit of the Prince of
Wales to this country the entire regiment was placed
under arrest for refusing to parade in the Prince's
honor.
John Valentine Carroll, who was the only one of
five children to survive infancy, was educated in the
public schools of New York, spent one year in
Washington and Lee University at Lexington, Vir-
ginia, a year at St. Francis Xavier University in
New York, and in 1879, before completing his studies
in the medical department of the L'niversity of New
York, came to Montana. Thougli not qualified by
degree for the practice of medicine, there was a
great need for men of medical training in the new
country, and by special permission of the secretary
of war he found his time and energies thoroughly
taken up by professional duties. In 1886 he re-
turned East and received his degree in medicine
from the L^niversity of New York, and during the
following year was a member of the staff of the
Asylum for the Insane.
Doctor Carroll then returned to Fort Assinniboine,
where he had spent his earlier years in Montana,
and on July 10, 1888, was appointed surgeon at Fort
Belknap. He continued his work as a Government
physician until September 24, 1895. Then, following
a year of post-graduate work at the University of
Michigan, he located at Fort Benton, and carried on
a large private practice until 1908.
The community of Fort Benton owes much to the
enterprise and enlightened judgment of Doctor Car-
roll. He was a willing worker and frequently a
leader in any movement directed to the attainment of
some important community project. One instance
was the building of an opera house greatly needed
by the town, and he served as president of the com-
pany. For a number of years he was identified with
the Board of School Trustees, and as a man of
universitv training succeeded in influencing much
of the work of the board in the direction of better
schools and improved standards. He also served as
chairman of the Board of County Commissioners.
Besides the business connections above noted Doctor
.Carroll was president of the Benton Electric Light
Company, was vice president of the Stockmens Na-
tional Bank, and a member of the firm of Mee &
Carroll, cattle ranchers.
At Fort Assinniboine, September 22, 1882, three
years after he came to the territory. Doctor Carroll
married Miss Martha Simpson, of St. Paul. Her
father was a mining engineer. Four children have
been born to their marriage. John V., Jr., born at
Fort Assinniboine, May 2, 1884, completed his educa-
tion in the Virginia Military Institute, the West
Point of the South, receiving his diploma with the
class of 1904. In 1913 Governor Stewart appointed
him commissary general of Montana, with the rank
of major, after he had served two years as first
lieutenant of Company M of the Alontana Second
Regiment of National" Guard. The only daughter,
Grace Mary Virginia Carroll, horn at Fort Belknap
February 2, 1890, is the wife of Charles W. Houck,
of Great Falls. Charles Simpson Carroll, born June
7, 1895, at Fort Belknap, was educated in the Fort
Benton High School, the U. S. Naval Academy,
Eastman's Business College at Poughkeepsie, New
York, and served with the rank of second lieutenant
in the Quartermaster's Corps during the World
war. James Martin Carroll, the youngest, was born
at Fort Benton June 27, 1899, and has about com-
pleted his work in the United States Naval Academy
at Annapolis.
Washington J. McCormick, who came to Mon-
tana in 1863, and was one of the founders and
builders of the City of Missoula, died in 1889, but
the memory of his character and achievements is
still vital in the history of his home city. In recent
years his son Washington J. McCormick has proved
a worthy possessor of the honored name, being one
of the able and brilliant young lawyers of the state.
The late Washington J. McCormick was born
near Muncie in Delaware County, Indiana, in 1835.
His grandfather, John McCormick, was a native of
Virginia and a soldier of the Revolution. Other
branches of the family in America included that to
which McCormick of Harvester fame belongs, and
James C. Blaine was also a descendant of a Mc-
Cormick. Rev. William McCormick, father of
W. J. McCormick, was a native of Virginia and a
soldier of the War of 1812, a Baptist minister, and
for many years followed his profession in Indiana,
and was also honored with judicial office in that
state.
Washington J. McCormick was a graduate of old
Asbury, now DePauw Universit}', at Greencastle,
Indiana, and was admitted to the bar in 1856, at
the age of twenty-one. He at once identified him-
self with the great West, coming to Utah in 1857,
and rose to distinction in the law and politics in that
territory. He served as acting secretary of state,
attorney general and chief justice of the Supreme
Court of LTtah. On coming to Montana in 1863, he
lived in Virginia City and practiced law two years
and was secretary of the first democratic conven-
tion of the territory. He was one of the first law-
yers to be admitted to the bar in Montana. In 1864
he was chosen a member of the Territorial Legis-
lature, and in 1865 moved to Deer Lodge and was
elected to the Legislature from that county. From
1866 to 1868 he was superintendent of the Flathead
Indian Agency, and in the latter year came to the
present site of Missoula. Here he became asso-
ciated with Captain Higgins and Hon. F. L. Wor-
den in developing and planning those activities
which constituted the groundwork of the new city.
He was the founder and first editor of the Missoula
Gazette, and was also extensively interested in mill-
ing and stock raising. At four different times he
represented Missoula County in the Legislature.
The late W. J. McCormick was distinguished not
only for the services indicated above, but a broad
versatility of talents and public spirit made him an
invaluable ally in every undertaking in his com-
munity. He was a gifted lawyer, wielded a great
influence in politics, had fine literary tastes, and
he needed no impetus of personal reward to work
for benefits that would be distributed among the
people at large. He was one of the local citizens
of Missoula who did most to secure the building of
the Northern Pacific Railroad through the town.
Though not a Catholic, he gave the grounds in Mis-
soula where the church, school and hospital stand.
580
HISTORY OF MONTANA
His death was due to injury received in a wind
storm at Fort Owen. He had bought the property
from Major John Owen in 1870. Fort Owen was
the oldest fortification in Montana. Mr. McCormick
died February 3, 1889.
In 1869 he married Miss Kate Higgins, daughter
of Christopher P. and Edith (O'Byrne) Higgins
and sister of the late Capt. C. P. Higgins of Mis-
soula, an associate of Mr. McCormick in some of
the pioneer enterprises of Missoula. The seven
children of Mr. and Mrs. McCorraick were all born
at Missoula. Mary Edith O'Byrne, William Wor-
den, John Francis Higgins, Blanche Ada Louise,
Veronica Honore Hester, Paul Christopher and
Washington J., Jr.
Washington J. McCormick, Jr., was born at Mis-
soula, January 4, 1884, and was only five years of
age when his honored father died. He was given
every advantage of good home, environment and
scholastic training. He attended the public schools
of Missoula, the University of Montana, Notre
Dame University in Indiana, and graduated from
Harvard University in 1907. He received his law
degree from Columbia University in igio, was ad-
mitted to the New York bar and began practice at
Missoula the same year. In ten years he has more
than justified the confidence of his friends and
admirers, and has gained a high and influential
place in the Montana bar. Mr. McCormick, Jr., was
elected to the Legislature in the Sixteenth Legis-
lative Assembly from Missoula County. Politically
he is a republican, and has been active in a number
of local campaigns.
In 1915 he married Miss Edna T. Fox, of Twin
Bridges. Montana, a daughter of John F. Fox of
that place. They have two children, Washington J.
and Angela Patricia. He is amember of Hell Gate
Lodge No. 383, Benevolent Protective Order of
Elks, and of the Fraternal Order of Eagles.
Stephen A. Schmitz. Having spent his life as a
patternmaker, Stephen A. Schmitz is an expert in
his line and fully qualified to discharge the duties
of his present position, that of superintendent of
the pattern department of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company's foundry. He was born at Bloom-
ington, Illinois, October 10, 1867, a son of John
Schmitz. The birth of John Schmitz occurred in
Germany in 1831, and his death at Bloomington,
Illinois, in 1904. Between nineteen and twenty he
come to the United States because of the obligatory
military service exacted in his native land, and
reached Chicago, Illinois, in 1850, where he lived
for a time and was married. By trade he was a
cabinetmaker, and seeing a suitable opening he went
to Bloomington, that state, where he worked at his
calling and also engaged in the furniture and un-
dertaking business, being a pioneer business man
there. He was a democrat in his political convic-
tions an-d voted the ticket of that party after secur-
ing his citizenship papers. His wife was Mary
Metzger before marriage, and she was born in Ger-
many in 1836, and died at Bloomington, Illinois, in
1880. Their children were as follows : Peter, who
is a pattern maker living at Hastings, Nebraska;
Helen, who married Henry Krieger, a retired
merchant, lives at Bloomington, Illinois ; Elizabeth,
who married a Mr. Flinchback, is deceased, having
passed away at Bloomington, Illinois ; Anna, who is
deceased, married James McGrath, who after his
wife's demise left Bloomington, Illinois, and went
to California, where he is still living; Angela, who
died at Bloomington, Illinois, in 1881, aged nine
years; and Stephen A.
Attending school until 1880, Stephen A. Schmitz
began working in September of that year, and was
employed in general lines of labor until he went to
Florence, Wisconsin, in 1882 and began his ap-
prenticeship at pattern making and followed this
trade as a journeyman at Marinette, Wisconsin. In
1890 he came west to Anaconda, Montana, as a
pattern maker for the Tuttle Manufacturing &
Supply Company, which later was merged with the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company as its foundry
department. The plant shut down in 1891 and Mr.
Schmitz went to Duluth, Minnesota, and later to
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and subsequently worked at
his trade at different points in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio
and Michigan. In 1899 he returned to Anaconda
and resumed work as a pattern maker in the foun-
dry department of the Anaconda Copper Mining
Company, rising through the position of foreman to
be superintendent of his department, and has con-
tinued as such since June i, 1906, having under him
fifteen men. His office is in the pattern shop of the
foundry department on the corner of Adams and
Sixth streets. Anaconda.
In politics he is a republican. He belongs to Ana-
conda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent Protective Order
of Elks, and Anaconda Homestead No. 312, B. A. Y.
Mr. Schmitz owns his residence at No. 603 Main
Street.
In July, 1899, Mr. Schmitz was married to Miss
Gussie Murafska, born at Watertown, Wisconsin,
the ceremony being performed at Milwaukee, Wis-
consin. Mr. and Mrs. Schmitz have the following
children : Walter, who was graduated from the
Anaconda High School, lives at Anaconda and is
with the Washoe Reduction Works of the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company; Gilbert, who is
attending the Anaconda High School; and Edgar,
who is also attending the same high school. The
second child, Lawrence, died when about eighteen
months old.
Mr. Schmitz is one of the experienced men in his
line and has proven the advisability of confining
oneself to one particular calling instead of wasting
effort in acquiring a partial knowledge of many.
Having located permanently at Anaconda he nat-
urally is interested in its growth, and gives to the
city a wholesome and intelligent attention without
entering into public life.
Howard E. Matson. A man of energetic nature,
sound judgment and excellent business qualifica-
tions, Howard E. Matson, secretary and treasurer
of the Butte Battery Company, is meeting with
acknowledged success in his undertakings, and
through a diligent use of his faculties and oppor-
tunities has proved himself a useful and worthy
citizen. A son of the late F. F. Matson, he was
born in Beardstown, Illinois, August 2, 1885, and
there acquired his preliminary education.
Born in New Jersey in 1S58, F. F. Matson fol-
lowed the tide of immigration westward when a
young man, settling in Beardstown, Illinois, in
pioneer days. Buying a tract of land that was still
in its virgin wildness, he cleared and improved a
farm, on which he lived and labored until his death ^
in 1893. He was a democrat in politics, and a '
much respected citizen. He married Elizabeth
Nickel, who was born in 1859, and is now residing
in Butte, her home being at 1015 West Porphyry
Street. Three children were born of their union,
as follows; Howard E., the special subject of this
sketch ; Finis F. ; and Edna, who was educated in
the schools of Beardstown, Illinois, and is now the
wife of William Roberts, a salesman for the Spo-
kane Company, with home at 1015 Porphyry Street,
Butte, Montana.
Finis F. Matson was born iii Beardstown, Illi-
nois, in December, 1888, and was there educated.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
581
An electrician by occupation, he came to Butte in
April, 1907, and for a time worked for the Montana
Power Company. In February, 1917, he established
the Exide Service Station, and met with such
marked success in its management that in May,
1919, he had the business incorporated as the Butte
Battery Company, with plant and offices at 207
South Montana Street. It is one of the leading
firms of its kind in Western Montana, and its offi-
cers, all men of recognized ability, are Finis F.
Matson, president; Thomas Davis, vice president;
and Howard E. Matson, secretary and treasurer.
An independent democrat in politics. Finis F. Mat-
son was candidate for clerk and recorder of Silver
Bow County, and made a good run at the polls.
Religiously he is affiliated with the Baptist Church.
To him and his wife, whose maiden name was Lulu
Atkins, two children have been born, Alice and
Helen.
Leaving school at the age of fifteen years, How-
ard E. Matson worked on a farm near Chandler-
ville, Illinois, for three years, when his widowed
mother, who had been living in that vicinity, moved
back to Beardstown, where he remained for awhile.
Going then to Quincy, Illinois, he attended the Gem
City Business College, and for four years worked
for the State Savings and Loan Company, obtain-
ing valuable business knowledge and experience.
Coming from there to Butte, Montana, in April,
1907, Mr, Matson was employed in the bank of
W. A. Clark & Brother until August, 1918, start-
ing as a clerk and being promoted to receiving
teller. In the meantime he became associated with
his brother Finis F. Matson, financially assisting in
the establishment of the substantial business now
carried on by the Butte Battery Company, in which
he owns a half interest.
Mr. Matson married, June 18, 1907. Miss Ida C.
Adam, a daughter of William and Joanna Adam,
her father being a merchant in Quincy, I'l'nois.
where the death of her mother occurred. Mr. and
Mrs. Matson reside at the Mueller Apartments.
Politically Mr. Matson is a republican, and fra-
ternally is a member of Butte Lodge No. 22, Ancient
Free and Accepted Order of Masons.
A T. PuRDY. Coming to Montana when a boy,
A T. Purdy has lived his active life in the territory
and state, and has found here both adventure and
achievement. Mr. Purdy for a number of years past
has been widely known as owner of the noted fruit
farm, the Twin Orchards Ranch, in Lincoln County,
near Eureka. .
Mr. Purdy was born in Jackson, Michigan, in 1866,
fourth among the eleven children of Henry and
Mary (Keeler) Purdy. He spent his boyhood days
in Michigan, but at the age of fifteen came alone
to Butte, Montana, and was soon working in the
mines.
Mr. Purdy married Terecia LeBeau, who was
born at Cincinnati, Ohio, a daughter of Alexander
and Ida (Towsley) LeBeau, her father being of
French ancestry and her mother of German. She
was one of a family of nine children, being the
oldest. She was six years of age when her parents
came out to Butte, but she grew up in their home
at Kalispell. Mr. and Mrs. Purdy were married
at the LeBeau ranch, a mile north of Kalispell.
They then moved to Foy's Lake, where Mr. Purdy
was engaged in the timber business. Subsequently
at Tobacco Plains he homesteaded 160 acres a mile
southwest of Glen Lake, and remained in that com-
munity eight years. During these experiences Mr.
and Mrs. Purdy had all the trials and hardships
of pioneering. Mrs. Purdy frequently lived alone
with her children while her husband was absent on
his duties as road supervisor. Five children were
born into their home : Frances, Lynn, Gordon, Alex-
ander and Thomas. They were well educated in
the public schools. Frances is the wife of Jerome
Filiatreau, a rancher near Eureka, and is the mother
of three daughters, June, Edith and Joyce. Lynn
married Miss Jessie Crowley and has a son, Donald.
Gordon, who is employed in the St. Paul Lumber
Mill at Tacoma, Washington, married Inez Doble.
Alexander and Thomas are still at home and students
in the district schools.
Mrs. Purdy's mother, who died in 1896, at Kalis-
pell, was a devout Christian of the Adventist faith,
and was greatly beloved by her own people and many
friends. Mrs. Purdy's father came to the Purdy
home for a two weeks' visit, and has so enjoyed the
environment that he has remained two years with
them.
Mr. and Mrs. Purdy are republicans in politics.
Mrs. Purdy while growing up became an expert
in assisting her father on the ranch and has been a
fearless rider. She still keeps at the ranch her faith-
ful old dog Collie, which has shown almost human
intelligence. Mr. Purdy has served as school trus-
tee, ditch director, and in other offices connected
with the public welfare.
For a number of years the Purdys owned and
operated the Meadow Home Dairy at Eureka, and
on selling that bought 200 acres at the foot of the
beautiful Rocky Range near Independent Mouiitain.
This ranch contains two large orchards, thus giving
the name Twin Orchards to the ranch. This is one
of the largest fruit farms in Lincoln County, and
thousands of boxes of apples are marketed every
season. The Purdy home has always been noted
for its hospitality, and friends and acquaintances
alike have learned to esteem the beauty of the sur-
roundings and the welcome of entertainment. Mr.
Purdy is the type of citizen whose influence is always
for the good of the community. He is a man of
convictions and ready to act on them. A few years
ago. as a typical instance, he learned that a local
character, who had claimed to have been a rough
rider, had cruelly shot his horse in the flank, and
threatened the life of his young companion if he
betrayed this act of cruelty. Mr. Purdy on learning
of it visited Huff and said he would give him just
two hours to go back on the road and put the horse
out of suffering and return and report. He per-
mitted the bully no excuse or delay, and he remained
to see his orders faithfully executed.
C. F. RiCHARDON, vice president and manager of
the farm loans department of the Citizens Scote
Bank of Roundup, which he helped to organize and
of which he was cashier for several years, is one
of the most prominent men and public-spirited citi-
zens of this region. He was born at Dexter, Michi-
gan, July 14, 1872, a son of Jacob and Rose (Wild-
ner) Richardon, both natives of Germany. The
father died on July 27, 1916, aged seventy-five years,
as he was born May 4, 1841. His wife, who was
born July 2, 1848, died on March 2, IQ02. They
were married at Stuttgart. Germany, and became
the parents of seven children, of whom three now
survive. Four of their children were born in Ger-
many, and the remaining three in Michigan, C. F.
Richardon being the sixth in order of birth.
Jacob Richardon served an apprenticeship in a
jewelry factory, but having a distaste for the trade
he went into business with a Mr. Siegle who was
the discoverer of the formula of carmine red, and
they began manufacturing this product, and while
connected with this concern he met his wife, who
582
HISTORY OF MONTANA
was one of its employes. After coming to the
United States and locating in Michigan Mr. Rich-
ardon was engaged in farming until his retirement,
which took place after the death of his wife in
1902, after which he went to North Dakota and
visited his children. A year later he returned to
Michigan and was married to Mrs. Fredica Benze,
and about 1905 they went to Pasadena, California,
where he died. From the time he secured his
naturalization papers he was a republican.
C. F. Richardon attended the rural schools of his
native county and the Dexter High School, from
which he was graduated in the class of 1897, and
in the fall of that year he came as far west as
Chaffee, North Dakota, where he spent two years
teaching school. He then embarked in a general
merchandise business at Chaffee, and conducted it
until the fall of 1902, when he sold. In 1903 he
assisted in organizing the Chaffee State Bank, and
served it as cashier for four years, when he helped
to organize the Farmers Security Bank of Chaffee,
which absorbed the state bank, and he was its
cashier until the fall of 1908. At that time he came
to Roundup and organized the Citizens State Bank
of this city, and was its cashier until the spring
of 1915, when he resigned to take charge of the farm
loans department, and become its vice president.
Mr. Richardon owns a fine ranch and is quite an
extensive wheat grower. He was also instrumental
in the organization of the Musselshell County Ab-
stract Company, of which he is president, and he is
manager, secretary and treasurer of the Citizens
Loan and Insurance Company. For one term he
served as city treasurer of Roundup. In politics a
republican, he is very active in his party,' and was
chairman of the County Central Committee of his
party until 1918, when he was made a member of
the State Central Committee. During the great war
he was chairman of the Young Men's Christian
Association committee and took an active part in all
of the movements of that organization, as well as all
of the other drives for war work purposes. At
present he is chairman of the Roosevelt Memorial
drive. For two years he has been on the school
board of Roundup. The Methodist Episcopal Church
holds his membership, and he is as energetic in it
as he is in other organizations.
On December 29, 1899, Mr. Richardon was united
in marriage with Alice E. Oertii, born in Wisconsin,
a daughter of Conrad and Louise (Linse) Oertii, the
former born in Switzerland and the latter in Saxony,
Germany. Of their three children. Mrs. Richardon
is the eldest. Mr. and Mrs. Oertii are now living
at Yakima, Washington. Gladys Merle, the only
child of Mr. and Mrs. Richardon, is one of the
bright students of the Roundup public schools. The
organizing ability Mr. Richardon has displayed has
brought into being several first-class concerns, and
he has never lost his interest in them, nor have they
in him, but his advice is sought and followed upon
many occasions, for his executive capabilities are
fully as great. As a citizen he measures up to
the highest standards of usefulness, and Roundup
has benefited from his location in its midst and his
efforts in its behalf.
Daniel A. G. Flowf.rree. .\s a Montana pioneer
the late Daniel A. G. Flowerree had some share and
experience in the mining activities which was the
primary_attraction of the territory. His most inter-
esting distinction rests upon the foresight and enter-
prise that led him, probably first among the original
settlers, to devote his resources to ranching and stock
raising. At one time he was the largest individual
producer of livestock in the state. He was a sterling
business man. highly successful, and through his
power and integrity was a stay to other business in
time of storm and stress.
He was born in Ralls County, Missouri. May 19,
183s, son of Kemp and Matilda (Caldwell) Flower-
ree. His grandfather, Walter Flowerree, was a Vir-
ginia planter, moved from there to Kentucky, ^,nd
in 1822 settled in Missouri. Walter Flowerree mar-
ried a member of the distinguished Breckenridge
family of Kentucky. Kemp Flowerree lived in Mis-
souri from 1833 until his death in 1881, and his
widow survived him until 1887.
Daniel A. G. Flowerree grew up in Missouri, but
the far west, with its romance and adventure, soon
took him away from home ties. In 1852, at the age
of seventeen, he went to California, and in 1855
went to tlie southern country of Nicaragua with the
Walker Expedition. From 1857 to 1864 he lived
quietly in Missouri.
Mr. Flowerree came to Montana in 1864, just about
a year after the first mining prospectors had located
in the gulches and valleys. He traveled by the Salt
Lake City route and arrived at Virginia City in 1864.
Late in 1865 he moved to Last Chance Gulch at
Helena, and in that year introduced to ^Montana a
herd of cattle brought from Missouri. Doubtless
there were others among the pioneers who recog-
nized the availability of Montana as a cattle growing
section, but probably none of them put their faith
into execution and carried out plans to larger pro-
portions than did the late Mr. Flowerree. During
the '70s he introduced many hundreds of cattle,
brought up over the old cattle trails from Texas,
and also brought in horses and cattle from Oregon.
In time his herds covered a vast domain of leased
and patented lands in Lewis and Clark, Teton, Cas-
cade and other counties, and to the end of his life
he owned immense holdings in those sections. It is
said that Mr. Flowerree built the first shingled roof
houses in Helena and Virginia City, the one in
Virginia City being the first two-story house erected
in Montana.
His business initiative never left him. Late in
■ life, after he had begun spending his winters in
Florida, he recognized the possibilities of the grape
fruit and orange industry of that state, and near
Fort Meyer developed one of the most productive
and valuable grapefruit plantations in Florida.
Mr. Flowerree was possessed of extensive capital
resources and became a recognized power in Mon-
tana finance. Business always meant to him some-
thing more than an opportunity for personal ad-
vantage and profit. He recognized his duty as a
steward of wealth. During the panic of 1893 he bor-
rowed on his personal note $400,000 from a Chicago
commission house and turned it over to a Helena
bank which was threatened with bankruptcy, saving
it from failure and doing much to bolster up the
financial credit of tlie entire state.
Mr. Flowerree died at -Atlanta, Georgia, Novem-
ber 22, 1912, at the age of seventy-seven. His funeral
was held in, Helena under the auspices of the Lewis
and Clark Society of Montana Pioneers. From a
well deserved tribute paid him by one of the speak-
ers of the occasion is appropriately selected the fol-
lowing paragraph :
"Much of the best in many people whom I have
known is not proclaimed upon the house tops. It
is quiet, unobtrusive and silent: yet there is good
there, there is kindness and health and sympathy
and love. Like the coming of the day upon the grass
and flowers, or the approach of the morning sun to
the golden doors of the East, not a footfall is heard,
not a trumpet sound, not a saluting gun is fired; yet
they come, and because they come some barren
'T^^fe^-^'^T^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
583
place is revived, some drooping flower lifts its head,
some discouraged soul looks up and takes courage.
Like so many of these earlier men of Montana who
saw the rougher side of life and endured the hard-
ships incident to formative days of social evolution,
Air. Flowerree was big-hearted and generous ; keen
and prudent in business which grew in dimensions,
he was open-handed and unselfish. Many an old
friend and acquaintance, down on his luck, knew
where he could turn for help, and indeed many could
testify that they did not need to ask, as it was
enough that they were in need to find his helping
hand ready. As a father, husband and friend he
was loved. As a citizen he was esteemed. He did
what he could as he knew it, as life appeared to him,
as the unselfish spirit led him in the way of sympa-
thetic helpfulness to express the best within him."
Mr. Flowerree married Miss Elizabeth Wethers,
of Missouri. She died in 1882. the mother of four
children, William K. ; Annie M., who became the
wife of W. L. Velie, of Moline, Illinois; Eudors,
who was married to J. J. Gray, of Chicago, and
Elizabeth, wife of William Wallace, Jr., of Helena.
February 4, 1885, Mr. Flowerree married Miss
Elizabeth F. Cornelius, and thev had one son,
Daniel A. G., Jr.
William Kemp Flowerree, banker, business man
and rancher of Great Falls, grew up from early
childhood in Montana, and for many years was
actively associated with the extensive ranching and
other business enterprises of his father, the late
Daniel A. G. Flowerree, whose career as a Montana
pioneer has been elsewhere sketched.
William Kemp Flowerree was born at Huntsville,
in Randolph County, Missouri, June 30, 1861, and
came to Montana with his parents in 1865. He can
hardly remember a time when he could not ride a
horse. At the age of eight he spent a summer rid-
ing the range for his father and was^ given in pay
two heifer calves. The commercial instinct mani-
fested itself in him as a boy. At Helena, where the
family lived, he would gather up bottles and sell
them, whiskey bottles bringing seventy-five cents
apiece, other bottles a dollar and a half a dozen, and
tin cans, especially old oil cans, twenty-five pents
apiece. There was a scarcity of tin in the state at
that time, and the tin recovered from cans and other
containers was used for roofing purposes. Another
early employment was driving a mule through a long
day from seven in the morning until six at night,
at 'a salary of 50 cents per day. Mr. FIowerre« was
sent back to Missouri to complete his high school
education, and he also attended the Kempers Mili-
tary School at Booneville.
As an associate with his father in the cattle and
horse business he served as vice president of the
F. D. Company. In 1880 he was one of a party
of ten men who took 1200 head of cattle across
the country to Cheyenne, Wyoming. On the way
they were halted by Sitting Bull and his 600 Indians,
and remained a day and a half in parley before
the white men and their cattle were allowed to
proceed. Cheyenne was then the nearest shipping
[loint, and from there the cattle were sent to the
Chicago markets. Mr. Flowerree was vice president
of the Flowerree Stock Company until his father's
death, and then succeeded as president of the com-
pany, one of the largest concerns of the kind in
Montana.
Mr. Flowerree became associated in the organiza-
tion of the American Bank & Trust Company at
Great Falls in 1915 and is vice president of that in-
stitution. He served two terms as a member of the
State Senate, representing Teton County, and is
affiliated with Helena Lodge No. 193 of the Elks.
March 2, 1889, he married Norma Kinna, who was
born at Helena, daughter of John and Jennett Kinna.
Her father was a Montana pioneer, and Mrs. Flower-
ree was the second among six children, three of
whom are still living. Mr. and Mrs. Flowerree have
two children, William Kemp, Jr., and Norma.
The son earned distinction as a soldier in the
World war. He was educated in the Kents Hill
College in Maine, in the University of California
at Berkeley, and also attended a school of com-
merce and banking at New York City. April 23,
1917, he enrolled in the First Olficers Training
School at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, received a first
lieutenant's commission in cavalry, and was sent to
Camp Grant at Rockford, Illinois, and became a
member of Company E of the Three Hundred and
Thirty-third Machiiu- Gun Il.itt.Tlion. He went over-
seas in October. 11118. and was in active service
in France up to January 3, IQ19, when he received
his honorable discharge at Camp Grant, Illinois.
Frank P. Baird. The educator of today has to
meet and overcome many obstacles of which those
of an older day knew nothing. The enlarging of
the curriculum of the public schools, with the de-
mand for the practice of pedagogy, necessitates a
long and careful training and constant subsequent
study and reading on the part of those to whom is
entrusted the training of the plastic mind of youth.
Popular demand has resulted in the development of
a class of men who have no equal in the history of
the world as educators. Their knowledge of their
work and public affairs is extensive and profound,
while at the same time their judgment is sound and
they have a keen insight into human nature so that
it is possible for them to give to each pupil the
individual attention now regarded as so necessary
for the proper rounding out of character. Among
those who have thus distinguished themselves along
these lines in a broad and comprehensive manner
is Frank P. Baird, superintendent of the schools of
Roundup.
Frank P. Baird was born on the farm in Venango
County. Pennsylvania, purchased by his great-grand-
father in 1796. and owned in turn by his grand-
father and his father, the latter, John M. Baird.
having been born on it October 29, 1848, and he is
stiU living in Grove City, Pennsylvania, conducting
an oil business, handling the oil from several pro-
ducing wells on this property. John M. Baird is a
democrat, and as such has been elected assessor and
collector of his township. For years he has been
an elder of the Presbyterian Church, of which he
is a steadfast member. In July, 1871, he was
married to Mary Grace Hovis, born in the same
township in Venango County as her husband, and
they became the parents of the following children:
Susan M., who is the wife of J. C. Chambers, of
West Newton, Penn.sylvania : Doctor Baird. who is
in a genera! practice at Roundup, Montana : James
C, who married Jessie Fulton, served during the
late war in the Aviation Corps as a sergeant ; Frank
P., whose name heads this review ; Almeda F.. who
died in 1915. was the wife of Rev. Edwin Howe, a
missionary at that time stationed at Canton, China;
and Jesse H., who is the pastor of the First Presby-
terian Church of Boise. Idaho, married Sue Bragstad,
of Roundup. Montana.
Frank P. Baird attended the public schools of his
native county, the Slippery Rock Normal School of
Pennsylvania, from which he was graduated in 1902,
and Grove City College of Grove City, Pennsylvania,
from which lie was graduated in 1905, and since
then has done post graduate work at the Grove City
College and the University of Montana. In order
to earn the money necessary for his college expenses
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Mr. Baird taught school, his first charge being a
rural one in Venango County, and his salary twenty-
eight dollars per month. This school was three
miles from his home, and he walked the distance
back and forth each day. Later he was principal
of the grade schools at Southwest, Westmoreland
County, Pennsylvania. His next charge was as
principal of the West Sunbury Academy, a prepara-
tory school for college, and there he remained until
1906, when he came to Montana, arriving at Wibaux
in August to take charge of its public schools. He
graduated the first high school class of Wibaux, and
continued there as principal for five years. During
the period he was there the high school was made a
credited one with a four years' course. While living
there he homesteaded a ranch five miles east of
Wibaux, and there established his home, for on
August 25, 1908, he was married to Bessie M.
Barnes, one of the teachers under his charge. She
was born in Ohio, a daughter of Sylvester and
Delilah (Christopher) Barnes, who had six children,
four of whom are now living, Mrs. Baird being the
second in order of birth. Mr. Barnes, a carpenter
by trade, was a soldier in the war between the states.
On March I, 1911, Mr. Baird came to Roundup
as superintendent of its public schools, and graduated
the first high school class in 1914 on a full credited
basis. When he took charge of the schools he had
seven teachers, and now he has thirty-seven, and
the number of pupils in attendance has increased
from 275 to 900. He has been a member of the
county board of examiners representing the counties
of Dawson and Musselshell ever since the passage
of the law creating this board, and was appointed a
member of the state ta.x book commission in Novem-
ber, 1917, by Governor S. V. Stuart. During the
summer of 1917 he was one of the instructors at the
summer school conducted by the State University
at Missoula.
Like his brother Doctor Baird, Professor Baird
has had considerable military experience. During
his course in Grove City College he received military
training in the Cadet corps, which was in the charge
of a captain of the regular army. He was com-
missioned first lieutenant and adjutant in the Col-
lege Cadets and served in this capacity when the
Cadet Corps participated in the inauguration of
President Theodore Roosevelt at Washington, D. C.
Before graduation from college he joined Company
M of the Pennsylvania National Guard and served
as private, company clerk and sergeant for a period
of three years. While at Wibaux, Montana, he was
appointed sergeant of Company I of the Montana
National Guard and drilled a number of young men
for the company, the headquarters being at Glen-
dive. As first sergeant of this company he camped
with the Second Montana at American Lake and
Helena, Montana.
Professor Baird organized and was commissioned
captain of Company B, Second Montana National
Guard, in February, 1914, by Governor Stewart.
While captain of the company the Second Montana
camped for ten days with the regulars at Fort
. Wright in the summer of 1914. On account of the
labor troubles and riots in Butte, an order was
issued by the governor on August 30th for the
Second Montana to assemble in Helena, preparatory
to declaring military law in the City of Butte. He
led Company B to Helena and joined the regiment,
which entered Butte September i, 1914. He re-
mained with the company for a month, and on
account of educational duties demanding his attention
in Roundup, was released from active charge of the
company and placed on the reserve list of officers
in Montana.
He is a consistent member of the Congregational
Church. Like his father ^nd brother. Doctor Baird,
Professor Baird has always upheld the principles of
the democratic party. Professor and Mrs. Baird
have three children, namely: John Sylvestor,
Lawrence Edwin and Frances May.
When it is realized that 24 per cent of
the population of the United States, a trifle less than
one-fourth of the American people, are in school,
either as pupils or educators, some relative idea may
be gathered of the great importance of the schools.
From these figures it would seem that schooling is
our greatest national industry, and the proportion
of brains, hearts and souls that this industry absorbs
is even greater. It is estimated that over 23,500,000
persons are enrolled in the various educational in-
stitutions in the country. Small wonder that so
much importance is placed upon the selection of
the men and women who are to guide these pupils
who in turn will have to create and guard the future
of America. Measured by all the standards used in
such tests Professor Baird comes forth as a talented,
carefully trained and enthusiastic teacher, high-
spirited man and loyal citizen. His love for his work
and his understanding of the problems of young
people during their formative period peculiarly fit
him for his high calling, and the people of Round-
up are very fortunate in having him in charge of
their greatest industry, the production of alert brains
and healthy, normal characters from the plastic
young pupils sent to the schools under his able
supervision.
Michael D. Staunton" is now engaged in operat-
ing, a large wholesale grocery business at Roundup,
and has reached his present commercial importance
through a series of experiences each one of which
has had its part in the development of his character
and determining his worth to his community. He
was born in England on October 3, 1874, a son of
Thomas and Margaret (Quigley) Staunton, both
natives of Ireland. In 1879 Thomas Staunton
brought his wife and eight children to the United
States and settled in Meeker County, Minnesota,
where four more children were born. Nine of these
twelve children survive, Michael D. Staunton being
the fourth in order of birth. Although a merchant
in England, after coming to this country Thomas
Staunton engage4 in farming. He served as county
commissioner of Meeker County for two terms,
being elected on the democratic ticket. His death
occurred when he was fifty-five years old, his widow
surviving him and passing away when sixty years
of age.
Michael D. Staunton remained in Meeker County
until he was eighteen years old, and attended its
schools. He then was employed by the wholesale
grocery house of Anthony Kelley & Company at
Minneapolis, Minnesota, continuing with the new
firm of W. B. and W. G. Jordan, who took over
the business, for nineteen years, rising through the
different departments and finally becoming one of
the best traveling salesmen. During all of this
period he gained a thorough and practical knowledge
of the grocery business and formed a valuable
acquaintance with the trade, which he is now putting
to practical use. In 1913 Mr. Staunton located
permanently at Roundup and for five years conducted
a general merchandise business, but branched out
then into the wholesaling end of it. and operates
under the name of Staunton's Wholesale Grocery.
Like his father, he is a strong democrat, but has
not cared to enter piiblic life.
On April 5, 1901, Mr. Staunton was united in
marriage with Miss Mary Ellen Noonan, born at
Anoka, Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Staunton nave
two sons, Richard and Frederick. Possessing the
HISTORY OF MONTANA
business instinct in marked degree, coupled with his
intimate knowledge of the wholesale grocery busi-
ness, Mr. Staunton has been able to advance further
than one whose equipment was only theoretical.
While he has been building up his own business con-
nections, he has not failed to take a warm interest
in civic affairs, and has given his support to those
movements which have been projected with the idea
of improving and advancing Roundup and Mussel-
shell County.
Dr. Creswell T. Pigot, one of the reliable medical
men of Musselshell County, is engaged in a general
practice at Roundup, which was interrupted during
the great war by his service in the army. He was
born at London, Ontario, Canada, November 25,
1878, a son of Joseph and Martha (Blair) Pigot.
Joseph Pigot was born in Shropshire, England, in
1841, and died in 1898. His wife was born in London,
Ontario, Canada, in 1847, and is still living. They
had four children, three of whom survive. Doctor
Pigot being the youngest of the family. Joseph
Pigot came to Canada in young manhood, having
acquired an education in his native land, and locating
at London, Ontario, embarked in a wholesale crock-
ery business, which he conducted the remainder of
his life, becoming one of the most prominent men of
his community. He was very active in Masonry, and
was a past master of his lodge. From boyhood he
belonged to the Church of England.
Doctor Pigot attended the public schools of Lon-
don, Ontario, and then entered the medical depart-
ment of the Western University of London, Ontario,
from which he was graduated in 1900 following
which he became an interne of Saint Josephs Hospital
of that same city, and he was also at the Williams-
burg Hospital of Brooklyn, New York. In the fall
of 1902 Doctor Pigot came west to Butte, Montana,
and was there engaged in the practice of his pro-
fession until 1910, when he moved to Roundup, and
has been here ever since, becoming physician and
surgeon for the Round Coal Company, the Davis
Coal Company, and the Chicago, Milwaukee & Saint
Paul Railroad Company. He belongs to the Mon-
tana State Medical Association, the American Medi-
cal -Association, and is a Fellow of the American
Medical College of Surgeons. Doctor Pigot was
made a Mason by Silver Bow Lodge No. 48, Ancient
Free and .Accepted Masons, at Butte, Montana, but
demitted to Unity. Lodge No. 71, .'\ncient Free and
Accepted Masons of Roundup. He was a member
of Billings Chapter No. 6, Royal Arch Masons, but
demitted to Roundup Chapter No. '30 Royal Arch
Masons, and he also belongs to .Mdemar Comman-
dery No. 5, Knights Templar of Billings, Montana,
and Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine, of Helena, Montana.
On February 10, 1915, Doctor Pigot was united
in marriage with Alice Lowry, a daughter of Thomas
M. and Molly (Pierce) Lowry, prominent people of
Montana. Mr. and Mrs. Lowry had eight children,
five of whom are still living, and Mrs. Pigot is the
eldest living daughter. Doctor and Mrs. Pigot
have one son, (Treswell T., Jr., and one daughter.
Doctor Pigot was commissioned a first lieutenant
of the Medical Reserve Corps on August 4, 1917, and
called into the service in July, 1918, being sent to
Fort Riley and later to Camp Dodge, Des Moines,
Iowa. He was discharged in February, 1919, and
returned at once to Roundup to resume his former
peacetime duties. He is a man of unusual talent
and has won due appreciation from his patients and
others who are associated with him. A man of high
ideals, he has always tried to live up to them, and
the respect he commands he has won by the most
honorable of methods.
August Schrump is one of the men of his day
and locality who have responded in a remarkable
degree to the urge of the times and developed a fine
mercantile establishment at Roundup, and at the
same time has discharged the onerous duties of
several official positions. He was born in Iowa
County, Wisconsin, on a farm owned by his father,
on October i, 1863, being a son of Bernard and
Elizabeth Schrump, natives of Germany, who were
married in their native land. They became the
parents of nine children, seven of whom survive,
and of them all August Schrump was the eighth.
After seven of their children were born the parents
came to the United States on a sailing vessel, and
after landing in New York City came west to Iowa
County, Wisconsin, where they were pioneers of the
rural districts of that region, and worked hard to
develop a farm, and there both died. The Lutheran
Church held their membership. First a Whig, the
father later became a republican, and he was held in
very high regard in his neighborhood as an in-
dustrious, upright and dependable man.
August Schrump attended the public schools of
his native county, and during his boyhood learned
how to make himself useful under his father's ex-
cellent direction. When he was fifteen years old he
earned his first money pulling weeds in a corn field,
for which he received twenty-five cents per day.
Losing his parents, he was forced to become self-
supporting. Having no one else upon whom he
could depend, he exerted himself to the utmost and
by .the time he was twenty years old held a respon-
sible position with an elevator company, and when
he attained his majority was made its manager, hold-
ing that position for twelve years. Having saved
his money he was by then able to embark in a
merchandise business at Lawton, North Dakota,
where he saw a good opening, and continued there
until January 3, 1908, when he moved his stock
of goods to Roundup, where he has since remained.
He has the distinction of having been the pioneer in
his line at this place, and since he first came here has
enlarged his business, now controlling a fine trade.
While at Lawton he was appointed postmaster on
September 25, 1892, and served under Postmaster
General C. H. Payne until in April, 1898. On April
6, 1910, he was appointed postmaster of Roundup
under Postmaster General Frank Hitchcock, and
held the office for four years. In politics a republi-
can, he has been very active in his party and repre-
sented Musselshell County in the Fourteenth Mon-
tana State Assembly. For some time he has been
a member of the City Council o^ Roundup, and is
now its chairman. Well known in Masonry, Mr.
Schrump belongs to Unity Lodge No. 71, Ancient
Free and .Accepted Masons ; Helena Consistory, by
which he was made a Thirty-second Degree Mason,
and Bagdad Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine, of Butte, Montana.
On September 5, 1889, Mr. Schrump was married
to Nettie Fonger, born in Illinois. They have one
daughter, Lottie, who is the wife of A. H. Goetz, of
Roundup. Mr. Schrump is an excellent example of
the self-made man, and his success in life is all the
more to be commended in that it is the result of his
own, unaided efforts. He has a hearty, sincere
manner which impresses persons favorably, and he
has many warm, personal friends in addition to his
business associates. Taking a constructive interest
in the commercial and industrial growth of Round-
up, Mr. Schrump may be counted upon to give his
support to those measures which have this end in
view, and is certainly one of the county's most repre-
sentative and highly respected men.
586
HISTORY OF MONTANA
WiNFiELD Scott Stocking. One of the veritable
trail blazers of Montana and the Northwest, a pio-
neer miner, rancher and town builder in Montana,
was the late Winfield Scott Stocking, -whose life of
achievement and adventure came to a quiet close on
January 4, 1910, at the age of seventy-three.
He was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, March
15, 1837, son of Jared and Lucy (Bigelow) Stock-
ing, the former a native of Pennsylvania and thft
latter of New York. Jared Stocking learned the
cabinet maker's trade as a boy and made his trade
the basis of a large and profitable lumber and fur-
niture business at Grand Rapids, Michigan. _ He
died in Chicago at the age of sixty and his widow
survived him to the venerable age of ninety. Jared
Stocking was a Presbyterian and a whig and repub-
lican voter.
Winfield Scott Stocking was one of ten children
and acquired an early education in the schools of
Grand Rapids. From the age of fifteen he was
making his own way in the world, employed in
lumber and sawmill camps in Michigan, and also
sailing on the Great Lakes. About 1859 he and his
brother Jerome went to California, traveling by
sailing vessel around Cape Horn to San Francisco.
He was in the mining business .in California and in
1862 joined in the stampede to the Salmon River
mines of Oregon. His party discovered the John
Day mines in Oregon. In 1863 Mr. Stocking con-
tinued his prospecting to a place known as Rocky
Bar, Idaho, and while there he met Miss Margaret
Henry, who had come from Louisville, Kentucky.
They were married January 16, 1864, at Boise City,
and their honeymoon w^as spent traveling overland
to Bannock, Montana. Mr. Stocking continued min-
ing and prospecting there, and also located a hay
ranch on Crow Creek. In July, 1865, he had decided
to go to Fort Benton for supplies. Mrs. Stocking
not wanting to be left alone, accompanied him,
and after th'ey reached Fort Benton he returned with
ox teams and took his household goods to the Fort.
He built a home at Fort Benton, and in the fall
of 1865 with nine other men went down the Mis-
souri River to Camp Cook, and soon afterward
moved his family from Fort Benton, where the In-
dians had become threatening, to a place of safety
at Camp Cook, where United States troops were on
guard. In the spring of 1866 he returned on the
ice of the Missouri River to Fort Benton, and from
that time forward w'as a resident of that community.
He engaged in the retail meat business and was
also proprietor of the Benton Hotel for five years.
In 1867 he had located the first ranch in Choteau
County, and for many years did an extensive busi-
ness in general farming and stock raising. In 1883
he built the first Opera House in Fort Benton, and
he also served as one of the first county commis-
sioners, being appointed in 1867. He was a member
of the grand jury at Benton. In 1872 he planted
the first fruit trees in Choteau County, and four
years previously, in 1868, had raised the first grain
on the banks of the Teton River. He was in every
sense a pioneer, and by his initiative had an im-
portant influence in the development of the country.
He owned valuable property in and around Fort
Benton. He joined the Knights of Pythias Lodge
at Fort Benton in 1884. Politically he was a stanch
republican and was a friend of many of the pioneer
statesmen of Montana, including Paris Gibson.
Mr. Stocking and wife had two children :
Katherine Lou, wife of Albert H. Stewart, a resi-
dent of Great Falls, and John J.
Thomas F. Corbally. Owing to his long con-
nection with the public affiairs of Cascade County,
the name of Thomas F. Corbally, of Great Falls,
needs no formal introduction to the readers of this
volume. In a straightforward, conservative man-
ner he has sought to perform his duties as a con-
scientious public official, believing, as was enunciated
by an eminent American statesman, that "public
office is a public trust." He has always, sought to
perform the duties of a progressive citizen, and his
support can always be counted upon in the fur-
therance of an}' laudable movement having for its
object the welfare of the general public.
Thomas F. Corbally was born in New York City
on February 16, 1881. His parents, John P. and
Julia (Smith) Corbally, were natives of Ireland,
the father born in County Louth and the mother
in County Cavan. They are both now deceased, the
father dying in 1915, at the age of sixty years, and
the mother passing away in 1914, at the age of fifty-
eight years. They were married after emigrating
to this country and meeting in New York City, and
they became the parents of four children, three of
whom are living. John P. Corbally came to the
United States in young manhood with his widowed
mother, landing in New York. He was a carpenter
by trade and was an employe of the Stephens Car
Building Company for many years. Politically he
was a democrat.
Thomas F. Corbally attended the parochial school
in New York City and also was a student in the
College of the City of New York. In 1897, when
sixteen years of age, he came to Great Falls, Mon-
tana with his late uncle, Thomas Corbally, one of
the first settlers of Great Falls. His first employ-
ment here was with the B. & M. Smelter Company,
and in 1906 he was appointed chief of the department
of county clerk and recorder of Cascade County. He
performed the duties of that position so satisfac-
tarily that in 1910 he was appointed chief of the de-
partment of county treasurer, holding the office until
1913. On March 17, 1913, he was appointed public
receiver of the United States land office at Great
Falls, taking over the office on April 2, 191 3. He
was the first land officer appointed by President
Wilson, and has given to the office his very best
efforts, discharging the duties of the position to
the entire satisfaction of the government and the
patrons of the office.
In February, 1909, Mr. Corbally was married to
Bessie E. Rowles, who was born at Sunriver, Cas-
cade County, Montana, the daughter of Presley H.
and Ellen (McDonnell) Rowles, the former of whom
is a native of Ohio and the latter of Connecticut.
They are now living in Great Falls. Mrs. Corbally
was the second in order of birth of the five daugh-
ters born to them, four of whom are living. Mr.
Rowles was one of the pioneers of Cascade County,
having done much early freighting, later operating
a ranch on Sunriver. To Mr. and Mrs. Corbally
have been born three children, John P., Thomas
T., Jr., and Elizabeth.
Politically Mr. Corbally is a stanch supporter of
the democratic party and has been active in ad-
vancing its interests. Fraternally he is a fourth-
degree member of the Knights of Columbus, and
also belongs to Great Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevo-
lent Protective Order of Elks. He has shown him-
self to be a man of strong and alert mentality,
deeply interested in the welfare of his community,
and today is recognized as one of the representative
men of the locality.
George N. Griffin. There are many individuals
who attain materia! success, and there are many
others who answer the call to serve in high positions
in life. When both these ends are achieved by one
/ty^yj'tz^i
/--V*'Z-0'
HISTORY OF MONTANA
man and entirely through his own unassisted efl:'orts
there is occasion for more than usual interest to be
aroused in the consideration of the factors that have
brought this about. It is a long step from the task
of a mine boy picking slate from the dump of an
English coal mine to a seat of equality among the
dignified legislators of one of the great common-
wealths of. United States. Such a step has been
taken by George N. Griffin, a prominent citizen of
Roundup, Montana, who now bears additional hon-
ors and is serving under Governmental appointment
as state coal mine inspector.
George N. Griffin was born in Lowestoft, County
Suffolk, England, December 30, 1861. His parents
were William and Susanna CNichoUs) Griftin, na-
tives of Cambridgeshire, England, the former of
whom died in 1894, when aged sixty-seven years, and
the latter when the youngest of the five children,
George N., was a child. In 1879 the father and
three surviving children came to the United States
and located at Rapids City in Rock Island County,
Illinois. There he worked until 1884 as a coal miner,
although he was a tailor by trade, but in that year
he went to Colorado, going into the business of
raising cattle and horses, spending his last days on
his ranch near Leadville. He was a sturdy, honest
man, but accumulated no fortune.
To a large extent George N. Griffin has been
identified with the coal mining industry all his life.
Before coming to the United States he worked as a
miner, having but indifi^erent school privileges in his
youth, and after locating with his father at Rapids
City, Illinois, he worked in the coal mines for about
three years, and later at Kirksville, Iowa, for eighteen
months, and at Angus, Boone County, Iowa, for two
years. While at Angus he repaired his neglected
education by attending night school, and also took
a course with the International Correspondence
School at Scranton, Pennsylvania. In June, 1886,
Mr. Griffin came to Almy, Uinta County, Wyoming,
where he resided for twelve years, during which time
he held positions of responsibility, being fire boss
and mine foreman. Later he spent one year at Lew-
isville, Colorado, then moved to the Sheridan Coal
Company neighborhood near Sheridan, where he was
employed as mine foreman until he pushed on to
Diamondville, Wyoming, where he was mine boss
and assistant superintendent for three years.
In the spring of 1902 Mr. Griffin came to Gallatin
County, Montana, where he was employed as coal
mine superintendent with the Amalgamated Coal
Mining Company for about six years. In the spring
of igo8 he accepted the appointment of coal mine
superintendent with the Republic Coal Company at
Roundup, Montana, and continued his association
with that company for six years, relations being
severed with feelings of mutual esteem.
In the meanwhile the sterling qualities which made
Mr. Griffin so useful and efficient in the nositions of
responsibility entrusted to him by some of the great-
est corporate business bodies of the country were
recognized by his fellow citizens at large as those
most needful in the firm conduct of public affairs,
this general feeling resulting in igoo, in his election
from Uinta County as a member of the First Gen-
eral Assembly of Wyoming. Public approval did
not end here, for in 1910 he was elected a member
of the Upper House of the Fifth Legislature of
Wyoming, representing Uinta County. Although
elected for a term of four years. Senator Griffin did
not serve the full term, resigning his seat in order
to accept a superintendent's position with the A. C.
M. Company. At this time he was also a member
of the town council and of the school board of
Diamondville. In 191 1 Governor Richards appointed
him a member of the State Board of Arbitration,
which he served as chairman. For one year he
served as city auditor of Roundup, and for six years
has been a member of the school board. On July
28, 1918, Governor Samuel V. Stewart appointed
Senator Griffin to the office he still so admirably fills,
that of state coal mine inspector. Many other un-
solicited honors have come to him as a result of his
broad-minded, intelligent views on leading questions
of. the day, and as tribute to his higli personal
character.
On May 8, 1882, Mr. Griffin was united in marriage
to Miss Catherina Proud, who was born in England,
a daughter of John and Hannah (Walker) Proud,
both of whom died in the United States. Of their
ten children Mrs. Griffin was the youngest born. To
Mr. and Mrs. Griffin the following children have
been born: Edith, who died in infancy; Edith (2),
who is the wife of J. C. Knapp ; Arthur, who is mar-
ried ; Maud, \^ho is widely known as an educator in
Montana, has served as county superintendent of
schools in Musselshell County; Ruth, who is the wife
of Dr. H. H. Cox, of Chicago, Illinois; Bessie, who
is an e.xpert stenographer ; Harry P., who is a stu-
dent in the department of journalism in the Univer-
sity of Montana, received his honorable discharge
from military service following the signing of the
armistice, was a member of the au.xilliary naval
force, completed his training at Great Lakes and was
then transferred to Pelham Bay, New York; Philip,
who served during the great war as a member of
the S. A. T. C. at Missoula, Montana, is a student
in the Montana State University; Walter, who is a
student in the high school at Roundup ; Dorothy, who
also attends the high school; and MoUie, who is a
grade student.
Senator Griffin belongs to Bozeman Lodge No. 18,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, demitting to
become a charter member of Unity Lodge No. 71,
Roundup, and served as the first master of this lodge.
He belongs also to Zona Chapter No. 12, Royal Arch
Masons; St. John's Commandery No. 12, Knights
Templar ; and Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine at Helena, Mon-
tana. With his family he belongs to the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church. As his father favored the
policies of the democratic party. Senator Griffin in
his youth accepted the same, but later, in the course
of a busy and rather eventful life, he found reason
to change his views and since then has been a zealous
supporter of the principles of the republican party.^
Oscar R. McVay, United States commissioner at
Roundup, police magistrate of the city and a justice
of the peace, is a man who is known for his effi-
ciency, trustworthiness and absolute dependability,
and his record amply justifies his occupancy of these
offices. Mr. McVay was born on his father's farm in
Union County, Iowa, August 27, 1858, a son of Jacob
Newton and Rachel (Davis) McVay. Jacob N.
McVay was born in Pennsylvania in 1828, and died
in 1899, and his wife, born in Knox County, Ohio,
in 1832, died in 1871. They were married in Ohio
and had nine children, six of whom are still living,
Oscar R. McVay being the fourth in order of birth.
Growing up in Pennsylvania, Jacob N. McVay at-
tended the schools of his native state, and left it in
1852 to move to Ohio, from whence he moved on
westward to Illinois, and after two years there, during
which time he was engaged in farming, he settled
in Union County, Iowa, and until 1869 was engaged
in farming and stockraising. In the latter year he
went to Jasper County, Missouri, where he bought
land and continued his agricultural activities up to
the time of his death. While always voting the
588
HISTORY OF MONTANA
democratic ticket, he was not a man who cared for
office and never sought public honors.
Oscar R. McVay attended the public schools of
Iowa and Missouri, and until he was sixteen years
old remained with his father, but at that time went
to Kent County, Kansas, and rode the range in
Kansas and later in Colorado and New Mexico for
seven years. He then became a stationary engineer,
and was employed as such in Missouri until 1896,
when he came to Musselshell and was a rider for the
old Roundup Ranch. His next occupation was saw-
miliing with his brother John V. McVay, and he
continued in it until 1905, and was then made head
sawyer in a large sawmill and held that position for
two years. In January, igo8, he became pump man
for the Republic Coal Company, but resigned in
April, 1908, to go with the Carpenter • Creek Coal
Company as hoisting engineer, but left its employ in
July, 1908. Then, in October. igo8, he became engi-
neer with the Republic Coal Company,' and remained
with it until March, 1910. In April of that same
year he was elected police judge of Roundup, and
with the exception of a short period has held that
office ever since, and for the past seven years he
has also been a justice of the peace. On August
15, 1916, he was appointed United States commis-
sioner, and his record has been such as to insure his
continuance in office for some time to come. He
is a member of Order of Eagles. In politics he
is a republican.
On November 29, 1880, Mr. McVay was married
to Miss Emma E. Shenefelt, born in Illinois Sep-
tember 10, 1862, a daughter of E. M. and Catherine
Shenefelt, both of whom are now deceased. Mr. and
Mrs. Shenefelt had thirteen children, of whom Mrs.
McVay was the fifth. The children born to Mr.
and Mrs. McVay are as' follows : Ella M., who is
the wife of William C. Grant, of Musselshell County,
Montana, has nine children; Bertha M., who died in
infancy; Pearl E., who is the wife of Oliver M.
Wyman, of Yellowstone County, Montana, has five
children; John O., who died in infancy; Creola F.,
who is the wife of Erin M. Beall, of Roundup, Mon-
tana, has one child; and Ernest O., who is attending
the Roundup High School. Mr. McVay is a man
who has known how to take advantage of opportun-
ity when it came to him. In his official duties he
plays upon his problems with the great searchlight
of personal knowledge, and his decisions are seldom
reversed.
Patrick A. Hopkins, assessor of Musselshell
County, is one of the alert young men who are mak-
ing this section of the state one of the best localities
in the West, not only because of their official work
but also on account of the encouragement they offer
to agricultural and industrial activities, and the pub-
lic-spirited interest they show in making public im-
provements and supporting the good roads and
similar movements.
Patrick A. Hopkins was born on his father's farm
in Saint Croix County, Wisconsin, March 19, 1883,
a son of Patrick and Catherine (Hennesy) Hopkins.
Patrick Hopkins was born in County Mayo, Ireland,
and died in 1886, aged fifty-two years. His widow
was born at Rockford, Illinois, and is still living
They were married in Wisconsin and had seven
children, five of whom survive, Patrick A. being
the third in order of birth. Coming to the United
States in young manhood, Patrick Hopkins landed
from the sailing vessel in which he had made the
trip at New York City, from which he drifted
westward and finally located in Wisconsin, wlicre
he obtained employment on steamers plying on the
Great Lakes, and remained in this line of work for
about ten years. He then bought a farm on Erin
Prairie, Wisconsin, which was in the wilderness of
Saint Croix County, and here he w'orked hard to
develop his land. As his earnings accumulated, he
invested his money in another farm, which was in
Goodhue County, Minnesota, paying $1.25 per acre
for it, but he continued to reside on his original
farm, where he died. From the time he was nat-
uralized he voted the democratic ticket.
Patrick A. Hopkins grew up on his father's farm
and during the winters attended the rural schools.
When he was twenty-tw-o years old he left home
and bought a farm in Cavalier County, North Da-
kota, on which he remained for three years. In the
fall of 1909 he came to Musselshell County and
homesteaded, and since then has been closely iden-
tified with the development of this region. Like
liis father he is a democrat, and he was the suc-
cessful candidate of his party for county assessor
in 1918.
On June 27, 1917, Mr. Hopkins was united in mar-
riage with Emma A. Voght, born in Pembina County,
North Dakota. Mr. Hopkins is a man who has
always worked hard, and his success in life has
come from the fact that he has been industrious,
thrifty and efficient in everything he has undertaken,
and the people of Musselshell County feel satisfied
with his administration of the affairs of his office.
Both he and Mrs. Hopkins are popular, and their
pleasant home is oftentimes the scene of the gather-
ing of their many friends to partake of their open-
handed hospitality.
Albert J. Fousek is one of the most useful citi-
zens Great Falls has ever had. He has lived in that
community for a quarter of a century, is a veteran
business man now retired, and again and again he
was called upon to render duty in public office. For
many years he was a member of the city council,
for two terms was mayor, and has also served in
the Legislature.
Few citizens of foreign birth have been more
frequently honored in Montana, and have more justly
earned these honors and the confidence of American
people than Mr. Fousek, who was born in Bohemia
November 27, 1869, son of Joseph and Anna Foiisek.
His parents were natives of the same province.
Albert was the youngest of three children, two of
whom are still living. His father was a carpenter
by trade and in 1876 brought his family to America,
spending about six years in New York City. He
worked as a carpenter with the Havemyer Sugar
Company of New York. He then moved to Min-
nesota, establishing a new farm in Renville County.
He continued farming for a number of years, and
later returned to New York City, where he remained
about six months and received an injury from which
he died. He died in New York in 1905, at the age of
sixty-five. His widow survived him until 1918, being
seventy-four at the time of her death. Both were
members of the Catholic Church.
Albert J. Fousek was about six years old when
brought to America, and acquired his early educa-
tion chiefly in the public schools of New York City.
He also attended school for a time in Minnesota.
The first money he ever earned was in digging
potatoes in Minnesota. For that heavy labor he was
paid $10 a month. For about two years he worked
as a farm hand. He was in St. Paul for some
years, at first working at street grading at $1.50 a
day, and then began an apprenticeship at the cigar
making trade. He followed his trade in St. Paul
until 1893, when he came to Great Falls and was
employed as a cigar maker until 1896, when he en-
gaged in business for himself. Mr. Fousek continued
^'i^i^^^^t^^^^^-'^C^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
active in the cigar business at Great Falls for over
twenty years, until he retired in June, 1918.
His first important office in local aflfairs was his
election as alderman from the Third Ward in 1904.
He was re-elected in 1906, 1908, 1910, 1912 and 1914.
He served altogether for eleven years, until he was
elected mayor in 1915. He was re-elected in 1917,
and gave two terins of efficient administration of
local municipal affairs. He was elected to the Leg-
islature in the fall of 1914, and served in the four-
teentji session, being a member of the city affairs
and publicity and other committees.
Mr. Fousek is a democrat and is one of the most
influential men in his party in this part of the state.
For the past thirteen years he has been treasurer of
the Fraternal Order of Eagles and is also affiliated
with the Knights of Pythias and Modern Woodmen
of America.
November 22, 1892, he married Miss Anna Havlick,
a native of LeSueur County, Minnesota. They are
the parents of six children : Mamie, Lydia, .Albert
E., Lewis, Benjamin and Blanche. Mamie is now a
student in the Montana State Normal School at
Dillon. Lydia is a Red Cross nurse and has been on
duty with the American army at Fort Sam Houston,
Texas. The son Albert E. while a high school boy
enlisted in the Second Montana National Guard
Regiment in the spring of 1917, and on December
24, 191 7, arrived in France as a member of Company
D, One Hundred and Sixty-third Infantry with the
Forty-first Division. He saw nearly a year of active
service in France, and was granted an honorable
discharge with the rank of sergeant at Fort Russell,
Wyoming, March 15, 1919.
Mark Deforest Dearborn. Possessing ambition,
courage and perseverance in the realm of commer-
cialism, Mark Deforest Dearborn of Roundup has
made a success of his life and is now engaged in
booming the realty values .of his community and
county under the firm name of Mark D. Dearborn.
He was born in Waverly, New York, March 16, 1886,
a son of Deforest and Emma (Davenport) Dear-
born. Mr. Dearborn traces his ancestry back to
Henry W. Dearborn of Massachusetts, who served
as a general in the United States army, succeeding
General Hull during the War of 1812, and was sec-
retary of war under President Jefferson. Fort Dear-
born, about which the great metropolis of Chicago
has grown, and Dearborn Street of that city are
named for Gen. Henry W. Dearborn.
Deforest Dearborn was born at Janesville, Wiscon-
son, July 5. 1856, and his wife was born in New
York state and died in 1906, aged thirty-nine years.
They were married at Waverly, New York, and
became the parents of two sons and one daughter,
of whom Mark D. Dearborn was the eldest. Brought
to New York state when a child. Deforest Dearborn
was educated in its public schools, and his first
position was with the Lehigh Valley Railroad, and
he rose from brakeman to passenger conductor, but
left that road in 1898 and went to McAlester, Okla-
homa, to engage with the C. O. & G. Railroad. Later
he went to Denison, Texas, with the M. K. & T.
Railroad, and was engaged in construction work
for some time. Still later he was with the Fort
Worth & Denver Railroad at .^marilla, Texas, and
while living there joined the Order of Elks, and he
also belongs to the Order of Railroad Conductors.
In politics he is a republican.
Mark D. Dearborn secured a public school edu-
cation at Rochester, Buffalo and Geneva, New York,
and Denison, Texas, and also attended Harshaw
Academy in the last named city for three years,
completing his courses at a business college. He
then became cashier for a leading commercial house
of Denison, Texas, leaving it to assume the duties
of assistant postmaster at Sherman, Texas. Still
later he was with the Rockwell Lumber Company of
Denison and Midland, Texas, as bookkeeper and
cashier, leaving that concern to become treasurer and
accountant with the Denison Cotton Mill Company.
In 1909 he came to Roundup, Montana, as cashier
of the Roundup Coal Mining Company. In 1912
he engaged with the Studebaker Company^ at Spo-
kane, Washington, assistant manager of its 'automo-
bile department, but returned to Denison, Texas, to
become accountant for the Southwestern Security
Company. On October 1, 1914, he located perman-
ently at Roundup as cashier for Frank M. Wall,
general merchant, leaving him to go with the
Roundup Merchandise Company as cashier, and held
that position until he embarked in a real estate and
loan business under the firm name of Morrow &
Dearborri. Mr. Dearborn is now largely interested
in the oil development of this section and is mak-
ing a specialty in handling and selling oil properties
in the entire district. He is trustee for a syndicate
headed by L. A. Moran of Texas, which is drilling
with standard rig and equipment in one of the sub-
divisions of the City of Roundup. In 1917 Mr. Dear-
born was appointed city clerk of Roundup,- and in
April, 1918, was elected mayor of the city, and has
given it a very business-like and efficient adminis-
tration. Mr. Dearborn belongs to Unity Lodge No.
71, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, to the
Roundup Club and to the Literary Club, and is
appreciated in all. The First Congregational Church
of Roundup holds his membership and receives his
hearty support.
On September 22, 1908, Mr. Dearborn was mar-
ried to Hazel C. Sanders, born at Denison. Texas,
a daughter of William P. and Corina (Wright)
Sanders, natives of Wisconsin, who are both now
deceased. They had three children, two of whom
survive, Mrs. Dearborn being the eldest. Mr. and
Mrs. Dearborn have three sons, namely : Mark De-
forest (IV), Ralph William and Wright Sanders.
Mr. Dearborn is well balanced and sensible. By
training and instinct he is fitted for the business
he is now developing, and already he has registered
astounding results in the development of the realt\-
values of this region. In his official life he has
been equally successful, and his constituents are
prolix in their testimonials with reference to his
effectiveness and careful attention to details.
James Gunolf Alexander. Though his father
was a prominent and successful lawyer James
Gunolf Alexander early showed a preference for
commercial affairs, and in the comparatively brief
period of fifteen years since he left high school has
been identified with banking. He is now cashier
and managing officer of the Security State Bank of
Judith Gap, and since coming to Montana has ac-
quired numerous interests and holdings that serve
to make him an important man of affairs in this
section of the state.
In the paternal line Mr. Alexander is of Scotch
ancestry. The Alexanders on coming from Scotland
settled in New York. His grandfather, John Alex-
ander, was born in that state, and was one of the
early pioneers around Northfield, Minnesota, where
he developed a farm and became widely known as
an importer of Belgium horses. A man of promi-
nence in his locality, he was a representative to the
State Legislature of Minnesota during the '60s. He
died at Northfield in 1888. His wife was a native
of Norway.
In the same year that his grandfather died James
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Gunolf Alexander was born at Elkton, South Da-
kota, November 13, 1888. His father, John P.
Alexander, is one of the veteran members of the
South Dakota bar. He was born at Northfield,
Minnesota, March 9, 1857, grew up in that locality,
and was graduated with the second class from
Carleton College in Northfield. He received both
the degrees A. B. and LL. B. In 1879 he removed
to Canon Falls, Minnesota, where he began practice
and where he was married in January of that
year. From Canon Falls he moved to Groton,
South Dakota, then Dakota Territory, about 1882,
from there went to Elkton in 1888, and since 1907
has been a resident of Brookings, South Dakota.
He is still active in the law, and one of the few
members of the South Dakota bar who practiced
continuously for forty years in the state. The firm
of Alexander & Alexander, lawyers at Brookings,
is composed of John ' P. Alexander and his son
John C. The father has always been a strenuous
democrat in his political affiliations and has served
as county judge in South Dakota. He is a member
of the Congregational Church and he is affiliated with
the Masons and Odd Fellows. Judge Alexander
married Adeline Chamberlain, who was born at
Scranton, Pennsylvania, in January, 1864. She died
at Brookings in 1917, the mother of two sons, John
C. and James G.
James G. Alexander acquired his early education
at Elkton, graduating from high school in 1905,
and immediately entered the First State Bank of
Elkton. It was his ambition to become a banker,
and in the early years he regarded his wortc as an
opportunity to learn the business more than as a
source of income. When he left the Elkton Bank
in 1907 he was bookkeeper. Then after four months
as bookkeeper with the First National Bank of Bala-
ton, Minnesota, he accepted an opportunity to acquire
metropolitan banking experience as bookkeeper with
the Northwestern National Bank of Minneapolis.
January I, 191 1, the Citizens State Bank of St. Peter,
Minnesota, was organized and opened by N. H.
Olson and Mr. Alexander, the latter filling the post
of assistant cashier. For the past ten years he has
been an associate of Mr. Olson in the banking busi-
ness. In December, 1914, he came to Judith Gap,
Montana, and in the same month became cashier of
the Security State Bank of Judith Gap, and has
since been given the chief responsibilities of man-
agement. The bank was established in October, 1909,
under a state charter, and its present officers are :
N. H. Olson, president; Dr. E. M. Gaps, vice presi-
dent; Knute Husted, vice president; James G. Alex-
ander, cashier. The bank, whose home is in a.
modern building on Main Street at the corner of
Third Avenue, has a capital of $20,000, surplus and
profits of $15,000, average deposits of $250,000, and
is an institution well qualified by resources and the
personnel of its management to render a perfect
banking service to the community.
Mr. Alexander is a member of the State Bankers
Association and the American Bankers Association.
Other important interests he has acquired since com-
ing to Montana are as president of the First State
Bank of Coffee Creek, Montana, as a member of
the Montana Development Association, as a stock-
holder in the Southern Minnesota Mortgage Invest-
ment Company, and as a stockholder in the Judith
Gap Land Company. Mr. Alexander owns a ranch
of 520 acres four miles south of Judith Gap, devoted
to grain raising. He has other real estate in Judith
Gap, including a fine modern home, one of the best
in the city, located at the corner of Louis Street
and Fourth Avenue.
His standing as a citizen is indicated by the fact
that he is the present mayor of Judith Gap. Politi-
cally he is a democrat, is a member of the Catholic
Church, is a third degree Knight of Columbus, alii-
liated with St. Peter Council No. 1509 at St. Peter,
Minnesota. In October, 1912, at St. Peter, he mar-
ried Miss Florence Burg, daughter of Albert and
Catherine Burg, her mother still living at St. Peter.
Her father, who died there in December, 1912, was
a retired farmer and an early settler of Minnesot 1.
He died at the age of sixty-five. Mrs. Alexan.lcr
is a graduate of St. Peter High School, and gradu-
ated as a trained nurse from St. Mary's Hospital
of Minneapolis. To their marriage was born one
child, Charles, on June 5, 1914.
Herbert M. Peet. It is the progressive, wide-
avyake man of affairs who makes the real history
of a community, and his influence as a potential
factor of the body politic is difficult to estimate. The
examples such men furnish of patient purpose and
steadfast integrity strongly illustrate what is in the
power of each to accomplish, and there is always
a full measure of satisfaction in adverting in even
a casual way to their achievements in advancing
the interests of their fellow men and in giving
strength and solidity to the institutions which tell
so much for the prosperity of the community. In
every life of honor and usefulness there is no dearth
of incident, and yet in summing up the career of
any man the biographer needs touch only those
salient points which give the keynote to his char-
acter. In the life history of Herbert M. Peet are
found evidences of a peculiar characteristic that
always makes for achievement — persistency — and as
a result of such a life he has become one of the
best known and most highly esteemed citizens of
Montana, and as such is eminently entitled to rep-
resentation in a work such as the one in hand.
Herbert M. Peet was born in Shongo, Allegany
County, New York, on April 22, 1892, and is the
son of Edgar J. and fiertha (Graves) Peet. The
father was born in Allegany County, New York, on
October 12, 1870, and died on September 10, 1898.
In his early days he had been employed as a tele-
graph operator, but later became manager of the
estate of Edgar Peet. He died at the comparatively
early age of twenty-eight years. He was a member
of the Knights of the Maccabees and in politics was
a democrat. Mrs. Bertha Peet was born in Alle-
gany County, New York, on .A.pril II, 1875. By her
union with Mr. Peet she became the mother of
three sons, Herbert, Harold and Mark.
Herbert M. Peet attended the rural school at
Shongo, New York, and the common schools at
Canisteo and Belmont, New York, in his youth, but
at the age of eleven years he began to learn the
"art preservative" in the office of the Genesee Times
at Genesee, Pennsylvania, where he remained until
thirteen years of age, and during this period he was
given the opportunity of attending school. He then
went to work for the News at Whitesville, New
York, but some time later went to school at Wells-
ville, and at the same time put in as much time as
possible on the Wellsville Reporter, a daily paper,
his service on this paper extending through his high
school course and terminating in 1909. _ During
these early years Mr. Peet had been gaining some
valuable experience, both in the technical side of the
printing trade and also in the other phase of news-
paper writing. In 1909 he removed to Boston and
entered the employ of the Jamaica Printing Com-
pany, continuing for about two years, when at the
age of nineteen years, he returned to New York
state and became editor of the Whitesville News.
In 1913 Mr. Peet was the democratic candidate from
HISTORY OF MONTANA
591
his district for the Assembly, and as an evidence of
his popularity it is worthy of note that he was
defeated by only 1,700 votes in a district that nomi-
nally was republican by about 5,000 plurality. In
March, 1916, Mr. Peet sold the Whitesville News
and went to Kittanning, Pennsylvania, where he
became city editor of the Daily Times, but in Octo-
ber of that year, at the urgent request of Bert C.
White, state senator from Fergus County, Montana,
he came to Great Falls, Montana, and became editor
of the Montana Equity News. In 1917, he became
secretary to Mr. White and legislative correspondent
for the Equity News.
In May, 1918, Mr. Peet enlisted in the United
States army, and was assigned to the Eighth Divi-
■ sion, where he was made personnel sergeant in train-
ing headquarters at Camp Fremont, California. He
proved an efficient soldier and was on his way over-
seas when the armistice was signed. Consequently
he was returned to the home soil and was discharged
at Camp Lee, Virginia, on December 13, 1918. In
January, 1919, Mr. Peet returned to Helena, Mon-
tana, where he again became secretary to Senator
White. On June i, 1919, he became president of
the Harlowton Printing Company and editor of
the Harlowton Press, with which he is still asso-
ciated. The Press is one of . the most important
enterprises of Harlowton and is probably doing
more to build up and promote the prosperity of
this section than any other single element. Mr. Peet
is a forceful and pleasing writer, with the neces-
sary "punch" to emphasize what he has to say, and
his influence in local afifairs is generally acknowl-
edged.
On June 30, 1919, at the first state convention of
the American Legion, Mr. Peet was elected state
historian, and on July i, 1919, he was appointed by
Governor S. V. Stewart a member of the Veteran
Welfare Commission of the State of Montana, of
which he later became chairman. In August, 1919,
he was selected as editor-in-chief of the Montana
Legionaire, the official organ of the American Legion
for the State of Montana. Honors and responsibili-
ties were thus heaped on him thick and fast, but he
is fully capable of discharging his official duties to
the entire satisfaction of all concerned.
Politically Mr. Peet is a stanch supporter of the
democratic party. Fraternally he is a metyiber of
the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, having first
been made a Mason in Andover Lodge, at Andover,
New York, whence he demitted to Musselshell Lodge
No. 69, at Harlowton, Montana. He is also a mem-
ber of Harlowton Chapter, Royal Arch Masons,
and Palestine Commandery, Knights Templars.
On August 27, 1919, at Whitesville, New York,
Mr. Peet was married to Marie Former, a native of
Whitesville and the daughter of Lester J. and Bertha
(Wildman) Fortner, the former of whom is a suc-
cessful banker in Whitesville. To Mr. and Mrs.
Peet one daughter has been born.
Mr. Peet is a man of pleasing personality, broad
of mental ken and possesses to a marked degree
those characteristics which beget esteem, confidence
and friendship.
Andrew Thomas Anderson, clerk of the Four-
teenth Judicial Court, ex-mayor of Harlowton, and
one of the representative men of Wheatland County,
is recognized as a typical westerner of the highest
standard. He was born in the County of Haldiraand,
Ontario, Canada, August 31, iStn, a son of John
and Janet (Geddes) Anderson. John Anderson was
born at Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1809, and died in
1903, while his wife, born in New York state in
1819, died in 1908. They were married at Gault.
Ontario, Canada, and had ten children, five of whom
ToJ. 11— 38
survive, ."Xndrew Thomas Anderson being the young-
est of them all. When he was nineteen years of
age John Anderson came to Canada in. a sailing ves-
sel and landed at Quebec after being forty-nine days
on the ocean. Securing land in County Haldimand,
he developed a valuable farm and had the distinc-
tion of being one of the pioneers of that district,
and he and his wife rounded out tlieir lives on this
same farm. He was a member of the reform party,
and held several important offices, including that of
treasurer of the county. The Presbyterian Church
held his membership.
After attending the public schools of his native
county Andrew Thomas Anderson took a course in
the Toronto Normal School, and for eight years was
engaged in teaching school in Ontario. Then, in the
spring of 1891, he came to the United States, and
was a clerk in the store at Bigtimber, Montana, for
about three years, when, having saved up some
money, he went into the drug business at that
place, and conducted it for ?ix years. He then came
to Harlowton as bookkeeper for a mercantile estab-
lishment, and later assisted in incorporating the
Union Mercantile Company, of which he was man-
ager from 1903 until December 31, 1909, when he
was appointed United States commissioner, which
office he held until May 15. 1917, at which time he
received his present appointment. Mr. Anderson
was elected mayor of Harlowton in 1908 and re-
elected in 1909. Although he was again elected in
igiJ. he refused to qualify, feeling that his occupancy
of the office for two terms was sufficient service in
liehalf of the city. During the great war he served
as chairman of the Wheatland County Draft Board,
and cheerfully donated his services to his country
as long as they wece needed. Fraternally he belongs
to Carbonate Lodge No. 39, Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, of which he is past noble grand; Mus-
selshell Lodge No. 69, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, of which he is past master, and "he has
the distinction of bein? the first man initiated in
this lodge; Harlowton Chapter No. 22. Royal Arch
Masons ; and Palestine Commandery No. 18. Knights
Templar. Politically he is a strong republican and
will continue to uphold the principles of that party.
Like his father he is a member of the Presbyterian
Church.
In 1886 Mr. Anderson was married to Miss Jessie
Hall, born in London, England. Mr. and Mrs. An-
derson have two children, Mame Alberta and
Andrew Geddes. Mr. Anderson is a man who pos-
sesses vision, courage and initiative. He early
learned to work for knowledge and hold on to what
he learned. He looked into the future with all a
man's keenness of vision and made his plans so as
to have his efforts yield him the fullest measure
of profit, and at the same time he has so ordered his
life as to give more than the ordinary measure of
to his community.
WiLLi.\M Allen Chessman. The distinction of
William Allen "Chessman is not so much his long
life and residence in Montana as his forceful and
valuable participation in the business, civic and
municipal history of Helena.
Now living at the age of ninety, he was born at
Wevmouth, Massachusetts, August 19, 1830, son of
John and Lucinda (Wild) Chessman. The founder
of the family was George Chessman, who came
from England about 1700 and located at Braintree,
Massachusetts. He married Jane Duran. The
heads of the successive generations were : Clifford
Chessman, a native of Braintree, who moved to
Weymouth and married Lydia Orcutt ; Hosea
Chessman, who married Olive Shaw; Josiah Chess-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
man, who married Susannah Kingman ; John Chess-
man, who married Lucinda Wild, and William Allen
Chessman.
William Allen Chessman attended common school
at Weymouth, and learned and followed the trade
of shoemaker for two years before going West.
Mr. Chessman is one of the rare few who were
among the original California forty-niners. In that
year he embarged on a sailing ship at New York,
went around Cape Horn, and reached San Francisco
December 20, 1849. He is still a member of the So-
ciety of California Pioneers. For a number of years
he was interested in placer mining in that state, and
on coming to Montana in 1865 continued mining. He
bought some placer mines, subsequently some water
ditches, and built a bed rock flume in Last Chance
Gulch. At a cost of about $30,000 he equipped his
plant with a hydraulic appliance. The water supply
for the use of the mines around Helena came from
different sources. July i, 1889, the owners of the
various ditches and water rights were consolidated
under the Helena Consolidated Water Company,
with Mr. Chessman as president. June 11, i8g8, the
company was reorganized as the Helera Water Com-
pany and in September, 191 1, the property was
bought by the City of Helena. Thus he had a very
prominent part in developing the present public
water system of the capital. Mr. Chessman served
several years as vice president of the Peoples Na-
tional Bank, and at one time was a director of the
Montana National Bank.
He served in tive sessions of the Territorial Legis-
lature, being a member of the extraordinary session
of the House convening April 14, 1873, at'Virginia
City, then the capital ; was a member of the- eighth
session of the House, which convened also at Vir-
ginia City, January 5, 1874; attended the ninth ses-
sion, beginning January 3, 1876, at Helena ; and for
two terms was also a member of the Territorial
Council, the thirteenth session, beginning January 8,
1883, and the fourteenth session, beginning January
12, 1885. Mr. Chessman is an original republican.
He cast his first presidential vote for General Scott
as a whig in 1852 and several years later joined in
the movement to establish the republican party.
Mr. Chessman was initiated as a Mason June II,
1874, and was elected worshipful master of Helena
Lodge No. 3 four different times, in 1879, 1884, 1885
and 1886. He has taken all the other degrees except
those of the Council and thirty-third Scottish Rite,
and is a Mystic Shriner. He is an original member
of the Montana Club, had an active part in its early
management, serving once as president, twice as vice
president and sixteen times as a member of the
board of managers. For a long period of vears Mr.
Chessman has been identified with ft. Peter's Episco-
pal Church and is now senior warden. He is one of
the two survivors and the only one left in Helena
of the eight original incorporators of St. Peter's
Hospital, which was incorporated June 11. 1886.
He has served continuously on the board since its
incorporation. For twenty-three years Mr. Chess-
man was connected with the Helena Fair Association
as president or one of the managers.
.'*Lt Galena, Illinois, February 4, 1875, he married
Penelope V. Newhall. Her father, ' Dr. Horatio
Newhall, a native of Lynn, Massachusetts, graduated
from Harvard College with the class of 1817, fin-
ished his work in the Harvard Medical School in
1821, and going to Western Illinois in 1826 was one
of the pioneer physicians and surgeons at Galena,
and because of his skill and his learning achieved
a very prominent rank among the professional men
in the Mississippi Valley. Mr. and Mrs. Chessman
had four children: Susan Blanchard Chessman
Frank Newhall Chessman, William Allen, Jr., de-
ceased, and Frank N. Chessman. The son. Dr. Frank
N. Chessman, married Marvel White, of Chicago,
June 16, 1909.
Ernest C. B.\xtf.r. When he first came to Mon-
tana Mr. Baxter was a bookkeeper with the Gov-
ernment Indian Agency, but successive years have
brought him an increasing share in the industrial,
business and banking affairs of the state. He is
closely identified with a number of land, cattle,
banking and mercantile firms in the Musselshell
Valley.
Mr. Baxter was born on his father's farm in
Steuben County, New York, May 3, 1870, son of
Harry and Phoebe Marie (Smith) Baxter. His
father, who was born in Steuben County in 1844.
was for many years a farmer and later a dealer
in agricultural implements at Nelson, Pennsylvania.
At one time he served as sheriff of Tioga County,
Pennsylvania. He was a deacon and active member
of the Presbyterian Church, a republican and an
Odd Fellow. He died in 1910. His wife was born
in Pennsylvania in 1844 and died in 1912, at the age
of sixty-eight. They had three children: Portus, a
physician at Libby, Montana ; Ernest C. ; and May,
wife of B. C. Vestal, at Ingomar, Montana.
Ernest C, Baxter .acquired a high school educa-
tion at Addison, New York, and his early discipline
and business training was largely afforded by the
farming community of Steuben County, New York.
Mr. Baxter came to Montana in July, 1893. After
leaving his work as bookkeeper at the Crow Indian
Agency he ranched on the Yellowstone River near
Springdale, and did general farming and cattle raising
until 1898. Selling out, he moved to Livingston, and
was employed by A. W. Miles in the mercantile
business until the fall of 1899. He then went with
the Babcock and Miles general mercantile house at
Castle, and in the spring of 1900, still with the
same firm, established a business at Twodot and
had an active part in its management until 1905.
In that year Mr. Baxter with C. P. Tooley and
George K. Robertson, under the name Twodot Live-
stock Company, directed some extensive land and
livestock interests, and in the spring of 1006 Mr.
Baxter with C. P. Tooley and Dr. H. B. Tice or-
ganized the second bank ever established in the
Musselshell Vallev, known as the banking house of
Tooley, Baxter & Tice. The home of the bank
was at Twodot. Later was organized the Twodot
Land and Livestock Company, also the Tooley-Bax-
ter Land and Livestock Company, which acquired the
Linton Ranch, the Duffey Rancli and the Tice Ranch
west of Martindale, giving the firm an aggregate
of about 20,000 acres of land. In September, 1917.
was organized the Bank of Wheatland County at
Harlowton, and since then Mr. Baxter has made
his home at Harlowton and gives his personal^ su-
pervision to the bank as vice president and cashier.
With accumulating business interests, he has yet
found time to serve the public welfare and was a
member of the fourteenth and fifteenth sessions of
the Montana Legislature. He is a republican, is
a past grand chancellor of the Knights of Pythias,
is affiliated with Diamond City Lodge. No. 7. Ancient
Free and .\ccepted Masons at Twodot. Harlowton
Chapter No. 22, Royal Arch Masons, Palestine Com-
mandery No. 18, Knights Templar, and Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
March 3, 1900, Mr. Baxter married Miss Frances
Chapman, who was born at Otisville, Orange County,
New York, daughter of Henry and Frances (Otis)
Chapman, the former a native of Michigan and
the latter of New York. Her parents are both de-
ceased, and Mrs. Baxter is the younger of two
children, a brother being Henry. Mr. and Mrs. Bax-
A
HISTORY OF MONTANA
593
ter have an interesting family of five children, Galen
( ) , Robert H., Frances, Harr^ and Helen.
Fred P. Marks. Examples that impress force of
cliaracter on all who study them are worthy of
record in the annals of history wherever they are
found. By a few general observations the biographer
hopes to convey in the following paragraphs, suc-
cinctly and yet without fulsome encomium, some
idea of the high standing of Fred P. Marrs of
Harlowton as a business man and as one of the rep-
resentative citizens of his section of the state. Those
who know him best will readily acquiesce in the
statement that many elements of a solid and practical
nature are united in his composition and which dur-
ing a series of years have brought him into promi-
nent notice, his life record earning for him a con-
spicuous place among his compeers.
Fred P. Marrs was born in Tompkinsville, Ken-
tuck}', on May i8, 1882, and is the son of William
L. and Mary E. (Payne) Marrs. The latter was
born in Mount Herman, Kentucky, on February 5,
1855. and is now living at Tompkinsville. William
L. Marrs was born at Tompkinsville on April 10,
1854, and died on May 3, 1909. He was educated
in his native community and later engaged in the
lumber business, also being interested in farming
and live stock raising. Politically he was a demo-
crat, but was never an aspirant for public office.
Fraternally he was a member of the Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons and his religious membership
was with the Methodist Episcopal Church. To him
ani his wife were born nine children, of whom seven
are living.
Fred P. Marrs attended the public schools in
Tompkinsville. and then became a student in the
Bowling Green Business College at Bowling Green,
Kentucky, where he was graduated in 1904. How-
ever, before entering business college he had taught
school for four years and also taught one year after
leaving college. Then for two years he was em-
ployed as bookkeeper for a manufacturing concern.
In the fall of l907_Mr. Marrs came to Montana and
entered the employ of what was known as the Jaw-
bone Railway Company (later the Chicago, Milwau-
kee & St. Paul Railway Company), in the capacity
of cashier and ticket agant at Harlowton. After
filling that position about nine months Mr. Marrs as-
sisted in the organization of the Musselshell National
Bank at Harlowton. of which he became assistant
cashier on November 11, 1908. In this position Mr.
Marrs demonstrated executive abilities of a high
order and on February i. 1911, he became cashier of
the First National Bank of Harlowton, which posi-
tion he is still filling, to the entire satisfaction botli
of the bank officials and the patrons of the institu-
tion. The First National Bank is one of the strong
and reliable financial institutions of this section of
the state and has been an important factor in the
growth and prosperity of the community. A large
part of the success of the bank has been due to the
careful, conservative and yet liberal policy of its
cashier, who is held in high regard by his business
associates.
On April 11, 1909, Mr. Marrs was married to Eula
Pauline Franklin, who was born at Fountain Run,
Kentucky, the daughter of Benjamin F. and Lula
(Goad) 'Franklin, both of whom were natives of
Kentucky. The father died in 1907. Of their four
children the subject's wife is the third in order of
birth. To Mr. and Mrs. Marrs have been born two
children. Don Franklin and Fred P., Jr.
Fraternally Mr. Marrs is a member of Musselshell
Lodge No. ig. .^ncient Free and Accepted Masons;
Harlowton Chapter No. 22, Royal Arch Masons ;
Palestine Commandery No. 18, Knights Templar ;
and Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles
of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. His religious
affiliation is with the Metliodist Episcopal Church
while politically he is a democrat.
Although a quiet and unassuming man, with no
ambition for public position or leadershfp, Mr. Marrs
has contributed much to the material, civic and
moral advancement of the community, while his
admirable qualities of head and heart have won for
him the esteem and confidence of the circles in
which he moves.
Charles B. Riedeman, treasurer of Wheatland
County, has the distinction of being the first man
to hold that important ofiice, having been placed
in it first by appointment and later by election. He
was born in Monona, Iowa, November 14, 1882, a son
of Henry and Louisa (Messing) Riedeman, natives
of Germany. Henry Riedema.i died in 1915, aged
eighty-two years, but his widow survives him, being
now seventy-one years old. Of their nine children
six are now living, and of them all Charles B.
Riedeman was the seventh in order of birth. Com-
ing to the United States from Germany when nine-
teen years of age, Henry Riedeman went from New
York City, where he landed from the sailing vessel
which brought him across the ocean, to Ohio, and
was living in that state when the war broke out
between the North and the South, and he enlisted
in defense of his adopted country in an Ohio vol-
unteer regiment of infantry, and served for 3^/2
years, participating in all of the engagements of
his regiment, including that at Shiloh. After the
organization of the Grand Army of the Republic Mr.
Riedeman became a member of it. From the organi-
zation of the republican party he gave it an earnest
support. Some time after his return from the army
he went to Kansas and proved up a homestead, but
after five years there, on account of excessive
drought and other causes for crop failure, he went
to Monona County, Iowa, where he was engaged in
farming and stock-raising until 1912, in that year
retiring and moving to Onawa, Iowa, where he died.
Charles B. Riedeman attended the public schools
of Iowa during the winter months, and in the sum-
mer time helped his father on the farm, in this way
learning to be useful and the value of time. These
lessons of industry and frugality inculcated in the
growing lad, had an important part in the formation
of his character, and he feels that he owes much
to the precepts of his excellent father and mother.
Hard work and responsibilities developed the boys
of those days and gave them ambitions to strike out
for themselves at a very early age. Although only
fifteen years old when he left home, Charles B.
Riedeman had no fears for the future, and his faith
in himself was justified, for he went to South Dakota
and engaged in rock digging with mature men, re-
ceiving, as did they, $1.25 per day, the regulation
wage for that class of labor. Later he put to prac-
tical use the lessons he had learned in farming, and
still later did carpentering work, being engaged at
the latter for about two years. Having saved some
money, he invested it in a restaurant, owning sev-
eral at different times, one being at Onawa, Iowa, to
which he returned when he had some means to prove
that he knew what he was doing when he left
home. After conducting this last restaurant for about
six years he sold it. and in the spring of 1909 came
to Montana, homesteading at Judith Gap, where for
some years he was engaged in conducting his farm.
When he had it in good condition he went into the
real estate business, and also negotiated loans and
wrote insurance, at the same time overseeing the
594
HISTORY OF MONTANA
operations of his farm. With other representative
men of this region he saw that it would he advisable
to have a new county formed, and was one of those
who promoted the movement and induced Senator
Baxter to introduce the bill creating Wheatland
County, which was acted upon favorably, and the
new county was organized with Harlowton as the
county seat. Mr. Riedeman was appointed the first
treasurer of Wheatland County in 1917 and was
elected to that office on November 6, 1918, and is
the present incumbent. He is a democrat, and was
elected on his party ticket.
On November 29, 1914, Mr. Riedeman was mar-
ried to Marguerite Gordon, born in Wisconsin, a
daughter of H. L. Gordon. There were eight chil-
dren in the Gordon family, of whom Mrs. Riedeman
was the seventh in order of birth. Mr. and Mrs.
Riedeman have two children, Gordon Charles and
Grace Marguerite.
Robert W. Holland, county assessor of Wheat-
land County and one of the constructive optimists,
with a practical vision and abiding faith in the
possibilities and prospects of Harlowton and the
region around it, has done much to develop this
section. He was born in Allegheny City, Pennsyl-
vania, August 19, 1886, a son of Thomas and Ellen
(Mellors) Holland, both born in Manchester, Eng-
land, he in 1847 and she in 1849. They were mar-
ried in Manchester, and ten children resulted of their
union, five of whom are now living, Robert W.
Holland being the ninth in order of birth. They
came to the United States in i860 and located in
Allegheny City, Pennsylvania. In his earlier years
Thomas Holland was a sailor on many seas, but
after coming to this country was employed by
various companies in the steel industry, retiring from
active life in 1909. In politics he is a republican.
Robert W. Holland was educated in the public
schools of his native city and those of Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. His first employment was in the ad-
vertising department of a retail mercantile house,
from which he went to the mailing department of
the Crucible Steel Company. He was then em-
ployed by the cost department of the Park Steel
Company, from whence he went into the paymaster's
department. In the fall of 1906 Mr. Holland came
to Montana and located at Twodot, as bookkeeper
for G. R. Wilson & Company. Subsequently Mr.
Holland established a mercantile business under the
firm name of Holland Brothers, his brother James
being his partner. In the meanwhile, during 1908,
Mr. Holland was appointed postmaster of Twodot
and held the position until 1913, giving entire satis-
faction in his conduct of its affairs. When Wheat-
land County was organized in 1917 Mr. Holland was
appointed assessor, and was elected to the office on
November 6, 1918, and is occupied with its duties.
Fraternally he belongs to Musselshell Lodge No. 69,
Ancient Free and .\ccepted Masons ; Harlowton
Chapter No. 22, Royal Arch Masons, and is a mem-
ber of the Knights of Pythias. Like his father he
is a strong supporter of the republican party. He
belongs to the Episcopal Church and is a worker
in it.
On February 14, 1913, Mr. Holland was married
to Miss Maud Evans, born in Anaconda, Montana,
a daughter of Evan and Mittie Evans. Mr. Evans
was born on the line between Montana and Idaho,
and died in 1917, but his widow survives him. They
had six children, five of whom are now living, Mrs.
Holland being the second in order of birth. For
many years prior to his death Mr. Evans was a
ranchman and pioneer cattleman of Montana. His
political sentiments made him a republican. Mr.
and Mrs. Holland have the following children:
Robert Evans, Thomas D. and Jean Marie.
Daniel Gay Stivers, counsel for the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company and one of the veterans
of the great war, in which he attained to the rank
of lieutenant colonel, is one of the most representa-
tive men and distinguished attorneys of Butte and
Silver Bow County. He was born at Fort Davis,
Texas, February 10, 1869, a son of Maj. Edwin J.
Stivers. United States Army, now a resident of
Paris, France.
Major Stivers was born in Ohio in 1830, and is
descended from the one of two brothers bearing the
name of Stivers who, coming from Holland in 1714
to the American Colonies, settled in New Jersey, his
brother selecting New York. Growing up in Ohio,
Major Stivers lived there until he was thirty years
of age, when he entered the United States Army
in i860, and served all through the war between the
states, being with the .-^rmy of the Cumberland,
and later under the command of General Sherman.
Following the termination of that war Major Stivers
was in the Indian warfare, serving as major of his
regiment, and was mustered out of the service in
1894 with the rank of major. From then until
looi he lived in New York City, but then went
abroad to Paris, France. He is a republican, a
member of the Grand .Army of the Republic, the
Sons of the American Revolution and the Masonic
fraternity. The maiden name of his wife was Kaziah
A. Rawson, and she was born in Cayuga County,
New York, in 1840. Through her Revolutionary
ancestors she was eligible to the Colonial Dames
and has been a member of that organization for
many years. Major and Mrs. Stivers became the
parents of the following children: Lizette, who mar-
ried Charles T. Nagele, an artist of New York City,
New York; Edwin R., who is in the customs service
of the L^nited States Government, resides at Juneau,
Alaska; Daniel Gay, who was third in order of
birth ; Charles G., who is a physician and surgeon
of Los Angeles, California, served in the great war
in the medical corps and was mustered out with the
rank of major; and Howard R., who is in an
electrical supply business in New York City, New
York.
Daniel Gay Stivers was educated in the military
schools of the United States and the Chicago High
School, following which he attended lectures in the
law department of Columbia College at Washing-
ton, District of Columbia, leaving the latter in 1893.
In the meanwhile, during 1889, he had become con-
nected with what is now the ."Anaconda Copper Min-
ing Company, entering the office of W. W. Dixon,
chief counsel of the company. In 1895 Colonel Stiv-
ers was admitted to the bar, and in 1897 was ap-
pointed deputy county attorney of Silver Bow
County.
With the declaration of war between the United
States and Spain, D. G. Stivers was one of the young
men who responded to his country's call and was
commissioned captain of Troop L. Third United
States Volunteer Cavalry, Rough Riders, and was
mustered out in November, 1898.
Returning to Butte, he resumed his connection
with the .Anaconda Copper Mining Company and
was made one of the counsel for the company in
1899, and has so continued ever since. During 1903
he took a trip to Alaska prospecting for copper,
but with that exception remained at Butte until the
United States entered the great war.
Mr. Stivers was commissioned a major on June
I, 1917, and was detailed to build the embarkation
camp known as Camp Merritt, New Jersey, as con-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
595
structing quartermaster, the camp's capacity being
50,000 men. In November of that year, under his
direction, construction of the Port Newark terminal
was begun. In March, 1918, he was ordered to
France as quartermaster of the Third Division of
the Regular Army, and actively participated in the
campaigns as follows : Aisne defensive from May
27 to June 5, 1918; Champagne-Marne defensive
from June 5 to July 18, 1918; Aisne-Marne defen-
sive from July 18 to August 6, 1918; Saint Mihiel
offensive from September 12 to September 16, 1918;
the Meuse-Argonne offensive from September 26,
to November 11, 1918; and the First Army Area
between August 30 and November II, 1918. On
October 14, 1918, he was wounded during the
Argonne offensive, and he was awarded the Croix
de Guerre of France with the palm for gallantry
in action in the battle of Chateau Thierry. He was
cited by General Pershing on April ig, 1919, for ex-
ceptionally meritorious and conspicuous services ;
and was cited by General Petain, Marshal of France,
for important services rendered in the battles on
and north of the Marne in July, 1918. October 14,
1918, he was cited by General Pershing for distin-
guished and e.xceptional gallantry at Montfaucon,'
Argonne. Major Stivers was promoted to the rank
of lieutenant colonel in August, 1918, and was
thrice recommended for the Distinguished Service
Medal and once for the Distinguished Service Cross.
Returning to the United States, he was mustered out
at Camp Dix, New Jersey, in May, 1919, and re-
turned to Butte and his connection with the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company'.
In politics Colonel Stivers is a democrat. He be-
longs to the Episcopal Church. A Mason, he is a
member of Mount Moriah Lodge No. 24, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons ; Deer Lodge Chapter
No. 3, Royal Arch Masons; Butte Commandery No.
3, Knights Templar ; Bagdad Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine; and
Butte Consistory No. 2, in which he has been made a
thirty-second degree Mason. He belongs to the
American Bar Association, the Montana Bar Asso-
ciation, the National Geographical Society, the
United States Military Institute, the Military Order
Foreign Wars of the United States, is one of the
original executive board and an incorporator of the
American Legion, and is a member of the Spanish
War Veterans, and the National Rifle Association.
Socially he maintains membership with the Silver
Bow Club of Butte; the Anaconda Club of Ana-
conda; the Butte Country Club; is president of the
Anglers Club, the Rocky Mountain Club and the
Bonita Club, and belongs to the Montana Hunting
Club.
Colonel Stivers was married first to Susie F. Mc-
Manimon, of San Jose, California, on February 22,
1897, and she died in that same year. On Novem-
ber 10, 1916, he was married to Sally S. Knight, of
Anaconda. There are no children. Colonel and
Mrs. Stivers maintain their residence at No. 206
South Excelsior Avenue.
Frank M. Wall. The abilities of some men are
such that there appears to be no limit to what they
can accomplish, as practically everything they un-
dertake turns out successfully. However, it is a
mistake to regard such prosperity as the result, of
blind luck, for it is nothing of the kind. These
men who appear to the world as 'favored sons of
fortune are in reality simply those who possess the
initiative, the executive ability and determination to
forge ahead, never sparing themselves, but e.xerting
themselves to produce as many and good results as
lie within the possibilities, and in time they begin to
reap results which must be very gratifying. One
of these men is Frank M. Wall, one of the leading
business men and financial magnates of Roundup,
who has risen^ steadily to his present standing from
the very humble position of driver of a grocery
wagon.
Frank M. Wall was born at Saint Albans, Ver-
mont. December 29, 1869, a son of John and Ann
(Hand) Wall, both born in County Tipperary,
Ireland. He died in September, 1909, and she passed
away December 27, 1880. They were married in
Vermont and had ten children, six of whom are
now living, Frank M. Wall being the fifth in order
of birth. John Wall came to the United States
when nineteen years old by sailing vessel, and his
wife was brought here by her parents when she was
six years old. After landing in New York City,
John Wall went to Saint Albans, Vermont, and
became a farmer and breeder of fine horses and cat-
tle. After spending about twenty-five years in Ver-
mont he came west to the vicinity of Jamestown,
North Dakota, and homesteaded, later buying addi-
tional land, and was one of the pioneers of that
locality. Discovering that his land was suited to
wheat growing, he raised that crop and at one time
had 1,060 acres planted to it. Subsequently he sold
and went to Helena, Montana, where he lived in
retirement until his death. He never cared for pub-
lic office, but took care to vote, and was a strong
republican. From childhood he was a member of the
Roman Catholic Church.
Frank M. Wall attended the schools of Vermont,
North Dakota and Helena, Montana, and completed
the high school course. His first work was the driv-
ing of a delivery wagon for a Helena grocery store,
from which he rose to be a clerk and continued in a
grocery for three years. Mr. Wall then became as-
sociated with the Copper City Commercial Company,
and remained a member of its sales force for eight
years, when he resigned to become Indian trader on
the Black Foot Indian Reservation, and for seven
years he was engaged in trading with the 'Indians,
but then sold, and in the spring of 1908 he located
permanently at Roundup and established the general
merchandise house of F. M. Wall & Company, of
which he was president. In 1912 Mr. Wall took
over the business and is now the sole proprietor.
He was one of the organizers of the First National
Bank of Roundup in 1908, and was its president
until 1913. In addition to his other interests Mr.
Wall owns 6,000 acres of ranch land. He belongs
to Anaconda Lodge No. 239, Benevolent Protective
Order of Elks ; Helena Council, Knights of Colum-
bus, and in his religious faith he is a Roman Catholic.
Politically he is a republican, but like his excellent
father he has not cared to enter public life.
On February 14, 1913, Mr. Wall was united in
marriage with Miss Ira Gorsline. and they have
two children, Agnes Louise and Frank Michael. Mr.
Wall has always taken a constructive interest in the
growth of Roundup, and is proud of the progress
it has made. Few men in this vicinity stand as high
in public confidence as he, and he deserves the
respect his life and business methods inspire.
Emil R. Lausted, now in his third successive
term as county surveyor of Meagher County, has
been a civil engineer as a result of long and prac-
tical experience, and that has constituted his chief
work and service during his active life.
He was born at Menominee, Wisconsin, Feb-
ruary 7, 1876, son of Frederick J. and Sophia (Run-
neburg) Lausted. His parents were natives of Ger-
many, his father born August 26, 1840, and his
mother August 9, 1844. The father came to this
country when a young man by sailing vessel, land-
ing at New York City, and first located at Me-
596
HISTORY OF MONTANA
nominee, Wisconsin. He worked in the lumber
camps and mills of that section, and later took up a
homestead in Dunn County, Wisconsin, where he
made a home and farm out of the wilderness. In
1883 he returned to Menominee, and in 1893 located
at St. Cloud, Minnesota, where he died in Feb-
ruary, 191 5. He was a republican and a member of
the German Evangelical Church. His widow is now
living at Harlowton, Montana, and of their eight
children seven are living.
Emil R. Lausted, the third among these children,
received his education in the public schools of
Menominee, graduated from the St. Cloud High
School with the class of 1897, and in 1900 grad-
uated from the Minnesota State Normal at St.
Cloud. After about three years as assistant super-
intendent of the air brake department of the Great
Northern Railway Mr. Lausted went to work for
the Minnesota state engineering department, begin-
ning as a chain man with a surveying crew in
Stearns County the first year, the second year was
a rod man in drainage work, and for three years
an instrument man. In 1907 he was elected county
surveyor of Douglas County, Minnesota, and by re-
election in 1909 served two full terms. At the close
of this service he came to Meagher County, Mon-
tana, and homesteaded near Harlowton. While
busily engaged in improving his homestead he was
elected in November, 1914, to the office of county
surveyor, and has been re-elected in 1916 and 1918,
and his office during the past six years has been
burdened with a large amount of technical duty
not only in the laying out of boundary lines but
in the technical service involved in much public
construction work.
Mr. Lausted is a member of Diamond City Lodge
No. 7, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and in
politics a republican. June 5, 1907, he married Lil-
lian S. Britzius, who was born at Wells, Minne-
sota, fifth among the eight children all still living
of Rev. George and Margaret (Brown) Britzius.
Her father was born in Ohio and her mother in
Minnesota. Her father has for many years been
a minister and is now located at Minneapolis. Mr.
and Mrs. Lausted have two children, Richard T.
and Luella May.
Thomas William Wfxsh, M. D. Those of a
future generation looking back over the records of
the operations of the physicians and surgeons of
the great war are going to marvel how the people
of this country managed to keep in even ordinary
health with so many of the best representatives of
the profession under arms. Certain it is that the
very flower of the class who devote their talents
and skill to the alleviation of disease responded to
their country's call and either devoted themselves
with the care of the embryo soldiers at home camps
or went across seas and plunged into the horrors of
hospital work, winning honors and the eternal grati-
tude and affection of the wounded. One of these
enthusiastic professional men who proved their loy-
alty as well as their skill is Dr. Thomas William
Welsh, of Roundup.
Doctor Welsh was born on his father's farm in
Johnson County, Iowa, October 5, 1877, a son of
Michael and Ann (Hallarand) Welsh. Michael
Welsh was born in County Tipperary, Ireland, and
his wife was born in County Clare. He died in 1896,
but she survives. Of .their twelve children seven
are living and Doctor Welsh was the youngest born.
Both of the parents were brought to the United
States by sailing vessel w^hen young, landing in New
York City. In those days a trip across the ocean
was an undertaking, nine weeks being the usual time
of passage for the sailing vessels, and sometimes
the journey consumed much more. After learning
the tanner's trade, Michael Welsh working at it for
some time in New York State, and then learning of
the opportunities offered in Iowa for securing cheap
land, he traveled overland to Johnson County, and
there obtained 160 acres of land on which he was
engaged in farming and stockraising until his death,
making a specialty of hog-raising. He was a man
who devoted himself to his work, and did not care
for public office, but never failed to vote, casting his
ballot for the democratic candidates.
Doctor Welsh grew up on the farm and attended
the rural schools, after which he took a course in
the Iowa City Academy, and was for three years a
student of the University of Iowa. Entering the
medical department of the Northwestern University
at Chicago, Illinois, he took the regular medical
course, and was graduated therefrom in 1903. In
1913 he took a post-graduate course in the Royal
Ophthalmic Hospital of London, England, and that
same year was at the Vienna-AUgemeine Poliklinik
and the K. K. Universitat Zu Wien and in other
foreign cities.
Following his graduation he located at Braddock,
North Dakota, remaining there from 1903 until in
July, 1908, when he came to Roundup, Montana.
For some years Doctor Welsh has specialized in dis-
eases of the eye, ear and throat. He belongs to the
Musselshell Medical Society and the Montana Med-
ical Society and is an active factor in both organi-
zations.
On November 22, 1905, Doctor Welsh was united
in marriage with Miss Ethel .\. Jung, born in South
Dakota. They have three sons and one daughter,
namely : Michael, Lucile. Leo and Leslie.
On January 14, 1914. Doctor Welsh enlisted in
Company B, Second Regiment, Montana National
Guard, and was made sergeant of his company. He
first saw active service during the Butte, Montana,
riots in 1915, and was on the border from June 23 to
November 7, 1916. On September i, 1917, he was
called to the Officers' Training Camp at Presidio,
California, and remained until December i, was
enrolled into the Medical Corps in June, 1917, and
called to active duty on August 6. 1918, and remained
in the service until February 20, 1919. During that
period he was at the base hospital of Camp Lewis
from September i, 1918, until October i, when he
was sent to Camp Kerney, California, as assistant
of the Sixteenth Sanitary Train, and was later placed
in command of Field Hospital No. 263. His honor-
able discharge bears the date of February 20. 1919.
In politics he is a democrat. Since his return to
Roundup he has resumed his practice and his interest
in local affairs.
Hon. John Hurly was born in Berrien Springs,
Michigan, July 19, 1878, and attained his rank on
the Supreme Bench soon after he became forty years
of age. His grandfather, Thomas Barry Hurly.
spent his life in County Kerry. Ireland, and was an
Irish barrister. He died in 1861. His son, William
Hurly, born at Tralee. County Kerry, on June 12,
1854, came to this country with his mother about
1862, grew up at St. Joseph, Michigan, was married
there, and for ten years was in the newspaper busi-
ness in Southwestern Michigan. Jn 1886 he moved
to Forman, North Dakota,. and continued in the real
estate and newspaper business there until his death
on March i, 1913. He was always an active repub-
lican. William Hurly married Ella B. Murphy, who
was born at Berrien Springs, Michigan, June 20,
i860, and is still living at Forman, North Dakota.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
597
Her father, Sanford Murphy, was a member of
Company E, Sixth Iowa Cavalry, which regiment
came west in 1863 or 1864 with General Sully and
Mr. Murphy was killed in an engagement with the
Indians near Fort Rice, near what is now Mandan,
North Dakota.
Judge John Hurly spent his boyhood at Forman,
North Dakota, attended public schools, graduating
from high school in 1897. As a means of earning
his living and preparing himself for his chosen pro-
fession he learned shorthand, and for five years was
a stenographer at Wahpeton, North Dakota, part of
that time acting as court reporter. He was studying
law at the same time with Hon. W. E. Purcell, since
United States senator from North Dakota, and with
Hon. W. S. Lauder, district judge, and was ad-
mitted to the bar in March, 1903. Later he went to
Washington as secretary to Congressman Thomas F.
Marshall of North Dakota. In the fall of 1907 he
began practice at Minot, North Dakota, remained
there one year, and in 1908 came to Montana and
opened his law office at Glasgow. He was elected
county attorney of Valley County in 1910, serving
one term of two years. In 1912 he was a candidate
on the republican ticket for the office of the District
Court of the Twelfth Judicial District, but was de-
feated. He continued in practice at Glasgow until 1917.
In 1916 Mr. Hurly again received the republican
nomination for district judge and was elected by a
large majority. The Seventeenth District comprised
Valley, Phillips and Sheridan counties. Judge Hur-
ly was on the District Bench until September i, 1919,
when Governor S. V. Stewart appointed him as asso-
ciate justice of the Supreme Court.
Judge Hurly and family reside at Glasgow, Mon-
tana. April 20, 1908, at St. Paul, Minnesota, he
married Miss Jeannette P. James, a native of Minne-
sota. They have three children: Ella Marjorie,
born November i, 191 1 ; Jean, born September 13,
191 5, and John Thomas, born January 28, 1918.
Charles Gilbert Gaddis, chairman of the board
of commissioners of Meagher County, and one of
the extensive ranch owners of this region, is en-
gaged in the cattle industry. He was born at Fort
Logan, Montana Territory, August 31, 1879, a son
of William and Margaret L. (Young) Gaddis, both
born at Washington, District of Columbia, he in
1831 and she in 1836. His death occurred in 1908,
but his widow survives him and is living in her
native city, although eighty-three years of age. They
had four children, of whom Charles Gilbert Gad-
dis, the youngest, is the only survivor. Growing up
at Washington, William Gaddis embarked in a gro-
cery business and conducted it until 1869, when he
left the capital for Fort Shaw, Montana Territory,
to take the place of post trader for the Federal
Government. Later he was transferred to Fort Lo-
gan, and continued to hold that position until 1880,
when the post was abandoned, at which time
he bought the fort with the land surrounding it
and engaged in the cattle industry, continuing in
it until his death. Well known in Masonry, he be-
longed to Navy Lodge No. 4, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons, at Washington ; Helena Chapter,
Royal Arch Masons ; Helena Commandery, Knights
Templar ; and Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Or-
der Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. In politics he
was a strong democrat.
After acquiring his education in the public schools
of Helena, Montana, Charles Gilbert Gaddis became
manager of his father's ranch, and when the latter
died he bought the estate and is still in the cattle
business, having from 300 to 350 head of cattle of the
Hereford strain. His ranch contains about 3,200
acres and is well improved and very valuable. In
November, 1918, Mr. Gaddis was elected commis-
sioner of Meagher County, and is now chairman of
the board. His political convictions are such as to
make him support the principles of the democratic
party. Mr. Gaddis, like his father, became a Mason,
and belongs to the Diamond City Lodge No. 7,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Helena Con-
sistory No. 3, in which he has been raised to the
thirty-second degree; and Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, and both
he and his wife belong to Martha Chapter No. 11,
Order Eastern Star.
On February 6, 1907, Mr. Gaddis was united in
marriage with Emma C. Wilson, born at Portland,
Oregon, a daughter of John J. and Emma C. (Ran-
ner) Wilson, who had ten children, of whom four
daughters and two sons survive, Mrs. Gaddis be-
mg the eldest of them all. The Wilsons are now
hvmg at Dalton, Montana, where Mr. Wilson is
engaged m mining. Mr. Gaddis is a man of open
mind and heart and quick understanding, and has
always had the will and resourcefulness in carrying
on his busmess which make for profitable results.
As a citizen he has shown a commendable public-
spirit that has led him to support those measures
he believes will work for the best interests of his
sections, and as an official his record is unblemished
and characterized by the power to stimulate his as-
sociates to whole-hearted endeavor, so that he is
a natural leader, and one upon whom many rely
for inspiration and advice.
Ira B. Tourtlotte, secretary and general manager
of the Stockfeeders' Company of Glasgow, is one
of the dominating figures in the horse industry of
this part of the state, having raised himself to his
present responsible status through his own individual
efforts. He is a native of Anoka County, Minnesota,
where he was born on December 18, 1879, a son of
Jonathan B. Tourtlotte, born in Maine, whose father
was of French origin, although himself also a native
of Maine. He married a Miss Whitney and Jona-
than B. was their youngest child.
Jotham B. Tourtlotte was born in February, 1857,
and his educational training was confined to the
public schools. The greater part of his mature life
has been spent with the Washburn Flour Mills at
Anoka, Minnesota, although, after twenty-five years
of service with them, in 1910 he resigned and located
at Puyallup, Washington. He was married to Clara
Herrick, a daughter of John Herrick, and a native
of Wisconsin, where she was born in i860, and they
had two sons, namely: Ira B. and his brother,
Alvin F., a merchant of Sanger, North Dakota.
Both he and his wife are members of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. While he is a republican, he has
never sought or desired to be burdened with the
responsibilities of office, and he has never joined
any fraternal organizations.
Growing up at Anoka, Minnesota, Ira B. Tourt-
lotte attended its public schools, and when he was
nineteen years old left school to go into the Pills-
bury Flour Mills, and remained with this corporation
until he came to Montana in 1902. At that time he
was a finished miller, and could have remained indefi-
nitely with the Pillsbury people had he so desired,
but he decided to brancli out. and so came west. He
immediately entered the sheep business on the Big
Dry in Dawson County as a partner of Clarence
Hall and W. A. Twitchell, the partners beginning
with about 3,000 head of sheep, and they ran them
on the range until the spring of 1904, when they
lost one-half of their flock in the terrible March
598
HISTORY OF MONTANA
storm, and they disposed of the remnant of their
sheep.
Mr. Tourtlotte then went to work for wages on
the Selway ranch at the head of Pumpkin Creek,
Custer County, of which DeLos Selway, brother of
R. R. Selway, was foreman, and remained for a
year. Returning then to Minnesota, Mr. Tourtlotte
spent the ensuing winter, and then, in the spring of
1906, located at Wilton, North Dakota, and em-
barked in a hotel business. Although this was an
entirely new line with him, he made money, and
spent six years as proprietor of the Wilson Hotel
of that place. Having recuperated his losses, Mr.
Tourtlotte then returned to Montana, in 1912, and
embarked in business at Glasgow in partnership
with Messrs. Twitchell and Selwaj'. They are ex-
tensively engaged in shipping horses in and out of
Glasgow, and since 1916 have been incorporated as
The Stockfeeders' Company. Until then Air. Tourt-
lotte had charge of their farm, located south of
Glasgow, and they handled a considerable amount
of cattle, but since they have confined themselves
exclusively to horses.
On August 14, 1906, Ira B. Tourtlotte was united
in marriage with Miss Frances W. Gearhart, who
was born at Bradford Junction, Ohio, April 21,
1877, and was brought to Minnesota as a child. She
was reared at Elk River and after she had com-
pleted the courses in the public schools there, took
the regular course at the Winona Normal School,
from which she was graduated therefrom in 1898.
Prior to that she had been engaged in teaching in
the country, and after completing her normal course
she spent several years in grade work in Minnesota
and two years at Everett, Washington. Mrs. Tourt-
lotte is a daughter of William F. Gearhart, a na-
tive of Pennsylvania, who married Priscilla De
Weese, born in Ohio. Both Mr. and Mrs. Gear-
hart died at Elk River, the former many years ago,
and after his death his widow became a milliner.
Mr. and Mrs. Tourtlotte have four children,
namely: Eugene and Donald, who are living and
two who died when very young. Mrs. Tourtlotte
has a sister, Mellie, who is the wife of William Holt",
of Tripp, South Dakota.
Ira B. Tourtlotte cast his first presidential vote
in 1900 for William McKinley ; in 1908 for Mr. Taft,
and then in 1912 and 1916 he cast his vote for Wood-
row Wilson. He is a man who has never permitted
obstacles to overcome or adversity to discourage
him. The majority of men after having sustained
the loss he met with would have felt that fate was
against them, and certainly few would have returned
to Montana, or any other locality that he had found
so unprofitable, but Mr. Tourtlotte is not of such
caliber. It is a source of pride to him that he has
been able to return and wrest from Montana more
than was taken from him through the forces of
nature in his first venture in the state. He has
also won the confidence of his fellow citizens, and
is recognized as one of the dependable and sound
business men of Glasgow. Mrs. Tourtlotte's intel-
lectual attainments are of such a character as to
make her an authority on matters pertaining to cul-
tural movements, and she and Mr. Tourtlotte have
gathered about them a very congenial circle of per-
sonal friends whom they delight to entertain at their
hospitable home. The influence of such people is
naturally strong, and when it is exerted, as it is
in this ca<e. along constructive lines, its force is felt
over a wide area and is always inspiring in char-
acter.
Edward Carter Harcamne, receiver of the United
States Land Office at Glasgow, has been a resident
of Valley County since 1908, and of Montana since
1899, having come here from his native State of
Delaware. He was born at Felton, Delaware, No-
vember 22, 1873, a son of Robert W. Hargadine,
born at Viola, Delaware, a farmer's son, who be-
came a practicing physician and a florist. He was
graduated in medicine from the University of Penn-
sylvania, and not only attained to distinction in his
profession, but was a man of note in his com-
munity, serving as president of the local school
board, as a member of the Delaware State Board
of Medical Examiners, and directed his mind toward _J_
educational advancement. His death occurred in
1893 when he was forty-nine years of age.
Doctor Hargadine was married to Mary Evelyn
Carter, a daughter of Edward J. Carter and his
wife. Elizabeth (Reynolds) Carter. The Carters,
Reynolds and Hargadines were all old Delaware
people and all held to the democratic faith. Robert
J. Reynolds, once elected on the democratic ticket
governor of Delaware, was a brother of Mrs. Eliza-
beth (Reynolds) Carter. Mrs. Hargadine died in
1910, having borne her husband the following chil-
dren : Edward Carter, whose name heads this re-
view; Mary, who is the wife of George E. Hurd,
the eminent Montana attorney of Great Falls ;
Robert W., who is a resident of Saint Paul, Minne-
sota ; Albert, who is a conductor of the Great North-
ern Railroad out of Havre, Montana ; Julia, w-ho
married Robert S. McKellar, an attorney of Glasgow,
and Aimee C, who is the wife of John Todd, a
farmer of Glasgow.
Growing up at Felton, Edward Carter Hargadine
attended the graded and high schools there and
learned floriculture and horticulture in his father's
greenhouses and nursery in a practical manner. He
had the misfortune to lose his father when he was
only seventeen years old, but he had, even at that
age, sufficient knowledge of the business to continue
it, and did so until he left Felton for Montana.
Aiter his arrival in the latter state in 1899, he
sought and found employment with Houser & Com-
pany, railroad contractors, and began with them as a
"flunky." Later he w-as made shipping clerk, and
when he had been with the concern but six months
was placed in the office of the Great Northern Rail-
road at Glasgow as cashier. Still later he was made
agent of the company at Chinook, Culbertson and
then Glasgow, and also discharged the duties of
yardmaster at Glasgow. On March I, 1910, he left
the road and secured some government land three
miles from Glasgow, and spent three and one-half
years on it. His claim shelter was a four-room cot-
tage, and he had proper accommodation for his stock.
During the time he spent on this claim he harvested
four crops, his produce comprising potatoes, wheat,
corn and garden stuff, and he left it only to assume
the duties of the land office.
On August I, 1913, Mr. Hagardine was appointed
to his office to succeed Walter Shanley, one of the
early settlers and widely-known men. Mr. Harga-
dine was re-appointed in August, 1917.
Edw-ard C. Hargadine w^as married at Glasgow,
Montana, on -August 24, 1909, to Miss Anna M.
Dignan, a daughter of David Dignan, born at Rich-
field Springs, New York, in December, 1883. She
was educated at her native place, reaching this state
in 1902. Mrs. Hargadine is the youngest of four
children. Her brother, Thomas Dignan, is one of the
leading attorneys and a prominent business man of
Glasgow. Mr. and Mrs. Hargadine have three chil-
dren, namely: Mary Evelyn, Ellen Elizabeth and
Anna Jane.
During the great war the Hargadine household was
actively engaged in Red Cross work and Mrs. Har-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
599
gadine was secretary of the Valley County Chapter
oi that organization. Mr. Hargadine is a member
of the Knights of Columbus. He and his family are
Catholics.
Charles Manson Crutchfield was established in
a profitable law practice in Montana before the ter-
ritory merged into the state, and for many years
enjoyed a position of singular prominence in the
bar of Western Montana. His home for many years
was at Hamilton, where he died August 25, 1910,
and where Mrs. Lena Payne Crutchfield, his widow,
still resides. Mrs. Crutchfield is one of the promi-
nent women of Montana, and is a Daughter of the
Revolution and was very prominent in Red Cross
and other patriotic activities during the late war.
The late Charles Manson Crutchfield was born
at Richmond. Virginia, June 19, 1863, and death came
to him at the very zenith of his professional career.
He was reared in Richmond, Virginia, attended pub-
lic schools there, and was a graduate of the law
school of. Washington and Lee University at Lex-
ington, Virginia. He received his LL.B. degree in
1S85. He was a member of the Sigma Chi college
fraternity.
After his admission to the bar Mr. Crutchfield
practiced for a time at Richmond, but in 1887 came
to Montana and established a home at Phillipsburg.
In 1889 he removed to Missoula and was a partner
in practice with Col. Tom Marshall. In 1896 he
established his home at Hamilton, where he en-
joyed a large general civil and criminal practice.
He was at one time attorney for Marcus Daly and
handled many of his legal interests. After the death
of Mr. Daly he served as attorney for the Ana-
conda Copper Mining Company at Hamilton until
his death.
Mr. Crutchfield w-as a fine type of the southern
gentleman, polished, scholarly and the soul of in-
tegrity. He was deeply interested in democratic
politics and for four terms was a representative in
the Montana Legislature, two terms from Deer
Lodge County and two terms from Ravalli County.
He was also a delegate to the Constitutional Conven-
tion which framed the organic law of the State of
Montana. Mr. Crutchfield served as a vestryman
in the Episcopal Church, and was affiliated with the
Masons, Odd Fellows and Modern Woodmen of
America and Knights of Pythias.
In 1891, at Warrenton, Virginia, Charles Manson
Crutchfield and Miss Lena Payne were united in
marriage. Mrs. Crutchfield is a native of Warren-
ton, Virginia, and belongs to an old and prominent
family of Virginians. Her eligibility to the Daugh-
ters of the American Revolution comes from her
paternal ancestor. Col. William Edmonds, who was
commissioned a captain in the Virginia troops before
the Revolution and rose to the rank of colonel dur-
ing the war for independence.
Mrs. Crutchfield's father was Inman H. Payne,
who was born at Warrenton, Virginia, in 1822, and
died while visiting his daughter in Hamilton, Mon-
tana, in 1895. He was a Confederate soldier, serv-
ing all through the war. His life at Warrenton was
spent as a merchant and farmer. He was a demo-
crat and a member of the Episcopal Church. He
married Mary Massie, who was born at Warrenton,
Virginia, in 1824, and died there in 1891. Mary
Massie, the oldest of their children, married Col.
M. B. Hardin, a Confederate soldier, and after-
ward a professor of chemistry at the Virginia Mili-
tary Institute. Both are now deceased. George H.
Payne is a traveling salesman living at Baltimore.
John M. is a retired farmer at Warrenton, Virginia.
Inman H. is a real estate broker at Norfolk, Vir-
ginia. Berilard W. is a retired merchant at Colum-
bus, Ohio. Julian D. was in the insurance business
and died at New Orleans at the age of forty-five.
Alexander was a minister of the Episcopal Church
and died at Warrenton at the age of twenty-nine.
Markham B. died at Warrenton aged thirty-five, a
merchant.
Mrs. Crutchfield, ninth and youngest of her
father's children, has been a resident of Montana
nearly thirty years. At Hamilton she is a member
of the Woman's Club, the Delphian Society, the Epis-
copal Church, Leona Chapter of the Eastern Star,
the Royal Neighbors, and is also a member of the
Hamilton School Board.
Mrs. Crutchfield was the mother of seven chil-
dren: \'irginia, the oldest, died at the age of two
years. Inman Payne served as an American soldier
on the Mexican border eight months, then attended
an officers' training camp, and spent twelve months
overseas. He was wounded in the leg at the battle
of the Argonne, and during 1919 was a convalescent
in the Walter Reed Hospital at Washington, D. C.
Charles Manson, Jr., is in the automobile business at
Minneapolis. Mary Hardin was a graduate of t"he
Hamilton High School in 1918 and lives with her
mother. Lena Robb died at the age of two months.
Miss Jack Massie is a senior in the Hamilton High
School, while Virginia Denoon is in the second year
of her high school work.
Malcolm Gillis became a resident of Butte over
thirty years ago, and as a result of his previous
experience in the mining district of Northern Michi-
gan he readily found employment with the old Butte
& Boston Mining Company, and later w-ith the Bos-
ton & Montana Mining Company. Afterward he
engaged in business as a merchant, for two terms"
was postmaster of Butte, and for many years has
wielded an influence amounting to leadership in pub-
lic affairs and in the republican party.
Mr. Gillis was born at Morris, Canada, April 30,
1862, son of Neil and Jessie (Campbell) Gillis. His
parents were born in Scotland and were married
at Cape Breton. Nova Scotia, Canada. Neil Gillis
settled at Cape Breton in 1852, was a farmer there,
and subsequently moved to Lake Linden, Michigan,
and spent his last years at Butte, where he died in
December, 1905.
Malcolm Gillis' memories of his early boyhood
are associated with the state of Michigan. He at-
tended district and high schools there, and soon
after he was eighteen years of age went to work
for the Quincy Mining Company. He was also em-
ployed in the machine shops of the Calumet &
Hecla Mining Company, and therefore when he came
to Montana in 1889 he was equipped with a con-
siderable practical and technical experience in min-
ing operations. After a brief residence at Anaconda
he moved to Butte in December, 1889. He was
in the service of the Butte &: Boston Mining Com-
pany fifteen years, and then with the Boston &
Montana Mining Company until he went into busi-
ness for himself. In later years, however, he never
lost his interest in his former associates in the
mines, and made their welfare a subject of his
direct influence and action. He performed a valu-
able service to the miners of the Northwest in their
contest' with the American Federation of Labor.
In partnership with F. A. Chase, Mr. Gillis en-
gaged in the hay, grain and coal business at Butte,
beginning with a total capital of $2,000 and with a
small plant and equipment. The business prospered
and grew, but eighteen months later Mr. Gillis sold
out to accept appointment as postmaster of Butte
to succeed George W. Irwin, deceased. Mr. Gillis
600
HISTORY OF MONTANA
was a personal friend of the late Presi'dent Roose-
velt and was appointed postmaster by Mr. Roose-
velt when president. In 191 1 he was reappointed
for a second term by President Taft. Mr. Gillis
has been associated on terms of intimacy with many
of the prominent men of the republican party in
Montana. For three terms he was elected chairman
of the County Central Committee of Silver Bow
County. He is a former secretary of the Good
Roads" Congress of Montana, and has held all the
leading offices in the Engineers' Association. Mr.
Gillis for years has been a devoted follower of the
national sport of baseball, and in 1909 he sold his
interest in the Butte baseball team, of which for a
}-ear he was president and owner. Mr. Gillis is a
member of the Butte Chamber of Commerce, is
a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and a
member of Bagdad Temple of the Mystic Shrine,
has filled all the chairs in his Lodge of Odd Fellows,
is a past exalted ruler of Butte Lodge of Elks, and
is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
At Lake Linden in Northern Michigan in 1891
he married Miss Bertha Schlichting, a native of that
city, daughter of Herman and Margaretha (Oseau)
Schlichting. Thev have two children: Herman
Donald, born at Butte in 1892, and finished his edu-
cation in the State Agricultural College at Mon-
tana; and Clara Lucile, born at Butte in 1894,
graduated from Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Massa-
chusetts, in IQ16, and is employed by the govern-
ment in the Bureau of Standards in Washington,
District of Columbia.
DoMixiCK Fox. It is not strange that the people
of the little republic of Switzerland should come
to the United States and establish homes, for our in-
stitutions are similar in many respects to their
own, and they do not have such a hard time adjust-
ing themselves here as do the emigrants from other
countries of Europe, born and reared under condi-
tions which are just about the antithesis of our
own. The ports of entry to our republic have ever
been open to the Swiss and they have been coming
to our country for two centuries or more, and their
substantial homes now adorn the hills and plains of
the farming communities all over the Union, while
there is scarcely a city of note where they are not
found engaged successfully in business. They have
been loyal to our institutions and have proven to be
splendid citizens in every respect. Thus they have
aided us in pushing forward the civilization of the
western hemisphere and we have helped them in rna-
terial ways, giving them every opportunity, which
they have not been slow to grasp, being people of
thrift, tact and energy.
.Among the successful and well known citizens of
Western Montana is Dominick Fox, who was born
in Switzerland, the son of Aloise and Mary (Reich-
mat) Fox, of whose family of twelve children he is
the eleventh in order of birth. He was reared in his
native land and secured a good practical •education
in the schools of that country. At the age of twenty-
two years he decided to cast his lot with the New
republic across the sea, and on landing in this coun-
try he at once come to Butte, Montana. During the
first three years he was employed in the smelters,
but he had larger visions of his future career here
and he came to the Flathead Valley. He filed on a
homestead located nine miles northwest of where
Kalispell now stands, though at that time the In-
dians roamed without molestation over the spot
where later that prosperous city was founded. Mr.
Fox had married at Butte just before coming to the
new country, and he and his wife bravely and ener-
getically set to work to carve them a home out of
the wilderness. They made substantial improve-
ments and not only created a fine farm for them-
selves, but were of incalculable help to many other
early settlers in the Flathead country. They have
been witnesses of practically all of the development
of this section of the state and have in a quiet
and unostentatious manner contributed as best they
could and in many ways to the progress of civili-
zation here. They acquired 320 acres of fine land,
which they devoted to general farming and stock
raising. A number of years ago they sold their
homestead ranch, but having decided to again engage
in farming they bought a farm near Columbia Falls,
where they lived eight years. Eventually, however,
they decided to dispose of their farm land in order
that they might take life a little easier. They
moved to Kalispell, where- they had purchased a
fine modern home, and there they are now living in
comfort and ease, enjoying the rest which their years
of toil so richly entitle them to.
Through the years which embrace the early settle-
ment of the Flathead country Mr. and Mrs. Fox bore
their part in every movement for the advancement
of their community. They were especially inter-
ested in the welfare of the public schools and were
influential in their promotion. They have continued
their old habits of hospitality and it is a common
saying that "the latch string of the Fox home always
hangs on the outside." Mr. Fox is still enjoying
vigorous health, and he enjoys nothing better than a
day with a hook and line at a nearby stream or lake.
He is an unusually successful fisherman, and for a
number of years he has in the summer time pre-
served fish by smoking and which in the winter
time is considered quite a delicacy. Mrs. Fox relates
that she was the first white woman in her neighbor-
hood when she first came to the Flathead country,
and that the Indians frequently camped near her
home and held their war dances there, at which time
she says their war whoops were not particularly re-
assuring to her. However, she never allowed fear to
conquer her. She persisted in being kind to the
red men, who were always welcome to food when-
ever they called at her cabin, and in return the
Indians never molested them. The nearest town at
that time was Demersville, while the county seat
then was Missoula, some 150 miles distant. At that
time Missoula Countv reached clear to the Cana-
dian line. With all of their extraordinary experi-
ences Mr. and Mrs. Fox never regretted casting their
lot with their adopted country, and they surely have
honored the county of their citizenship.
While living in Butte Mr. Fox was married to
Magdalena Spani, who also was a native of Switz-
erland and who, during her girlhood days, was a
playftiate of Mr. Fox back in their Swiss home.
Religiously Mr. and Mrs. Fox are adherents of the
Roman Catholic Church at Kalispell. In his political
views Mr. Fox is broad, preferring to give his vote
and his support to those men and measures which in
his opinion will most benefit all the people. Quiet
and unassuming in manner, Mr. Fox is genial and
approachable, and because of the material success
which he has earned and the fine qualities of his
character he enjoys the confidence and esteem of the
entire community.
Daniel Fr.ancis Mooney, present deputy sherift'
of Beaverhead County, is prominently interested in
ranching around Dillon, and is the son of a Montana
pioneer, Edward Mooney, whose history has been
identified with Montana for nearly forty years.
Daniel Francis Mooney was born at Chester.
Pennsjdvania. -'\pril 26, 1886. Edward Mooney, his
father, was born in Countv Mavo, Ireland, in 1852,
^^frOe-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and came to the United States in 1873, at the age
of twenty-one. For several years he was satisfied
with the life of the Eastern states and was em-
ployed as section foreman for the Baltimore &
Ohio Railway at Chester, Pennsylvania. In 1880 he
came out to Montana, locating at Feely, and was
the first section foreman of the Utah Northern, now
the Oregon Short Line Railway. In 1885 he estab-
lished his home at Red Rock, where he continued
his work as section foreman, but in 1898 left rail-
roading to devote all his time to his growing farm-
ing and ranching interests in Rayans Canyon. He
is one of the men who have been prospered by many
years of attention to the agricultural and stock rais-
ing resources of the state. He still owns 3,000 acres,
but since 1916 has lived retired at Dillon. He is a
republican in politics and a member of the Catholic
Church. Edward Mooney married Miss Kate Do-
herty, who was born in County Mayo, Ireland, in
1854. Lizzie, the oldest of their children, is the wife
of W. F. Henneberry, a rancher at Dillon ; Edward
died when three years old; Daniel F. is the third in
age; Katie died at the age of two years, and Nellie,
the youngest, is the wife of W. S. Trask, proprietor
of a garage at Jerome, Idaho.
Daniel Francis Mooney acquired his early educa-
tion while living on his father's ranch in Beaverhead
County. Later he attended the College of Montana
at Deer Lodge and was graduated in 1902. He found
adequate outlet for his energies and enterprise on
his father's ranch until 1916, and operated that ex-
tensive property, raising cattle for beef. He owns
individually 1,600 acres of Rayans Canyon and man-
ages this as a grain and hay farm.
A resident of Dillon since 1916, he has served as
deputy sheriff and taken a prominent part in repub-
lican politics, serving on the Republican Central
Committee of Beaverhead County and as a member
of its executive committee. Mr. Mooney is affiliated
with Dillon Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd
Fellows. He and his family reside in a comfortable
modern home at 310 South Dakota Street.
He married at Butte in .August, 1917, Miss Lucy
Morris. She was -born at Trout Creek, Montana,
was educated in the public schools of Whitehall, and
is a member of the Methodist Church and is affi-
liated with the Ladies of Woodcraft of the Modern
Woodmen of America and the Women's Guild at
Dillon. Mr. and Mrs. Mooney have one son, Francis,
born June 10, 1918.
Mrs. Mooney is a daughter of Matthew Morris,
who was born in England and was a Montana pio-
neer, locating in the vicinity of Whitehall as early
as 1879 and being one of the pioneer ranchers in that
vicinity. Mrs. Mooney's mother was Annie Wil-
liams, a native of England, and she is still living at
Fishcreek, Montana.
Livingston Marble and Granite Company.
Among the most important of the local industries
which have had much to do with the growth and
prosperity of Livingston, one of the leading enter-
prises is the concern whose title forms the caption
to this brief review. Starting modestly a dozen years
ago. the company has enjoyed a steady, healthy
growth through the years, until today its producFs
are known over the entire west. A fine quality of
granite and e.xpert technical knowledge on the part"
of those who handle it are the elements which have
gained this company the enviable reputation which
it now enjoys, and those who are mainly responsible
for its success are entitled to specific recognition in
a work of the character of this one.
D. E. Ayres, president of the Livingston Marble
and Granite Company, was born in Iroquois County,
Illinois, on May 23, 1862, and is a son of D. H.
Ayres. The family is an old one in America, th?
subject's paternal ancestors having come from Ger-
many and located in Pennsylvania in colonial days.
D. li. Ayres was born in 1831 in Hamilton County,
Ohio, where he was reared and where he married.
He followed farming all his life. Some time in the
'Sos he moved to Iroquois County, Illinois, being a
pioneer of that locality, and in 1869 became a pioneer
settler of Bates County, Missouri, where he lived the
rest of his days, his death occurring there in 1897.
Before leaving Hamilton County, Ohio, he married
Mary Wise, also a native of that county, born in
1833, and who died in Bates County, Missouri, in
1899. Their children now living are as follows :
John I., a farmer in California ; Mark, who operates
a broom factory in Bates County, Missouri; D. E.;
Oliver Ulysses, a contractor and builder in Bates
County, Missouri. D. H. Ayres was a republican
in politics, and his religious membership was with
the Methodist Episcopal Church.
D. E. Ayres received such an education as was
afforded in the rural schools of Bates County, Mis-
souri, and remained on his father's farm until he
was twenty years of age. He then learned the
marble and granite cutting trade, which vocation he
followed at different places in Missouri and for a
time was engaged in that business at Butlerj that
state. In 1905 Mr. Ayres came to Montana, locating
at Livingston, where he followed his trade until
1907, in which year he went into the monument busi-
ness on his own account. .\t that time he bought
all his marble and granite from eastern quarries, but
it was "soon afterward discovered that right here
at home in Park County lay unlimited deposits of
the finest granite in the world, and from that time
the success of the enterprise was assured, for, from
the fact that the granite is found largely in the form
of granite boulders, it is more cheaply obtained than
is possible in the quarries of the east. The business
grew rapidly and in 1917 the Livingston Marble and
Granite Company was incorporated, with D. E.
Ayres as president, Irene L. Ayres, secretary and
treasurer, and E. M. Ayres, manager. In 1915 a
splendid plant had been erected at 117 East Park
Street, equipped with all modern machinery for cut-
ting and polishing, but eventually the work outgrew
the old plant. To this another large addition was
made in the summer of 1919. The company owns
and controls 970 acres of granite land, situated at
Gardner, Park County, the source of supply being
thus practically unlimited. This is of the finest
quality of monumental granite, coming out in various
shades, and takes a beautiful polish. The company
also handles the best New England granites, the
extra dark from Quincy, Massachusetts ; the dark
from Barre, Vermont; the light carving granite
from Concord, New Hampshire ; the marble which
withstands all climates from Rutland and Proctor.
Vermont ; the regal blue marble from North Caro-
lina ; Italian marble from Carrara, Italy, and also
red and dark granite from Scotland, as well as the
red and blue from Sweden.
Politically D. E. ."^yres is a republican and fra-
ternally is a member of Zephyr Lodge No. 151.
Woodmen of the World ; Silver Tip Camp, Modern
Woodmen of America, and Livingston Lodge,
Knights of Pythias. He is also a member of the
Livingston Chamber of Commerce and the Living-
ston Club.
In 1885 at Butler, Bates County, Missouri, D. E.
Ayres married Mary DeAtley, the daughter of J. T.
DeAtley, who was a successful farmer and who is
now deceased, as is his wife. To Mr. and Mrs.
Ayres have been born the following children :
602
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Ernest M., who died on March i8. 1919, at Living-
ston, was manager of the plant of the Livingston
Marble and Granite Works; Nora is the wife of
\V. A. Boles, a rancher in Paradise Valley, Montana ;
W. E. is a rancher at Shields River Valley, near
Livingston; Ethel died in 1912. aged twenty-one
years; Thomas J., who is a marble polisher in the
plant at Livingston; Ruth is the wife of W. E.
Bayne, a farmer near Livingston; Irene is secretary
and treasurer of the Livingston Marble & Granite
Company; Roy, who is a traveling salesman for the
granite company, enlisted in November, 1917, as a
yeoman in the United States Navy, and was mus-
tered out in May, 1919; Chester A., is also an em-
ploye of the granite company; Mark died at the age
of eleven years.
Robert S. Oliver, superintendent of the dust treat-
ing plants at the Big Stack of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, is one of the energetic young men
who have assisted in developing this mighty cor-
poration and become such important factors in the
life of Anaconda. He was born at Escanaba, Michi-
gan, June 22, 1880, a son of John F. Oliver, and
grandson of John Oliver, born at Aberystwithe,
Wales. John Oliver came to the United States about
1854, settling in Waukesha County, Wisconsin, on a
farm, being the head of the first Welsh settlement
in the country west of Chicago. He died at Gene-
see, Wisconsin, before his grandson, Robert S.
Oliver, was born.
John F. Oliver was born at Aberystwithe. Wales,
in 1844, and was brought to the United States by his
father in 1854, and was reared near MilwEfukee in
Waukesha County, Wisconsin. In 1862 he went to
Escanaba, Michigan, and was engaged in a whole-
sale and retail coal business for thirty-five years,
dying there in 1914. He belonged to the Episcopal
Church. The first Master Mason who lived in
Northern Michigan, John F. Oliver was very active
in his order. When he came to this country the
events which resulted in the organization of the
republican party were vital and before the public,
and from its birth he supported that party. The
maiden name of his wife was Harriet Baldwin.
They were married at Escanaba, Michigan, where
she still resides, but she was born at Cleveland, Ohio,
in 1849. Their children were as follows : Catherine,
who married H. M. Stevenson, manager of the Mt.
Fleecer Timber Company, of Butte, Montana ; Clin-
ton B., who is conducting his father's coal com-
pany at Escanaba. owned by his mother ; Col. L. W.
who is colonel in the cavalry branch of the reg-
ular army, was graduated from West Point Military
Academy, and is now stationed at Washington, Dis-
trict of Columbia, on special detail as a member of
the general staff ; Robert S., whose name heads this
review, and Annie, who married N. B. Briscoe, a
major in the regular army, who has just returned
from France after serving in the great war.
Robert S. Oliver attended the public schools of
his native place, and was graduated from its high
school in 1899, following which he spent a year in
the West Indies with the Army of Occupation im-
mediately succeeding the Spanish-American war,
holding a clerical position with that force. He then
went to the Michigan CoBege of Mines at Houghton,
Michigan, and was graduated therefrom with the de-
gree of Engineer of Mines, and a member of the
Greek Letter fraternity Sigma Rho. In 1903 Mr.
Oliver began to make practical use of his technical
knowledge and was assistant engineer of the Tri-
Mountain Mining Company on the copper range of
Michigan, remaining with that concern for eighteen
months. He then came west to Utah and for a year
was engineer for the Continental Alta Mines at
Aha. From there he went to Southwestern Idaho to
become superintendent of the Addie Consolidated
Gold Mines, and continued this connection for two
years. His next change was when he went to Bing-
ham Canyon, Utah, as a miner, soon being made
engineer, then foreman and finally superintendent
and manager for the Utah Apex Mining Company,
with which he remained until 191 1. On October 20th
of that year he came to Anaconda and started in
the testing department of the Anaconda Copper
Mining Company, rising rapidly through various
stages of engineer of the light and water depart-
ment, foreman of the then new 3,000-ton leaching
plant, head of the research work on aluminum in-
vestigation, head of the tailings disposal, superin-
tendent of the public utilities department, his present
very responsible position, where he has charge of
seventy-five men. His offices are in the Stack Build-
ing of the Washoe Reduction Works, two miles east
of Anaconda. Having been reared a republican, Mr.
Oliver has adhered to that party, but has confined
his support of it to exercising his right of suffrage.
He is a member of the Episcopal Church. A Mason,
he belongs to Canyon Lodge No. 13, Ancient Free
and Accepted Masons, at Bingham Canyon. He
is also a member of the American Institute of Min-
ing Engineers, the Anaconda Club and the .'Ana-
conda Country Club. His residence is at 415 West
Park Avenue, Anaconda.
In 1908 Mr. Oliver was united in marriage at
Salt Lake Citv, Utah, with Miss Hattie Pike, a
daughter of Dr. W. R. and Mary Pike. Mrs. Pike
is deceased, but Doctor Pike resides at St. George,
Utah, having retired from practice as a physician
and surgeon. Mrs. Oliver is a graduate of the
Brigham Young University of Provo, Utah. Mr.
and Mrs. Oliver have three children, namely: Helen,
who was born July 4, 1910; John, who was born
March 31, 1913, and Harriet, who was born August
4, 1917.
James B. Gnose. Not readily deceived in men or
misled in measures, James B. Gnose, of Anaconda,
is eminently fitted by natural ability and training
to represent his district in legislative halls, where he
has displa3'ed vision, courage and initiative, and
been able to bring about some important legislation
for his state. In addition to his pre-eminence as a
member of the Upper House of the State As-
sembly, Mr. Gnose is one of the substantial business
men of .'\naconda, conducting here one of the lead-
ing mercantile establishments. He was born at Mill-
hausen, Indiana, January 3, 1865, a son of Jarnes
Gnose, a native of Pennsylvania, who died in Mill-
hausen, Indiana, in 1899, having been taken there in
childhood. By occupation he was a millwright, and
was also engaged in farming. From the time of the
organization of the republican party, James Gnose
was one of its strong supporters, and he never neg-
lected an opportunity' to live up to his convictions,
not only with reference to civic matters, but also
those of religion, and found expression for them
through the medium of the Lutheran Church, of
which he was a consistent member. He married
Catherine Snell, born at Millhausen, Decatur County,
Indiana, who died at Zenas, Indiana, December 23,
1918. Their children were as follows: Delia, who
married Henry Osman, lives at Elwood, Indiana, Mr.
Osman now being in a transfer business, although
until he lost his arm in an accident he was in the
traffic department of a railroad ; Senator Gnose, who
was the second in order of birth ; Ira, who is asso-
ciated with his brother. Senator Gnose; William,
who is in the United States army; Charles, who is
'^^ (^Qz^ ^f~^^z^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
603
in liis brother's, Senator Gnose, dry goods estab-
lishment; Martha, who married Benjamin Baker, a
merchant of Zenas, Indiana; and Sehna, who mar-
ried Dennis A. Woods, banker, merchant and leading
man of Zenas, Indiana.
James B. Gnose attended the rural schools oT
Decatur County, Indiana, and for a year was a stu-
dent of Moore's Hill College, when he entered the
National Normal University at Lebanon, Ohio, and
spent two years in that institution. In the fall of
1887 Mr. Gnose returned to Zenas, Indiana, and
taught school for two years, and for one of those
years was principal. He then came to Anaconda,
and for a time was engaged in chopping saw logs on
Modesty Creek for Walton & Scott, and then
located in the town and drove a team for contract
work until October, 1888, when he began teaching a
school in the Deer Lodge Valley, which occupied
him that winter. In the following summer Mr.
Gnose was engaged in developing fish culture on Lost
Creek with the hope of interesting the Federal au-
thorities to the e.xtent of putting in a Government
hatchery at .'Vnaconda. In this he was disappointed,
for the hatchery was established at Eozeman, Mon-
tana. With the coming of winter Mr. Gnose resumed
his school teaching and the following summer en-
gaged with Jesse Miller in his dairy, remaining with
him until 1891, when he established a small general
store at 317 East Commercial Avenue, which has
been expanded until it is now the leading estab-
lishment of its kind in Deer Lodge County, it being
a wholesale and retail grocery and bakery, occupy-
ing three fronts, of seventy-five feet of frontage. He
is a strong republican and very active in politics,
serving as alderman of Anaconda for one term,
and then being elected to the State Senate in 1916.
Mr. Gnos'e served as a member of the Fifteenth
and Sixteenth sessions and is still representing his
district. He was chairman of the mines and mining
committee of the Sixteenth Session, and was chair-
man of the fish and game laws committee in the
Fifteenth Session and codified these laws. In the
Fifteenth Session he also served on the educational,
banks and banking and other important committees,
and was chairman of the commerce and trade com-
mittee, and fathered some of the most constructive
legislation introduced and passed during those
sessions.
Senator Gnose belongs to Anaconda Lodge No. 239.
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the Ana-
conda Club, and the .Anaconda Country Club. He
resides in the Gnose Block, and owns it, the block
opposite the Montana Hotel, his store building and
other city realty, and did own several ranches, but
has lately disposed of them. As his name indi-
cates, his family originated in Holland, represen-
tatives having come from there to Pennsylvania
at an early day in the history of America. Mr.
Gnose has never married. Always active in pro-
moting the welfare of .\naconda. during the Sec-
ond Liberty Loan drive he served as chairman
of the local committee, and saw to it that the
Quoto was considerably oversubscribed. This
drive was the most successful of the series at
Anaconda, the amount raised being $1,250,600. and
the senator received many telegrams from promi-
nent national office holders and others congratulat-
ing him on his especially good work in this drive.
The plans he made and put into operation for this
drive were followed in the subsequent drives.
Peter Lagoni. In many respects the career of
the late Peter Lagoni. long one of the progressive
farmers of the Flathead Valley, is peculiarly in-
structive in that it shows what a well defined pur-
pose, supplemented by correct principles and high
ideals, can accomplish in the face of discouraging
circumstances. It is an example of triumph over
obstacles, the winning of success by honorable meth-
ods, and as such may be safely followed by those
whose life work is yet to be accomplished. He was
a fine type of the sterling pioneer, having invaded
the wilderness of this localitv when settlers were
none too numerous and when there was much to be
done before a comfortable home could rise and good
crops be reaped from the virgin soil, but he was a
man who never permitted discouraging circumstances
to influence him," for he forged ahead despite them,
and won not only material success, but the confi-
dence and good will of all who knew him.
Peter Lagoni was born in Denmark, where he was
reared to the age of thirteen years. At that time he
and his brother August were brought to the United
States by their father, who took that move in order
to avoid their being conscripted into the German
army. After accompanying them safely to the new
world in which they were to cast their future lot
the father returned to his home and family. Pos-
sessing the industrious and economical habits of
his progenitors, Peter Lagoni bravely went to work
to win his way and in time succeeded in no uncer-
tain manner. His first investment in real estate was
the purchase of a pre-emption right from a Spaniard
in the Flathead Valley, and it is interesting to note
that his judgment in the selection of that particular
tract was verified in subsequent years, for that tract
became the homestead wliich has been occupied by
the family during later years. The tract is located
about a mile west of Kalispell and is considered one
of the choice farms of this section of the country.
The residence is attractive in style and convenient
and comfortable in arrangement, while the other
farm buildings are substantial in character, an addi-
tional feature of value about the place being the
many fine fruit and shade trees which were set out
by Mr. Lagoni. and which now give an added beauty
to the home.
That Mr. Lagoni was progressive in his ideas and
methods may be judged from the fact that he was
one of the first men in this section of the country
to advocate irrigation for farm lands, and he per-
sisted in his advocacy of the system in the face of
almost solid opposition. However, the irrigation
idea gradually began to take hold of the ranchmen
and eventually its advantages became a matter of
absolute record, thus justifying Mr. Lagoni's argu-
ments.
Mr. Lagoni was proud of his humble beginnings
and they fitted in with his hopeful, helpful philosophy
of human life that merit will have its reward and
that in this free country, which he loved, although
born under an alien flag, young men may still look
forward to success and honor as confidently as at
any time in its history as the prizes of fidelity,
courage and indomitable energy. Of lowly begin-
nings, he nevertheless belonged to the highest nobil-
ity of the race. No accident made his career, for
he achieved every step, often in the face of over-
whelming obstacles. He was universally recognized
as a splendid citizen, progressive in all that the term
implies; a man of lofty character, sturdy integrity
and unswerving honesty. During the early years of
his settlement here he was one of the sturdy figures
upon whom the burdens of the new community fell
and he bore his part in the general upbuilding of
the same manfully and well. So when on June 22.
IQI.8, Mr. Lagoni closed his eyes to earthly scenes
the community realized that it had suffered an ir-
reparable loss.
Mr. Lagoni married Anna Hannan. who was born
604
HISTORY OF MONTANA
in Bethlehem, Northampton County, Pennsylvania,
the daughter of Martin and Johanna (Hartnett)
Hannan. To* this union were born two children,
Sylvia and Dixie Jane, the latter being now a student
in the Kalispell public schools. Sylvia, after com-
pleting her elemental education in the Kalispell
schools, finished her education at St. Mary's Hall,
Faribault. Minnesota, where she specialized in art
and music, graduating with distinctive honors in both
subjects. She then returned home and took up the
duties of housekeeper, devoting herself to her father,
whose faithful companion she was during the re-
mainder of his life, she and her sister contributing
in every possible way to his comfort and ease. She
is cultured and refined, and because of her many
fine qualities of character is held in the highest
esteem throughout the community where she has
lived all her life. After the death of the father
the giandmother Hannan came into the home and
assisted the girls to care for the home, in conjunc-
tion with her married daughter. Mrs. Helen Harmon,
whose husband is manager of the estate. The mem-
bers of the Lagoni family are adherents of the Epis-
copal Church, to which they give generous support.
Politically Miss Lagoni pays but little attention to
party lines, supporting the men and measures which
in her opinion are for the greatest good to the great-
est number. During the trying days of the recent
World war the Lagoni sisters showed themselves to
be typical loo% American girls, and, as did many
others, they donned their khaki suits and, going into
the fields, they contributed in a very definite way
to the success of the allied cause by their efforts
at home.
The Lagoni ranch is one of the best in the Flat-
head, standing today as a monument to the sturdy
industry and intelligent direction of Mr. Lagoni.
The ranch was devoted to diversified farming and
stockraising, special attention being given to the
breeding and raising of Chester White hogs, which
were raised for the stock market. It is the purpose
to specialize to some extent on Holstein cattle.
Elmer Jay Andkrson. This is a brief account
of a Montana pioneer, whose life for nearly forty
years was lived at White Sulphur Springs, where
he achieved success as a merchant, and enjoyed
many of the substantial honors of citizenship and
the esteem of his friends due the integrity of his
character.
Of an old Ohio family, Elmer Jay Anderson was
born at Alliance in that state November 20, 1854.
He was well educated, finishing at Mount Union
College at Alliance, and then returned to the voca-
tion of farming, in which he had been reared. In
1878, more than ten years before Montana became
a state, 4ie came up the Missouri River, first to
Fort Benton and then to Townsend. where for a
brief time he worked on the ranch of Governor
Potts.
He had been in Montana about a year when he
went back to Ohio, and on December 25. 1879. he
married Miss Eva King, a native of Homeworth,
that state. After their marriage they started for
Montana, and in 1880 Mr. Anderson located at
White Sulphur Springs, where he bought out a store
previously established, and was actively identified
with merchandising, banking, mining and stock rais-
ing until his death on May 7. 1917. Along with the
cares and responsibilities of a successful business he
at different times exercised much influence in politics
as a republican, and served as a member of the
Montana State Senate in iqoo-oi. He was affiliated
with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
Mr. and Mrs. Anderson were the parents of four
children : Glenn, Olive King, George Eldon and
Harold. Harold died in 1895. Olive King is the wife
of Moncure Cockrell, of Deer Lodge, Montana.
George Eldon, who is a salesman for a wholesale
grocery house of Bozeman. where he lives, mar-
ried Wilma Trotter, a daughter of William Trotter,
of Boulder, and they have a daughter, Virginia.
Glenn Anderson, a prominent mining engineer, was
educated at Columbian University at New York,
graduating in 1904 with the E. M. degree. He has
been engaged in mining ever since, and is now a resi-
dent of Butte and has given his professional services
to a number of the mining companies of the state.
He is a republican in politics, is a member of the
Phi Kappa Psi college fraternity, and is affiliated
with Summit Valley Lodge, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons. In 1907 Glenn Anderson married
Lucy Stephens, daughter of A. J. and Fannie Steph-
ens, of Fort Logan. Alontana. To their marriage
were born two children, Jay Stephens and Marian
Montana Anderson.
Robert M. Mitchell. In reviewing the various
branches of commercial activity, the historian finds
that there is none more important, especially during
the present epoch, than that connected with the
handling and distributing of foodstuffs of all kinds,
so that the men engaged in a business of this nature
are not only certain of obtaining a fair measure of
prosperity, but are rendering a service to the world.
One of the men of Butte who is not only now con-
centrating upon this work, but has devoted his life
to it, is Robert M. Mitchell^, manager of the North-
west Sales Agency, fruit and vegetable brokers and
car lot distributors.
Robert M. Mitchell was born at Farmington,
Washington, on November 17, 1887, a son of Edmund
and Lela (McDowell) Mitchell. The Mitchells colo-
nized in Ireland, from Scotland in the sixteenth cen-
tury, coming from that country to the American
colonies, while the McDowells are of Scotch descent.
The birth of Edmund Mitchell took place in Mis-
souri, and his death, at Bellingham. Washington, in
1907. He was reared, educated and married in his
native state, and there owned and conducted a hotel,
but left Missouri for Washington before his son
Robert M. Mitchell was born, continuing as a hotel-
man at Stanwood, Everett. Farmington and Belling-
ton, and other points in Washington. He was a
democrat politically, and fraterally belonged to the
Knights of Pythias. His widow, who was born in
Missouri, survives him and makes her home in
Seattle, Washington. Their children were as fol-
lows : AUie. who married Herman Gantenbein. sales-
man of Seattle; Robert M.. whose name heads this
review ; Vera, who married Charles Schloth. a sales-
man, resides at Portland. Oregon; Frank, who died
at Ballard. Washington, at the age of thirteen years;
Mayme, who married Leonard Shortall, a salesman
of Seattle ; and Walter, who is a banker of Seattle.
After the death of her husband Mrs. Mitchell was
married to Michael E. Sullivan, a mill foreman of
Seattle, and they have a son, Eugene, who is attend-
ing high school.
Robert M. Mitchell attended the public schools of
Washington until he was fourteen years old. but at
that time he left school and became a clerk in a
grocery store at Seattle, where he remained for six
years. He then went to Spokane. Washington, to
become a wholesale fruit salesman, and during the
two years he was thus engaged he learned the mer-
cantile business from both the retail and wholesale
ends. In 191 1 Mr. Mitchell became salesman and
manager of the wholesale fruit house of the Brown
Fruit Company at Edmonton, Canada, and continued
HISTORY OF MONTANA
605
with this concern until 1916, when he left and went
to Calgary, Alberta, as manager of the Mitchell Fruit
Company, which he had organized in connection with
the Nash Organization, and managed both until 1917.
In the latter year Mr. Mitchell's services were se-
cured as salesman by the Ryan Fruit Company, with
which he continued until April, igi8. when he came
to Montana and organized the Pacific Brokerage
Company at Great Falls, and in October of that same
year he organized the Northwest Sales Agency, a
business of his own, which he still conducts. In
December, 1919, he transferred his headquarters
from Great Falls to Butte, although he still maintains
a branch at Great Falls, and another one at Bil-
lings. Montana. Although his is a new company he
has already built up the leading business of its kind
in Montana. His offices are at 9 Hennessy Annex,
and he resides at 12 Hennessy Annex.
In 1910 Mr. Mitchell was married at Spokane,
Washington, to Miss Mabel Rausch, a daughter of
Julius F. and Margaret Rausch, residents of Tacoma,
Washington, where Mr. Rausch is recognized as a
musician of great talent. Mrs. Mitchell was gradu-
ated from the Broadway High School of Seattle,
Washington. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Mitchell
are as follows : Helen Roberta, who was born Jan-
uary 2, 1913 ; Edmund Vance, who was born in Sep-
tember, 1915; and Margaret Lela. who was born in
Marcli, 1917. Mr. Mitchell is a democrat in his po-
litical faith. Since boyhood he has been a consistent
member of the Baptist Church and is a generous con-
tributor toward its support. He belongs to Great
Falls Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
and Deer Lodge Chapter No. 3, Ancient Free and
.'Kccepted Masons, of Butte. Mr. Mitchell is a man
who possesses the staying power and is now reaping
the harvest of years of steadfast endeavor, and al-
though he has been located at Butte but a short
time, the conservative business men feel that he is
a valuable addition to the sound interests of the
metropolis of Montana.
.Alfred L. O'Brien, metallurgical engineer for the
Anaconda Copper Mining Company, is one of the
most expert men in his line in the country, and al-
though only thirty has attained to a well-known dis-
tinction in his calling. He was born at Boston,
Massachusetts, April 3, 1890, a son of J. J. O'Brien.
The paternal ancestors came from Ireland to Massa-
chusetts in 1791, while on the maternal side Mr.
O'Brien traces back to Quaker forebears, who were
also among the founders of the republic. J. J.
O'Brien was born at Boston, Massachusetts, in 1833,
and is now living at Dorchester, Massachusetts, hav-
ing spent his entire life in and about Boston. Dur-
ing his active years he was engaged very profitably
in merchandising, but for some years has been re-
tired. He is an independent democrat. During the
Civil war he gave his country his service as a soldier,
and was at the battles of Antietam and Gettysburg.
T\yo of his brothers made the supreme sacrifice,
dying in defense of their country during that con-
flict. J. J. O'Brien was married to Mary A. Paul,
born at New Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1858. She
died at Boston, Massachusetts, having borne her hus-
band the following children : Frank J., who is a hptel
proprietor of Chicago, Illinois; Mabel, who is un-
married and resides with her father; Alfred L.,
whose name heads this review; Paul, who is a lieu-
tenant in the regular army, served as instructor in
the transport service during the great war; Lucy,
who married Harry G. McLeod. a manufacturer of
soft drinks, lives at Dorchester, Massachusetts ;
Grace, who married W. H. Hanlin, an artist, lives
at Chelsea, Massachusetts ; and Hester, who married
William Cummings, who served during the great
war overseas, and as a member of the Army of Oc-
cupation, and she during the period of his service
is living with her father.
Alfred L. O'Brien attended the excellent public
schools of his native city, and was graduated from
high school in 1909, following which he became a
student of Lehigh University at Bethlehem, Pennsyl-
vania, from which he was graduated in 1913, with the
degrees of Mining Engineer and Metallurgist. In
October of that same year Mr. O'Brien came west to
Anaconda and became assistant testing engineer for
the Anaconda Copper Mining Company. It was not
long before those in authority realized his capabili-
ties, and the young man was promoted to be chief
chemist and later was made assistant superintendent
of reverberating smelting. His services further re-
ceived recognition by his appointment to his present
very responsible position. His offices are in the gen-
eral office building of the Washoe Reduction Works
two miles east of Anaconda. In his political views
Mr. O'Brien is independent, preferring to use his
own judgment with reference to supporting candi-
dates. He belongs to the Anaconda Club and the Sil-
ver Club of Butte, Montana. Fraternally he main-
tains affiliations with Anaconda Lodge, No. 239,
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
In 1916 Mr. O'Brien was married at Anaconda
to Miss Moina Ducie. a daughter of John and Ellen
(Mulhern) Ducie, both of whom died in 1917. Mr.
Ducie vvas one of the pioneers of Montana, and dur-
ing the early days was engaged in prospecting over
the state. Mr. and Mrs. O'Brien have two daughters,
Phyllis Milicent and Rosalba. Mr. O'Brien is a man
who possesses the power to stimulate men to whole-
hearted endeavor, and not only has technical training,
but also business ability, a strong will and resource-
fulness. During his connection with the Anaconda
Copper Mining Company he has attained the full
measure of the confidence of his associates and has
proven his personal integrity and sincerity in every
day conduct of the affairs entrusted to him. Both
he and Mrs. O'Brien are popular socially, for they
hold their friends in good account and like to have
them about them, their pleasant hotrie oftentimes
being the scene of delightful gatherings. Just as
Mr. O'Brien is a model host, he is equally popular
as a guest, and is a man of personal charm, culture
and wide intellectual interests, which are shared by
his wife.
William G. Allin. The name Allin belongs
among the early pioneers in Montana. William G.
Allin, who at the time of his death was one of the
oldest residents of Cascade County and a prominent
citizen of Great Falls, was a son of the late William
Allin. and father and son for many years were suc-
cessfully associated in ranching and stock raising.
and both have been well known leaders in state
aflfairs and in democratic politics in Montana cov-
ering a period of half a century or more. William
G. Allin died at Great Falls, May i. 1920.
Grant Allin, grandfather of William G. Allin, was
a pioneer of Missouri, and for many years held the
office of clerk of court of Randolph County, that
state. He was an ardent democrat. When he left
office he was succeeded by his son William Allin.
William Allin was born in Kentucky, and that state
was also the birth home of his wife, Amanda Allin.
She died in 1882, at the age of forty-six, the mother
of seven children, three of whom are still living.
The late William Allin though a native of Ken-
tucky spent many years in Chariton and Randolph
counties, Missouri. William G- Allin was born Qn ■
his father's farm in Chariton County November 19,
606
HISTORY OF MONTANA
1856. In the meantime his father had become a Cali-
fornia forty-niner. He went overland to the coast
and spent some time in the mining districts, until
the spring of 1850. He went back to Missouri,
married, and was again in California for a time.
In 1864 he arrived in Montana, was in the Alder
Gulch mining district, and the winter of 1864-65 he
and several of his companions spent in Deer Lodge
Valley. He owned some mining interests near Butte.
In 1866 he again crossed the country to his home
state of Missouri. In the early '70s he was interested
in Texas and lived there for a time. From 1872
to 1875 he was again in Missouri, and in the latter
year came to the Chestnut Valley of Montana. This
time his choice of a home was permanent, and he
lived in the Chestnut Valley until his death in 1915,
at the age of eighty-five. He became extensively
interested in farming and cattle raising.
William G. Allin acquired his early education 'in
the public schools of Missouri and later attended
college at Huntsville, Missouri. From the time he
was eighteen years of age he was closely associated
with his father in the livestock and ranching busi-
ness. In 1914 he was appointed state stock inspector
and continued to perform those duties until his
death. He was a delegate to county democratic
conventions in Cascade County for over thirty years,
and probably no one has a better knowledge of
politics in that county from the time of its organiza-
tion from Meagher County. Mr. AUin was a mem-
ber of the Christian Church.
July 20, 1899, he married Ethel Maw, a native
of England, who came to America, in early child-
hood with her parents, who settled at Hot Springs,
Arkansas. They had three children, Ethelyn, Wil-
liam F. and Edith.
John Lang. No state in the Union can boast of
a rnore heroic band of pioneers than Montana. In
their intelligence, courage, capacity and loyalty to
the right they have never had any superiors, for in
their daring and heroism they have been equal to the
Missouri and California argonauts. Their priva-
tions, hardships and earnest labors have resulted in
establishing one of the foremost commonwealths
in the great Northwest of our country, and one
which still has great possibilities before it. A mem-
ber of this worthy band is John Lang, long one of
our successful and thrifty ranchers, but who is now
living retired in Kalispell.
John Lang was born in Renfrewshire, Scotland,
and is the son of John and Jane (Hannah) Lang.
He was reared under the parental roof and secured
his education in the schools of his home neighbor-
hood. In his early life he followed the sea, but
shoftly after his marriage, which occurred in 1864,
he determined to cast his lot with the great republic
across the sea. Taking passage on the "Brittania,"
he arrived in New York harbor on May 4, 1865. As
they entered the harbor the first news that reached
them was of the assassination of President Lincoln.
Mr. Lang had left his young bride in Scotland until
such a time as he should have a home established
for her. Times were hard, and Mr. Lang's start in
the new land of his adoption was anything but
propitious, for, going down into Virginia, he was
forced to work for his board for a time. Later,
however, he went to Cole Valley, Illinois, where he
was fortunate in obtaining steady employment. He
then sent back to Scotland for his young wife, who
with her yoiing babe made the trip across the ocean
alone, rejoining her husband on Christmas day, 1865.
In the following year Mr. Lang left Illinois in a
covered wagon and drove overland to Nebraska,
where he took up a homestead in Washington
County. He made his home there until 1881, when
he came to Butte, Montana, where he remained for
a time, but later filed on a pre-emption claim in
the Flathead Valley, on which he located on May
14, 1883, thus being literally one of the very first
settlers in this locality — in fact he was the only
man with a family on the east side of the river,
there being four "squatters" there beside him. He
entered at once upon the task of improving his land
and constructing a home, which in a new country
is a task of some proportions, though tlieir needs
in those days were much less than the necessities
of the present day. Mr. Lang took a prominent part
in the various phases of the development of the new
country, having helped to build the first schoolhouse,
which was constructed of logs. He also rendered
good service as a school director. He was the first
justice of the peace in Flathead County, Tyson Dun-
can holding that office on the west side of the river.
At tliat time wild game was abundant, and the
pioneer table was seldom without meat. Mr. Lang
had a unique way of providing himself with wild
game as he needed it. He had caught and tamed a
young fawn, which would follow him about like a
dog. The animal would go into the woods and
after remaining awhile would return to its adopted
home accompanied by a number of wild companions,
who would be shot by the settlers, though they were
always careful not to kill more than they really
needed at that time, thus not wasting any food. Mr.-
Lang relates that as many as twenty-five deer have
followed the fawn home at one time. Through the
years that have come and gone since Mr. and Mrs.
Lang came to the Flathead country a wonderful
transformation has taken place in this country in
almost every respect, and to such men as Mr. Lang
is the community indebted for much of the solidity
and stability of the civilization which has followed
so closely on the heels of the pioneers. Under the
noted Bill Huston, Mr. Lang gave good service as
deputy sheriff of Missoula County. Mr. and Mrs.
Lang are now living in a comfortable and attractive
home in Kalispell, where they are quietly passing
the evening of life, surrounded by friends and ac-
quaintances who enjoy nothing more than to hear
Mr. Lang recite incidents of the early days. Mrs.
Lang recites that at one time two squaws, with large
knives, came into the cabin and tried to terrify her.
but she hid her true feelings and carelessly moved
about, apparently unconcerned. The squaws sat
around, watching her and laughing and talking, and
finally left. At another time a big ill-looking Indian
came into the cabin while the men folks were away,
and lay down on the floor so as to obstruct the
doorway and thus prevent her from going out. After
awhile, seeing that she paid no attention to him,
he left. The red men got ugly at times and com-
mitted outrages of the worst kind. They cremated
two white men, from whose ashes some tvventy-dol-
lar gold pieces were raked, thus identifying them.
At another time they killed a white man from whose
coat a squaw took a Masonic pin, which she wore
into town soon after, thus revealing the identity of
the dead man and the criminals. A couple of In-
dians were arrested and were under the guard of
Mr. Lang. The Vigilant Committee, deciding to
teach the Indians a salutary lesson, told Mr. Lang
that his wife was sick and that he was wanted at
home at once. In his absence the Vigilants took the
Indians out and hung them.
John Lang was married in Scotland, on April 29,
1864, to Margaret Stone, who, as has been related
elsewhere, did not accompany him on his immigra-
tion to the United States, but remained at home
until such a time as he could send for her. She
H^pyec^^ <^^^>^ %lJIh o(ay>^
^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
607
finally rejoined him on Christmas day, 1865. and at
that time placed in his arms their first-born child,
who had been born in bonnie Scotland, Her name
is Margaret and she is now the wife of John E.
McCarthy, of Browning, Montana. They have three
children, namely: Daniel E. ; John E., who saw
active military service in France during the World
war and is now a cadet at West Point Military
Academy; and Grace, the daughter, is a stenographer
in Washington, D. C. The remaining children of
Mr. and Mrs. Lang are as follows : John, who is
engaged in the mercantile business in Pendleton,
Oregon, married Catherine Kenny, and they have
one son, John. James is probationary ofticer at
Kalispell, having under his charge three counties.
He married Mollie Bosten, a native of Kentucky.
William, who is a stockman at Thompson Lakes,
married Phoebe Elliott, and they have a son, Adel-
bert, who is a student in electricity at Oakland,
California. Jane is the wife of L. C. Sloan, a stock
raiser at Browning, Montana, and they have one
son. Manly McCormick, who is now a student in the
Armour Technical Institute, Chicago. Jessie, who
was the first white child born on the east side of
the Flathead River, Ijecame the wife of Duncan
J. St. Claire, a stockman at Browning, Montana.
Politically John Lang has been a supporter of the
republican party ever since coming to this country,
his first presidential vote having been for U. S.
Grant. Mrs. Lang is independent in lier political
attitude, giving her support only to those measures
and men wliich she deems to be for the best interests
of all the people. Religiously they were both reared
in the faith of the Presbyterian Church, to which
they still are connected and to which they give
generous support. Fraternally Mr. Lang is a mem-
ber of the Knights of Pythias. Mr, Lang has been
essentially a man of the people, because he has large
faith in humanity and is optimistic in his views. His
success in life has been the direct fruitage of
consecutive effort, directed and controlled by good
judgment and correct principles,
Shirley S. Ford, a prominent young banker of
Great Falls, is a son of Robert and Sue (McClana-
han) Ford. The life record of his father, one of
the earliest settlers in Montana, and long a prominent
stockman and later a banker at Great Falls, is
sketched on other pages.
Shirley S. Ford was born at his father's home
at Sun River in Cascade County, March 9, 1887,
being the fourth of five children. He was educated
in the public schools of Great Falls, prepared for
college at St. Paul's School at Concord, New Harnp-
shire, then entered Harvard University, from which
he received his A. B. degree in 190Q. Returning
home, he went to work for the Great Falls National
Bank as bookkeeper, and since January, 1914, has
served as vice president of that institution. Mr.
Ford is a member of the Rotary Club, Commercial
Club, and in politics is a democrat.
August 25, 191S, he married Mi-ss Elizabeth Wal-
lace, only child of William J. and Elizabeth Wallace.
Her father was for many years a prominent lawyer
at Helena, but is now living in New York City.
Mr. and Mrs. Ford have one daughter. Gertrude
Elizabeth.
Henry Holmes St.\xley. Whether the elements
of success in this life are innate attributes of the
individual or whether they are quickened by a proc-
ess of circumstantial development, it is impossible
to clearly determine. Yet the study of a successful
life, whatever the field of endeavor, is none the less
interesting and profitable by reason of this same
Vol 11—39
uncertainty. In studying the life history of Henry
H. Stanley, a well known business man of Great
Falls, we find many qualities in his make-up that
always gain definite success in any career if properly
directed, as has evidently been done in his case
through his persistence in the pursuit of a worthy
purpose.
Henry Holmes Stanley was born in Chariton,
Lucas County, Iowa, on May 27, i860, and is the
son of Robert and Evelyn Stanley. Robert Stanley
was a native of Indiana and died at the age of sev-
enty-three years. He became one of the pioneer
farmers of Lucas County, Iowa, where he spent his
last days, having retired and moved into the Town
of Chariton. Politically he was a republican. His
wife was a native of Illinois and died at the age of
fifty-six years. To them were born seven children,
of which number four are living.
Henry H. Stanley attended the public schools of
his native community and remained on the paternal
farmstead until he had attained his majority. He
then went to Seattle, Washington, where for some
time he was employed in lumber mills, and later
on farms in that community. Going from there to
Idaho, he was employed in the mines for about a
year, when he went to Phillipsburg, Montana, and
was there employed as a miner for some time, later
following the same occupation at Butte for about a
year. He then came to Great Falls and engaged in
teaming, but about a year and a half later he sold
out and engaged in the real estate and loan business,
with which he has been identified continuously since
and today is considered one of the leaders in his
line in this section of the state. He has been very
successful in handling many large real estate deals
and has so conducted his affairs as to give entire
satisfaction to those with whom he has had dealings.
He possesses an accurate knowledge of land and
building values and his services are frequently sought
as an appraiser of values on real estate.
On February 15, 1880, Mr. Stanley was married to
.Amelia C. Wood, who was born in Lucas County,
Iowa, and to them have been born five children,
namely : Howard, who married Ruth Proyer and
they have one daughter ; Adelaide ; .Amelia ; Evelyn
and Dean. Howard and Dean are associated with
their father in business.
Politically Mr. Stanley gives his support to the
democratic party, though he is not an aspirant for
public ofiice. Nevertheless he takes a commendable
interest in the public affairs of the community and
for the past seven years he has rendered efficient
service to the public as a member of the school
board. His religious membership is with the Pres-
byterian Church. Fraternally he is a member of Cas-
cade Lodge No. 34, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons: Great Falls Chapter No. 9, Royal Arch
Masons ; Black Eagle Commandery No. 8, Knights
Templar, and Algeria Temple, .\ncient .'\rabic Order
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, at Helena. He is
also a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason.
The splendid success which ha^ C' iih' to Mr. Stan-
ley is directly traceable to tin- salient iirmu-; in his
character, for he started in life at tin- Imttoni of
the ladder, which he has moaned unaided. With a
mind capable of planning, he combined a will strong
enough to execute his well- formulated purposes, and
his great energy, sound judgment, keen discrimina-
tion and perseverance have resulted in the success
which is now crowning his efforts.
J. E. Kenkel, the pioneer shoe man of Great
Falls, was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1863. He
came to Montana in 1887 by way of the Missouri
River to Fort Benton and thence by stage to Great
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Falls, where he engaged in the shoe business the same
year, the style of the firm being Budge & Kenkel.
Their opening stock came to Helena by way of the
Northern Pacific and was from there freighted by
the T. C. Power Forwarding Company to this place.
Mr. Kenkel's parents were John and Mary
(O'Connor) Kenkel, who were among the early set-
tlers in St. Paul, where his father was engaged in the
cigar manufacturing business for many years, a
member of the firm of Hart & Kenkel. His father
died in 1899 and his mother in 1913.
In October, 1891, Mr. Kenkel was married to Miss
Adaline Riley, a native of Lansing, Iowa. Five chil-
dren were born to their union, and the three still
living are John T., Kathrine and Evelyn. John T.
Kenkel is associated with his father in business.
Harry B. Mitchell has been a resident of Mon-
tana since 1890, with the exception of a compara-
tively brief period when he followed his occupation
of a newspaperman elsewhere. He was born in
Scotland April 7, 1867, and came with his parents
to the United States while yet a small boy. The
family settled in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, and there
he passed his boyhood years and received his educa-
tion. His parent's were David and Mary (Ferguson)
Mitchell. They were the parents of thirteen chil-
dren, eight sons and five daughters, Harry being
the ninth in age. Upon leaving school he entered
the office of the Fergus Falls Journal and learned
the printing trade. Striking westward, he came to
Great Falls in 1890 and entered the employ of the
Great Falls Leader. In 1892 he purchased the Belt
Mountain Miner, published at Barker, then a flour-
ishing mining camp. A year or so later he sold that
newspaper and became associated with J. Alex.
Wright in the publication of the Neihart Miner, a
business connection which has continued ever since,
although the Neihart Miner has long ceased to exist.
In the summer of 1893 the slump in the price of sil-
ver brought stagnation to mining in Neihart, and
Mr. Mitchell was compelled to seek employment else-
where. Leaving Montana he was engaged in news-
paper work in Minneapolis and Chicago, spending
the winter in the same employment in New York.
The following summer business brightened in Nei-
hart and he returned there, resuming his position as
editor of the Neihart Miner. In 1896 he purchased
an interest in the Great Falls Leader and was its
manager until 1900. In that year he sold his inter-
est in the Leader and became managing editor of
the Great Falls Tribune, and in that position he
continued until 1918.
In the meantime, in 1907, he had purchased a tract
of land a few miles south of Great Falls, and in the
course of time this was developed into a dairy farm
of considerable size, being, in fact, one of the most
modern and probably the largest distinctively dairy
farms in the state, the milk from which is sold
directly to consumers in Great Falls. He retired
from the newspaper business in 1918 for the purpose
of giving the whole of his attention to the farm.
The farm is irrigated with water pumped from the
Missouri by electricity, Mr. Mitchell being the pio-
neer in the use of electricity for this purpose in
Montana.
In 1916 Mr. Mitchell was a democratic candidate
for Congress for Montana, but was defeated
by a small plurality by Miss Jeanette Rankin.
Again in 1918 he was nominated by his party with-
out opposition, but was again defeated by a small
plurality in a district largely republican. These are
the only times he has been a candidate for public
office, but he was for fourteen years a member
of the Great Falls Library Board and is at present
a member and vice president of the State Livestock
Commission. He is a Mason, a Knight Templar
and Shriner and an Elk. During the war he was
active in the Red Cross, and is still a member of
the home service department of that organization.
On August 8, 1895, Mr. Mitchell was married to
Miss Mary Greening, a native of Wisconsin and
daughter of William and Catherine (Cameron)
Greening. The former is still alive (1920) aged
ninety-four years. Mrs. Mitchell is one of the promi-
nent women leaders of the state, being very active
in club work and other civic activities. She has been
twice president of the Montana State Federation
of Women's Clubs, and during the war was chair-
man of the Woman's Council of Defense for Cas-
cade County. Mr. and Mrs. Mitchell have three
children : Catherine M., Fergus G. and Hugh B.
Catherine is a student at Wellesley College, Massa-
chusetts, and Fergus attends the State College at
Bozeman. The latter served in the students' train-
ings corps during the closing months of the war.
Cyrus W. Buck. The gentlemen to a brief re-
view of whose life and character the reader's atten-
tion is herewith directed is among the favorably
known and representative citizens of Western Mon-
tana. He has by his enterprise and progressive
methods contributed to the advancement of his com-
munity during the course of an honorable career,
and he has ascended through his individual efforts
from the bottom of the ladder to a place of relative
importance in this locality, having ever been known
as a man of unswerving integrity, sound judgment
and honesty of purpose.
Cyrus W. Buck was born in Washington County,
Minnesota, on the 5th day of October, 1868, and he
is the son of Orvil and Lavina (Mars) Buck. The
father was born in Indiana in 1843, and died in 1915,
and the mother, who is also deceased, was a native
of Minnesota. They became the parents of four chil-
dren, two sons and two daughters, the subject of
this sketch having been the second child in order of
birth. Orvil Buck went from Indiana to Minnesota
in young manhood and engaged in farming in Otter-
tail County, where he lived until 1902, when he re-
moved to the State of Washington, where he en-
gaged in farming and fruit raising until 1910. In
the latter year he located in Chouteau County, Mon-
tana, in what is now Teton County, and was there
engaged in the sheep business up to the time of his
death. He was a member of the Methodist Episcopal
Church and of the Grand Army of the Republic,
his affiliation with the last-named organization being
consistent from the fact that during the Civil war
he served for one year and six months in the Union
army as a member of the Si.xty-first Regiment, Min-
nesota Volunteer Infantry. Politically he gave his
support to the republican party.
Cyrus W. Buck received his education in the public
schools of Minnesota, having been reared in the
home of his grandfather. The first money ever
earned by him was by selling to his grandfather for
$2 a dog which had cost him $1. The days of his
early youth wire spent in working on the home farm,
and at the age of sixteen years he engaged in work-
ing out as a farm hand in Ottertail County, Min-
nesota. After about two years of such work he went
to Glenwood Springs, Colorado, and entered the
employ of the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, work-
ing in the supply department for about two months,
at the end of which time he was transferred to the
civil engineering department. He continued in that
work until April i, 1887, when he came overland
by the way of Salt Lake to Silverbow, Montana,
thence on to Fort Benton, where he was employed
^Jl!^ ClAyiyyri<:p^C^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
609
in riding the ranges as a cowboy up to 1894. when
he located a homestead in Chouteau County, near
Lost Lake, and here lie has since been engaged in
the horse, cattle, sheep and hog business. He has
been successful in his ranch enterprise and is recog-
nized as one of the most progressive and enterpris-
ing stock men in Western Montana. He ships his
cattle mainly to the Chicago markets, and buys and
sells many horses. His ranch property is well im-
proved with substantial and conveniently arranged
buildings, the general appearance of the place indi-
cating the owner to be a man of sound judgment
and excellent taste.
On January 11, 1899, at Fort Benton, Montana,
Mr. Buck was married to Margaret McVicar Gray,
who was born in Glasgow, Scotland. Her parents,
William and Isabel (McVicar) Gray, were also na-
tives of Scotland, and both are deceased, the father
dying in 1913 and the mother in 1899. They became
the parents of twelve children, six sons and six
daughters, all of whom were born in the land of hills
and heather. The father was a market man in Glas-
gow for many years, up to 1880, when he came to
the United States, locating in Minneapolis, Minne-
sota. Some time later he sent for his family, who
joined him here. In 1881 he came up the Missouri
River to Fort Benton and located on a ranch in
Chouteau County. Later he returned to Minnesota
and bought cattle, which he shipped by rail to Bil-
lings, Montana, from which point he drove them
overland, a distance of 210 miles, to his ranch in
Chouteau County. In 1887 he added a herd of sheep
to his stock interests, and later added horses and
hogs. All of his meat animals have been shipped
to the Chicago market. In igo2 he retired from
active business and is now enjoying a richly earned
rest. He is a member of the Presbyterian Church
and gives hfs support to the republican party. Tij
Mr. and Mrs. Buck have been born five children,
namely : Marion McVicar, Jack, Margaret A., Grace
B. and Robert R.
Politically Mr. Buck is an ardent supporter of
the republican party, though to a certain extent he
reserves the right to vote for the men and measures
which meet with his approval, regardless of political
lines. Religiously he is a member of the Presby-
terian Church, to which he is a liberal contributor.
Fraternally he is a member of Benton Lodge No.
25, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Great
Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks. In every phase of community life
Mr. Buck has stood consistently for whatever will
advance the best interests of the community, and
because of his clean character and genial personal
qualities he enjoys a well-earned popularity in this
iity.
J. V. Harrington. For more than three decades
the honored and venerable pioneer and substantial
farmer whose name appears above was a resident
of Western Montana and a prominent factor in its
material growth, playing well his part in the ma-
terial, civic and mora! unbuilding of the same. He
noted many wonderful changes after he made his
advent into the wilderness here and he talked inter-
estingly of the early days when this section of the
country was still the home of the Indians and the
haunts of many varieties of wild beasts. The
death of this honored Montana pioneer occurred
on the 17th of April, 1920.
J. V. Harrington was born in the quaint and his-
toric Town of Pictou, Nova Scotia, and is the son
of John and Elizabeth (Norton) Harrington. He
was educated in the public schools of that country,
but when only fifteen years of age he determined
to cast his lot with the people of the states. Going
to Eastport, Maine, he was soon engaged in engin-
eering work, his first job being the erection of
machinery on the steamboat "Westmoreland." He
then sailed to Portland, Maine, and Boston, Massa-
chusetts, and during the summer time made many
trips to Philadelphia and to southern ports, whence
vegetables and other farm products were brought
to the northern ports. During the winter months
he sailed to New Orleans, carrying marketable pro-
duce from northern ports. This program he car-
ried out during three seasons on the steamship
"Oriental," calling at the ports of New Orleans, Pen-
sacola, Havana and Cienfugoes, and carrying north
a cargo of melons and other tropical and semi-tropi-
cal fruits and vegetables. At length Mr. Harring-
ton decided to transfer his attention to the Great
Lakes, and for some time he served as an engineer
on a tugboat on the lakes and Detroit River, occa-
sionally taking trips to Cleveland and Erie. One
fall he was taken sick with the "fever and ague"'
and was compelled to lay the boat up at Milwaukee
for the winter while he went to Chicago for medi-
cal treatment. About the time he recovered suffi-
ciently to think of work a call was made for men
to work on the construction of the Union Pacific
Railroad, mechanics especially being called for. Mr.
Harrington answered the call and went to the Wa-
satch range, which was then the terminus of the
Northern Pacific Railroad, where he was engaged as
an engineman. However, hearing wonderful stories
of the success attending gold hunters in Montana
and Idaho, he determined to venture in that line
himself. He first located at Rocky Bar, Idaho,
where his mining venture was fairly successful. He
determined to solve the best means of working the
ground in sluicing and hydraulic power, and in this
he was successful. Possessed with a natural desire
to see the country, he then went to Arizona. While
there he became engaged in a round-up of some
bad Indians, being associated with a noted Indian
fighter named Smith. On one occasion also he was
w-ith General Crook, the famous Indian fighter, at a
time when the Indians had been unusually ugly,
killing men, women and children in a most dastardly
manner. Mr. Harrington joined with other citizens
and United States troops and they pursued the In-
dians, killing 103 of the savages and taking others as
prisoners. From Arizona he came by horseback to
Montana, and at Butte he was again engaged as an
engineer. While there he helped to erect the largest
hoisting engine in the State of Montana, also one
of the largest Cornish pumps in the state.
Two years later Mr. Harrington came to the
Flathead Valley and filed on a homestead claim of
160 acres, and also bought considerable land adjoin-
ing, his holdings of Montana land finally amounting
to about 1,000 acres. This has continued the home
ranch to the present time, though the family now
spend the major portion of their time in their
rnodern and comfortable home in Kalispell. At one
time Mr. Harrington operated a threshing machine
on the land where now stands the beautiful and
thriving City of Kalispell. In this connection it is
worthy of note that to Mr. Harrington belongs the
credit for bringing the first steam thresher and the
first steam plows to the Flathead Valley. The secret
of his success was simply that he made the best
use of the opportunities that presented themselves.
He was a good business manager and accumulated
a goodly property, but at the same time was generous
in his support of every measure for the general
good and was of material assistance to others who
had a hard time getting started. He was a stock-
holder in the First National Bank of Kalispell and
610
HISTORY OF MONTANA
was also the president of the Dayton State Bank,
botli being strong and influential financial institu-
tions. He was active in all matters affecting the
Flathead Vallej' during all the years of h;s resi-
dence here, and related many interesting stories.
Among these he told of one occasion wlien Indians
had committed depredations in Missoula County.
Mr. Harrington was instrumental in capturing and
bringing them to justice, three of the criminals being
hung. Three escaped, and it took three years of
good work to capture and bring them to justice.
• While hunting and fighting Indians in Arizona Mr.
Harrington had learned how to deal wuh them, and
his services were now most valuable to the authori-
ties in their efforts to round up the criminals.
While living in Butte Mr. Harrington was mar-
ried to Mrs. Nellie Hathaway, who was born in
Idaho, the daughter of William and Mary (Ed-
wards) Richards. By a former marriage Mrs. Har-
rington became the mother of a daughter Elizabeth,
and an adopted son, James. Three children were
born unto Mr. and Mrs. Harrington, John, Viva
and Nellie. All ol these children have been edu-
cated in the public schools of Kalispell. John is
assisting in the operation of the home ranch. James,
who also is helping to operate the ranch, married
Rosa Lerch, and they have two children, J. V., Jr.,
and Hilda. Viva, who possesses a remarkable sing-
ing voice, is specializing in music and is now a
student in the Chicago Conservatory of Music study-
ing both instrumental and vocal. Nellie, who has
attended school in Spokane, is now a student in the
Kalispell High School. Elizabeth is the wife of
J. W. Harrington, of Alberta, Canada.
Politically Mr. Harrington was an earnest sup-
porter of the democratic party, while fraternally
he was a member of the Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons and the Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks. Religiously he was an earnest member of
the Presbyterian Church, as is also his wife, of which
they are generous supporters. Mr. Harrington was
a great believer in travel as an educational agent,
and made a number of pleasant and interesting
trips. In 1913 he and the family took a trip to
Liverpool, England, Swansea, Wales, London, Eng
land, and Belfast, Ireland. Mr. Harrington by cease-
less toil and endeavor gained a marked success m
business affairs, won the respect and confidence of
men and was recognized as one of the distinctively
representative citizens of his community.
Bower Brothers Ranch. The ranch known as
"Bower Brothers' Ranch" lying in the western part
of the Judith Basin country, east of Wolf Butte
and south of the High Wood Mountains on Surprise
Creek, in what was then Magher County, Montana
Territory, was established by A. W. and J. E. Bower
in 1880. In the spring of 1881 their brother G. C.
Bower joined them.
All were born in Pleasant Valley, Dutchess County,
New York. All came to Montana by way of Bis-
marck and the river route to Fort Benton, the head
of navigation on the Missouri, at that time a thirty-
days' trip from New York. The country was full
of game and Indians, although the Indians had been
ordered to their reservations.
The firm, afterwards incorporated, continued in
business for twenty-seven years or until 1907. build-
ing up one of the largest and best sheep ranches in
Montana. Their wools were much sought for by
the large manufacturing houses of the East.
A. W. Bower went East to live. J. E. Bower
makes his home in Helena, is a director in the Union
Bank & Trust Company, while G. C. Bower became
a resident of Great Falls. He is a thirty-second
degree Mason and president of the Great Falls Dairy
Products Company.
Leslie Henry Hamilton. It is said that this
well known Great Falls capitalist, banker and busi-
ness man started his career in Montana forty years
ago with only about $500 in capital which he in-
vested in a flock of sheep. He was in the sheep
industry through various ups and downs, and even-
tually saw his flocks "grazing on a thousand hills."
He has had his home in Great Falls for many years,
and his executive ability, his means and influence
have been sought by many of the leading enterprises
of that locality.
Mr. Hamilton was born on his father's farm in
Windham County, Vermont, December 6, 1852, son
of Joseph Henry and Abigail (Mather) Hamilton.
His parents were also natives of Windham County,
and of old New England ancestry. His father, who
died in 1899, at the age of seventy-two, was educated
in the common schools of Vermont and spent his
active career as a farmer in the Green Mountain
State. He was honored with several local offices,
was a member of the Congregational Church, which
he served as deacon, and cast his first votes for
whig candidates and later was a republican. He
came out to Montana several 'times during the '90s,
visiting his son in the Judith Basin. His first wife
died in i860, at the age of twenty-six. Of her five
children Leslie H. is the oldest, and four are still
living. The father married for his second wife Abi-
gail Cross, and had three sons, two of whom are
living.
Leslie H. Hamilton received his early impressions
of life on his father's rugged and rather stern farm
in Vermont. He was eight years old when his
mother died. He lived at home until reaching his
majority, and then for several years did some con-
tract work getting out timber and cordwood. His
chief employer in that work was the father of the
late Gen. Nelson J. Miles. In March, 1878, Mr.
Hamilton left home for the West, traveling by rail
as far as Winnemucca, Nevada, and thence taking
a stage si.xty miles north to the Hoppin Brothers
sheep ranch near Camp McDermott. He worked
on that ranch herding sheep and building fence and
later had charge of the feed lots, looking after about
1600 sheep and ninety head of cattle. In July, 1879.
the Hoppin Brothers sent him to Bannack City, Mon-
tana, with 5,000 head of sheep consigned to a well
known Montana French miner, .\bail Bazette. When
he turned over the sheep to Mr. Bazette, Mr. Hamil-
ton remained in his employ as superintendent of the
Bazette sheep interests. He also did some mining.
In April, 1880, he bought a team and journeyed into
the Yellowstone Valley and on to the Judith Basin.
At that time he had as working partners Albert
Barney and John Stoutenberg. They formed a part-
nership under the name Barney, Hamilton & Stout-
enberg to engage in the sheep business. They bought
their first thousand head of sheep in the fall of
1880. In 1888 Mr. Hamilton bought the interests
of Mr. Barney, and in the meantime Stoutenberg
had sold his share to Rev. Jacob Mills. Mills and
Hamilton continued the partnership under the name
of the Sage Creek Sheep Company, and in 1890 the
company was incorporated with Mr. Hamilton as
president, Mr. Mills, vice president, and Mrs. Hamil-
ton, secretary and treasurer. This became one of the
biggest sheep outfits in the Judith Basin. The com-
pany had 26,000 acres of land, which in 1908 they
sold to the Cotton Wood Coal Company for $260,000,
At that time they also had 50.000 head of sheep on
the range, and these were also sold.
In the meantime, in l8gi. Mr. Hamilton had moved
CALi> (yn^ 1^^3(AAjJiy^^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
his home to Great Falls. He was one of the organiz-
ers of the Bank of Fergus County at Lewistown,
the oldest state bank in Montana, started in 1887,
and he is still a director of that institution. He
was one of t-he organizers of the Commercial
National Bank of Great Falls in 1913, and since
1916 has served as its president. In igoS, after
selling his sheep and ranch properties. Mr. Hamilton
took his family to Boston in order to afford his
children the advantages of tlie best institutions of
learning in the East. He remained there three years,
and on returning to Great Falls in 1911, where he
had retained many valuable property, interests, he
built the Standard Garage, whicli was the largest and
best equipped garage in the state. He sold his auto-
mobile business in J914. Mr. Hamilton was one of
the founders of the Deaconess Hospital at Great
Falls, and put up the first building and has always
been one of the stanchest supporters of the insti-
tution. He is president of its board of trustees.
Mr. Hamilton is one of the large stockholders in the
Montana Flour Mills Company, which operates three
mills, one at Lewistown, Harlowton and Great Falls,
besides a chain of elevators. He is a stockholder
in the Montana Lumber Company, the Montana
Power Company, and has interests in banks and
business undertakings too numerous • to mention.
Mr. Hamilton is a republican, without official record,
and is a member of the Congregational Church.
During the war he saw his two sons go into the
service, and at home he took a leading part in the
various campaigns for war funds and was especially
active in behalf of the Red Cross.
Mr. Hamilton married Miss Elizabeth Montgomery
at Sage Creek in the Judith Basin on August 10,
1887. She was born at Newport. Vermont. To their
marriage were born five children. Julia Bell, born
February 6, i8go, is a graduate of the LaSalle Semi-
nary in the East, and is the wife of Julius C. Peters,
a Great Falls attorney, and the mother of three chil-
dren. Henry Montgomery the oldest son, born
December 6, 1892, was educated in the public schools
of Great Falls, in the Phillips Exeter Academy, and
graduated from Dartmouth College in the class of
1914. Before America entered the war with Ger-
many he made application for service with an ambu-
lance corps in France. In .\pril, 1917, he enlisted in
the American Field Service, and for five months
was on ambulance duty on the French front and for
five months on the Italian front. He then enlisted
in the French army, choosing the light artillery,
and was sent to the French Artillery School at Fon-
tain Bleau, graduating November i, 1918, with the
rank of aspirant. For three months he was with
the .^rmy of Occupation in Belgium and Lu.xem-
burg, and received liis honorable discharge at Paris
February 15, 1919. .Abigail Matlier, the third of the
children, was born in July, 1894, was educated in
Vassar College, and is now the wife of William
Heron, and they live in Florida. They have one
daughter. Harley .Alexander, born in March 18,
1895, was educated in the Great Falls grammar and
high schools, the University of Wisconsin and the
University of Minnesota, and on June 28, 1918, en-
listed in the United States Infantry. He was as-
signed to duty with Company C of the One Hundred
and Fifty-ninth Regiment, .\fter a very brief period
of training he left Camp Kearney in California and
went overseas in July, 1918. He saw service in the
great battle of the Argonne and was wounded
October 5, 1918, and as a result of his wounds died
and was buried at the .American Field Hospital
No. 4 at LaGrange-aux-Bois on October 7, 1918.
Leslie H. Hamilton. Jr., the youngest of the chil-
dren, was taking a course in banking at the Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania, where he died at the age
of nineteen.
Adam Stimpf.rt is a past master in the agricul-
tural implement and inacliinery business. During
his hard working youth on an Illinois farm he
learned to appreciate good implements, though there
were few of them at his command. Nearly twenty-
five years ago he engaged in the implement business
in Illinois, and in 191 1 transferred his field of opera-
tions to Great Falls, where he is now sole proprie-
tor of the largest implement and machinery house in
Cascade County.
Mr. Stimpert as a local business man and booster
of Great Falls has, many interests outside his home
community. While in the Legislature he originated
the constructive measure by which Montana voted
an appropriation to acquire a state owned elevator
system for the benefit of the Montana grain growers.
Mr. Stimpert is a member of the board of managers
of the State Terminal Elevator Commission, and
has given much of his time from his business to the
investigations and the other preliminary efforts look-
ing toward the establishment of the first state owned
elevator.
Mr. Stimpert was born on his father's farm in
Woodford Countv, Illinois, January 9, 1869, a son of
Theobald and Charlotte (Muller) Stimpert. His
parents were both natives of Germany. Theobald
Stimpert came to New York in the early '50s, met
and married Charlotte Muller in that city, after-
ward lived at Boston, and from there moved west
to a farm in Woodford County, Illinois. He had
much of his land cleared and was on the high road
to prosperity when death overtook him in the prime
of life, in 1871, at the age of forty-three. His widow
survived him and passed away on the old Illinois
homestead in 1903. Of their eight children four are
still living, Adam being the youngest child.
Adam Stimpert was only two years old when his
father died. The work of the farm had to be car-
ried on somehow, and as soon as old enough Adam
Stimpert did his share in the duties. He attended
local schools only for a few terms, and at the age
of thirteen his mother called his education finished
and required his continuous presence and work m
the fields. At the age of sixteen he and an older
brother rented the homestead, and after his mar-
riage Mr. Stimpert took his bride to the home farm
and remained there until the spring of 1896.
In that year he moved to Benson, Illinois, and
engaged in the farm implement and machinery busi-
ness. He had the technical talents and qualifica-
tions that made this an appropriate field for his
energies, and his aggressiveness soon showed that he
had chosen wisely. For several years he was trav-
eling representative for the Huber Manufacturmg
Company in Northern Illinois, and later became a
traveling man for Reeves & Company, handling their
machinery in Illinois. In 191 1 this company sent
him to Montana, with headquarters at Great Falls.
Mr. Stimpert has been a steadfast enthusiast with
respect to the opportunities and advantages of Great
Falls ever since locating here. His alertness to new
opportunity soon caused him to sever his connection
with Reeves & Company and buy the old established
Judd Implement Companv. which started business
at Great Falls in 1895. Mr. Stimpert has since been
sole proprietor of this business, and has extended
its scope from an exclusive retail to both a whole-
sale and retail farm implenunt concern.
Mr. Stimpert has been a democrat in his political
affiliations, and on that ticket he was elected a mem-
ber of the State Legislature in 191O. During the
following session he introduced a bill providing for
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a state owned terminal elevator, and after the pas-
sage of the bill and when the first board of man-
agers was under consideration, he was appropriately
selected for one of the board. His appointment
was made April 8, 1919. Mr. Stimpert is also a.
member of the International Association of Rotary
clubs and is affiliated with Euclid Lodge No. 58,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Great Falls
Chapter No. 4, Royal Arch Masons, Black Eagle
Commandery, Knights Templar. Helena Consistory
of the Scottish Rite, and Algeria Temple of the
Mystic Shrine at Helena. He is a member of the
Christian Church and is identified with all the local
organizations for better business, better government
and better general development of the community
of Great Falfs.
January 14, 1892, Mr. Stimpert married Miss
Jescena Seggerman, a native of Woodford County,
Illinois, and a daughter of Henry Seggerman. To
their marriage were born five sons, only two of whom
have reached mature years. Walter, born September
3, 1804, early in the war with Germany enlisted in
the aviation department at San Diego, was trans-
ferred to Dallas, Texas, and then to Waco, and was
promoted to first sergeant November 11, 1918, armis-
tice day, receiving his honorable discharge soon
afterward. The son Frederick D., born April 7, 1899,
was a member of the Students Army Training Corps
of the University of Montana at Missoula, and was
granted his discharge from tliat organization after
the cessation of hostilities.
George E. Grover. The greatest results in life
are often attained by simple means and the exercise
of the ordinary qualities of common sense and per-
severance ; but practical industry, wisely and vigor-
ously applied, never fails of success. The everyday
life, with its multiform duties, affords every oppor-
tunity for the acquisition of experience of the best
kind, and its most travel-worn ways provide an
earnest worker with ample scope for effort and im-
provement. This fact having been realized by
George E. Grover, the well-known stone and marble
worker of Great Falls and one of the most highly
esteemed citizens of that locality, he seized the small
opportunities that he encountered on the Labyrinthine
road of life, permitting no obstacles to bar his ad-
vance toward the ultimate goal of success — never
attained by the inert, craven and ambitionless
plodder.
George E. Grover is a full-blooded Yankee by
both ancestry and birth, his nativity having oc-
curred at Brandon, Vermont, on August 27, 1868,
and he is the son of Samuel T. and Julia (Manley)
Grover, both also natives of Vermont. The father,
who was born in 1841, is still living, his wife having
died in 1877, at the age of thirty-five years. They
•were the parents of two children, the subject of
this sketch and a sister. Samuel T. Grover spent
his boyhood days on his parent's farm, securmg his
education in the district schools. At the outbreak
of the Civil war in 1861 he enlisted in Company G,
Twelfth Regiment, Vermont Volunteer Infantry,
taking part in all the campaigns, battles and varied
experiences of the command up to the time when
he was taken sick with typhoid fever. On his re-
covery he was granted an honorable discharge and
returned to his home. There he first engaged in
farming, but later teamed for a number of years,
until his retirement. Politically he is a republican
and fraternally is a member of the Grand Army of
the Republic, being a past commander of the post
to which he belongs.
George E. Grover remained on the paternal farm-
stead until he was fourteen years of age, when he
learned the marble business at Proctor, Vermont, one
of the great marble-producing centers of the coun-
try. In 1888 he went to Chicago, Illinois, where he
was in the employ of the Vermont Marble Company
up to 1903. In that year he came to Great Falls
and engaged in the monument business, in connection
with which he also opened a department for the
production of cut stone for building purposes. He
has been eminently successful in this enterprise and
has supplied some of the most beautiful monu-
ments now found in our cemeteries. In both design
and execution the product of his marble shop will
compare favorably with the best work seen anywhere
in the West. He has supplied dressed stone for a
number of the best buildings of this community, and
in all his contracts he has given thorough satisfac-
tion, for one of the cardinal principles of his creed
is to turn out only such work as will pass the most
rigid inspection. As a result he has won not only
a large share of the local business in his line, but
also has gained that which is of more real value,
the confidence and good will of all who have had
dealings with him.
On April 16, l8g2, Mr. Grover was married to
Anna M. Thompson, who was born at Neenah, Wis-
consin, and they have two children, Ethel, the wife
of E. J. Higgs, and Marjorie Jane.
Politically Mr. Grover gives his support to the
republican party, and has taken a keen interest in
local public affairs. In April, 1917, he was elected
alderman from the Third Ward and was re-elected
in 1919. Fraternally he is a member of Cascade
Lodge No. 34, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
Great Falls Chapter No. 9, Royal Arch Masons ;
Black Eagle Commandery No. 8, Knights Templar,
of which he is a past commander. He is also a
member of the Great Falls Chamber of Commerce, in
which he has taken an active part in assisting in the
furtherance of every movement for the upbuilding
and advancement of Great Falls. Genial and ap-
proachable in manner, he has gained a host of ac-
quaintances, all of whom are his friends, for he has
proved himself deserving of the friendship of all
good men.
Thomas M. Collins. The history of the loyal
sons and representative citizens of Montana would
not be complete should the name that heads this
review be omitted. When the fierce fire of rebellion
was raging throughout the Southland, threatening
to destroy the Union, he responded with patriotic
fervor to the call for volunteers, and in some of the
bloodiest battles for which that great war was noted
proved his loyalty to the government he loved so
well. During a useful life in the region where he
lives he has labored diligently to promote the inter-
ests of the people, while at the same time insuring
his own welfare. He bore his full share in the great
task of opening up the Flathead country to civiliza-
tion, coming here at a time when the danger from
Indians and wild animals was still a reality. Through
the period of early development he was an im-
portant factor in the improvement and advancement
of material, civic and moral_ affairs.
Thomas M. Collins was born in Franklin County,
Vermont, and is the son of Thomas and Margaret
Collins. Early in life he was taken to Clinton
County, New York, where he was reared, and he
secured his education in the public schools of Chazy
in that county. On July 29, 1861, when seventeen
years of age, he enlisted at Burlington, Vermont, in
defense of the Union. He enlisted as a musician
and was assigned as bugler to Company H. Four-
teenth Regiment, United States Infantry. This com-
mand was assigned to the First Brigade, Second
"y-^fffKlA-^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Division, Fifth Army Corps, and became a part of
the great Army of the Potomac. Mr. Collins took
part in sixteen major engagements, and in the seven
days battle in the Peninsular, under General McClel-
lan, he lost a brother, who was shot down at his
side. On July 29, 1864, in front of Petersburg, Mr.
Collins received an honorable discharge because of
the expiration of his period of enlistment, and re-
turned to his home in EUenburg, New York. His
next venture was as a sailor on the high seas,
going on the Minerva Smith, a whaler, from New
Bedford, Massachusetts. He made two voyages on
the whaler, and then for six months he was a
member of the crew of the revenue cutter Miami,
which was stationed at Newport, Rhode Island. This
boat had the distinction of having been used by
President Lincoln as his pleasure yacht while in the
presidency. Mr. Collins was next in the merchant
service, going around Cape Horn to San Francisco.
There, after six years service on the water, he quit
the sea and went to Prescott, .'Arizona, where for a
time he followed mining and prospecting. From
there he went to Pioche, Nevada, where he also
prospected and mined. He next located in the min-
ing camp at Frisco, Utah, where he became superin-
tendent of the noted "Cerro Gordo" mine. Some
time later, after having devoted himself to mining
and prospecting for eighteen years, he moved to
Anaconda, Montana, where he was employed in the
great smelter works for five years. He also engaged
in the real estate business there, erecting houses
and selling them, but he sold out there and mpved
to the Flathead country, where in 1886, he home-
steaded a farm. Here during the years following
he devoted himself to the improvement and culti-
vation of this ranch, which he maintained at a high
state of improvement, the residence and farm build-
ings being of a substantial and attractive character,
while he ever followed up-to-date and progressive
methods in his operations. Eventually he sold out
there and moved into the Town of Kalispell, where
he bought a comfortable home and where he is
quietly spending the evening of his life, in com-
fortahle enjoyment of that rest which he has richly
earned.
While a resident of Frisco, Utah, Mr. Collins was
married to Fannie Stewart, and to them were born
five children. Charles Clinton. William Wilkie,
Thomas M., Jr., Fannie J. and Harold. Mr. Collins
suffered the loss of his first wife by death, and some
years later he was married to Mrs. Edward True-
man. Her maiden name was Margaret Anna Inglis,
the daughter of William and Fannie (Wright)
Inglis, of Bolivar, Missouri. In that place she was
reared and educated until ten years of age, when
she accompanied an aunt to New Mexico. Later she
accompanied her to Denver. Colorado, thence to
Laramie, Wyoming, and Deadwood, Black Hills,
South Dakota. Some time later, in Nevada, she was
married to Edward B. Trueman, a mine owner.
Later they moved to Montana, where Mr. Trueman
engaged in mining. Tliey became the parents of
four children, namely: Henry Edward, Bertha Idela.
Raymond Inglis and Edward Benton. In 1883 they
came to the Flathead Valley to engage in farming.
They left Anaconda with 2.000 head of cattle and 500
head of horses, most of which were sold on the way.
They became the owners of three ranches, a part
of tlieir land comprising the site of the future City
of Kalispell, and at that time Missoula was the near-
est postoffice. But little improvement had been
effected in the Flathead country, settlers being widely
separated, while Indians were frequent callers at
the settlers' cabins and wild bears were numerous.
The death of Mr. Trueman occurred about fifteen
years ago, and Mr. Trueman remained a widow until
her marriage to Mr. Collins in 1916.
Mr. Collins relates many thrilling incidents of the
pioneer days, and one in particular is worthy of note
here. While returning from a trip to Ravalli, Mon-
tana, he met Mr. Trueman. who was returning from
Missoula. The stage, which made but one trip a
week, had gone, and their only alternative was to
walk the distance home, fifty miles. They two and
another man, Thomas Stanton, started to walk, but
before the journey was completed Mr. Collins be-
came exhausted. They walked far into the night,
but at length Mr. Collins could go no further and
told his companions to go on and he would follow
as soon as he had rested. It was getting cold, so
before leaving him they built a fire. When they had
traveled several miles farther they were overtaken
by a horseman who reported that he had passed Mr.
Collins, who was still lying by the roadside where
they had left him. Mr. Trueman, uneasy over leav-
ing his friend alone, asked the stranger for the
temporary loan of his horse that he might go back
and look after Mr. Collins. The horseman declined
to loan his horse, claiming that Mr. Trueman might
be a horse thief. After some parleying Mr. True-
man finally pulled the rider off his horse, told him
to go ahead to a certain stopping place and await
his return. Riding back, he found Mr. Collins lying
where he had left him, but in so deep a sleep it was
difficult to arouse him. It was getting bitter cold,
and it was with considerable difficulty that Mr.
Trueman got Mr. Collins up on the horse behind him,
in which way he got him safely to the next stopping
place, where he returned the horse to its owner.
Mrs. Collins has a vivid recollection of the early
days of Butte, when it was but an embryo mining
camp. Mr. Trueman was a participant in many of
the stirring events of the early days in the North-
west. He went all through the Nez Perce war,
acting as guide to the United States troops. They
marched from Assiniboia, under Captain Norwood,
to the Big Hole country, thence to the Snake River
and the Yellowstone, and was on the Gibbons battle
on Big Hole River, that being the battle in which
Captain Logan lost his life. When Trueman left
liis family to go with the United States troops to
battle with the Nez Perce Indians he left his
butcher business in charge of his wife who con-
ducted it during his absence. There were some 200
men employed at Dewey's Flats who were dependent
on Mr. Trueman for their meat supply, which supply
ran short, and as the cattle were in the vicinity in
which the Indians were giving so much trouble there
was great danger in going after the cattle for a
fresh supply of meat, the men refusing to take the
necessary danger, so Mr. Trueman in company with
a boy seventeen years old agreed to take the risk,
which they successfully accomplished in two days
and one night and received a royal welcome on their
return to camp with the much needed supplies. Mrs.
Collins remembers when she was living in the Black
Hills that the Sioux became troublesome and were
driven back from the settlement to Laramie City.
Mrs. Collins is a consistent member of the Chris-
tian Church at Kalispell and is a member of the
Woman's Woodcraft. Mr. Collins was reared a
Catholic. They are both hospitable and generous,
and an hour spent in their comfortable home, listen-
ing to tlieir stories of the early days, is a genuine
pleasure. They look upon the world with optimistic
eyes, rejoicing that they have had so large a part
in the wonderful development of the Flathead coun-
try, and secure in the love and esteem of all who
know them.
Mr. Trueman was sheriff of Elks, Nevada, and
also was sheriff in Beaverhead County. Montana.
614
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Fraxk O. Wheeler. It is a well authenticated
fact that success comes not as the caprice of chance,
but as the legitimate result of well-applied energ>-,
unflagging determination and perseverance in a
course of action once decided upon by the individual.
Only those who diligently seek the goddess For-
tuna, find her — she never was known to smile upon
the idler or dreamer. The subject of this sketch
clearly understood this early in life, so he did not
seek any royal road to success, but sought to direct
his feet along the well beaten paths of those who
had won in the battle of life along legitimate lines.
In tracing his life history it is clearly seen that the
prosperity Mr. Wheeler now enjoys has been won
by commendable qualities, and it is also his personal
w'orth that has gained for him the good standing
among his fellow citizens in Great Falls, which he
now enjoys.
Frank O. Wheeler was born in Burlington, Ver-
mont, on May 2, 1887, and he is the second in order
of birth of the three children born to his parents,
Charles F. and Louise (Olmsted) Wheeler. Charles
F. Wheeler was also a native of the Green Mountain
State, and died in 1897- He was reared and edu-
cated in his native state and then engaged in the
clothing business at Burlington. He was appointed
postmaster of that city by President Garfield and
served one term. Politically he was a republican ;
fraternally, a member of the Independent Order ot
Odd Fellows, and his religious affiliation was with
the Congregational Church. His wife, who also was
born in Vermont, died in 1902, at the age of forty-
five years.
Frank O. Wheeler was reared under the parental
roof and secured his education in the public schools
of Burlington. On completing his education he en-
tered a drug store and thoroughly learned the busi-
ness. In 1907 Mr. Wheeler came to Great Falls and
entered the employ of La Peyre Brothers, with
whom he remained about three years. He then
formed a partnership and engaged in the drug busi-
ness under the firm name of Kenyon & Wheeler, the
business being prosperous from the start. In 1918
Mr. Wheeler became the sole owner of the business,
which is now conducted under the style of the
Wheeler Drug Company. The store is most eligibly
located on Central Avenue, between Third and
Fourth streets, and enjoys a large and representa-
tive patronage. Mr. Wheeler carries a large and well
selected stock of goods such as is usually found in
an up-to-date drug store, and because of his courte-
ous treatment and prompt service he enjoys a well-
deserved popularity.
On September 23, 1912, Frank Wheeler was united
in marriage to Josephine Farrell, who was born and
reared in Lawrence, Massachusetts, and to this union
two children have been born, Frederick F. and
Dorothy L.
Politically Mr. Wheeler gives his earnest support
to the republican party, though not in any sense
a seeker after public office. Fraternally he is a
member of the Masonic Order, belonging to Euclid
Lodge No. 58, and to Great Falls Consistory (thir-
ty-second degree), Scottish Rite, and is also a mem-
ber of Great Falls Lodge No. 214, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks. Because of his genial
personal qualities and his active interest in every-
thing that tends to the upbuilding of his adopted
city he richly deserves the confidence and esteem of
the people which are unreservedly accorded to him.
Arthur P. Heaney is one of the best known busi-
ness men in Great Falls, for, though a resident of
this city only since 1915, he has already gained a
wide reputation for progress and fair dealing.
Though he has labored indefatigably for the ad-
vancement of his own interests, he has not been
neglectful of his duties as a citizen of one of the
choicest sections of the great Treasure State. There-
fore he is held in high regard by all classes in his
home community, enjoying the confidence and good
will of all as a result of his public spirit, fair and
straightforward business methods and his exem-
plary character.
Arthur P. Heaney was born on his father's farm-
stead in Renville County, Minnesota, on April 12,
1872, and is the son of Owen and Margaret (Percey)
Heaney. Owen Heaney was born in Ireland in 1820
and died in October, 1898, at the age of seventy-
eight years. When but twelve years of age he was
brought by his parents to Canada. He spent his
youth and received his education there, and in 1867
came to Rochester, Minnesota, near which place he
engaged in farming for about two years. He then
located in Renville, that state, to which place he
traveled with an ox team, and there literally hewed
a farm out of the wilderness, being one of the
pioneer settlers in that locality. He was a success-
ful farmer and also became a successful breeder of
Durham cattle and Percheron horses. He became
prominent in local public affairs, and served for
twelve years as chairman of the board of county
commissioners and for many years was a member
of the school board. Nominally a democrat in his
political faith, nevertheless he took a broad view
of local affairs and always voted for the men
whom he considered best fitted for the offices to be
filled. His wife was born near Quebec. Canada, and
her death occurred in 1912. at the age of eighty-one
years. They were married in Canada and became
the parents of nine children, seven sons and two
daughters, of whom five are living.
Arthur P. Heaney secured his educational training
in a log cabin schoolhouse in his native county and
later was a student in the public schools of St.
Paul, Minnesota. The first money he ever earned
was for picking potato bugs on the Fourth of July
when eight years of age. When but ten years of age
he drove plow horses and did other farm work of
like nature. He lived at home until nineteen years
of age, when, in partnership with his brother William
J. Heaney, he engaged in the hardware and agricul-
tural implement business at Olivia, Minnesota. This
business was continued for four years. In 1897 he
came to Great Falls, Montana, and obtained employ-
ment with the Great Northern Railroad Company in
the train department for two years. He then re-
turned to Minnesota, and engaged as a traveling
salesman and collector for the McCormick Harvester
Company, later the International Harvester Com-
pany, with whom he remained for eight years. In
1906 he was elected clerk of the 'District Court,
serving one term of four years. During the last
year he engaged in the automobile business in Min-
neapolis and Aberdeen, South Dakota, continuing
these two enterprises up to August, 1915. He then
came to Great Falls as state distributor for the
Velie automobiles, trucks and tractors. This reliable
car has under his able direction found many buyers
in the state, and he is building up one of the best
automobile agencies in the Northwest.
On May 5, 1905, Mr. Heaney was married to Pear!
V. Smith, who was born in Ellsworth, Wisconsin,
and they are the parents of two daughters, Lola
Elaine and Gladys.
Fraternally Mr. Heaney is a member of Great
Falls Lodge No. 214. Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks, the Modern Woodmen of America
and the Ancient Order of Hibernians, having been
a member of the two last named organizations for
HISTORY OF MONTANA
more than twenty years. He is also a member of the
Illinois Commercial Travelers' Association. He was
one of the organizers of the Montana State Auto
Distributors' Association, which he served as presi-
dent in 1917, and is chairman of the State of Mon-
tana for the National Auto .Association. He is also
a member of the Great Falls Commercial Club, m
the various activities of which he takes a leading
part. Politically he is a stanch supporter of the
democratic party. He is recognized as one of the
live, energetic business men of Great Falls, and he
enjoys the confidence and good will of those he
has been associated with either in a business or
social way.
•Andrew John Sulliva.n-. The life of Andrew J.
Sullivan, the well-known merchant of Great Falls,
has been such as to elicit just praise from those who
know him best, owing to the fact that he has always
been true to the trusts reposed in him and has been
upright in his dealings with his fellow men, at the
same time lending his support to the promotion of
any cause looking to the advancement of the inter-
ests of the community at large.
_ Andrew J. Sullivan was born in Petersboro, New
York, on the 31st day of March, i860, and is the son
of Jerry and Mary Sullivan. Jerry Sullivan was
born in Ireland, and died in 1906, at the age of
eighty-eight years. In young manhood he came to
the United States by sailing vessel, and after arriv-
ing_ in this country first followed his trade, that
of a shoemaker. Later he located in Madison
County, New York, where he engaged in farming,
and there spent his remaining days. In politics he
was first a whig and on the dissolution of that
party and the formation of the republican party
he aligned himself with the new party. Jerry Sul-
livan was married in Petersboro, New York. His
wife was a native of England, and died in 1912, at
the age of eighty-two years. They became the
parents of three children, all of whom are living and
of whom the subject is the eldest.
Andrew J. Sullivan was reared on the home farm
and attended the district school during the winter
months. When eighteen years of &ge he engaged in
teaching school in New York State, after which he
took up teaming on railroad contract work. In
March, 1890, Mr. Sullivan came to Great Falls and
was first employed in carrying brick. Later he en-
gaged in teaching school and was employed as an
instructor in McKay's Business College. He then
entered into a partnership with W. G. Stark, and
from 189-; to 1906 they were engaged in the hard-
ware and furniture business, enjoying a large pat-
ronage and carrying a large and well selected stock
of goods. In the year last mentioned Mr. Sullivan
bought his partner's interest in the business, of which
he has since been sole owner. His courteous treat-
ment of his customers and the high quality of the
goods he carries have attracted to his store a repre-
sentative patronage and he is now conducting one
of the leading stores in his line in Great Falls.
On January 21, 1896, Mr. Sullivan was married
to Catherine McCarrick, who was born in St. Paul,
Minnesota, but whose death occurred in 1908. They
became the parents of two daughters, Helena and
Florence.
Politically Mr. Sullivan has been a consistent
supporter of the republican party and has taken an
intelligent interest in local public affairs. He served
three terms as alderman from the Second Ward, and
since 1918 he has been giving efficient service as
police commissioner. Fraternally he is a member of
the Woodmen of the World, the Fraternal Order of
Eagles and the Knights of Columbus. The record
of Mr. Sullivan, as outlined above, contains no ex-
citing chapter of tragic events, but is replete with
well-defined purposes which, carried to successful
issue, have won for him an infiuential place in busi-
ness circles and high personal standing among his
fellow citizens.
James Russell Hobbins. Golden opportunity,
awaiting a Midas-like touch of genius and ability, is
not necessarily metropolitan in its abode, but is resi-
dent, too, far from the commercial turmoil of big
cities. Upon the plains and benches of an immense
western empire and in the busy municipalities of a
newer domain has it beckoned to the capabilities of
able and talented men. There are many such men
who have wrought in the evolution of the Treasure
State, evolved vast businesses consistent with com-
munity growth, and wrested fortunes from a resilient
opportunity that yielded easily to their power.
Among the adopted sons of Montana who have con-
tributed of their ability to the development and
growth of this state is the gentleman whose name
appears at the head of these paragraphs.
James Russell Hobbins was born in Madison,
Wisconsin, on August 19, 1883, and is the son of
Joseph W. and Minnie (Mears) Hobbins. Joseph
W. Hobbins was born in England in March, 1847,
and was brought to the United States when eleven
years of age. He received a good public school edu-
cation and then attended the Wisconsin State Uni-
versity at Madison. His first business enf^dgemcnr
was as general agent and appraiser for fire insurance
cornpanies, but in 1881 he engaged in the banking
business, having been one of the leading spirits in the
organization of the Capita! City Bank of Madison.
He was elected president of the bank, which is one
of the strong and influential financial institutions of
that city, and is still serving in that capacity. He
is also, an extensive holder of real estate in Madison.
Politically he is a republican. He married in Madi-
son Minnie Mears. who was born at Madison in 1857.
and they became the parents of eight children, all
of whom are living and of whom the subject of this
review is the sixth in order of birth.
James R, Hobbins attended the public schools of
Madison, completing his educational training in the
University of Wisconsin, where he was graduated
with the class of 1904. On leaving school he became
identified- with the fire insurance business as a spe-
cial agent and adjuster, in which capacity he was
employed for si.x years, his territory covering the
states of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Illinois, where
he represented a number of companies. He then
became identified with the Hydro Electric Com-
pany, operating in California, New Mexico and
Colorado, being employed in plant construction and
operation. Then he made surveys and planned con-
struction work for the Federal Light and Traction
Company, of which he was general engineer. In
1912 Mr. Hobbins came to Great Falls and joined
the construction department of the Great Falls
Power Company having in charge the transmission
line conduits and the development of its commercial
interests in Northern Montana. Subsequently he
became commercial manager of this company. For
about a year he was transferred to the main office
of the company at Butte, where he had charge of
the lands department and of the right of way. On
April I, 1916, Mr. Hobbins came to Great Falls
as manager of the Northern division of the Great
Falls Power Company, and of the Great Falls Dis-
trict of the Montana Power Company, in which
capacity he is still rendering efficient service.
On August 3, 1908, Mr. Hobbins was married to
Bertha Bollinger, who was born in Davenport, Iowa.
HISTORY OF :\IONTANA
the daughter of James and Alice Bollinger. To this
union have been born two children, James R., Jr.,
and Mary Alice.
Politically Mr. Hobbins gives his support to the
republican party. He is identified with a number
of local institutions. He is a member and past
president of the Great Falls Rotary Club, and is
district'govemor of the Twentieth District of Rotary
clubs, including Utah, Idaho and Montana. He is
a past president of the Commercial Club and at the
present time is a member of its board of directors.
He is a member of the Cascade County Board of
the Red Cross and also of the executive council
of the Home Service Society of the Red Cross.
He is also a member of the Greek-letter college
fraternity Kappa Sigma. A man of forceful in-
dividuality and marked initiative power, Mr. Hob-
bins has been well equipped for the duties of citi-
zenship, while his probity of character and his genial
personality have gained for him universal esteem
and friendship among those with whom he has been
associated.
Robert E. McCarten, M. D. The man who de-
votes his talents and energies to the noble work of
administering to the ills and alleviating the suffer-
ings of humanity pursues a calling which in dignity,
importance and beneficial results is second to no
other. If true to his profession and earnest in his
efforts to enlarge his sphere of usefulness, he is
indeed a benefactor of his kind, for to him more than
to any other man are entrusted the safety, the com-
fort and in many instances the lives of those who
place themselves under his care and profit by his
services. Of this class of professional men is Robert
E. McCarten of Great Falls, who stands with few
peers and no superiors among the physicians and
surgeons of Montana.
Robert E. McCarten was born at Viroqua, Ver-
non County, Wisconsin, on September i, 1884, and
is a son of James and Margaret (Harkness) Mc-
Carten. James McCarten was a native of the north
of Ireland, and his death occurred in 1885, about
eleven months after the birth of the subject of
this review. He came to the United States with
his mother by sailing ship when he was a young
man. He was a pioneer settler in Vernon County,
Wisconsin, having been one of the first settlers in
that now favored locality, and there he literally
hewed him a farm out of' the wilderness, and there
he spent the remainder of his life and died. He was
survived many years by his widow, who was born
in Waukegan, Illinois, and who died on December
24, igi8, at the advanced age of eighty-one years.
The subject of this sketch is the youngest of the
eleven children born to these parents, of whom four
sons and four daughters are still living.
Robert E. McCarten secured his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of his native town, and
then became a student in the University of Minne-
sota. Having determined to make the practice of
medicine his life work, he then matriculated in the
Jefferson Medical College at Pliiladelphia, Pennsyl-
vania, where he was graduated with the class of
1910. The following year he spent as interne in St.
John's Hospital at Lowell, Massachusetts, where he
gained some valuable experience.
In 191 1 Doctor McCarten came to Great Falls and
entered upon the active practice of his profession,
and here his talents and abilities were quickly recog-
nized, so that for several years he has been recog-
nized as one of the leading medical practitioners
in this section of the state. During this time he has
not only gained a good name in his chosen vocations
but has also established a sound reputation for up-
rightness and noble character in all the relations
of life. He early realized that to those who attain
determinate success in the medical profession there
must be not only given technical ability, but also a
broad human sympathy which must pass from mere
sentiment to be an actuating motive for helpfulness.
On January 4, igi6, Doctor McCarten was mar-
ried to Ann Shannon, a native of Helena, Montana.
Doctor McCarten is a member of the Cascade
County Medical Society, the Montana State Medical
Society and the American Medical Association. In
1917 he was appointed city physician of Great Falls,
serving two years. Politically he is independent.
Genial and unassuming in manner, nevertheless Doc-
tor McCarten possesses to a pronounced degree those
qualities which attract, and he enjoys a large circle
of warm and loyal personal friends.
Earle F. Angell. The alert city attorney of
White Sulphur Springs, Earle F. Angell, is attract-
ing attention by his masterly handling of the legal
problems of the community, in which he displays a
thorough knowledge of the law and its proper in-
terpretation. Mr. .Angell was born at Washington.
District of Columbia, Januarv 24, 1890, a son of
Albert E. and Sarah F. (Fi'ske) Angell. Albert
E. Angell was born at Providence, Rhode Island,
January 12, 1854. and died September 13, 1914. His
widow, who was also a native of Providence, was
born in that city on January 3, 1858, and is now
living in it. She and her husband had two daughters
and one son, the latter being the second child. 'For
thirty-five years Albert E. Angell was a clerk in the
United States war department. In politics he was a
republican, and in religious faith a Universalist.
Earle F. ."Angell was reared at Washington, and
attended its schools, being graduated from the high
school course. He then entered the law department
of Georgetown University, from which he was
graduated in 1913, and in October of that same year
came to Montana and was admitted to the bar of
that state at Helena, where he was engaged in the
practice of his profession until 1916. In the latter
year he located permanently at White Sulphur
Springs, and that same year was appointed city at-
torney, and has been reappointed each year since
that date. Mr. Angell was elected attorney of
Meagher County in 1918 and was equally efficient
in that office. In politics he is a democrat. He main-
tains fraternal connections with Lewiston Lodge No.
456. Benevolent Protective Order of Elks.
On June 24, 1913, Mr. Angell was united in mar-
riage with Edna Louise Groff, born at Washington,
District of Columbia, a daughter of Hector and Rosa
Groflf, she being the younger of the two children
born to her parents. Mr. and Mrs. Angell have two
children, Jane Hamilton and Robert Fiske. Mr.
Angell is a young man of great initiative, and is
bending every energy to improve the conditions of
his community, as well as to protect its interests.
Possessing as he does a strong personality, he is
able to put over plans he knows will work out for
the best and exerts a powerful influence among his
fellow citizens, who, recognizing his ability, are very
willing to have him assume leadership, for they
know that he will not promote any inovement tliat
will not meet with the approval of the better element.
Amos Theodore Peterson. In the fall of 1914
Amos Theodore Peterson took charge of the Jeffer-
son County High School as principal, and that school
has grown and developed under his direction and
management for the past six years. This high school
at Boulder undoubtedly represents one of the most
advanced schools in the state in the matter of equip-
(dayt^ ^7-^<^t>^^.jLjC/
HISTORY OF MONTANA
merit and departmental administration. It possesses
an almost unique feature of county high schools, two
dormitories, providing accommodations for pupils
from a distance and converting the school prac-
tically into a hoarding school or college. Boulder
was the second city in the state to make this pro-
vision for the students of the county high school.
Mr. Peterson is a college and university graduate
and holds a high rank among Montana educators.
He was born at Edwall, Washington, January 13,
1889. His father, George A. Peterson, who was
born at Christiania, Norway, in 1842, was twelve
.years of age when he came to America with his
father. The family settled in Upper Micliigan, where
George A. Peterson was reared and educated. In
1872 he moved to the Northwest and settled on a
farm at Spangle, Washington, moved to another
farm near Edwall in 1887, and achieved a substantial
siiccess in agriculture, tliough he went through many
of the hardships of the pioneer days. Since 1912
he has enjoyed a comfortable retirement at Spokane.
He is a republican and a member of the Lutheran
Church. His wife was Hannah Anderson, who was
born in Litchfield, Minnesota, in i860. They have
a family of "seven cliildren: Hulda M., wife of
A. P. Harold, a furnace manufacturer at Spokane;
Emily E., wife of B. O. Killin, a postal clerk at Hay-
ford. Washington ; J. E., who is a graduate of the
University of Washington at Seattle in the law de-
partment with the degree LL. B. and a successful
attorney at Seattle ; Amos Theodore ; Wallace, who
took his degree as Doctor of Dental Surgery from
the North Pacific Dental College at Seattle and is
now practicing at Sitka. Alaska ; Florence C, wife
of Robert Nelson, a veterinarian at Molson, W'ash-
ington, and Genevieve L., who is attending Whit-
worth College at Spokane.
Amos Theodore Peterson acquired his early edu-
cation in the rural schools of Spokane County and
so far as possible pursued his consecutive work from
the primary schools through the various grades until
he had finished his university career at the age of
twenty-five. He attended for two years the pre-
paratory school of the State College of Washington
at Pullman, and then took the regular academic
course of the State College, graduating A. B. with the
class of 1914. He has since taken post-graduate
work in chemistry at the University of Colorado
at Boulder. Mr. Peterson is a member of the Alpha
Tau Omega fraternity.
Mr. Peterson has been continuously identified with
the schools at Boulder since .the fall of 1913. The
first year he was a commercial teacher, and was
then promoted to principal of the Jefferson County
High School. He has a staff of six teachers, and
while he started with an enrollment of only twenty-
eight pupils, the scholars now number ninety-six and
the school is rapidly growing in every department.
The spring of 1920 saw the completion of the-
handsome new high school building with dormitories
and gymnasium. Mr. Peterson has during his ad-
ministration added four departments of instruction,
domestic science, agriculture, manual training and
teachers' training.
He has also been a leader in community affairs
as well as a teacher. He is county director of the
War Savings funds, and served all through the war
in that capacity. He was also a four-minute man
and took the lead in all the drives for the Young
Men's Christian Association during the war. He
is a director of the local Young Men's Christian
Association, is chairman of the vocational education
committee of the State of Montana, is a democrat,
a member of the State Teachers' Association, and
is affiliated with Boulder Lodge No. 41, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons.
August 22, 1915, at Moscow, Idaho, he married
Miss Daisy E. Wilson, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Robert Wilson, residents of Pullman, Washington.
Her father is a traveling salesman. Mrs. Peterson
is a skilled musician, especially as a pianist, and is
a graduate of the music department of the State
College of Washington. They have one daughter,
Helen Daisy, born September 25, 1918.
Isaac Watts Choate, at present code commis-
sioner for the State of Montana, was born at West
Barnet, Vermont, September 12, 1882. His branch
of the Choate family is English and settled in Ver-
mont and Massachusetts in colonial times. David
Worthen Choate, his grandfather, a third cousin of
Rufus Choate, was born in Thetford, Vermont,
February 12, 1808, and spent his life as a farmer
and merchant in Peacham Vermont, where he died
July 14, 1894.
Charles Augustus Choate, the father of I. W.
Choate, was born in Peacham, Vermont, March 30,
1838. In his early manhood he left his native state
and joined the argonauts of his day in the search
for gold in California, making the voyage around
the Horn. TBree years were spent as a miner in
California and Idaho, and then he returned to his
home state, spending the remainder of his life as
a farmer at West Barnet, Vermont, where he died
April 7, igo2. He was a man of prominence in his
community, representing the County of Caledonia at
one term of the State Legislature. He was a re-
publican in politics, a very consistent Christian and
a member of the Congregational Church.
Charles Choate married Alice M. Watts, who was
born in Peacham. Vermont. January 6. 1845, and
died in West Barnet, Vermont. September 19, 1882.
He later married Lucy Ella Watts, a sister of Alice
M. Watts. The children of Charles Choate and
Alice Watts were as follows: David Worthen
Choate was born at West Barnet, Vermont, August
26, 1869. For eighteen years he was a locomotive
engineer in the employ of the Soo Railway, with
headquarters at Minneapolis, Minnesota. Returning
to his old home at West Barnet, Vermont, he died
September 8, 1909, survived by his wife, Harriett
Choate, formerly Harriett Bailey, of Peacham, Ver-
mont, and by a son, Worthen Choate.
Charles Augustus Choate, Jr., born October 2,
1871. is a farmer at West Barnet, Vermont, occupy-
ing the lands first settled by his father and which
have now been developed into a beautiful and pro-
ductive country home. In 1903 he was married to
Pearl Field, and they have two sons. Charles
Augustus, Jr., and Paul Merrill Choate. A de-
ceased daughter, Alice Choate, was taken from them
at the age of three years.
Elsie A. Choate, born November 26, 1880, was
educated at Peacham Academy, Bridgewater Normal
School and Wellesley College. She has spent much
of her life as a teacher and has made her home at
Peacham, Vermont, where she now resides.
Isaac Watts Choate is the fourth in age of the
children of Charles A. Choate, and there were also
two other children, a daughter born March 25 and
died October 4, 1877, and a son. Nelson Choate,
born May 2, 1879, and died March 12, 1881.
Mr. Choate attended the public schools in Cale-
donia County, Vermont, graduating from Caledonia
County Grammar School, familiarly known as
Peacham Academy, with the class of woo. and en-
tered the University of Minnesota at Minneapolis.
He received his A. B. degree in 1904 and at gradua-
618
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tion was elected a member of the honorary scholar-
ship fraternity. Phi Beta Kappa. He was also a
member of Phi Gamma Delta fraternity. The two
years following his graduation Mr. Choate spent in
Chicago as an employe of Sears Roebuck & Com-
pany. From tliere he went to Seattle in 1906, and
for 'a short time was wMth the house furnishing con-
cern of Frederick Nelson & Company, and after
that until 1908 he was employed by the Independent
Telephone Company. In the summer of 1908 Mr.
Choate moved to Bridger, Montana, where he en-
tered the law office of W. L. Hyde, and for two
years pursued the study of law, resulting in his
"admissiqn to the bar of Montana in 1910. He prac-
ticed law at Manhattan. Montana, from the spring
of 191 1 until 1914. and then moved to Bozeman,
Montana, where he established himself in practice,
serving one term as deputy county attorney of Galla-
tin Countv and a year as city attorney of Bozeman.
In 1918 Mr. Choate became'assistant attorney gen-
eral under Attorney General S. C. Ford, and, mov-
ing to Helena, performed the duties of that office
until the following spring, when he was appointed
by the Supreme Court to the office of code commis-
sioner.
Mr. Choate is a republican. He is past exalted
ruler of Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, and for the year 1919-20
served as president of the Montana State Associa-
tion of Elks. He is a member of the Montana Bar
Association and of the Presbyterian Church.
Isaac Watts Choate married, September 20. 1909.
at Lynn, Massachusetts, Miss Roberta E. Gammon.
She was born at West Barnet, Vermont, October 21,
1884, moving to Lynn, Massachusetts, in her early
girlhood. She graduated from the high school of
that city and resided there until her marriage. Mr.
and Mrs. Choate have four children, Margaret Ro-
berta, born at Bridger, Montana, November 19, 1910;
Lyman Watts, born at Manhattan, Montana, Decem-
ber 3, 1912; Robert Ingraham, born at Bozeman,
Montana, June 6, 1915, and David Powell, born at
Bozeman, Montana, January 27, 1918.
Charles J. Weston is a veteran building con-
tractor, for many years identified with the industry
in his native state of Minnesota, and for over a
decade in Montana at Miles City and at Sidney.
For five years he has lived at Sidney, going to that
city when it was taking on urban proportions, and
his work has characterized him as one of the chief
builders of the county seat.
Mr. Weston was born at Lake City, Minnesota,
May 3, 1864, son of Albert E. and Jennie (Jenks)
Weston. His father was Ixirn in Essex County,
New York, son of a farmer and charcoal burner
of the Empire State. .Mbert Weston grew up in
Essex County, became a mechanic and carpenter,
and spent many years in contracting. In early life
he lost several of his fingers in a planing mill and
was therefore disabled for military service during
(he Civil war. He came to Minnesota by boat up the
Mississippi River to Lake City, and lived and did
his work there for many years. He died in 1907.
He was a republican without participation in public
office, and was a member of the Methodist Church.
After coming to Lake City he married the daugh-
ter of Thomas Jenks, who had come to Minnesota
from Montpelier, Vermont, and was a very success-
ful farmer. Mrs. Albert Weston died in 1906. She
was the mother of four sons, Arthur T., of Minne-
apolis ; George W. of Chicago ; Charles J. ; and
Allen C, of St. Louis.
Charles J. Weston made the very best of his
rather limited opportunities to secure an education
in Lake City, Minnesota, where he spent his boy-
hood. Later he supplemented this with a business
course in Minneapolis. He learned the carpenter's
trade, and at the age of seventeen became a journey-
man worker in South Dakota. Before he was twen-
ty-five he was taking contracts in building at Water-
town, South Dakota, but subsequently moved to
Minneapolis, and for twenty-one years was busily
engaged in the building business. He was rather a
pioneer in the plan of building homes and selling
them on monthly payments to working people. He
employed his capita! and enterprise to encourage a
great many residents of Minneapolis to become
home owners. His construction work in that city
is still in evidence, and perhaps the most conspicuous
of his contracts are the Wooscocket Flats and the
Nelson Apartments.
On leaving Minneapolis Mr. Weston moved to
Miles City, Montana. During the six years he was
there he built the fir.st hospital, the Young Men's
Christian Association Building, the Masonic Temple,
the Smith Building and three annexes to the Olive
Hotel, besides performing many minor contracts.
While the five years spent in Sidney constitutes
an era of rather difficult conditions for the building
contractor, Mr. Weston's work is in evidence by
many notable structures, including the homes of the
First National Bank and the Yellowstone Bank &
Trust Company, the business house of the Yellow-
stone Mercantile Company, the Sidney Deaconess
Hospital and Clinic, the Valley Hotel, one of the
best institutions of its kind in Eastern Montana, the
Bendon concrete garage building, two additions to
the Sidney High School, made to accommodate the
growing school population, and another evidence of
his ability to construct places of amusement as well
as commercial establishments is the Princess The-
ater.
Mr. Weston while at Watertown, South Dakota,
voted for Benjamin Harrison for president in 1888,
and has remained steadfast with that party though
he has never offered himself for a public candi-
dacy. His family are members of the Congrega-
tional Church at Sidney. During the war he and
Mrs. Weston helped carry on the local work of the
Red Cross and were interested in the success of
the Liberty Loan and other campaigns.
At Minneapolis Mr. Weston married Miss Lois
Green, who was born in the State of Maine, a daugh-
ter of Charles E. Green. Mr. and Mrs. Weston have
one cliild. Helen, who is the wife of J. Clifford
Moore, of Miles City, and has two sons, James and
Robert Moore.
Ben C. Brooke, M. D. At least four generations
of the Brooke family, which was transplanted from
Scotland to America more than a century ago, have
furnished men of distinction to the profession of
medicine and surgery. One of the first medical col-
■ lege graduates and thoroughly well qualified phy-
sicians to come to Montana was the late Dr. Ben-
jamin C. Brooke, whose character and abilities
honored the profession of his choice and made his
residence and citizenship in Montana productive of
the finest service to his community and state. A
son of this pioneer physician is and has been for
a number of years regarded as one of the most
skillful surgeons of Montana, Dr. Ben C. Brooke of
Helena.
His father, the late Benjamin Coddington Brooke,
was born at Morgantown, West Virginia, April I,
1822. Other branches of the Morgantown Brooke
family have achieved distinction in various lines.
The parents of Benjamin Coddington Brooke were
Dr. Thomas Frederick and Mary (Coddington)
Brooke, the former a native of Prince George and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the latter of Allegany County. Maryland. Dr.
Thomas Frederick Brooke's father was a native of
Scotland, was an early settler in Maryland, and like-
wise practiced medicine. Dr. Thomas Frederick
Brooke began his professional career in Maryland,
but subsequently moved to West Virginia. His
widow finally came to Montana with her son.
Benjamin Coddington Brooke was liberally edu-
cated in the schools of West Virginia, and had no
other ambition than to qualify himself for tlie pro-
fession and service which had been outlined for him.
by the dignified example of his father and grand-
father. He studied in the Cincinnati Medical Col-
lege, and graduated from the Jefferson Medical Col-
lege of Philadelphia. Nearly all his professional
service and experience were gained in the far West,
much of the time close to the frontier. In 1854
he went to Western Missouri, began practice in the
district that has since become Kansas City, and in
1858 he crossed the plains, joining in the rush to
the new gold discoveries at Pike's Peak. Colorado.
Thus he became one of the pioneer doctors at Den-
ver. From there in the spring of 1863 he came to
Montana, first identifying himself with the com-
munity of Virginia City, but after 1866 lived at
Helena. His skill and knowledge in medicine and
his long continued devotion to the work set a high
standard in his profession, and did much to elevate
the vocation of medicine at the very beginning of
Montana's territorial history. He was a man of fine
character, excellent business ability, became inter-
ested in mining, farming, stock ranching and other
business affairs, and whether as a private citizen or
as a physician his name and record properly belong
in any account of the pioneer personalities of Mon-
tana. He died at Helena May 9, 1891. He married
Sarah Mackbee and they were the parents of six
children. Of the two sons that reached mature
years. Lee D. has earned a high place in the profes-
sion of law. The two daughters are Mrs. Rudolph
Horsky and Miss Lalla M. Brooke.
Dr. Ben C. Brooke was horn at Helena May 9.
1872, and his nineteenth birthday was the date of
his father's death. He received his early education
in the schools of Helena, including high school, and
later entered Bellevue Hospital Medical College of
New York City, graduating with high honors in
1896. Since that year his home and the scene of his
professional work have been in Helena. For the
past ten years he has confined his practice to
surgery. In 1898 Doctor Brooke went east to the
New York Post Graduate School, and thereafter
for seven years devoted some weeks or months
every year to study with this institution, specializing
in surgery. He also did work in the New York
Polyclinic. Doctor Brooke by his attainments and
experience has worthily won a place as Fellow of
the American College of Surgeons.
At Helena he is affiliated with the firm, Brooke
& Lanstrum, the junior associates being Arthur
Jordan, B. E. Wiley, Rudolph Horsky and Don L.
Treacy. This firm maintains one of the finest
equipped private offices in the state, at 12 Edwards
Street. They have two special operating rooms and
other facilities for surgery, including an X-ray de-
partment and a large medical library, and the firm
does a large special practice in eye, ear, nose and
throat.
Doctor Brooke served as county physician of
Lewis and Clark County for 1897 to 1903, as
city physician the same years, and for three terms
covering about the same period was county coroner.
For eight years he was a member of the City and
County Board of Health. Doctor Brooke is the
medical director of the Montana Life Insurance
Company, served three terms as secretary of the
Montana State Aledical Society, and is a member
of the American Medical Association. He is inde-
pendent in politics, is affiliated with King Solomon
Lodge No. 9, Ancient Free and .'Accepted Masons ;
Helena Consistory No. 3 of the Scottish Rite;
Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine and Helena
Lodge No. 193, Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks. Doctor Brooke is vice president of the Placer
Hotel Company and owns one of the best city homes
in Helena, at 12 South Benton Avenue.
At York, Nebraska, he married Miss Bertha
Sands, who was born at Rushville, Illinois, and fin-
ished her education in the Helena Business College.
Doctor and Mrs. Brooke had five children ; Vir-
ginia, who died in the fall of 1919, at the age of
ten years; Ben, Jr., who died in infancy; Bennie,
born in 1911; Wallace, born in 1914, and Robert,
born in 1917.
John Oilman Bullard, the surveyor general of
Montana, has been identified almost continuously
since boyhood with interests closely allied with those
with which he is now connected, and few men of
his years can lay claim to wider experience along
certain lines or better preparatory training for the
exceedingly important office he now holds.
Mr. Bullard traces descent through a long and sub-
stantial American ancestry to England and to the
founder of the family in this country, Benjamin
Bullard, who was among the very first settlers in
Massachusetts, as he drew a grant of land in Water-
town as early as 1637. Among his descendants was
Doctor Bullard. born in HoUister, Massachusetts,
December 8, 1768. He removed to Sutton, Massa-
chusetts, in 1805, and his death occurred there on
the 6th of May, 1842. He was the father of ten
children, one of whom was Asa Bullard, the grand
father of Montana's present surveyor general. Asa
Bullard, who was born in Massachusetts, gained
distinction as the founder of many Sunday schools
of the Congregational Church in New England. He
was a graduate of Amherst College, Massachusetts,
and he died in the City of Cambridge, that state.
Among other distinguished personages connected
with this family may be mentioned Henry Ward
Beecher and Clara Barton.
William Reed Bullard. a son of Asa, and the
father of John Oilman Bullard, was born in Cam-
bridge, Massachusetts, in 1838, and he died at Helena,
Montana, in 1890. He was reared in Cambridge,
graduated from Harvard College, now Harvard"
University, with the class of 1857 and the degree
of M. D., and during a short time thereafter prac-
ticed medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana. From there
he came to Montana in 1866, choosing Helena as his
future home, and here he enrolled his name arnong
the pioneers and among Montana's most prominent
and successful physicians and surgeons. He con-
tinued in the practice of medicine in Helena until
his death, and his success was due more perhaps to
the fact that he was a stanch advocate of careful
nursing, giving efficient care and watchfulness
precedence over medicine or drugs. He was inde-
pendent in political matters, always exercising his
right of franchise as his conscience dictated. Al-
though reared a Congregationalist, Doctor Bullard
after locating in Indianapolis affiliated with the
Unitarian Church. He belonged to Morning Star
Lodge No. 5, Ancient Free and .Accepted Masons,
and was a member of the State Medical Society
and the Lewis and Clark County Medical Society.
Doctor Bullard married Mary Nancy Oilman, a
member of a Puritan New England family. Her
father, John Coffin Oilman, was a trail blazer in the
620
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Northwest, and was the first county treasurer of Jef-
ferson County, Montana. Mrs. Bullard was reared
in Ohio and Wisconsin. She died May 8. 1920, ni
Helena, Montana. Doctor and Mfs. Bullard became
the parents of two cliildren. twins, and the daughter,
Clara Gertrude, resides with her brother in Heletia.
She attended the Helena High School and the
Helena Business College, and is now engaged in
stenographic work in the surveyor general s othce.
John Gilman Bullard still lives in the house at
309 East Broadway in which he was born December
II 1873. Just before completing the senior year m
the Helena High School his father died, and he was
obliged to leave school to assist in his own support.
During the following three months he was employed
by Wallace & Thornburg, real estate brokers, and
then, in November, 1891, entered the office of the
United States surveyor general as a draftsman m
the mineral department. He remained there but one
month, however, leaving the position to pursue a
three months' course in shorthand and typewriting
in Miss Jackman's shorthand school, where he at-
tended during the year 1892, but he never found
occasion to put into practice the knowledge he there
^Trom May, 1892, until July 30, 1892, Mr. Bullard
was again in the office of the United States sur-
veyor general, occupying the same position as be-
fore. On the 30th of July, 1894, he was appointed
to a permanent position in the same office in the
agricultural department, starting in as a draftsman
and continuing in that capacity until 1908, when he
.was advanced to the office of examiner of plats.
On the 14th of January, 1920. Mr. Bullard was ap-
pointed surveyor general of Montana, and this is the
first promotion that has ever been made from tlie
civil service ranks to an administrative position
either in the surveyor general's office or in the land
department of the United States Government. Mr.
Bullard has offices in the Federal Building. He
gives his political allegiance to the democratic party,
is a member of the Episcopal Church, and belongs
to Helena Lodge No. 193, Benevolent Protective
Order of Elks.
Mr. Bullard has gained more than a local reputa-
tion as a skilled penman, and is often called upon
to engross resolutions passed by the Legislature upon
the death of prominent statesmen. Among many
other works of that character he engrossed the reso-
lutions passed by the Legislature at the death of
President McKinley and also at the death of Theo-
•dore Roosevelt. For the latter work he received
a letter of thanks from Mrs. Roosevelt. Mr. Bul-
lard has never married.
Arthur Jordan, M. D. Doctor Jordan, now a
member of the prominent firm of physicians and
surgeons, Brooke, Lanstrum, Wiley & Jordan, at
Helena, was formerly active in his profession and
also in public aff^airs at Twin Bridges.
He was born at Atlantic, Iowa, September 17,
1869, son of James and Agnes (Dungan) Jordan.
His father was a Union soldier, spent many years as
a farmer in Iowa, and in 1907 removed to Oregon.
Doctor Jordan was reared at Atlantic, Iowa, at-
tended high school, also took a normal course, and for
four years was a student of medicine in Iowa State
University, graduating in 1895. Soon afterward he
came to Montana and for ten years practiced at
Marysville and in 1905 moved to Twin Bridges.
While he was one of the hard working members
of his profession at Twin Bridges he took a deep
interest in local politics as a republican, was elected
a member of the Legislature in 1910, was chosen
mayor of the city in 1912, and also served as chair-
man of the Twin Bridges School Board and as a
member of the City Council. He is active in the
various medical societies, is a Mason, Elk and Mac-
cabee, and is affiliated with several social organiza-
tions at Helena.
October 20, 1897, at Marysville, he married Adele
M. Dillon, daughter of a pioneer family of Marys-
ville, Patrick B. and Mary Dillon. Doctor and
Mrs. Jordan have two children, Arthur and Eliza-
beth.
Sidney Miller, who is registrar of state lands of
Montana, has been a resident of Montana through-
out the period of statehood and six months prior to
that period, and has long been prominent in official
affairs in Lewis and Clark County.
Mr. Miller was born on a farm in Andrew County,
Missouri, March 2, 1866. His father. Frederick T.
Miller, who for a brief period in the '60s was en-
gaged in the freighting and transportation business
to Virginia City, Montana, was born in Callaway
County, Missouri, in 1832. He early moved to
Northwest Missouri, locating on a farm in Andrew
County, but had many interesting experiences and
travels in the West. He first went out to California
in 1852, followed placer mining in that state, and
also worked in the mines around Jacksonville. Ore-
gon. He spent seven years in the far West and
enjoyed more than the average success of miners.
He then went back to Andrew County, Missouri,
married, and for a year or two engaged in the
overland freighting business at Denver, Colorado.
It was in this period of his career, during the early
'60s, that he brought a load of supplies up to the
pioneer mining camps of Montana, selling his goods
and his outfit at Virginia City. He then returned
to Andrew County, Missouri, and was satisfied with
the quiet environment and duties of a farm. He
died in Andrew County in 1898. He was a demo-
crat and a member of the Christian Church. Fred-
erick T. Miller married Christina Kelley, who was
born in Andrew County in 1842 and died there in
1908. They were the parents of four children:
Elvina. wife of Louis E. Nuckles, a farrner in An-
drew County; Sidney; Andrew O., who lives on the
old homestead farm in Missouri, and Clifford C,
also an Andrew County farmer.
Sidney Miller attended the rural schools of An-
drew County and graduated in 1886 from the Stan-
berry Normal School at Stanberry. Missouri. Dur-
ing the next year he taught at Union Star, Missouri,
and then took a special course in shorthand at Stan-
berrv, and put his newly acquired art to use as an
emplove of the Tootle-Housa Dry Goods Company,
now Tootle, Wheeler & Motter Company, at St.
Joseph, Missouri.
Mr. Miller came to Montana in March, 1889. For
the first two years he was an employe of John T.
Murphy, a Helena grocer, and then for a year was
with an abstract company. For nearly thirty years
Mr. Miller has been an efficient and capable public
servant. From 1892 to 1900 he served as deputy
county clerk and recorder of Lewis and Clark
County. He was elected chief of that office in. 1900,
re-elected in 1902. and serving through 1904. In
the meantime, in' the fall of 1904. he was elected
clerk of the District Court for Lewis and Clark
County and his four-year term in that office began
January i, 1903. From 1909 to 1913 he was deputy
assessor, and in ftie latter year was appointed by
Governor S. V. Stewart as registrar of state lands,
with offices in the State Capitol. Mr. Miller is a
democrat.
He and his family reside in a modern home at
8?5 Breckenridge Street. He married at Helena in
HISTORY OF MONTANA
621
1894 Miss Loretta Finnerty. daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. Peter Finnerty, deceased. Her father was a
New York State farmer. Mrs. Miller died at Helena
in igio, the mother of two children, Sidney Fred
and Ethel Loretta. The son, after graduatirig with
the A. B. degree from the University of Wisconsin,
enlisted in 1918 and served overseas in France a
year, being with the Machine Gun Company of the
Twenty-Seventh Division. He was mustered out in
May, 1919, and is now a student of law at Harvard
University. The daughter, Ethel, is in the eighth
I grade of St. Vincent's Academy at Helena.
Bert E. Wiley, M. D. Talent, inclination, phys-
ical and mental equipment, all combine to point the
way of Doctor Wiley to specialization and unusual
success in the field of medicine and surgery. He
came to Montana in 1903 and in 1917 located at
Helena, where he is the eye, ear, nose and throat
specialist in the Helena Clinic, comprising Drs.
Brooke, Lanstrum, Wiley, Jordan, Horsky and
Treacy, an organization that probably combines a
greater range of abilities in the medical profession
than any other in Montana.
Doctor Wiley was born in New Brunswick, Can-
ada, June 9, 1876. His grandfather, John Wiley,
was born in the north of Ireland in 1812, was a-
cabinet maker by trade, and spent most of his life
in New Brunswick. He died at Fredericton, that
province, in 1882. He married a Miss Todd in Ire-
land, a native of that country. Three of their chil-
dren are still living: Sarah, wife of A. B. Ather-
ton, a retired surgeon of San Diego, California;
Grace, wife of Henry Good, a clergyman, living near
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and John M.
John M. Wiley was born at Fredericton in 1852
and is still in business as a druggist in that city,
an occupation he has followed many years. He is
a conservative in politics and a member of the
Methodist Church. John M. Wiley married Mar-
garet Macdonald, who was born in New Brunswick
in 1856. Doctor Wiley is the oldest of their four
children: Sarah is the wife of William Cooper, a
lumber dealer at Kansas City, Missouri; Harold is
a druggist at Missoula, Montana, and Margaret is
the wife of a real estate and insurance man at Fred-
ericton.
Bert E. Wiley acquired a public school education
at Fredericton, graduating from high school in
1892, and in 1896 completed his literary education in
the ■ University of New Brunswick. He took his
medical course at McGill University in Montreal,
receiving his degree M. D., C. M. in 1901. He was
a member of the Delta Upsilon college fraternity.
After practicing for a year at Fredericton Doctor
Wiley came west to Montana in the spring of 1903
and for nearly fifteen years practiced medicine with
his home at Kalispell. In the early years he was
associated with his uncle, the late Dr. A. D. Mac-
donald. Determining to specialize, Doctor Wiley
went abroad in 1909, and for two years availed him-
self of all the splendid opportunities for study and
clinical work on the subject of the eye, ear, nose and
throat. Part of that time he was house surgeon in
the London Central Ear, Nose and Throat Hos-
pital, also in the Royal Ophthalmic Hospital, and
spent six months in post-graduate work in Vienna.
Returning to this country in 191 1, he continued his
work along special lines in Kalispell for six years,
and in 1917 removed to Helena, becoming associated
with the firm of which he is a member today. His
partners are all men of the highest ability and he
handles the work of the firm in eye, ear, nose and
throat.
Doctor Wiley is a republican, is affiliated with
Kalispell Lodge No. 42, .'\ncient Free and Accepted
Masons; Kalispell Chapter No. 13, Royal Arch
Masons; Cyrene Commandery No. 12, Knights
Templar; Helena Consistory No. 3, of the Scottish
Rite, and Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine. He
is also a member of the Montana Club of Helena
and the Helena Rotary Club. He married at Helena
in 1918 Mrs. Grace (See) Scott, a native of Cincin-
nati, Ohio, who has resided in Helena for the past
fifteen years.
H. Sol Hepner was the first boy to receive a high
school diploma from the Helena High School and
graduate with the class of 1885. Some ten years
later he opened an oflice and began making his
abilities and services known as a lawyer. He has
been steadily engaged in a growing practice as a
lawyer nearly twenty-five years, and has long en-
joyed an enviable rank at the Helena bar.
Mr. Hepner was born in Russia, at Tzaritzin,
February 25, 1869, son of Barnett H. and Bertha
(Maizel) Hepner. The business qualifications and
the fine character of Barnett Hepner are well attested
in Helena. In his early career in Russia he did
considerable railroad contracting. Leaving his wife
and children behind, he came to America in 1871,
living in Pennsylvania and for several years in Colo-
rado. In 1879 he opened a clothing store at Helena.
He was one of the early merchants of that city
and gave his personal supervision to his business
until his death in 1908. He had sent for his family,
who arrived and joined him at Helena in 1882.
Of the three children H. Sol is the only son. The
daughters are Jennie, wife of Louis Weigel, and
Luba, wife of Sylvain Levy.
H. Sol Hepner was thirteen years of age when
he came to this country. In the meantime he had
made good use of the opportunities afforded by the
Imperial Pro-Gymnasium at Tzaritzin, Russia, and
continued his education in the public schools of
America, rapidly becoming proficient in the Eng-
lish language. After graduating from high school
as above noted he went to work in the Montana
National Bank, and gave dutiful attention to his
responsibilities there for several years. In 1889 he
entered the law school of the LIniversity of Mich-
igan, and was graduated two years later. He was
admitted to the bar in 1892 and after working in
several law offices began practice at Helena. Mr.
Hepner still occupies his offices in the Union Bank
Building, where his clients have sought his profes-
sional services for many years. He has enjoyed
political honors, and has rendered service in every
office he has held. From 1897 to 1899 he represented
his home county in the State Legislature and in
1909-10 was county prosecuting attorney for Lewi.s
and Clark County. He was a candidate for the dis-
trict bench in 1900. He served as city attorney of
Helena during 1911-12. Politically he is a demo-
crat.
For over a year during the World war Mr. Hep-
ner practi'cally sacrificed his private practice and de-
voted his time and abilities to the Government. The
President appointed him in January, 1918, a mem-
ber of District Exemption Board No. i for Mon-
tana, with jurisdiction over twenty-six county and
City of Butte local exemptior* boards. Elected
chairman, he gave his time to this exacting service
until the close of the war and received his honor-
able discharge March 31, 1919. In the various war
auxiliary movements, such as the Liberty Loan. Red
Cross, Young Men's Christian Association, United
War Work and other drives, he was also extremely
liberal with both time and personal means, serving
on all of these as captain of teams.
Mr. Hepner is one of the prominent Masons of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
the State of Montana and has also been active in
other fraternal organizations. In October, 1919,
he attained the distinctive honor of the thirty-third
degree in Scottish Rite Masonry. He served as grand
master of the Grand Lodge of Masons in Montana in
1903-04, is a past grand patron of the Order of
the Eastern Star, is past thrice illustrious grand mas-
ter of the Royal and Select Masters, and is a past
potentate of Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
He has also held the position of head adviser in the
head camp of the Pacific Jurisdiction of the Wood-
men of the World, is a past exalted ruler of Helena
Lodge No. 193 of Elks, and is a past noble grand of
the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
June 6, 1899, Mr. Hcpner married Josephine Israel.
Mrs. Hepner is a native of Newark, New Jersey,
who came to Helena in 1879 with her parents. She
has also taken an active part in fraternal affairs,
having been honored by being elected worthy grand
matron of the Grand Chapter, Order of Eastern
Star of Montana. On March 20. 1920, a second
chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star was or-
ganized in Helena and by unanimous vote was
named Josephine Hepner Chapter. She has served
in various civic capacities and is one of the best
known and most beloved women in the state. At
present she is vice president of the Montana Chil-
dren's Home Society and is actively connected with
and on the board of directors of the Civic Club of
Helena, and was the first woman ever appointed on
the Public Library Board of Helena. Mr. and Mrs.
Hepner have two children, Claire Algeria, born in
1900, and Harold Steffan, born in 1904. The daugh-
ter is now a junior in Northwestern University at
Evanston, Illinois, while the son is in the junior
class of the Helena High School.
William Wellman is now living retired at White
Sulphur Springs, but has been very closely asso-
ciated with the development of this region, and the
Wellman addition to the city was made by him
from a small ranch he owned on the outskirts.
Prior to his retirement he was actively engaged in
a harness business, and is held in the highest esteem
by his fellow townsmen as a good citizen and upright
man.
William Wellman was born at Quincy, Illinois,
March 25, 1844, a son of William and Sophia Well-
man, the former of whom was born in Germany in
1819, and died in 1902, at the age of eighty-three
years, and the latter, who was also a native of
Germany, was born in 1822 and died in 1905. They
were married in Germany, and nine children resulted
of their union, six of whom are now livmg, William
Wellman being the fourth. The first child was
born while the parents were crossing the ocean on a
sailing vessel from Germany to the United States.
They landed at New Orleans. Louisiana, and came
up the Mississippi River to Quincy, Illinois, where
the father worked at his trade of blacksmith, and
there died. He was a democrat in politics, and a
Roman Catholic in religious faith.
William Wellman, the younger, attended the pub-
lic schools of Quincy, Illinois, and since leaving
school has improved himself by self-instruction. He
learned the harnessmaking trade in his native city,
and leaving it in 1868, found employment at his
trade at Ottumwa, Iowa, for about five years. His
next change brought him further west to Freemont.
Nebraska, where he spent six years, and then spent
about two years at Denver, Colorado. Albuquerque,
New Mexico, next attracted his attention, but he
only remained there for six months, and then re-
turned to Fremont, Nebraska. In 1883 he came to
Montana Territory, and was at Bozeman for six
months, and for the same length of time at Helena
and Miles City, and then he located permanently at
White Sulphur Springs, embarking in the harness
business, carrying it on until his retirement in 1917.
In politics he is a democrat, although not bound
down by party ties, as he prefers to choose his own
man.
On February 2, 1891, Mr. Wellman was married
to Nellie Weaver, born in Clay County, Missouri.
On September 17, 1892, Mrs. Wellman bought eighty
acres of land adjoining White Sulphur Springs, later
adding seventeen acres. This property the Wellmans
have divided into town lots, on which comfortable
residences are being built. Both Mr. and Mrs. Well-
man are excellent people and they deserve the high
esteem in which they are held.
Miss May Trumper. To her duties as state super-
intendent of public instruction Miss Trumper brings
an experience of twenty years as a Montana edu-
cator, and also a singular zeal and resolution and
a broad vision as to the objects and responsibilities
of the public school system and her own state office.
Miss Trumper was borji at Jeffersonville, Ohio,
a daughter of Samuel P. and Maria Louisa (Hidy)
Trumper. She acquired her early education in the
public schools of London, Ohio, and at intervals in
her teaching career has kept in touch with advanced
thought as expressed at some of the leading insti-
tutions of higher education in the country. She dfd
her early college work in Granville College in Ohio,
and has also attended the Harvard University Sum-
mer School, the University of California, and re-
ceived her degree Bachelor of Science from Co-
lumbia L'niversity in 1917.
Miss Trumper began teaching in rural schools in
Madison County and afterward at Granville, Ohio,
as an instructor in the high school, was principal of
the high school at Bryan, Ohio, and in 1899 came
to Montana and for several years was in the Flat-
head County High School at Kalispell. She was
elected and served eight years as county superin-
tendent of schools of Flathead County, filling that
ofiice from 1907 to 1915. She was elected four times
on the republican ticket. In 1916 she was elected
state superintendent of public instruction, her of-
ficial duties beginning in 1917 and her term closing
in 1921.
By virtue of this state office she is also a member
of the State Board of Education, the State Land
Board and the State Board of Educational Ex-
aminers. Her personal stafT at the capital includes a
deputy superintendent, two rural school supervisors,
one high school supervisor, and one director of
vocational education.
Since coming to Montana Miss Trumper has wit-
nessed wonderful strides in the evolution of a com-
plete educational program. While all of this is a
matter of proper pride to Montana people, much
yet remains to be done, not only in increasing the
efficiency of the many splendidly equipped schools
in the larger cities and more populous counties, but
particularly in extending the facilities of popular
education to remote districts. Miss Trumper since
entering office has given this problem a great deal
of thought and careful study, and has kept the im-
perative needs of rural districts before the educa-
tional authorities to the utmost extent of her influ-
ence. Miss Trumper attends the Episcopal Church.
Edmund Curtis Follensby. While his business
as proprietor of the Auto-Election Station at Helena
is a very particular service widely appreciated by
the owners of motor cars in the capital city, Mr.
Follensby has a much broader technical knowledge
HISTORY OF MONTANA
623
of mechanics than that involved in the motor car
industry. He has been a machinist since early man-
hood, and has been called upon for some of the
most exacting and difficult work of that profession.
Mr. Follensby was born at North Concord, Ver-
mont, June 10, 1882, and is of the old New England
ancestry. His grandfather was Frank Follensby,
who died at Southboro, Massachusetts, in 1894.
The father was Curtis C. Follensby, who was born
at Southboro in 1854, was educated in his native
town, and as a boy began earning his own living.
His early experiences were in the lumber woods of
New Hampshire and Vermont. He married at Sher-
brooke in the Province of Quebec, and after his
marriage lived at North Concord, Vermont, where he
owned two sawmills. Both these plants were de-
stroyed by fire, and in 1889 he bought a mill at St.
Johnsbury, Vermont, in partnership with W. L. Rus-
sell, who had married his sister, Lavina. Curtis C.
Follensby was a very successful business man at
St. Johnsbury, served as selectman of the town for
many years, and took a deep interest in doing what
good he could in a civic way to his community. He
was an active member of the Masonic fraternity
and a republican in politics. He died at St. Johns-
bury October 10, 1914. His brother, Lorenzo Fol-
lensby, served for twenty-four years as sheriff at
Whitefield, New Hampshire. C. C. Follensby mar-
ried Ellen Bailey, who was born at Sherbrooke,
Quebec, January 13, 1849, and is still living at St.
Johnsbury, Vermont. Edmund C. is the oldest of
her four children. Maude E. holds a secretarial
position in New York City. Bailey F. operates a
mill and the extensive lumber business left by his
father at St. Johnsbury. Isabelle F. is the wife of
Ellsbree D. Locke, a traveling salesman, their home
being at 1762 Beacon Street, Waban, Massachu-
setts.
Edmund Curtis Follensby was reared in a good
home and had every encouragement to make the
best of his talents and abilities. Hi's education was
completed when he was about sixteen years of age,
concluding with a course in the high school at St.
Johnsbury. For two and a half years he was an
apprentice machinist in the factory of the E, and T.
Fairbanks Scale Factory. Another six months were
spent with a shop at St. Johnsbury which made a
specialty of repairing all kinds of sawmill machinery.
His work as a machinist had an interesting variation
when he was employed for six months in the woods
of Vermont operating a portable sawmill for his
father's estate under the name of the Russell, Fol-
lensby & Peck Lumber Company. In order to master
motor mechanics he entered an automobile electric
station at Worcester, Massachusetts, remaining there
a year, and then for one vvinter resumed the opera-
tion of the portable sawmill plant in Vermont. When
the. mill ceased operation he spent three months
in the factory of the Stanley Motor Carriage Com-
pany of Newton, Massachusetts, and was then sent
on the road by the company as a service man. He
was in that work a year, and his duties brought him
to Montana June i, 1906. Resigning from the
Stanley Company, he went with the Morris Mining
Company at Pony for two years. During the win-
ter of 1908-9, with headquarters at Glendive, he
drove a Stanley steamer on the mail route for the
Yellowstone Stage Company. Late in 1909 he made
a business trip to Spokane, and the following winter
was spent at Radersburg, Montana, where he set up
a number of Fairbanks-Morse gas engines and In-
gersoll-Rand air compressors at the mines. From
the spring of 1910 until the mines shut down in the
fall Mr. Follensby operated a hoisting engine on the
hill at Butte for the W. A. Clark interests. The
Vol. 11—40
Ingersoll-Rand Company then employed him at Vir-
ginia City to set up an air compressing plant and
sawmill, and after putting both of these into opera-
tion he left in the spring of 191 1 and came tQ Helena,
soon afterward going to Radersburg, where he in-
stalled a hoisting plant operated by gasoline for the
Ohio Keating Gold Mining Company. During the
summer of 1911 he was again in Helena, and in the
early fall became an engineer for the Power Heat-
ing Plant of the State Capitol, and held that posi-
tion for seven years, until May i, 1919.
At that date Mr. Follensby opened his auto-electric
station, the plant and offices being in the Empson
Building. His thorough technical knowledge and
broad experience give him the highest qualifications
for the service which his station affords. It is not
proper to describe it as an ordinary automobile
repair shop. The work is rather that of a thorough
overhauling, with expert mechanics and facilities
for renewing and overhauling the batteries, all the
electric generating and starting ignition systems,
also the motor, transmission and rear axles, and the
plant has facilities for charging batteries on cars
without removing them. It is the only business of
its kind in Helena and the largest in Western Mon-
tana. A complete stock is kept of starting and gen-
erator brushes, ignition contact arms, coils and bat-
teries.
Mr. Follensby is a democrat in politics and his
home is in the Templeton Apartments on Main
Street.
Peter Schiekts had a great deal of business ex-
perience in his native state of Minnesota prior to
coming to Helena in 1911, though up to that time
experience was his chief capita! and his money
resources when he reached the capital city of Mon-
tana amounted to only $2.40. In nine years he has
made the best use of his opportunities and is now
sole proprietor of the leading business of its kind
in Lewis and Clark County.
Mr. Schierts was born in Wabasha County, Minne-
sota, November 28, 1878. His father, Joseph Schierts,
and his grandfather, Frank Schierts, were both na-
tives of Vienna, Austria, the former born in 1839
and the latter in 1810. Frank Schierts received his
early education and was married at Vienna, Austria,,
and came to the United States in 1854, settling on a
farm in Wisconsin. Later, in 1861, he homesteaded
in Wabasha County and lived on his homestead
until he retired. Joseph Schierts has been a resident
of Wabasha County, Minnesota, since 1856. He was
married there and worked as a day laborer to the
age of twent}',-one. He then homesteaded 160 acres,
bought other land and acquired a large farm of 680
acres. He sold that and retired into Wabasha in
1900, where he is still living. His father died at
Wabasha in 1892. Joseph Schierts is a Catholic and
a democrat in politics. His wife was Elizabeth Roller,
who was born in Germany in 1844. Their children
are: Frank, a farmer in Wright County, Minnesota;
Mary, who married Frank Graflf, a farmer, and both
died at Wabasha; Annie is the wife of Henry Tus-
haus, a cattleman and farmer in Wabasha County;
Kate is the wife of Theodore Peters, a retired
farmer and auctioneer at Kellogg, Minnesota; John
is a teamster at Wabasha; Joseph is operating a
lumber yard and furniture store at Kellogg, Minne-
sota; Peter is the seventh in the family; George,
the youngest, is an attorney at Anandale, Minne-
sota.
Peter Schierts acquired a rural school education
in Wabasha County, and lived on his father's farm
to the age of twenty-two. and for three years there-
after conducted the old homestead. He then bought
624
HISTORY OF MONTANA
a ranch in Stutsman County, North Dakota, but his
chief business was handling hardware and imple-
ments at Kellogg, Minnesota. He remained there
three years, and for two years more was in the real
estate anci insurance business at Kellogg. Return-
ing to Wabasha, he worked in a hardware and im-
plement house until igio, and for the following
year was connected with the hardware and imple-
ment firm of McPhail Company at Langdon, North
Dakota.
This is a brief outline of his business career up to
the time he arrived at Helena on March 13, 191 1.
Without capital, he turned his experience to good
account in the service of others, and for four years
was in the hay, grain and farm implement business
of C. H. Fortman. For another year he managed
that business, and when Mr. Fortman became post-
master the firm of Schierts & Ries bought the estab-
lishment and a year later Mr. Schierts bought out his
partner and has since been sole proprietor. He now
does both a wholesale and retail business in hay,
grain, coal and wood, and handles a number of na-
tionally known and advertised farm implements,
mcludmg the Heider tractors, cream separators,
poultry supplies. The office of the business is at
15-17 Placer Avenue, and he maintains a large
warehouse and yards on the Northern Pacific tracks.
This is easily the most extensive concern of its kind
in Helena and the surrounding county. Mr. Schierts
is also a stockholder in the Foidel Undertaking
Company at Helena.
Mr. Schierts is an independent voter, a member
of the Catholic Church, is a third degree Knight of
Columbus, affiliated with Helena Council No. 844,
and is a member of Helena Lodge of the Loyal
Order of Moose. He owns a modern home at 126
Chestnut Street.
In igoo, at Wabasha, Minnesota, he married Miss
Catherine Howe, daughter of Peter and Otilda
(Baker) Howe. Her parents reside at Kellogg,
Minnesota, her father being a retired farmer and is
now president of the Kellogg State Bank. The two
children born to Mr. and Mrs. Schierts are Viola
born July 14, 1901, now a junior in the Helena
High School, and LeRoy, born August 12, 1908.
. Philip Henry Huber, who is a senior member and
president of the corporation, Huber, Jasmin & Rouse
Company, at Helena, has been more or less corf-
tmuously identified with business at Helena for a
quarter of a century, and the experience of his ma-
ture years have brought him a close acquaintance
with many of the cities and towns of most of the
states in the so-called middle and far West.
Mr. Huber was born at Hamilton in Butler County
Ohio, September 26, 1868. His grandfather, Wil-
liam Huber. was born in Germany in 1795, and in
1847 brought his family to America and settled in
Butler County, Ohio. He was one of the early
farmers in that locality and lived there until his
death at Riley in 1875. George Huber, father of
the Helena business man, was born in Germany in
1844, and was a small child when brought to Amer-
ica. He was reared, educated and married in Butler
County and spent all his mature life there as a
blacksmith. He died at Hamilton in February, 1916.
He was a strong and ardent democrat in politics, a
very consistent Christian and active supporter pf
the Presbyterian Church. His wife was Mary Stabe
who was born in 1846 and died at Rilev. Ohio De-
cember 24, 1884. Philip Henry is the oldest of'their
children. William F.. the second in age, is a rail-
road man living in California. David G. lives at
Hamilton, Ohio. Sadie M. is unmarried and also
lives at Hamilton.
Philip Henry Huber acquired his early education
in the rural scliools of his native county. He prac-
tically grew up in his father's blacksmith shop,
served an apprenticeship there, and has made that
mechanical trade the basis of his very successful
business career. He left home at the age of twenty-
one, and his first sojourn was at Wellington, Kansas,
where he worked as a blacksmith from August,
1889, to June, 1890. Continuing westward, he was
in Denver a short time, reached Salt Lake City July
I, 1890. remained there as a horseshoer for the firm
of Pembleton Brothers, a few months, and arrived
at Portland, Oregon, in November, 1S90. January
I. 1891, he spent at Seattle, Washington, and in
December of the same year returned to Portland,
and in January, 1892. went on to San Francisco, was
at Los Angeles in the latter part of February, and
then, after several years of traveling that had taken
him pretty well over the middle and far West, he
returned to Riley, Ohio, and resumed employment
with his father for eighteen months. But the lure
of the far West was strong upon him, and in 1895
he was back in Los Angeles. In February, 1896,
he started north with team and wagon, following the
coast route through San Francisco and up to Red
Blufif, traveling the same trail that the old forty-
niners had useS. He worked as an itinerant black-
smith, stopping for a few days or weeks in various
towns along the road, and in this way reached Cald-
well, Idaho, from there Went on to Shoshone, Idaho,
where he sold his team, and thence by way of Poca-
tello arrived at Butte June I, 1896. On the 4th of
June he reached Helena, and, v^'ith the exception of a
year or so has beer^ identified with this city ever
since. For eight months he worked as a blacksmith
for W. C. Lewis at the corner of Ninth Avenue and
Davis Street, and then bought a shop of his own
on Main Street. In 1898, selling out, he spent part
of the following year working at his trade for the
firm of Huntley & Child, proprietors of the Yellow-
stone Park Transportation Company. Returning to
Helena in the fall of 1899, Mr. Huber again fol-
lowed his trade, and with a partner, Mr. Fowler,
owned a shop on State Street until he sold his in-
terest in 1904. In 1905 he bought another shop on
Main Street and continued his work there until
kicked by a horse in 1909. Receiving severe injuries,
both legs being broken, he spent some time recuper-
ating, and then, still unable to take up the regular
work of his trade, he went on the road for the Cape-
well Horse Nail Company in March, 1910, covering
the State of Montana and a part of South Dakota.
He left the road in January, 1911, and returned to
Helena and bought the establishment of S. T.
Strange at 426 Fuller Avenue. That was his place
of business until October, 1917, at which date he
formed the corporation of Huber, Jasmin, Ott Com-
pany. Mr. Ott subsequently sold his interest to S.
W. Rouse and the corporation is now Huber, Jas-
min & Rouse Company, with headquarters at 418
Fuller Avenue. Mr. Huber is president of the com-
pany, P. T. Jasmin is vice president and S. W. Rouse
is secretary and treasurer. This company does a
general blacksmithing and horseshoeing business,
also manufactures commercial automobile bodies,
automobile accessories, does automobile repairing and
handles the largest supply of Temme guaranteed
auto springs in the State of Montana. Another line
carried is the Presto tanks. This is the second larg-
est business corporation of its kind in Montana.
Mr. Huber was for ten years state organizer for
the Master Horseshoers' National Protective Asso-
ciation. In behalf of other business interests he has
covered practically every state in the West, includ-
ing besides those mentioned Arizona. Mr. Huber
MATllIS aioh:
HISTORY OF MONTANA
625
is a democrat, a member of the Presbyterian Church,
and is very active in fraternal affairs, especially as
a Mason and Odd Fellow. In Masonry his affilia-
tions are with Morning Star Lodge No. 5, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons; Helena Chapter No. 2,
Royal Arch Masons ; Helena Council No. I, Royal
and Select Masters ; Helena Commandery No. 2,
Knights Templar; Helena Consistory No. 3, having
taken fourteen degrees of Scottish Rite Masonry,
and has long been a Mystic Shriner. He is a mem-
ber of the Patrol of Algeria Temple. In Odd Fel-
lowship he is a past grand of Montana Lodge No.
I, is past chief patriarch of Rocky Mountain En-
campment No. I, is past captain of Schuyler Colfax
Canton No. 2. Mr. Huber also belongs to Garnet
Camp No. 105, Woodmen of the World, and to the
Independent Order of Foresters, the Royal High-
landers and Orde/ of Eagles.
His home is a modern residence at 512 South
Park Avenue. Mr. Huber married at Hamilton,
Ohio, in 1900, Miss Mary Elizabeth Ziliox, a native
of Millville, Ohio. They have two children. Alma
Louise, born March 17, 1902, now a member of the
junior class of the Helena High School, and George
William, born November 22, igo6.
Mathis Mohn is a rancher and stockman in the
Flathead country, his home being on rural roiite
No. 2 out of Kalispell.
Born in Norway, a son of Mathis and Rachel
Mohn, at the age of twenty he determined to realize
the opportunities of the new world, and sailing
from Norway landed at Boston and from there went
on to Fergus Falls, Minnesota, and farmed in North
Dakota until 1893, when he came to the Flathead
country and bought 200 acres northwest of Kalis-
pell. Here he has since profitably engaged in
farming and stock raising, handling Hereford cat-
tle, Chester White hogs and Percheron horses.
He is a member of the Norwegian Lutheran
Church. For many years he has made a home for
his mother and sister, until the; death of his beloved
mother in 1918. She was a good woman, a kind
neighbor and loved by a large circle of friends, and
had done her best to rear and train her chidlren to
good citizenship.
Mr. Mohn has found all the opportunities he
craved in the Flathead country, and has done much
to advance its interests and advantages for others.
He has served as trustee and clerk of the local school
board and believes in securing the best teachers.
He has a fine home located on high ground over-
looking much of the surrounding district. He is
secretary of his church. He has witnessed the sur-
rounding community grow up from a wilderness.
In earlier days he shot many bear and deer. A new
irrigation district has recently been organized known
as the Tarry Lake Irrigating District, with Mr. Mohn
as president of its board of commissioners. He is
also a director in the Farmers Mutual Insurance
Company and in the Equity Supply Company at
Kalispell. These are organizations directly benefit-
ing all the farmers of his section. Mr. Mohn is a
stanch republican, and has served as a member of
the Republican Central Committee.
James Sherwell Scott first came to Mc
few days after the territory was admitted to the
Union as a state, and for a number of years was
operator with the Western Union Telegraph Com-
pany. Mr. Scott is now head of J. S. Scott & Com-
pany, stock brokers, and has been in the stock
brokerage business at Helena for a number of years.
He was born at Detroit, Michigan, April 3, 1871.
His ancestors for several generations lived at Kelso,
Scotland. His grandfather, James Scott, spent his
life there as a farmer, born in 1809 and died in
1881. Robert Riddell Scott, his son, was born in
Kelso in 1848, and about 1864 came to America and
settled at Chatham, Ontario, Canada. He was a
carriage builder by trade and followed that trade
all his life. He was married at Chatham, worked
at his trade in Detroit from about 1869 until 1873,
then returned to Chatham, and in 1890 moved to
Minneapolis, Minnesota. When he retired from
business in 1898 he came to Helena and in 1905
went to Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, where he died
in 1907. He was a very consistent member of the
Presbyterian Church. Robert R. Scott married
Margaret Wilson Edwards, who was born at
Chatham, Ontario, in 1850, and is now living at Ed-
monton. James S. is the oldest of her children.
Robert is one of the owners of the Northern Hard-
ware Company of Edmonton. Madge Thompson
lives at Edmonton. George H. is associated with
his brother, Robert, in the Northern Hardware
Company, a wholesale and retail business, operating
several stores in other towns besides Edmonton.
James S. Scott acquired his education in the
public schools of Chatham. He was in high school
through his freshman year and then on account of
ill health left school in 1885 and for a time was
employed as messenger with the Great Northwestern
Telegraph Company at Chatham. After two years
he was qualified for the position of telegraph
operator, and a few months later was put on the
regular force at Hamilton, Ontario. He remained
there two years, in March, 1889, went to Spokane as
an operator with the Western Union Telegraph
Company, and was transferred to Montana in No-
vember, 1889. He continued with the Western
Union Telegraph Company until 1893, and was then
sent to Chicago, where he was with the same com-
pany until 1895. Returning to Helena in the winter
of 1895, Mr. Scott was soon afterward made assistant
day chief operator and in 1898 promoted to night
chief operator.
Since 1903 Mr. Scott has been in the brokerage
business. In 1907 he removed to Butte as man-
ager of Mayo Sachs & Company, stock brokers, but
in the spring of 1908 returned to Helena as manager
of W. M. Biggs & Company. In the fall of 1910
he went East, making his headquarters at Chicago,
and sold Montana lands and later handled Northern
Michigan lands for a year or so. He was back in
Montana at the close of 1912, and on January i, 1913,
bought the brokerage business of W. M. Biggs &
Company, with Claude E. Wilson as his partner.
Since July i, 1918, he has been sole owner of the
business. His offices are at 42 West Sixth Avenue,
and he handles a large volume of business. The
success of his firm is the more noteworthy, since
Helena is the smallest city in the United States
where a private wire service is maintained by
brokers.
Mr. Scott is also vice president of the Cruse
Consolidated Mining Company, is a director of the
Amalgamated Silver Mining Company, and owns
considerable real estate at Kalispell. His home is
at 562 Fifth Avenue in Helena. He is an inde-
pendent voter, is a member of Morning Star Lodge
No. 5, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Helena
Consistory No. 3 of the Scottish Rite; Algeria
Temple of the Mystic Shrine, and is a member of
the Rotary Club, Montana Club, Country Club and
the Helena Commercial Club.
In 1901, at Helena, he married Miss Eva Josephine
Breidenthal, daughter of H. and Elizabeth (Hall)
Breidenthal, both now deceased. Her father was a
flour miller, following that business in Indiana and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
later in Montana. Mrs. Scott was educated in the
Helena High School and Vincennes University at
Vincennes, Indiana. Mr. and Mrs. Scott have three
children : Sherwell, born March 26. 1904, is a fresh-
man in the Helena, High School and takes a promi-
nent part in athletics, being a member of the bas-
ketball team; Elizabeth, born July 26, IQ06, and
Lyman, born May 3, 1912, are both in tlie grammar
grades of the public schools.
Francis G. Johnson. The arrival of Francis G.
Johnson at Scobey antedated the coming of the
first railroad town. He was one of the pioneers in
commercial affairs, and for eight years has handled
a busy trade as a hardware merchant and has seen
his efforts grow and prosper in every direction.
Mr. Johnson was born June 22, 1877, at the old
town of Quincy in Trail County, North Dakota.
That old town at one time was an important point
on the Red River of the North, but the town dis-
appeared when the river traffic ceased and another
town sprang up on the railroad nearby.
Mr. Johnson is of English ancestry. His grand-
father, John Johnson, came to Canada from Eng-
land, and spent the rest of his life as a farmer near
Bayfield, Ontario. He married Miss Ford. The
youngest of their children was George H. Johnson,
father of the Scobey merchant. George H. John-
son was born in Bayfield, Ontario, grew up and mar-
ried there, and had practically no formal education.
However, he had a keen intelligence, and by his own
efforts gained enough knowledge to enable him to
conduct his business successfully. Coming to the
United States in 1872 he settled' on the Red River,
and though he had a very small capital, he took up
a homestead and as a farmer delved into the inex-
haustible riches of the Red River Valley with con-
siderable success. His location at Quincy, the old
Hudson Bay post, gave him other opportunities for
business. He kept the post, fed the travelers, and
gradi»lly engaged in the mercantile business. An-
other important source of revenue was shipping
horses from Ontario and selling them to the farmers
of the Red River country. In course of time he had
accumulated about 1,600 acres of the rich soil of the
Red River country. However, he had suffered an ac-
cidental injury, and saw medical service far and near
and dissipated a large part of his fortune in these
efforts to restore his health. Nevertheless, he lived
to the age of seventy, passing away in 1910. On
coming to the United States he became an American
citizen and was identified with the democratic party.
He held several local offices, but feeling his dis-
qualification on account of limited education declined
an offer to become a candidate for both branches of
the Dakota Legislature. He was deeply interested
in political campaigns, served as a delegate to sev-
eral state conventions, and once was sent to Wash-
ington to bring the attention of the postoffice de-
partment to his section of Dakota. He was a mem-
ber of the Presbyterian Church and for more than
fifty years was affiliated with the Masonic fraternity.
Another part of his record that deserves attention
was his work to secure the establishment of schools
in the early days of North Dakota. After canvass-
ing the situation with his neighbors and being un-
able to arouse them, he took the matter in his own
hands, built a schoolhouse, hired a teacher, and thus
gave the first practical impetus to public education
in his region.
George H. Johnson married Margaret Sparling.
She was born and reared at Clinton, Ontario. Her
mother's maiden name was Margaret Elliott. The
children of George H. Johnson and wife were:
Marv, wife of Seth Carkin of Fargo, North Da-
kota; Elizabeth, wife of F. C. Harrington of the
old Quincy locality in North Dakota ; Joe E., of
Opheim, Montana ; John \V., of Great Falls, Mon-
tana ; Francis George, of Scobey, Montana ; Clara,
Mrs. R. B. Cox, of Neihart, Montana, and Florence,
who died at the age of sixteen.
Francis George Johnson grew up under varied
influences, his father being a farmer, merchant
and hotel man. He attended public schools, but was
not regularly enrolled after his tenth year. Most
of his work was done on his father's farm to the
age of sixteen. He then became a farmer on his
own account, buying land near home, and remained
there until igii. He started without capital, the
original machinery and stock being a present from
his father, and with that start he handled his affairs
so successfully that he paid for 380 acres of land
and the equipment necessary to operate it.
On selling his farm and stock Mr. Johnson bought
a half interest in a hardware business at Hendrum,
Minnesota. The firm of Larsen & Johnson was in
business there for several years. After tne first
year Mr. Johnson left the active management to
his partner and came to Montana, establishing him-
self as a hardware merchant at Antelope. He was
in that locality two years, beginning in 1912, and
then removed to Scobey. Here his was one of the
first three or four business houses on the town sit?.
His building was 24 by 40 feet, and it housed a stock
of shelf-hardware. Later he added harness, and has
built up a large retail trade over the surrounding
district. Since then he has established branch stores
at Westfork and Avondale. At Scobey he is also
interested in the Farmers' Oil Company.
Mr. Johnson, like his father, has felt a deep and
sincere interest in public education. For the past
two years he has served. as a member of the Scobey
School Board, his associates being H. W. Olson.
Paul Crum, George Cudhie and Mr. Lund. During
his term on the board the school building has been
equipped with a steam heating plant and preparations
made for the erection of a new high school build-
ing, which will cost $70,000.
Mr. Johnson since attaining suffrage has voted as
a republican, his first ballot going to Major McKin-
ley. He took his first degrees in Masonry at Scobey
and is affiliated with the Chapter, Commandery and
Consistory bodies of Helena.
In Norman County, Minnesota, December 28, 1904.
Mr. Johnson married Miss Julia Nelson, a native of
Minnesota. Her parents, Sivert Nelson and wife,
were born in Norway. Mrs. Johnson is a sister of
Cornelius S. Nelson, of Plentywood, Montana, re-
ferred to elsewhere. Mr. and Mrs. Johnson have
four children named Adalaide, Norman, Estella'and
Phyllis.
Sidney Bennett. All of those who identified
themselves with Northeastern Montana before the
close of the nineteenth century were pioneers.
These pioneers almost without exception were in
some way identified with the livestock industry, since
farming and ordinary commerce offered no attrac-
tions until the last ten or twenty years. The firm
of Bennett Brothers was prominent among the range
stock men and shippers out of tliis region for sev-
eral years. One of them is Sidney Bennett, now a
resident of Scobey, where he subsequently became
interested in merchandising, but is now giving most
of his time to rural development work.
Mr. Bennett was born in England November 30.
1878, one of the four sons and tliree daughters of
William and Kezia (Nichols") Bennett. The year
after his birth the family came to Ontario, Canada,
and when Sidney was eleven years of age they
HISTORY OF MONTANA
627
moved to the United States. Sidney Bennett ac-
quired his final schooling in the St. Paul High
School, and left school at the age of seventeen and
came to Montana joining his brothers in the live-
stock shipments which they carried on for a num-
ber of years.
When the Spanish-American war came on in
1898 Sidney Bennett enlisted at Duluth in Company
C of the Fourteenth Minnesota Infantry under
Captain Resche and Colonel Van Duze. The regi-
ment was sworn into the Federal service at St.
Paul, went for training to Chickamauga Park and
later to Knoxville, Tennessee, where it was in camp
when the war ended. The regiment returned to St.
Paul and was given a thirty-day furlough, and
before that expired Chief Bugapagoosick of one of
the Minnesota Indian reservations went on the war
path with his followers and some of the volunteers,
including Sidney Bennett, vt-ere called out to the
seat of hostilities. They did guard duty to pacify
the settlers, while the Indians all fled across the
line into Canada, .\bout ten days of guard duty was
all that was required of the boys and they were then
ordered to St. Paul for muster out. Mr. Bennett
was discharged in 1899 and at once returned to Mon-
tana and since that year has been identified with
Sheridan County.
He was associated in the ranch enterprises with his
brother Jack Bennett, their headquarters being at
Redstone on tlie Big Muddy. Some of the interest-
ing facts regarding the Bennett Brothers business
as cattlemen are told in the story of Jack Bennett.
Sidney Bennett continued rancliing until 1907, when
he was appointed deputy sheriff of Valley County,
then embracing all the region of Sheridan County.
That was a time when much stock "rustling" was
going on. and Mr. Bennett and other officers in the
course of duty came into frequent contact with the
cattle outlaws. He helped maintain the law and
dignity of the state, the sheriff at that time being
S. C. Small.
On leaving his official post Mr. Bennett came to
old Scobey and organized the Cusker Lumber Com-
pany. He established his lumber yard and stocked
it by hauling his supplies sixty miles from Poplar
With the construction of the railroad and the open-
ing of the new townsite of Scobey the yard was
moved to that point and Mr. Bennett continued active
in the management until 1916 when he sold out to
the McCurdy Lumber Company. Since then his
chief business has been investing in lands, handling
farming and grain growing propositions, and in per-
forming a number of services directly instrumental
in the upbuilding of his community.
He was one of the chief movers toward the build-
ing of an electric light plant for Scobey, taking
stock in order that the enterprise might get under
way. He was appointed mayor of Scobey in 1917
as successor of Ole Helland and was elected to
that office in 1918 for a term of two years. The
chief features of his administration were the installa-
tion of a water plant and the construction of a
sewer system. During the World war he was a
member of the County Council of Defense, a mem-
ber of the Fuel Administration, chairman of the
local Red Cross and the Young Men's Christian
Association, also chairman of one of the Liberty
Loan drives, and of the "Seven in One" drive.
Some of his most important work in promoting
patriotism was as chief of the American Protective
League, and for eighteen months he directed the
work of that voluntary organization in and around
Scobey.
Mr. Bennett cast his first presidential vote for
Major McKinley, having been brought up as a re-
publican. He served as chairman of the republican
county central committee of Sheridan County four
years. He took his first work in Masonry at Glasgow,
including the chapter degrees, and the Consistory
and Shriner degrees were conferred upon him at
Helena, where he still holds his membership. The
Bennett family enjoys the comforts of a modern
home, with an independent water system at Scobey.
At Poplar, Montana, in May, 1912, Mr. Bennett
married Miss Estelle Johnston. She was born at
Lowell, Massachusetts, and the Johnston family was
identified with the early period of colonization in
New England, and in one of the early generations
some blood of New England Indians was mixed with
the stock. Her father Walter Johnston was also
a native of Massachusetts, and was a Union soldier
with a Massachusetts regiment. One of his brothers
was lost in a battle of that war. Walter Johnston
was a professional baseball player during early life,
and while the Civil war was still in progress he went
to Minnesota, entered a homestead, and later be-
came a locomotive engineer on the St. Paul and
Duluth Railway and did his last railroad service
with the Santa Fe Company as a master mechanic.
The Johnston home is now in Los Angeles. Mrs.
Bennett is a daughter of Walter and Joquette (Spen-
cer) Johnston, her mother being a daughter of Judge
Spencer. Walter Johnston married a second time.
Mrs. Bennett spent most of her early life at St.
Paul, Minnesota, where she finished her education
in high school.
Arthur Stone Needles, M. D. The oldest phy-
sician in point of continuous service in the Scobey
community is Dr. Arthur Stone Needles, who iden-
tified himself with that locality in 1914. Doctor
Scobey is a very capable man in his profession,
has both the natural talents and the thorough train-
ing for successful work as a physician and surgeon,
and was also one of the representatives of the
medical profession in Montana who volunteered their
services to the Government at the time of the World
war.
Doctor Needles was born at Pueblo, Colorado,
September 12, 1885. His father John T. Needles,
who went to Colorado about 1880, was born in the
vicinity of Joplin, Missouri, one of the older sons
in a large family of children. The grandfather was
a Missouri farmer and spent his last years in Mis-
souri. John T. Needles became a professional
photographer and was in that business at Leadville,
Colorado, and elsewhere, and in 1884 established
his home in Iron City at Pueblo where he lived
until his death in 1890 at the age of sixty. At
Kansas City, Missouri, he married Miss Sylvia
Stone, whose people were Kentuckians and early
settlers around Booneville, Missouri, where Sylvia
Stone was born. Her father was a physician. She
is still living at Pueblo. There were three sons :
John Walter, a dental surgeon at Pueblo ; Frank ;
and Dr. Arthur S. of Scobey.
Doctor Needles grew up at Pueblo, attended the
grammar and high schools of that city, and was
classically educated in the University of Colorado
at Boulder, graduating in 1908 with the A. B. degree.
He took his medical course in the Medical School
of the University of Michigan, graduating in 191 1,
and almost immediately came to Montana. At Mis-
soula he was an interne in the Northern Pacific
Hospital for a year, for another year was house
physician at Hunters Hot Springs, and for a few
months engaged in practice at Glasgow. From
there he removed to Scobey in 1914, where from the
beginning he found a welcome proportionate to his
technical abilities and his popularity as a citizen.
628
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In addition to his private practice he has served
as local surgeon for the Great Northern Railway.
Doctor Needles was on duty almost constantly for
the benefit of his practice at Scobey except for the
period of the World war, when he left his practice,
was given intensive training for the service of the
Medical Corps at Fort Riley, Kansas, and was as-
signed to active duty at Camp Lewis, Washington,
with the rank of first lieutenant. He was with the
Thirteenth Division in the Seventy-fifth Infantry,
and completed his service in that camp. He received
his honorable discharge February 20, 1919, and then
resumed his work at Scobey. He is a member of
the Scobey Post of the American Legion. Doctor
Needles is a republican, having voted for Mr. Taft
in 1908 and Mr. Hughes in 1916. He was the first
member initiated into the Masonic lodge at Scobey
after it was chartered. He also holds membership
in the lodge of Odd Fellows at Scobey and in the
Williston Lodge of Elks.
At Billings, Montana, Doctor Needles married
Miss Emily Carter, who died at Scobey in 1915.
July 29, 1918, at Scobey he married Miss Ingrid
Jesten, daughter of Andrew Jesten and a sister
of Mrs. Christian T. Swenson of Scobey. Doctor
Needles has no children.
Christ Prestbye. All of the old timers in the
Flathead country know and esteem the Prestbye
family, people of splendid worth, early settlers in
this section of Montana, hard workers and hospi-
table and generous friends.
Christ Prestbye, who now resides six miles north-
west of Kalispell, was born in Norway, a son of
Abraham and Edel Prestbye. There were three sons
and two daughters in the family. The daughters
were Hilga, now Mrs. Christensen, and Hannah.
The sons were Antone, Christ and Martin. Christ
spent his early life as a sailor on the high sea's.
More than thirty years ago he came to Montana,
and was followed by his brother Martin. From
Butte they came up into the Flathead country, filing
on a pre-emption and engaging in farming and stock
raising. They developed their homes by the plant-
ing of shade and fruit trees, and these farms still
stand as a monument to their endeavors and
sacrifices.
Christ Prestbye married Matilda Christensen, a
native of Norway and a daughter of Christen and
Marie Helgerude. They have three children, Abra-
ham, Emin and Grant. The boys were well educated
in the public schools of Kalispell, while Abraham
and Grant finished their education in Spokane Col-
lege and Emin the law department of the University
of Montana. He is now a successful attorney and
city attorney of White Fish. The son Abraham mar-
ried Clara Gilbertson, and he lives on his father's
farm. They have one child, Norman. The Prestbye
family are members of the Lutheran Church and
socially they belong to the Sons of Norway. Politi-
cally Mr. Prestbye gives his support to the principles
of the democratic partv.
The Prestbyes have been distinguished by patri-
otic records. The son. Grant, was a soldier in the
World war, being in an ofiicers' training camp in
Georgia and was commissioned a second lieutenant.
He was preparing to sail overseas when the armis-
tice was signed.
In 1917 Martin Prestbye relieved himself of the
responsibilities of his farm and sold it, since mak-
ing his home in Kalispell. The Prestbyes have
never had reason to be dissatisfied with their choice
of Montana as a home. In his early life Martin
Prestbye saw many of the arduous experiences of a
seafarer's life. He was engaged in the seal fisheries,
sailing in the dangerous waters around the North
Pole, going into the fishing fields early in the spring
and returning in the fall.
When Mrs. Christ Prestbye was a young woman
in Norway she was employed in a newspaper office.
The Indians were still plentiful when the Prestbyes
settled in Montana. Mrs. Prestbye thought it best
to treat these aborigines with kindness. The Indians
knew they could always be warmed and have some-
thing to eat in the Prestbye home, and they never
threatened the Prestbyes with trouble. A squaw
once came to the Prestbye home. Mrs. Prestbye
asked the baby's age. The squaw leaned her head
on her hands, closing her eyes, and then held up the
fingers of both hands, indicating thereby that the
baby was ten days old.
Christ Prestbye as a sailor crossed the Atlantic
Ocean forty-three times. After coming to the Flat-
head district he became a navigator on Flathead
Lake. He was pilot of the Crescent and captain of
a sailing vessel for five years. Every season for
three years from 1893 to 1896 he had the distinction
of opening up navigation on the Kootenai River
from Jennings to Fort Steele, British Columbia.
Christ Prestbye at one time was the nominee of the
democratic party for county treasurer. During the
World war he took a leading part in his community
in selling Liberty Bonds, and hid a place on the
honor roll for his efficient help in that direction.
During the last Indian scare in this section of Mon-
tana Mr. Prestbye was detailed as a guard for the
women and children, who took refuge in the school-
house at Ashley.
Joseph Benjamin Fleming was one of the early
merchants both at old and new Scobey and while
he has seen his business affairs prospered he has
not neglected the welfare of the community and
has given his aid not only in public office but with
effective groups of citizens working for the com-
mon welfare.
Mr. Fleming has had a widely varied and inter-
esting experience since coming to Montana and
elsewhere. He was born at Carondelette in the City
of St. Louis, Missouri, October 28, 1873. His par-
ents were both natives of Ireland. Thomas Fleming,
his father, came to the United States when young
and married at New Orleans Miss Elizabeth McCaf-
fery. Thomas Fleming located at St. Louis during
the Civil war, was a steamboat man on the Missis-
sippi River, and in 1877 moved out to Colorado,
locating at Denver where he died soon afterwards.
His wife also died at Denver, and of their children
Joseph B. was the only one to grow up.
Mr. Fleming was about eight years of age when
his mother died and after that he lived in the home
of his uncle Bennett Fleming. He attended the
parochial and public schools of Denver to the eighth
grade and between the age of fifteen and sixteen
began making his own living. His early apprentice-
ship and trade was as printer. He acquired a thor-
ough knowledge of the art at Denver, where he was
employed on the Rocky Mountain News, did work
in a job office at Pueblo, was in the composing
rooms of the Kansas City Star, on the Courier-
News at Savannah, Georgia, and worked at various
other points in the South as a journeyman doing
his final work as a printer on papers and in job
offices at Memphis.
On coming North Mr. Fleming located in North
Dakota and for seven years was proprietor of the
Merchants Hotel at Washburn. The following
year he continued in the hotel business at Max,
North Dakota, and on leaving North Dakota came to
old Scobey on April 19, 1913. His business in Mon-
^-^^^^CLyiyiiJL C^^^^-U^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
tana has been continuously in the bakery and con-
fectionery trade. At old Scobey he erected a shop
and business house, which he moved to the new
town on October 17, 1913, and he still occupies his
old stand.
His interests have always extended beyond his per-
sonal affairs. For two years he was a member of the
Scobey Council, being on the first aldermanic board.
On account of obsence of funds in the treasury that
board had to content itself largely with marking
time. For eighteen months he was a member of the
school board until he resigned on account of ill-
ness. In politics he has acknowledged no party
ties, acting independently in matters of votes and in
support of candidates. He is a Master Mason and
Odd Fellow.
At Harvey, North Dakota, June 14, 1904, Mr.
Fleming married Miss Josephine Peterson, who was
born in North Dakota, second of the eight children
of Peter and Julia (Swan) Peterson. Her father
was a Danish Norwegian, and her mother a native
of Norway. Peter Peterson for many years was
engaged in the hotel business and was also a farmer.
Mr. and Mrs. Fleming have two daughters, Grace,
born in 1907, and May, born in 1909.
Henry Gray. A resident of Northeastern Mon-
tana for twenty years, Henry Gray, who began his
life as a homesteader has achieved prominence and
great influence in the business affairs of Sheridan
County and has been directly interested in much
of the growth and prosperity of Redstone.
Mr. Gray was born in Grant County, Wisconsin,
June 6, 1870. His father Joseph Gray was a native
of New York State and one of several children.
One of his brothers reared a family in Vernon
County, Wisconsin, and his only sister seems to
have remained in New York State. Joseph Gray
after his marriage went West and settled in Grant
County, Wisconsin, and later homesteaded in North
Dakota, where he finished his career as a farmer.
He lived to the remarkable age of ninety-eight
years twenty-seven days, his death occurring Decem-
ber 28, 1917. He was a strong republican in poli-
tics, and a member of the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows. He married Caroline Stone, whose
people were also New Yorkers. She died near
Hope, North Dakota, in 189s. Their children were:
W. C. of Tower City, North Dakota; George who
has been a wanderer and was last heard from Texas ;
Willis and Randall, farmers at Page City, North
Dakota; Omer, a business man of Page City; Frank
of Oswego, Montana; and Henry who is the youngest
of the family.
Henry Gray lived in Grant County, Wisconsin,
until 1883 when his parents moved to North Dakota,
and he grew to manhood in Steele County, that state.
He had a public school education, and before he
left home at the age of eighteen had acquired some
knowledge of the butcher's trade. He began his
career as a wage earner cutting meat on the block
at Fargo, at Superior, Wisconsin, and then estab-
lished a business of his own at Hunter, North
Dakota.
From Hunter, North Dakota, Mr. Gray came to
Montana in May, 1900, and established himself on
the Big Muddy in the Redstone community. None
of the lands in that region were then open for
settlement, and where one stopped and sat down
had a right to stay and use the surrounding ter-
ritory so far as he did not trespass upon the similar
rights of other squatters. The nearest trading and
postofiice point was Culbertson. Mr. Gray came here
for the purpose of ranching, bringing with him as
a nucleus of his business sixty-five head of yearling
heifers. As his home he built a one-room lumber
shack, and the following year brought out his family,
and with his cattle started earnestly to achieve suc-
cess by grazing his stock on the public domain. As
soon as the lands were open for settlement he filed
on and proved up a homestead, and still owns it as
part of his rather extensive ranch holdings. Mr.
Gray continued actively as a rancher for about seven-
teen years, and while his personal interests have
since been diverted elsewhere he still owns his ranch
property and its stock. His cattle brand was VX
on the right rib, while his horse brand is "lazy
JM" on the left side. His first shipments of stock
were made through Culbertson, and later when Red-
stone became a station on the Great Northern he
shipped from that point. The Gray Ranch inter-
ests total 2100 acres. In recent years grain growing
has become a feature of the ranch management, and
about 840 acres are now under cultivation. Much of
this is seeded to bromas grass and western rye
grass, especially adapted to hay and grazing, and
these grasses in the opinion of Mr. Gray do better
and give more satisfactory results than alfalfa.
While still engaged in ranching Mr. Gray took
stock in the State Bank of Redstone when it was
organized, and was elected by the directors vice
president. He remained one of the board until
1919, when he sold his stock. While connected
with the bank he saw the need of an oil station at
Redstone. Not being able to interest either the
Standard Oil Company or an independent company,
he decided to make it a matter of his individual
enterprise and opened what is now the Westland
Oil Station at Redstone in April, 1913. The busi-
ness encouraged him and he gradually expanded by
taking in other capital and assistants, establishing
a number of branch stations. The Redstone Oil
Company was merged with the Scobey Oil Company,
resulting in the Westland Oil Company, whose head-
quarters are at Scobey, with about seventeen
branches in other towns around. Mr. Gray has been
president of the Westland Oil Company since it was
organized December 29, 1919.
Mr. Gray has used his private business enterprise
in a way to bring about community benefit, and
has never contented himself with office holding.
He is a republican, having cast his first ballot for
Benjamin Harrison in 1892. He is a Past Noble
Grand of Hunter Lodge of the Independent Order
of Odd Fellows in North Dakota.
At Perham, Minnesota, January 14, 1892, Mr.
Gray married Miss Carrie Hutchinson. She was
born in County Armagh, Ireland, September 25,
1868, eighth in a family of ten children born to
John and Anna (McCann) Hutchinson. Mrs. Gray
was sixteen years of age when she came to the
United States with her brother, sailing from Lon-
donderry, Ireland, aboard the Polynesia and landing
at Toronto, Canada. Her destination was Fargo,
North Dakota. Mrs. Gray had only a sixth grade
education, and was a working girl at Fargo when
she met Mr. Gray. Mr. and Mrs. Gray have four
children : Emma, Harry, Ruth and Lulu. Harry is
a factor on the Gray Ranch and married Pearl
Guerin. Emma is the wife of Philio P. Schneider
and Lulu is Mrs. Noel K. Dickson. Mrs. Henry
Gray passed away April 26, 1920.
Oscar R. Aslakson is manager and a partner in
the Flaxville Mercantile Company at Flaxville and
has had a busy and interesting career as a home-
steader and merchant in Northeastern Montana since
1907. His early training was in commercial lines,
HISTORY OF MONTANA
and lie has proved one of the valuable factors in
an organization that novif operates three stores in
Northeastern Montana.
Mr. Aslakson was born in Yellow Medicine
County, Minnesota, April 21, 1880, a son of Nor-
wegian parents. He lived on a farm to the age of
fourteen, attended school at Canby, Minnesota, to
the age of fourteen, and then accompanied the
family on their removal to Chicago. In that city he
attended the grammar and high schools for a year,
took a commercial course at the Athena:um, and on
leaving school went to work in the office of Swift
& Company for six months and for a time was
also in the correspondence department of Montgom-
ery Ward & Company. By that time he had a hos-
pital experience and for several months did nothing
but recuperate. Leaving Chicago Mr. Aslakson pros-
pected for opportunities for about two years in
South Dakota and Minnesota, being employed by
several wholesale houses. At Minneapolis he gained
further experience as clerk with several firms for
about two years.
With this varied knowledge of business affairs
Mr. Aslakson came to Montana in July, 1907. His
first location was at Culbertson, where he became
connected with the Whittmeier & Brooks Company.
He was one of the dependable workers of that or-
ganization for almost eight years. Three months
before his eighth year term expired he came into
Sheridan County and entered a homestead near Red-
stone. His neighbor just across the road was his
brother Thomas. Mr. Aslakson began his improve-
ments with a one-room frame house 14 by 20 feet,
subsequently remodeled into three rooms, and dur-
ing the period of proving up he did his duty on the
land by attempting to raise grain and livestock. Like
most of the homesteaders of that time^ he was
unable to make the claims provide for his family
and he earned additional funds by occasionally clerk-
ing for the Redstone Mercantile Company, working
as a harvest hand and behind threshing machines.
On leaving his claim M-r. Aslakson came to Flaxville,
and in March, 1916, took the management of the
Flaxville Mercantile Company, at the same time ac-
quiring a partnership in the business. His person-
ality has been the chief factor in the success of that
firm.
For some years Mr. Aslakson has been associated
with A. Ingwalson & Company, formerly a part-
nership, but changed to a stock company and incor-
porated in 1920. This corporation now conducts
general merchandise stores at Plentywood, Flaxville
and Redstone, Montana, Crosby and Wildrose, North
Dakota.
Mr. Aslakson was reared in a republican home,
and cast his first presidential vote for Colonel Roose-
velt in 1904. also for Taft in 1908, but in 1912 and
1916 gave his ballot to Mr. Wilson. He was reared
under good religious influences, and while not a
member of any denomination he encourages church
work.
At Culbertson December 15, 1910, Mr. Aslakson
married Miss Evelynn Hill. She was born at Min-
nesota Lake. Minnesota, July 15, 1880. Her mother
is Mattie (Dyer) Hill. She was one of two chil-
dren to reach mature years, her brother being Vard
Hill of Orland, California. Mr. and Mrs. Aslakson
have a daughter, Candace Oralynn.
Jacob C. Timmons is one of many Iowa settlers
who have identified themselves with Northeastern
Montana. He left Iowa when farm values were
beginning their rapid advance and came to the West
where land could be had for practically nothing and,
with a homestead and the open range, engaged in
the livestock industry. His farm and ranch have
been the essential features of his enterprise but
he early lent himself to the promotion of business
afifairs, was one of the founders of the old Village
of Scobey, and has also been closely identified with
the growth and progress of the new town of that
name.
Mr. Timmons was born in Marshall County, low:
April 22, 1868, son of Robert M. and Nanc,
(Shivley) Timmons. Both the Timmons anu
Shivley families were pioneers in the State of Iowa, i
going there about 1854. Robert M. Timmons w.-
born in Delaware in 1833 and was the oldest o!
numerous family of children and when they were
orphaned it fell to his lot to help take care of
and rear the younger children. For this reason he
had but few educational opportunities. Going to
Iowa by ox team he became a laborer and teamster,
invested his surplus earnings in land, gradually be-
came independent and finally a successful feeder of
stock and widely known over that region as a pio-
neer, successful business man and a splendid citi-
zen. His wife was a daughter of Ulrey L. Shivley,
who moved to Iowa by ox team from Indiana. Mr.
Timmons died in 1903 and his wife died in January,
1918, at the age of eighty-three. They were the
parents of three sons and five daughters. Those
still living are: John, Mrs. Emma Anson, Mrs. Eliza-
beth Shewalter all of Marshalltown, Iowa; Jacob
C. ; and George W. of Marshalltown. Three others
now deceased were : Mrs. Alice Bell of Shadron,
Nebraska ; Mrs. Adel M. Daniels, who died at her
old Iowa home the wife of M. A. Daniels; and
Mary who died in childhood.
Jacob C. Timmons came to manhood with a knowl-
edge of farming acquired by his experiences on his
father's place and had a country school education.
After two years as a helper to his father on the
farm he married and for a dozen years farmed in
Iowa until he sought larger opportunities in the
West.
The influence that led him to Northeastern Mon-
tana was the presence of his brother-in-law the late
Mansfield A. Daniels. He brought with him three
or four cars of young cattle and a few horses
and unloaded his emigrant car at Poplar in May,
1902. That country was then a part of Valley
County. By wagon he proceeded up Poplar River
in search of a permanent location, and established
himself on that stream in section 20, township 35,
range 48. The lands had not yet been surveyed,
and he was a squatter until the region was platted
when he filed and proved up his tract. His first
act was to erect a temporary building, a two-room
frame house with corrals and cattle sheds for his
stock. A year later his wife and child joined him
and he then vigorously launched himself into stock
raising. He increased his herds by other shipments
the following year, and what with improving his pro-
posed homestead, looking after his stock, and pro-
viding housing facilities, he was a very bus^f man
indeed.
Mr. Timmons has had a part in practically every-
thing that could be considered essential to the history
of development in that region. He early conceived
the idea of irrigating his lowlands. With some of
his neighbors including Joseph Bonness, Charles and
Fred Woodley and M. A. Daniels, a system of
ditches was constructed to ring the waters of Poplar
River over the land, this system being known as
"The Joint Irrigation Project." The work was a
matter of a number of years. The first three dams
constructed were temporary and were destroyed by
freshets. In 1920 a solid cement dam was built,
and that gives the system a permanent character
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Nevertheless. the older dams proved their value and
beneficiaries of the water rights have harvested
aboundant crops of hay.
Some of the lands adjacent to his homestead
and owned by him later came into Air, Timmons'
possession by purchase. His present ranch around
old Scobey comprises 1180 acres. He also had ex-
tensive tracts under lease, all of which in former
years furnished him abundant opportunity for his
business as a ranchman and farmer. While he has
maintained his hay lands intact, he has done much
to cultivate his other holdings.
In former years Mr. Timmoils and Mr. Daniels
were partners in their stock raising and about nine
years after he came to Montana they also opened
a small store under the name Daniels & Timmons.
This was continued until 1916 and was the central
factor in the business life of old Scobey. Gradually
other enterprises sprang up, including a blacksmith
shop, hotel, livery, bank, and such was the enterprise
of the little village until the building of the Great
Northern Railway resulted in the founding of the
new town of the same name.
Mr. Timmons was also one of seven men w'ho
launched and promoted the Farmers Elevator in
Scobey. He is a stockholder in the Farmers Oil
Company and in the Montana Life Insurance Com-
pany.
Mr. Timmons readily adapted himself to the
changing conditions caused by the rapid introduction
of newspapers and the converting of the open range
into farming tracts. He was associated with Mr,
Daniels and John Manternach in the purchase of
the first threshing machine brought to the locality,
and operated it for a couple of years, Daniels &
Timmons continued their range and stock interests
until about 1912, when they sold their surplus of
cattle and horses and concentrated their attention
upon farming. Their cattle brand was "lazy YD"
and their horse brand was "Jbar 5" and for years the
firm made annual shipments from Northeastern
Montana to the Chicago markets.
Mr. Timmons was reared in a democratic home
and cast his first presidential vote for Cleveland
in 1892, and has always supported that party in
national elections. While his private enterprise has
been in the nature of a service to the entire com-
munity. He has also enjoyed official responsibilities
as county commissioner of Sheridan County. He
was elected in 1915 as successor to Harry Loucks
and was associated with the comrpissioners F. A.
Weinrich, P. J, Eie, J. D, Matkin and R, G, Tyler.
Besides the routine work the board did important
new road construction and bridge building, and also
held special elections for seed grain and road bonds.
November 5, 1890, Mr. Timmons married Miss
Martha Louella Benner, a native of Illinois. Her
father Henry Benner was born in Pennsylvania and
from Illinois moved to Iowa when Mrs. Timmons
was a child. She was the youngest of five daughters
and two sons. Her father spent his life at the anvil
and forge. Mr. and Mrs. Timmons have one daugh-
ter, Blanche E. She grew up in the frontier country
of Northeastern Montana, has been a constant and
valuable aid to her parents, and like other new set-
tlers has proved up a claim. The Timmons perma-
nent home on the ranch was built and completed
with twelve rooms, equipped with lighting system,
hot and cold water and furnace. Besides this modern
home the ranch has other features that make it
noteworthy in the country around Scobey. It con-
tains barns and granaries of generous capacity, and
all the other facilities indicate that Mr. Timmons
is one of the most progressive farmers and ranchers
in this section.
W. M. Bellefleur has rendered an important
service in Flathead County during the past seven
years as superintendent of the County Infirmary
and Hospital.
Mr. Bellefleur was born at Green River, Canada,
son of William Bellefleur. He was educated in the
schools of Canada and came to Montana in 1879,
journeying up the Missouri River as far as Fort
Benton. He did freighting around Missoula and also
conducted a livery barn there. In 1881 he drove a
herd of cattle back to Canada, returning to Montana
in 1882 and locating in the Flathead Valley, where
he filed on a homestead. He still owns that quarter
section, and for many years was successfully engaged
in farming and stock raising.
Mr. Bellefleur married Flora Tibdeau. She was
the mother of four children, W. A., H. H., Eliza-
beth and Josephine. In 1913 Mr. Bellefleur assumed
charge of the County Poor Farm and Hospital. His
son, W. A. Bellefleur, was educated in the public
schools of Kalispell and was a soldier in Company
C of the Eighty-seventh Infantry, spending five
months in training at Camp Dodge, Iowa. The
daughter, Elizabeth, is now Mrs. Hamilton, and
Josephine is the wife of George W, Lang and lives
at Lovelock, Nevada. Mr. Bellefleur married for
his second wife Irene Duffy, a native of Minnesota,
and a daughter of Martin and Mary (Grady) Dutfy.
She was educated in the public schools at North-
field, Minnesota. They have one child, George.
The County Home at present has nine inmates.
Everything about the home is a credit to the county
and to the care and sympathetic management of Mr.
and Mrs. Bellefleur. Mr. and Mrs. Bellefleur are
members of the Catholic Church and he is affiliated
with the Modern Woodmen of America and the
Elks, while Mrs. Bellefleur is a Maccabee. In poli-
tics he supports the democratic party. For six years
he served as deputy sheriff of Flathead County, and
while living at Creston was a member of the school
board.
A visit to the County Home convinces anyone that
Mr. Bellefleur is the right man in the right place.
He has every department of the home in perfect
system. A number of cows provide milk and but-
ter for the home, there is an abundant supply of
poultry, every winter 225 cords of wood are burned
to keep the rooms warm, and the store rooms are
well filled with provisions. Everything is in perfect
sanitary condition.
Mr. Bellefleur owns a fine summer home at Lake
McDonald in Glacier Park. His two sons farm his
ranch and are among the progressive and capable
young men of the county.
Carlton B. Bull. While he is now president of
the State Bank of Redstone and has other important
interests in that section, Carlton B. Bull began his
career in this locality twenty years ago as a cowboy
and ranch hand. His connection with Redstone
covers the period of the life of the town. He has
given his support to all matters deserving public
consideration, and has influenced the destiny of the
community to date.
Mr. Bull was born at Cedar Rapids, Iowa, August
2, 1880. His father Joseph W. Bull is a prominent
Minnesota lawyer. Born near Reading, Pennsyl-
vania, of a family of poor farmers, he worked his
way through college, read law, was admitted to the
New York State bar, and on removing to Iowa began
practice at Tipton, where he was married. His wife.
Harriet Boynton, was born near Upper Sandusky,
Ohio, was liberally educated, and was a teacher in
the states of Ohio and Iowa before her marriage,
Joseph W. Bull removed from Tipton to Cedar
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Rapids and was an active member in his profession
in that city for about twenty years. While his prac-
tice was general, he became distinguished as an ex-
pert on title and land laws. At the age of about
sixty he retired from his profession, having in the
meantime removed to Minnesota, and his winter
home is now in Minneapolis with a summer home
on Lake Minnetonka. Joseph W. Bull is a veteran
Union soldier, and his name is inscribed on the sol-
diers' monument erected in Duluth. He has never
been active in politics, though he was interested in
the free silver issue of which Mr. Bryan was the
chief exponent. He and his wife had four children :
Emerson K. of North Bend, Washington; Bertha
B., wife of Bert F. Lum of San Francisco ; Clara who
died in young womanhood; and Carlton B.
Carlton B. Bull was eight years of age when his
parents removed to Duluth, Minnesota, in 1888, and
he acquired most of his education there. For two
years he attended high school in Pasadena, Cali-
fornia.
He was not yet twenty-one years of age when
he arrived in Montana October 25, 1900. From
Culbertson he went out to the ranch of Jack Ben-
nett, present sheriff of Sheridan County and rode
the range and did the common work of the Bennett
ranch one year. During three successive years he
was employed similarly by other well known settlers
and ranchers of the locality. In his ambition to
become an independent rancher he had accumulated
about fifteen head of cattle and a few horses. Most
of his cattle perished in the hard winter that fol-
lowed and with the remainder he located on Wolf
Creek fourteen miles south of Redstone. He ex-
changed his few cattle for other horses, put up hay
for their winter feed, and the next spring bought
400 head of cattle on time, giving as earnest
money two of his horses and getting credit on the
balance. The next four years constituted a period
of regular work on the range, practically without
vacations, and at the end he had $2,800 to show for
his work besides a number of horses. His horses
were a profitable feature of his business and for
two years he also handled a considerable flock of
sheep, likewise with some profit. Mr. Bull continued
ranching until 1913. He had taken up a desert claim
and homesteaded on Wolf Creek and when he aban-
doned his ranch he owned 480 acres. Since then his
dealings in land have increased his holdings until he
now pays taxes on 2,000 acres. More and more he
has emphasized the farming branch of his business
and has found a satisfactory profit from that portion
of his land seeded to alfalfa and broom grass.
Mr. Bull had a brief experience in banking at
Plentywood in the State Bank, and in the fall of
1913 he opened the State Bank of Redstone. His
associates were Peter Marron, Andrew Fadness,
N. L. Nelson and Norman Hanson of Fertile, Min-
nesota, and Henry Gray and L. C. Lindemann of
Redstone. At the organization Mr. Fadness was
elected president, Henry Clay, vice president, Mr.
Lindemann, cashier, and Mr. Bull assistant cashier.
The capital of the bank has remained steadily at
$25,000. Since the death of Mr. Fadness the board
of directors on January 2, 1920, promoted Mr. Bull
from the vice presidency to president.
Mr. Bull was one of the organizers of the Com-
mercial Club of Redstone, serving it as president,
and is a member of the school board of the village.
During the war he was a member of the County
Council of Defense, was local chairman of Liberty
Loan drives, and is a life member of the Red Cross.
A republican, he cast his first vote for Roosevelt in
1904, and has always regarded himself as a republi-
can in principle though like thousands of others
he supported Mr. Wilson in 1916. He was made
a Mason at Culbertson, Montana, and is Past Mas-
ter of Eagle Lodge No. 103 at Redstone.
At Culbertson September I, 1907, Mr. Bull mar-
ried Miss Blanche Claydon. She was born at Per-
ham, Minnesota, March 19, 1885, daughter of Fred-
erick and Harriet (Haslett) Claydon. Her parents
were born and married in England and left their
home in London to come to America. Mr. Claydon
came to the United States in 1881, took up a home-
stead and occupied it for a brief time in Ottertail
County, Minnesota, and then removed to Perham
and finally to Wadena, Minnesota, where during his
last years he was engaged in milling. His widow
survives him. Their children were : Dr. L. E. Clay-
don and Percy of Red Wing, Minnesota; Frederick
of Wadena; Mrs. Bull; May, who died after her
marriage at Wadena; and Horace C. of Phoenix,
Arizona. Mr. and Mrs. Bull have one daughter,
Harriet A., born October 17, 1914.
Herbert C. Hawley is one of the reliable and
successful druggists of Harlowton, where he has
established himself in the confidence and esteem of
his fellow citizens. He was born at Napanee, On-
tario, Canada, April 21, 1879, a son of Charles H.
and Cynthia R. (Detlor) Hawley, both of whom
were born in Canada. He died on October 31, 1918,
but she is still living, being now in her seventieth
year. They had three children, as follows : Joseph
C, Herbert C. and Edith M. Charles H. Hawley
was a farmer and a breeder and lover of horses
and cattle, preferring the Hambletonian and Short-
horn strains to any others. Although not connected
with any religious organization, he helped to sup-
port and attended the services of the Methodist
Episcopal Church, of which his wife was a con-
sistent member from girlhood. During his long life,
for he lived to be seventy-seven, he accomplished
much, and was always hardworking and thrifty.
Herbert C. Hawley attended the public schools of
his native place and the Napanee Collegiate Institute,
after which he came to the United States and took
up the study of pharmacy at the University of Min-
nesota, where he was thoroughly grounded in his
profession. Subsequent to his graduation from the
latter institution he established himself in business
at Hensel, North Dakota, and remained there until
1908, in that year coming to Harlowton, where he
has built up a very desirable connection. His drug
store is well stocked with a full line of the goods
usually found in an establishment of this kind, and
his patrons know that when buying from him they
will get just what they ask for, it being his pride
that he never uses substitutes.
On August 25, igo2, Mr. Hawley was married to
Miss Mabel McGuin, born at Winnipeg, Canada, a
daughter of Henry and Jane (Lee) McGuin, na-
tives of Canada, both of whom survive. They had
two children, Delbert and Mrs. Hawley. Mr. Mc-
Guin was a farmer and also owned and operated
an elevator during his active years.
Very prominent as a Mason, Mr. Hawley belongs
to Musselshell Lodge No. 69, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons ; Harlowton Chapter No. 22, Royal
Arch Masons ; Palestine Commandery No. 18,
Knights Templar, of which he is now eminent com-
mander; and Algeria Temple, Ancient Arabic Order
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine of Helena, Montana. In
politics he is a republican. During 1910 he served
as president of the Commercial Club and is enthusi-
astic with reference to it and the work it is accom-
plishing toward building up Harlowton and expand-
ing its commercial and industrial interests.
Mr. and Mrs. Hawley have two children, Edith
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Bernice and Alma May, both of whom are charming
girls. The family occupies an enviable position in
the social circles of Wheatland County, and their
pleasant home is often the scene of delightful gath-
erings.
Grover Cleveland Perkins, funeral director of
Harlowton, is a man whose reliability in sympathetic
service, moderation in charges in the hour of be-
reavement and thorough knowledge of his profession
have recommended him to the general public. In
addition to hjs undertaking business, Mr. Perkins is
a traction specialist and handles the new Hart-Parr
Studebaker cars, Diamond trucks and accessories,
Oliver plows and tractors.
The birth of Mr. Perkins took place on his father's
fai-m in Jefferson County, Missouri, on July 26, 1885.
He is a son of David A. and Kansas Virginia
(Frost) Perkins, both natives of Missouri, he born
on October 15, 1856, and she on December 28, 1858.
They had nine children, of whom three sons and
four daughters survive, Grover Cleveland Perkins
being the fifth child in order of birth. Early in life
David A. Perkins was engaged in farming and
stockraising, and then went into the mercantile field
and for more than thirty-five years has been en-
gaged in this line with profitable results. He is an
Odd Fellow and Modern Woodman. In politics he is
a strong democrat. The Baptist Church holds his
membership.
After completing his public school courses Grover
Cleveland Perkins took the teacher's examination and
passed it, and then took a course at the St. Louis
School of Embalming from which he was graduated
in 1910, and later was graduated from the Eckels
School of Embalming, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,
following which he returned to Harlowton and en-
gaged in a general merchandise business and under-
taking, continuing until 1913 as manager of the
Fair Store, and when he sold his interest in the
Uruer Merchandise Company he went into the
garage and automobile business, continuing as a
funeral director, however. In 1915 AJr. Perkins was
appointed to fill the office of county commissioner,
and was elected chairman of the board and in
November, 1918, he was elected a member of the
county board of Wheatland County, and has been
its chairman ever since. Fraternally he belongs to
Musselshell Lodge No. 69, .Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons ; Helena Consistory, in which he has
reached the thirty-second degree ; and Algeria Tem-
ple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic
Shrine. He is also a member of the Odd Fellows, of
which he is past noble grand, and since 1908 he has
served on the finance committee of the Grand Lodge
of that order. Like his father, he is an ardent demo-
crat. For several years he has been a member of the
city council of Harlowton. In addition to his other
interests Mr. Perkins is a director of the Wheatland
County Bank.
On February 12, igo8, Mr. Perkins was united in
marriage with Miss Nellie May Townsend, a daugh-
ter of William H. Townsend, and second child in a
family of three children born to her parents. Mr.
and Mrs. Perkins have three children living and two
dead, namely: Grover H. ; Delmon D. ; Clyde, who
died when six and one-half years old ; Glenn Wilson,
who died in infancy; and Lois Mae. Both Mr.
and Mrs. Perkins are held in high esteem by all who
know them.
Charles Henry Lanius. It is a well attested
maxim that the greatness of the state lies not in the
machinery of the Government, or even in its institu-
tions, but in the sterling qualities of its individual
citizens, in tlieir capacity for high and useful effort
and unselfish endeavor and their devotion to the
pijblic good. To this class belongs Charles H.
Lanius, the present efficient and popular postmaster
of the Town of Harlowton. Through a residence of
years in this locality his influence for good has been
widely felt, for he has at all times been actuated by
the highest motives and lofty principles, and the his-
tory of his section of the state should certainly con-
tain his record.
Charles Henry Lanius was born in Bethlehem,
Pennsylvania, on Januai-y 18, 1883, and is the son
of Charles C. and Sarah (Ebert) Lanius. The
father was born in York, Pennsylvania, and his
death occurred in 1897, at the age of forty-seven
years. He is survived by his widow, who is now
seventy years of age. She too was born in York.
They were the parents of three children, all of
whom are living, namely: Jane; Sarah L., the wife
of J. Cullen Sullivan; and Charles H.
Charles H. Lanius received his elementary educa-
tion in the public schools of Philadelphia, Pennsyl-
vania, and then became a student in Nazareth Hall
Military Academy at Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where
he was graduated with the class of 1897. Then he
took a course in Patrick's Business College at York,
Pennsylvania. His first employment was as a book-
keeper in the York National Bank, where he re-
mained until 1904, when he went to Denver, Colo-
rado, and accepted the position of bookkeeper and
chief clerk with the Glen Rock Coal Company. Two
years later, in 1906. he went to Anderson, South
Catolina, where for about three years he served
as secretary for the Anderson Real Estate and In-
vestment Company. In the spring of 1909 Mr.
Lanius came to Meagher County, Montana, and
took up a homestead. He immediately engaged in
farming operations, which commanded his attention
until 1914, when President Woodrow Wilson ap-
pointed him postmaster at Harlowton. So eminently
satisfactory was his conduct of the office that in
1918 he was reappointed and is still serving in that
position, to the entire satisfaction of both the Gov-
ernment and the patrons of the office. Mr. Lanius
has always taken an intelligent interest in the public
affairs of the communities in which he has lived
and during the legislative session of 1913 he was,
on May 9th, appointed treasurer of Wheatland
County. He was later elected to that office, but never
entered upon his official term, as the county was not
located until afterward.
Politically Mr. Lanius is a stanch supporter of the
democratic party. Fraternally he is a member of
Musselshell Lodge No. 69, Ancient Free and Ac-
cepted Masons and Harlowton Chapter No. 22, Royal
Arch Masons.
Mr. Lanius was married to Bessie H. Hough,
a native of South Carolina, and to them has been
born a son. Charles Henry, Jr. Genial and ap-
proachable, Mr. Lanius has won a host of warm per-
sonal friends since coming to this section of Mon-
tana, and he deservedly stands among the leading
citizens of this section.
I. L. Flinchpaugh. The years of the honored
subject of this sketch are a part of the indissoluble
chain which links the annals of the past to those
of the latter-day progress and prosperity, and a
history embracing Western Montana would not be
complete without due reference to the long life he
has lived and the success he has achieved as an
earnest, courageous laborer in one of the most im-
portant fields of endeavor, agriculture. He is public
634
HISTORY OF MONTANA
spirited and lends his support to any cause that has
for its ultimate oSject the betterment of his locality
in material, civic and moral lines.
I. L. Flinchpaugh was born near Cincinnati, Ohio,
and is the fourth in order of birth of the eight
sons born to Caleb and Rachel (^IngersoU) Flinch-
paugh. These children were named as follows, and
it is worthy of note that all of the children are liv-
ing at the present time, the youngest being over
fifty j'ears of age: W. H., principal of one of the
Cincinnati high schools, David, Wesley R., I. L.,
Jacob. Francis M., A. E., who is also principal of
one of the high schools of Cincinnati, and E. R.,
a successful physician in Prices Hill, a suburb of
Cincinnati. The subject of this sketch received his
education in the public schools of his native locality,
where he remained until about thirty years of age.
He was reared to a farm life, but subsequently
learned the trade of a carpenter. At the age of
thirty years Mr. Flinchpaugh came West and was
empIo}cd as a bridge carpenter in the construction
of the Bitter Root Railway. On December 5, 1887,
he came to the Flathead country and filed a pre-
emption claim to 160 acres of land, the tract being
located where the thriving City of Kalispell now
stands, and this same land he afterward sold to the
Kalispell Town Site Company. About a year later
he was married, and he and his wife went onto their
claim and began in earnest to create a homestead
or ranch. They have never left this section of the
country, having been well satisfied with their first
choice of location, and here they have reaped the
rewards of their years of toil and discomforts and
sacrifices, so that today they are in the enjoyment
of a splendid competence. They have been witnesses
of the wonderful transformation which has taken
place here and can recite many interesting stories of
those early years. At that time Missoula County
extended clear up to the Canadian line, comprising
an extent of territory larger than the State of
Ohio. They were 150 miles from the county seat,
Missoula, the trip being made by boat, wagon and
horseback. In those days the country abounded in
wild game of many varieties, and the pioneers had
no lack of fresh meat for their larder. Deer were
very plentiful, and Mr. Flinchpaugh has bagged hun-
dreds of them, his home now being adorned by some
magnificent mounted deer heads as trophies of the
old hunting days. Mr. Flinchpaugh says he has
counted in one day as many as 150 deer, twenty-
five being in one bunch, and each hunter was per-
mitted to shoot six deer. Indians were numerous
and were frequent callers at the cabin homes of the
white settlers, with whom they generally remained
on good terms. Mr. Flinchpaugh's present home,
vvhich lies about one mile west of Kalispell, comprises
sixty-one and a half acres and is a finely improved
ranch, everything about the place being arranged for
the comfort and convenience of the owners. They
have made it a point to plant good fruit trees and
now have some fine varieties of apple, phim and
cherry trees, besides strawberries and small fruit.
They have planted a large part of the place to alfalfa,
which in this section proves a very reliable and
profitable crop.
In Missoula Mr. Flinchpaugh was married to Mary
Glockle, the daughter of John and Mary Glockle,
who has proven a helpmate to him in the truest
sense of the word. Religiously they attend the
Church of Christ, Scientist, in the faith of which
they are enthusiastic believers, and to the support
of which society they give generously. Politically
Mr. Flinchpaugh is a stanch supporter of the demo-
cratic party, though he is not in any sense a seeker
after public office. The examples such men as Mr.
Flinchpaugh furnish of patient purpose and steadfast
integrity strongly illustrate what is in the power of
each to accomplish. By a straightforward and com-
mendable course he has made his way to an envi-
able position, winning the hearty admiration of the
people among whom he has lived and earning a
reputation for industry, public spirit and wholesome
living.
McClellan Wininger, a son of Michael and
Nancy (.Tarter) Wininger, was born on a farm
near Glasgow, Kentucky, January 24, 1862. Their
ancestors were of Teutonic lineage, who immigrated
to America prior to the Revolutionary war.
The Wininger descendants came from old Sax-
ony. Germany, and settled in Pennsylvania about
1750. Subsequently, c, 1808, some of the families
moved to Hawkins County. Tennessee, where tlie
grandfather, Stephen Wminger. married Rhoda
Robinette, of Scottish parentage, whose descendants
were from Normandy, c, 1560. From this union there
were five boys and four girls and during the year
1848 they all moved to Barren County, Kentucky.
Nancy Tarter was one of the twelve children of
Andrew and^ Alfa (Haunschel) Tarter, of Scott
County, Virginia. The Tarters (some of the fami-
lies wrote their names Darter) were of Scandinavian
extraction, and traditionally they traced their de-
scendants from the ill-fated Greenland settlements
and relief expeditions, c, 1410. The Haunschels
and their relatives, the Wetzels, settled in Western
Virginia. Living on the frontiers, the Haunschels
were mostly exterminated during the Indian wars.
Michael Wininger was married in 1859. The
following year he purchased a farm on which he
resided for forty-five years. They raised six boys
and four girls. McClellan wa.s the oldest, and at
the age of fourteen the father was taken with
asthma, which rendered him incapable of attending
to business for six years. During this time Mc-
Clellan managed the farming operations successfully.
There was never a mortgage on anything and all
bills were duly paid. And the old farm is still
owned by the 'family. Of the brothers, Stephen D.
resides in Montesano, Washington ; I. H. Wininger
in Glasgow, Kentucky, and Chris M. in Oakland,
California.
From early boyhood McClellan Wininger had a
desire for books and study. Most of his spare time
was given to reading history, travels and the
sciences. After he became of age he took several
courses in the Normal School and Business College,
and taught school four years in his native county.
He came to Helena. Montana, in 1887, and vyorked a
while along civil engineering lines. Through polit-
ical influences he was appointed one of the guards
of the U. S. prison at Deer Lodge, which position
he held till April, 1889, when he came to Flathead
Valley.
There was an Indian scare at the time, but of no
serious consequences. The trouble was mostly
caused from whiskey. The Indian when sober is
generally peaceable. Later, in September, 1890.
Sheriff Houston with- seventy-five volunteers, of
which posse McClellan Wininger was secretary,
made a raid on the Indians for the purpose of ap-
prehending a few miscreants who were afterwards
captured and legally executed. This was the last
of what might be termed Indian troubles in the
valley.
In 1891 he assisted A. A. White and others in ob-
taining the Kalispell townsite and was associated
with the right of way department of the Great
Northern Railway Company, when the line was
located through the valley.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
635
Mr. Wininger is a lawyer bj- profession and was
admitted to the bar in 1893. During the panicky
years he settled the business of the defunct Globe
National Bank of Kalispell. This settlement resulted
in a partnership and business relations with V. Simp-
son of Winona, Minnesota. Tlie business was prin-
cipally loaning money and farming. The loans
amounted to about $36.0(10. The Acme Dairy Farm
comprised 1,200 acres of land and several smaller
tracts. There were tliirty-hve milch cows, about
two hundred head of cattle in all, mostly Shorthorn,
about 20 per cent registered. They propagated
thoroughbred Poland-China hogs, over a hundred
per year. The greatest number of horses was thirty-
si-x head, some registered Percherons. The grain
crop amounted to about 3,000 bushels per year. The
largest amount invested was $55,400.
Some loans were made to Coats and Preston, lum-
bermen at Lakeview. The enterprise was not a suc-
cess. Coats retired from the business. Mr. Preston
was accidentally killed in the logging department.
It devolved on Mr. Wininger to take the outfit. . Im-
provements were made and the business put on a
financial basis. Owing to cheap timber and close
competition the profits were small. Common lum-
ber sold at $7 per thousand. The entire cut during
the summer was sold as low as $8 per thousand.
The yearly cut stacked in the yard amounted to
about $34,000. The cost of the plant, with logs for
the next season and lumber on hand, aggregated a
$65,000 investment. During the progress of this
operation, 1904, the Great Northern Railway Com-
pany removed their line. .•Xnd in reparation the
railroad company purchased the mill, lumber on
hand and the standing timber within two miles
thereof. The amount received covered all the ex-
penses and left a profit of about $16,000 for the five
years' experience in the lumber business.
Mr. Wininger took an active part in progressive
farming. He was secretary of the Farmers' Board
of Trade, a farmers' organization affecting a better-
ment of conditions. He first built and promoted
the farm telephone lines. In October, 1905, he
headed a committee of farmers and investigated the
sugar beet industry in Utah and Idaho with the
object in view of growing them in this valley. It
required irrigation and labor that the farmers here
were unwilling to furnish. After the death of Mr.
Simpson the farming enterprise was settled, in
1906, the junior partner realizing something over
$16,000 profits for the eight years' transactions.
On March 26, 1907, he took over the business of
the Farmers Mercantile Company and operated it
for three years, but with not much success. He
closed out the business and constructed a building
called Wininger Block, which he now owns and in
which he resides in Kalispell.
Retiring from the strenuous life at the age of
fifty, he devoted his time to the study of the
sciences, history and travels. For several years he
has been an associate member of the Society of
Psychic Research, and has perused the theories of
the various religions of the world. He is a firm
believer of the evolution of all animal life. He
works upon the theory that human life has been
millions of years in developing from the lowest
forms of vitality to the present condition and that
the individuality will continue after corporal ex-
tmction. He has a library of several thousand select
volumes of books. There are specialties on biology,
botany, geology, mineralogy, astronomy, etc. There
is a fine collection of mineral specimens, relics, etc.,
where prospectors and those interested are welcome
to investigate.
John Metc.\i.f. History and biography for the
most part record the lives of only those who have
attained military, political or literary distinction, or
who in any other career have passed through ex-
traordinary vicissitudes of fortune. But the names
of men who have distinguished themselves in their
day and generation for the possession of those quali-
ties of character which mainly contribute to the suc-
cess of private life and to the public stability — of
men who, without brilliant talents have been exem-
plary in all their personal and social relations, and
enjoyed the respect, esteem and confidence of those
around them — ought not be allowed to perish, for all
are benefited by the delineation of those traits of
character which find scope and exercise in the com-
mon walks of life. Among this class of citizens in
Flathead County is John Metcalf, formerly an active
and successful ranchman and efficient public official
who is now retired from active life and living in
the Town of Kalispell. His life history has been
distinguished by the most substantial qualities of
character and has exhibited a long and creditable
career of private industry, performed with modera-
tion and crowned with success, and he today occu-
pies an enviable position in the esteem of the com-
munity.
John Metcalf is a native son of the old Hoosier
State, having been born in Kosciusko County, In-
diana, the son of Joseph and Sarah Metcalf. He
was reared in his native community and received
a good practical education in the public schools of
his native county. Subsequently' he moved to Iowa,
where he engaged in farming for many years and
in which his labors were rewarded with a fair
measure of success. Eventually he came to Montana
and located at LaSalle, where he conducted farming
operations and also operated a dairy until 1916,
when Mr. and Mrs. Metcalf decided that the time
had come when they ought to retire from the labors
and responsibilities of ranch life and enjoy the rest
which their years of activity had entitled them.
Coming to Kalispell, they bought a modern, comfort-
able and attractive residence on Wyoming Street,
where they are now living.
John Metcalf was married to Margaret Eleanor
Henry, a native of Marion County, Iowa, and the
daughter of John and Sarah (Johnston) Henry.
Mrs. Metcalf received her elementary education in
the public schools of her home community, com-
pleting her studies in the Iowa Central University at
Pella. She is a woman of more than ordinary cul-
ture, being a close reader and intelligent thinker
on the questions of the day, and she has clearly
defined opinions on the great issues which have
held a vital relation to the .'\merican people. She
has for many years been an active and enthusiastic
member of the Woman's Christian Temperance
Union, now holding a life membership in that society,
and she was the first president of the society at
LaSalle, Montana. She rejoices in the fact that
she has been one of that great army of white-ribbon
women through whose efforts principally John Bar-
leycorn has been dethroned and sent to his doom.
She has instilled in her children the same principles
of righteousness and justice which she has herself
been working and praving for through the years.
To Mr. and Mrs. M'etcalf the following children
have been born: Joseph, Miles J., Morris, John H.,
Sarah S.. S. D., R. M., E. Grace, V. P.. I. E., F. F.
and two who died in infancy. Joseph, who lives at
Skapoose, Oregon, was married to Daisy Lyons, of
Pleasantville, Iowa, and they have three children,
Leanore, Mary and Guy: Miles J. was married to
Grace Warnock, and they have two children, Mel-
HISTORY OF MONTANA
vin E. and Rodger ; Morris was married to Jessie
Reynolds, and they have one son, Lloyd; John H.
was married to Serena Snyder, and they have four
children, Raymond, John, Grace and Margaret E. ;
Sarah became the wife of S. D. Caffrey, and they
have two daughters, Elsie and Gladys ; Grace became
the wife of Al Childers, and they have two children,
Margaret E. and Frederick A.; V. P. was married
to Susan McGregor, and they have two children,
Bernard and Gertrude ; I. E., who was married to
Ida Bailey, is an ordained minister in the Christian
Church, but is now 'a student in Spokane University
at Spokane, Washington ; F. F. is a veteran of the
World war, having served eighteen months in
France. He was one of the survivors of the ill-
fated "Tuscania," and was a member of the Seven-
teenth Company, Sixth Battalion, Twentieth Engi-
neers. He was promoted to the rank of corporal
and received his honorable discharge at the Wyoming
Gamp. Mrs. Metcalf herself comes of illustrious
lineage, being a descendant of Patrick Henry, one
of the earliest and greatest of the American patriots,
and because of this fact she is entitled to and enjoys
honorary membership in that great society, the
Daughters of the American Revolution. This order
has a splendid chapter at Kalispell, named after
the noted Flathead Indian chief, Inneas.
In matters religious Mrs. Metcalf has been a
member of the Christian Church since the age of
sixteen years, and is now identified with that society
at Kalispell. Politically she is broad in her views,
not being bound by party ties, but prefers giving
her support to those men and measures which in
her opinion will be of greatest benefit to the great-
est number. Always calm and dignified, never de-
monstrative, her life has been, nevertheless, a per-
sistent plea, more by precept and example than b;'
public action or written or spoken word, for the
purity and grandeur of right principles and the
beauty and elevation of wholesome character. She
is a woman of many fine personal qualities and is
held in the highest esteem by all who know her.
F. W. BuCKSEN was one of the first postmasters
at Kalispell, and later until he retired, was a promi-
nent merchant in that city. Mr. Bucksen is an
old time Montana resident, for many years having
been identified with the frontier outpost of Fort
Benton, and was on the ground when Kalispell
came into being.
He was born at Cumberland, Maryland, a son of
William H. and Elizabeth (Rosenmerkle) Bucksen.
The family moved to St. Louis, Missouri, in 1870,
and F. W. Bucksen second among four children,
finished his education in the public schools of that
city. In 1878 he came up the Missouri River from
St. Louis to Fort Benton, Montana, at that time
the farthest northern outpost of civilization in Mon-
tana. He lived there until 1891, and knew inti-
mately the activities and the historical personalities
associated with old Fort Benton. When he first
located there the nearest railroad was Corinne, Utah,
and at Bismarck, North Dakota.
Mr. Bucksen came into the Flathead country in
1891. and for a time was in the Town of Demersville,
until that pioneer settlement was moved and merged
with the present City of Kalispell. Mr. Bucksen
served as postmaster of Kalispell from 1893 to 1897,
and after that engaged in general merchandising.
Mr. Bucksen is unmarried. He enjoys a large
circle of friends, and for nearly thirty years has
been looked upon as one of the men whose influence
has counted most in behalf of every advance move-
ment in this city. He has usually supported the
democratic party in politfcs.
W. R. Twining. While he now lives practically
retired from business responsibilities. W. R. Twining
for many years was a leading building contractor at
Kalispell, and many of the substantial structures,
business houses as well as homes that lend attractive-
ness to the city are the product of his skill and
business organization which he perfected and main-
tained.
Well known among the citizenship of the Flathead
Valley, Mr. Twining was born in Bucks County,
Pennsylvania, in 1855. His birthplace was on
Neschaminey Creek, twentj' miles north of Philadel-
phia. The Twinings are one of the oldest of Ameri-
can families, having come over from England at the
time of the Mayflower. In Mr. Twining's library at
Kalispell is an elaborate record of the family his-
tory, compiled by Thomas J. Twining of Fort
Wayne. Indiana. This volume shows 7,000 names
in the Twining genealogy-. During a residence of
nearly three centuries in America many of the
Twinings have achieved prominence in business, the
professions and in politics. Of the present genera-
tion perhaps the most notable is Nathan C. Twining,
a distinguished member of the United States Navy,
who during the World war was Chief of Staff to the
Vice Admiral commanding the United States naval
forces in European waters. Another member of the
family is Arthur Twining Hadley, president of Yale
University. The original Twinings were of Quaker
faith, and the object of their immigration to
America was to find a refuge for religious worship.
W. R. Twining, whose parents were Amos H. and
Mary (Tomlinson) Twining, was educated in the
public schools of Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He
married Emma Croasdale, who passed away in 1905.
She was a daughter of Austin and Mary Croasdale.
.\s a youth he learned the trade of carpenter, and
made that trade the basis of his profession and
business. Seeking the broader opportunities of the
West, he came out to Montana and was one of the
early building contractors to locate at Kalispell. A
long record of important contracts handled by him
in the valley might be compiled. He was superin-
tendent during the erection of the McKnight Block,
one of the finest in the city. He also constructed
the Buffalo Block, the office building of the Montana
Power Company, the Dillon Hotel, a portion of
Whipp's Block, and has also erected a number of
buildings on his own account, including Stoop's
Garage.
Along with a busy career he has not been unmind-
ful of the public interests, and for four years was a
member of the city council. He was also a member
of the Carnegie Library Building Board. While on
the city council he earned rnuch credit by the influ-
ences he directed toward ridding the city of unde-
sirable characters. His public spirit has led him
into every movement for the advancement and im-
provement of the city. He and his wife give their
political support to the republican party. Mr. Twrin-
ing is affiliated with the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows.
For his present wife he married at Spokane, Wash-
ington. Mrs. Christine M. Lillevig. the widow of
John P. Lillevig.. She was born at Minneapolis, a
daughter of Andrew and Carrie Pedersen. She
was eight years of age when her parents moved to
Montana, and she grew up in Kalispell, finishing
her education in the public schools of that city. By
her former marriage she has a son. Carlyle. now a
student in the Kalispell High School. Mr. and
Mrs. Twining have a son. Walmsley Ridge, who was
born January 10. 1915. During the Worid war Mrs.
Twining took a very active part in the work of the
Red Cross Chapter. She is a member of the Ch
HISTORY OF MONTANA
Science Church, belongs to Crescent Lodge No. 22
of the Rebekahs, and is color bearer of the Woman's
Relief Corps. Mr. and Mrs. Twining own an attract-
ive summer home on Bitter Root Lake, and the sum-
mer season is passed altogether in that wonderful
environment. They keep a motor launch, and Mr.
Twining seldom neglects an opportunity to hunt and
fish. As a boy those sports greatly attracted him,
though he had but little opportunity to pursue the
sport in the closely settled districts of the East. One
of the chief sources of his enjoyment of Montana
residence is the opportlinity it gives for every pleas-
ure and sport on the large scale possible in nature's
wonderland.
August Heller, a retired wholesale merchant and
rancher at Kalispell, has spent nearly all his life
close to the frontier, far out with the advance guard
of civilization, and for years doing the work of the
pioneer.
He was born at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, then
a western outpost, son of Albert and Caroline
(Myers) Heller. In 1861 the Heller family crossed
the plains to California, going by covered wagon.
Their first stop was at The Dalles, Oregon, thence to
Portland, by sea to San Francisco, and on down the
coast to San Pedro and establishing their home in
Los Angeles. August Heller spent a number of his
youthful years in Los Angeles, and while there
acquired a fluent command of the Spanish language.
He learned the butcher's trade, and on account of
his knowledge of Spanish was engaged by a business
man to go to Mexico and buy cattle. For a time
he lived at Tombstone, Arizona, and met and knew
many of the characters that made that locality
famous. The original mines at Tombstone were
located by the Sheflin brothers according to Mr.
Heller. The Sheflins had been scouts with thp
United States army. One year after they had dis-
covered the site an agent who was leaving the fron-
tier said to Mr. Sheflin "I guess we will see your
tombstone here when we come back." Afterward
Mr. Sheflin decided to call the place Tombstone.
Sheflin subsequently went to Alaska, engaged in
mining, and while there was taken ill and on his
deathbed requested that he be carried back and
buried at Tombstone. His brother and friends car-
ried out his wishes.
From Tombstone Mr. Heller went into Mexico as
an interpreter for a noted cattleman of that time,
John Slaughter. His next experiences were at
Bishop Creek, California, where he worked in the
butcher business, then returned to Los Angeles, and
subsequently moved to Portland, Oregon. He and
his father were the first meat packers to engage in
business at Spokane. Mr. Heller helped drive the
first cattle over the trails to the Coeur d'Alene coun-
try of Idaho and from there came to Montana.
The night following his arrival in Helena occurred
the hanging of Con Murphy, a noted cattle rustler.
Mr. Heller went on to Butte, worked at his trade,
and at Bozeman bought a saddle horse and went to
White Sulphur Springs, opening a butcher business
at Neihart. He was at Great Falls, where Paris
Gibson had just laid out a town, and was urged to
purchase lots, but ridiculed the idea, being unable to
foresee the development of the future and having
no faith in the building of a railroad through tnere.
Subsequently he filed on a ranch at Harlan, Mon-
tana, and while there met David R. McGinnis, emi-
gration agent for the Great Northern. He acquired
two of the best ranches in the country, but after
selling out moved to Fort Benton and resuming his
trade followed along with the construction of the
Great Northern into the Great Flathead Valley,
where he has since made his permanent home.
Mr. Heller married Miss Reta Heinze, a native
of Germany. They have one daughter, Carrie Hel-
ler, who was educated in the Kalispell High School,
also in colleges at Spokane, and has been carefully
reared at home and given the best advantages of
school and the world of culture.
Mr. Heller is one of the progressive and public
spirited citizens of the Flathead Valley, always
ready to support forward movements. He gives his
ballot to the man best fitted for office.
E. J. Green, auditor of Flathead County, and a
ranchman of this region, is one of the representa-
tive men of Montana. He was born in Kentucky,
a son of J. B. and Mary C. (Taylor) Green. The
Green family is of English origin, and the Taylors
belonged to the same family as President Taylor
and Governor W. E. Taylor of Kentucky. Of the
nine children of his parents, E. J. Green was the
t!iird in order of birth. He attended the Southern
Normal Schools of Huntington, Tennessee, and
Bowling Green, Kentucky, and was graduated from
the Bowling Green Business College. His brother,
R. P_. Green is now one of the leading educators
of Kentucky, who specialized in mathematics and
Greek and Latin. He was chosen by his fellow
educators to be president of the Kentucky Educa-
tional Association, and is recognized as one of the
leading figures in the educational life of his native
state.
E. J. Green was married to Florence Derington,
a daughter of J. H. and Mary Derington, of Florence
Station, Kentucky, and a niece of Judge Reed and
J. D. Parks, a leading attorney of Paducah, Ken-
tucky. Mr. and Mrs. Green became the parents of
three children, namely: Mary Helen, who died when
thirteen months old, Edward Derington. and Florence
Jean.
In 1909 Mr. Green came to Flathead County and
became bookkeeper of the Farmers Protective Asso-
ciation at Kalispell. holding that position until
1914. when he was elected county clerk and recorder
on the progressive ticket, and was re-elected in 1916
on the republican ticket. In 1918 he was elected
county auditor. Mr. and Mrs. Green and their chil-
dren are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church
of Kalispell. He is an Odd Fellow and she a Rc-
bekah, and both stand high in their orders. In
addition to his other interests Mr. Green owns a
valuable ranch six miles out of Kalispefl and is a
man of comfortable means. As a private citizen and
public official Mr. Green measures up to the highest
standards of American manhood, and is thoroughly
reliable in every respect. During the late war he
served as a member of the exemption board for his
county, thus rendering valuable service to his Gov-
ernment, and otherwise took part in the war work
of this neighborhood. Both he and Mrs. Green
stand very high in popular estimation, and have a
host of friends to whom they dispense a delightful
hospitality at their charming home.
W. H. Reiter, who at the age of eighty-five is
still enjoying life aiid with his good wife resides in
an attractive home at Kalispell, is a pioneer of the
great Northwest, having come to Idaho Territory in
the '60s and was one of the first settlers in Kalispell.
Mr. Reiter was born at Niles, Ohio, September 8,
1835, son of Manassa and Eliza (White) Reiter, his
mother being of English ancestry. Her Grandfather
White was employed by the English Government to
make banknote paper.
W. H. Reiter spent his boyhood at Niles, and his
HISTORY OF MONTANA
father's home was only two doors from that of the
McKinley home. W. H. Reiter and the late William
McKinley were playmates and schoolmates. Mr.
Reiter recalls some of the early efforts of William
McKinley at speech making. Mr. Reiter was sev-
eral years older and frequently would stand behind
McKinley and prompt him. McKinley's father was
an ironmaker at Niles and his business was ruined
because of the competition of foreign products dur-
ing the free trade regime. It was this, asserts Mr.
Reiter, that gave William McKinley his lifelong
ardor for the protective principle, eventually re-
sulting in the famous McKinley Tariff Act of the
'gos^ the most complete expression of protective
principles in American economic history.
Mr. Reiter finished his education in Allegheny
College at Meadville. Pennsylvania. In 1862 he ac-
companied an uncle to the far West and was soon en-
gaged in mining at Florence, Idaho. He was
elected a member of the Legislature in the eighth
session, and while in the Legislature assisted in
creating Idaho County. Mr. Reiter came to Mon-
tana in 1882, locating at Helena, and in i8go moved
to the Flathead country and filed on a pre-emption.
He proved up that original land and has a fine home
on it. situated in the very center of Flathead
County. He enlisted in Company H, First Cali-
fornia Volunteers, and fought in the Piute Indian
war as a scout. Later, in 1877, he participated in
the Xez Perce Indian troubles, was wounded three
times, acted as orderly for General Howard and as a
scout and performed many dangerous duties.
.\t Helena Mr. Reiter married Miss Julia Aurora
Thore Ostlund. She was born in Sweden February
29, 1850, a daughter of Andrew and Anna IMargaret
Ostlund. Mrs. Reiter's father and mother were
born in the year of 1814 and lived to the age of
eighty-four, while the mother lived to be ninety-
three. .Andrew Ostlund was a prominent govern-
ment official in Sweden, a well educated man and a
man of affairs in his native country. After their
marriage Mr. and Mrs. Reiter moved to the Flat-
head and Mrs. Reiter was the first bride at Kalis-
pell, the town having been started the same year.
Mrs. Reiter is a member of the Episcopal Church.
Politically Mr. Reiter is one of the original repub-
licans and cast his first vote in 1856, for the first
standard bearer of the republican party, John C.
Fremont, and has never missed an election in cast-
ing a straight republican ticket.
Mrs. Reiter as a young lady in Sweden was thor-
oughly educated and for ten years was a school
teacher and a special teacher of music, also a com-
poser of note. After coming to America she taught
music up to the time of her marriage. Mr. and Mrs.
Reiter enjoy the comforts of a pleasant home on
the banks of the Stillwater River, and the years still
sit lightly upon her. During his residence in Idaho
Mr. Reiter was postmaster in Florence for six years
and also ran the hotel and livery and feed barn.
He has had a great variety of western experience
both as a business man and rancher, and has always
kept in close touch with world affairs. He owns a '
good library, has been a constant reader, is a stu-
dent and debater, and has always been positive in
his convictions and fearless in e.^pressing his views.
Earl Ogden. A purpose in life is as the helm of
a ship — it shapes direction to the goal. It stirs
ambition, arouses determination, and is the main-
spring of success. To have some definite aim, some
target to shoot at — no matter how modest it may
be — is already to be well on the way to achieve-
ment. Destination has much to do with destiny. ■
Purpose is that for which a man endures difficulties
and hardships ; takes blows and rebuffs ; and tolerates
disappointments. It is because the men who have
achieved a permanent success in Montana have come
here with a definite purpose, that of becoming valua-
able factors in the communities in which they locate,
and have let nothing stand in the way of reaching
their goal, that the state has advanced so rapidly.
One of the well worth-while citizens of Augusta,
who exemplifies in his life and prosperity the facts
set forth in the above, is Earl Ogden, cashier of
the Peoples Bank of Augusta and a rancher upon
an extensive scale.
Earl Ogden comes of one of the old American
families which was established in the American
Colonies by ancestors who came here from England.
He was born at Martinsburg, Iowa, on August 5,
1880. a son of I. N. Ogden, who was born in Indiana
on March 4, 1843, and died at Oskaloosa, Iowa, on
February 11, 1920. The grandfather, Daniel Ogden,
was born in New Jersey in 1816, and died at Mar-
tinsburg, Iowa, in i8g6, having been a pioneer
farmer of Indiana and Iowa, and in the latter state
developing into a banker at Martinsburg. He mar-
ried Miss Rhoda DuBois, born in Indiana in 1821,
who died at Martinsburg, Iowa, in April, igig.
I. N. Ogden was reared, educated and married
at Martinsburg, lovifa, and became a farmer and
owner of a lumber yard and grain elevator, as well
as of the controlling stock in the Martinsburg Bank.
In 1913 he retired and moved to Oskaloosa, Iowa,
where he rounded out his life. Not only was he
a successful business man, but he took a very im-
portant and effective part in the civic and political
affairs of Martinsburg, always working as a republi-
can and as a sincere member of the Presbyterian
Church, of which he was an elder for many years.
He also maintained fraternal connections with the
local lodge of Odd Fellows.
The marriage of I. N. Ogden took place at Mar-
tinsburg, Iowa, when he was united with Mary
Botkin, born at Martinsburg, Iowa in 1878. She died
at Yuma, Colorado, on July 9, 1903. Their children
were as follows : Earl, who was the eldest born ;
Otto O., who lives at Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where he
is engaged in a lumber business; Fern, who died at
the age of twenty-two years, as the wife of Dr. A.
A. Lynn, a dentist, surviving his wife and a resident
of Marshalltown, Iowa; N. D., who is a rancher
near Simms, Cascade County, Montana ; R. B., who
is a rancher, lives at Cascade, Montana ; Beth, who
married Wallace Wick, assistant superintendent of
the Des Moines, Iowa, Power and Light Company ;
Lois, who married C. C. Willett, a breeder of
thoroughbred hogs and a resident of Brooklyn, Iowa,
survives his wife, who died in 1916; Gladys and
Florence A. both of whom are attending the Penn
College of Oskaloosa, Iowa.
Earl Ogden attended the public schools of Martins-
burg, Iowa, and was graduated from its high school
in 1900, following which he became cashier of the
6ank of that place, and held that position for three
years. He then embarked in the lumber, hardware
and grain business at Martinsburg, and conducted it
for seven years.
Mr. Ogden is an ambitious young man and found
the confines of Martinsburg too restricted for him,
so in 1909 he came to Great Falls, Montana, where
he spent the ensuing winter, and then in the spring
of 1910 he bought a ranch six miles south of
Augusta, comprising 3,000 acres of deeded land, in
partnership with his brother, N. D. Ogden, the two
still being associated, although they sold this ranch
in 1916 and bought another one of 7,000 acres just
south of Slmms, Montana, which they are conduct-
ing as a general ranching, cattle and sheep propo-
sition.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
In tile meanwhile, in 1916. Earl Ogden became
cashier of the Peoples Bank of Augusta, which posi-
tion he still holds. This bank was established on
December 22, 1913, and opened for busmess in
March, 1914. The officers of the bank are as fol-
lows: J. F. McGraw, president; J. W. Nixon and
Alexander Chrisholm, vice presidents; Earl Ogden,
cashier ; and Ursula Manix, assistant cashier. The
bank has a capital of $40,000, and its surplus and
profits amount to $20,000, while its deposits are
$250,000. It is located on Main Street and is one
of the sound banking institutions of Lewis and
Clark County.
Mr. Ogden is a republican. He maintains mem-
bership wilJi the Presbyterian Church of Augusta.
Fraternally he belongs to Augusta Lo'dge No. 54,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Dearborn
Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, of which
he is past noble grand, and he is also a member of
the Encampment of Odd Fellows. He owns a
modern residence at the corner of Main and Laura
streets, which is a new -one completed in 1918, and
one of the finest in the northern part of Lewis
and Clark County.
In 1901 Mr. Ogden was married at Martinsburg,
Iowa, to Miss Elizabeth M. Graves, a daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Johnson Graves, who live at Martins-
burg, Mr. Graves being a retired wagonmaker and
an ex-Union soldier. Mr. and Mrs. Ogden became
the parents of the following children : Dorothy, who
was born on June 17, 1903, is attending the Augusta
High School ; Madeline, who was born on September
24, 1905, is also attending the Augusta High School ;
Ruth, who was born on May 5, 1908; Fern, who was
born on January 17, 1910; and Donald, who was
born on March 10, 1916.
John Edwin Shattuck, president of the Shat-
tuck Commercial Company at Boulder, has been in
the northwestern states a number of years, beginning
his career as a railway telegraph operator, and
through his enterprise has developed probably the
leading mercantile establishment in Jefferson
County.
Mr. Shattuck was born at Boston, Massachusetts,
April 29, 1878. He is of English ancestry, his people
having settled in Massachusetts in colonial times,
and from Massachusetts moved to New Hampshire.
His father, John Edwin Shattuck, Sr., is now living
retired at Boston, where he was born in 1847, spent
nearly all his life in that city, and for many years
was a steward for the Revere House. At the age
of sixteen, in 1863, he enlisted in the Union army in
the Commonwealth Regiment of Massachusetts, and
served to the end of the war. He is a member of
the Grand Army of the Republic and is a republican
in politics. He married Melissa Stirks, who was
born in New Brunswick, Canada, in 1850 and died
at Eureka, Illinois, in 1881. She was the mother
of two children ; Florence and John E. The former
is the wife of William Wight, employed in the ac-
counting department of the city government at
Chicago.
John Edwin Shattuck spent his early life at
Loda, Iroquois County, Illinois, graduating from the
high school there in 1895. For one year he also
attended the Onarga Seminary, a Methodist school
at Onarga, Illinois. While a boy at Loda he
learned the duties of station agent and telegraphy
at the local office of the Illinois Central Railway,
and on leaving there went to St. Paul, Minnesota,
and was employed by the Soo line as a telegraph
operator six months. For another six months he
was night agent for the Minnesota Transfer Com-
pany at New Brighton, Minnesota. Mr. Shattuck
Vol. II— tl
came to Montana in 1900, and at White Sulphur
Springs established one of the first sheep-shearing
plants in the state. This plant was located at
Dorsey. He managed it through three summer sea-
sons, and during the winter acted as relief agent
in railway offices. Following that he was cashier
of the Yellowstone Bank at Mondak until 1907, in
which year he engaged in the mercantile business
at Elliston, Montana. He was proprietor of a store
there, but sold out in 1911, and removing to Spokane
organized the Spokane Feed and Fuel Company. He
was president and manager of this corporation until
1916, when he came to Boulder and established his
present business. This is now the leading general
store in Jefferson County, and has prospered through
a steady adherence to the ideal of affording a com-
plete and satisfactory service to all the patrons. The
business is incorporated as the Shattuck Commer-
cial Company, with Mr. Shattuck as president, Frank
Happ as vice president, and Mrs. D. O. Shattuck,
secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Shattuck also owns a ranch in Franklin
County, Washington, and a modern home at Boulder.
He is affiliated with Helena Lodge No. 193 of the
Elks and in politics is a republican. In 1903, at
Loda, Illinois, he married Miss Delia Ogan, daugh-
ter of Mr. and Mrs. John Wesley Ogan, now de-
ceased. Her father was an early mine operator
of Idaho. Mr. and Mrs. Shattuck have five chil-
dren: Donald, born in July, 1904; Ralph, born in
June, 1905 ; Wanda, born in April, 1907 ; Ramona,
born in August, 1913 ; and Richard, born in October,
1914.
H.\RRY Joseph McGregor, M. D. One of the best
qualified surgeons in the northern part of the state
is Doctor McGregor of Choteau, who in addition to
his general practice has maintained a highly efficient
hospital for the convenience of the people of Teton
County.
Doctor McGregor was born at Davenport, Iowa,
December 3, 1887, son of James and Elizabeth (Red-
fern) McGregor. James McGregor was born in
Scotland and came to this country with his parents
when he was an infant. The McGregors first lived
in Pennsylvania and afterward made the overland
journey to Iowa, in which state they were pioneers.
James McGregor grew up and was educated in the
Iowa schools, and became a merchant at Davenport,
where he was successfully engaged in business for
a quarter of a century. He died in Davenport in
1917, at the age of fifty-five. He was a democrat
in politics. His wife was a native of Iowa, and is
still living at the age of fiftj'-five. Doctor McGregor
was the fourth of their six children, five of whom
are still living.
Harry J. McGregor attended the schools of Dav-
enport, graduating from high school in 1905. He
took his medical course in the Iowa State Uni-
versity, receiving his degree in 1910. He served as
an interne in the State Hospital of Iowa City and
did his first practice in Nevada. He located at
Choteau in 191 1 and from the beginning has spe-
cialized as a surgeon. His hospital is finished with
every appliance and is one of the best institutions
of its kind in Northern Montana. Doctor McGregor is
a Fellow of the American Medical Association, and
is also a member of tlie Teton Countj- and State
Society.
For several years he was active in the Montana
National Guard, serving in the medical department
of the Second Montana Regiment. He held the rank
of captain. He was on duty in 1915 during the
Butte strike riots, and in 1916 went with the regi-
ment to the Mexican border. Doctor McGregor is
640
HISTORY OF MONTANA
affiliated with Great Falls Lodge No. 214 of the
Elks and in politics is a democrat.
June 12, 1912, he married Miss Mary O'Neill, a
native of Iowa and a daughter of Michael O'Neill.
They have two sons, Bob and Jack. Doctor McGregor
has been a leader in commercial circles in his com-
munity, having been president of the Choteau
Commercial Club during an active campaign, in
which many roads were put under way and a $150,-
000 high school was erected in the Town of Choteau.
Freeman A. D.\ley, of Teton County, has lived
in that section of Montana for a number of years.
He homesteaded a claim, has done his part in de-
veloping the country, and his father has been one
of the well known ranchers in Northern Montana.
Mr. Daley was born near Madison in Lacqui Parle
County, Minnesota, on his father's farm January 7,
1888, being the fifth among the thirteen children of
John J. and Anne (Lund) Daley. His mother was
born at Stavanger, Norway, January 26, i860. His
father was born in Wisconsin, April i, 1855, grew
up on his father's farm in that state, was married
in Iowa and in 1879 took up a Government claim
in Lacqui Parle Count\-, Minnesota. He built a
home, developed his land and was successfully en-
gaged in farming in that state until 1902, when he
moved to Teton County, Montana. Here he bought
the old Charles Cooper ranch ten miles northwest
of Choteau and became rather extensively interested
in cattle and horse raising. In 1916 he sold that
ranch and bought another one near Dupuyer, where
he continued in the cattle industry. In 1918 he was
appointed United States commissioner for his dis-
trict. He has also served two years as justice of
the peace and while in Minnesota was justice of the
peace and one term county commissioner of Lacqui
Parle County. He is a democrat in politics. Of his
family of thirteen children three sons and five
daughters are still living.
Freeman A. Daley was fourteen years of age
when his parents came to Montana. He acquired his
early education in Madison, Minnesota, and gradua-
ted from the high school at Choteau in 1907. Mr.
Daley is a civil engineer both by occupation and ex-
perience. In 1912 he graduated from the civil engi-
neering department of Montana State College at
Bozeman. For two years he was connected with
the engineering department of the Chicago, Milwau-
kee & St. Paul Railway. He then homesteaded a
claim near Choteau and in 1916 was appointed
under sheriff, serving eight months. For about two
years he worked and used every resource at his
command to make a success of dry land farming.
In November, 1918, he was elected county surveyor
of Teton County, and in that office his thorough
training as a civil engineer made him ' thoroughly
qualified for all the responsibilities devolving upon
him. He resigned from the office of county surveyor
April I, 1920, because the three former county com-
missioners of Teton County refused to place him
in charge of road and bridge work in the county,
thus making the office of county surveyor but a mere
joke. Since that time he has done private engineer-
ing and contracting. He is a democrat in politics
and is affiliated with Chevalier Lodge No. 12 of the
Knights of Pythias.
August 17, 1915, Mr. Daley married Patti G.
Caradine, a native of Beebe, Arkansas. They have
three children, John Joseph, Marcus Freeman and
Mary Anne.
Rev. Leonard Jacob Christler, rector of Saint
Mark's Episcopal Church of Havre, is one of the
aggressive clergjmen of his diocese, and an execu-
tive of exceptional ability to whose enthusiasm and
zeal is largely due the growth of the church in this
part of the state. Rev. Christler is also an effective
militant and during the period he served as a mem-
ber of the State Assembly, fathered and put
through some of the most constructive legislation
of recent years. He was born on his father's farm
near Union Springs, Cayuga Countv, New York,
November 24, 1876, a son of Henry Lewis and Mary
Jane (Riley) Christler, both of whom were born
at Waterloo, Seneca County, New York, he in 1858
and she in 1859, and both are still living. They had
five children, three of whom are still living, and of
them all Rev. Christler was the second in order of
birth. Henry L. Christler was engaged in farming
until 1904, when he embarked in mercantile business
at Waterloo, New York. He is a member of the
Episcopal Church. Politically he is a democrat.
After attending the public schools of Waterloo,
New York, Rev. Christler entered Brown University
at Providence, Rhode Island, and took the special
classical course. Following -his completion of it he
entered St. Andrew's Seminary of Syracuse, New
York, under the Rt. Rev. Frederick Dare Hunting-
ton, S. T. D., and took the regulation four years'
theological course, being graduated therefrom in
i8g6. For the subsequent four years Rev. Christler
was rector of Calvary Episcopal Church at Homer,
New York, and then from 1900 to 1907 was curate
of St. Peter's Church at Auburn, New York.
The ardent spirit of the young clergyman, how-
ever, was not satisfied with the work of old estab-
lished parishes and, his ability being recognized, he
was sent west on March I, 1907, as missionary of the
Milk River Valley, Country of Northern Montana,
with headquarters at Havre, and since that time has
developed one of the largest mission fields in the
American Church. When he arrived at Havre he
found a mission of seven communicants and set to
work with characteristic promptness to build a
parish, and today St. Mark's Parish has a largely
increased membership and is displaying a steady
growth in all directions. Rev. Christler has just
completed the erection of a beautiful stone church
edifice and in the grounds surrounding it has a
horticultural display which would do credit to any
expert in this art. A lover of flowers. Rev. Christ-
ler devotes his spare moments to cultivating them,
and in this healthful recreation doubtless finds a
much needed relaxation from the problems he is
constantly called upon to solve.
Since coming to Montana Rev. Christler has not
only built up St. Mark's Parish, but established St.
Mathew's Church at Glasgow in 191 1 ; built Trinity
Church at Gildford in 1915, and laid the foundation
for parishes in Malta and in about twenty-five com-
munities, which he visits every month, his territory
extending from Havre to the North Dakota state
line, to the Glacier National Park on the west, the
Canadian line on the north, and the Missouri River
on the south.
A democrat by inheritance and conviction, Rev.
Christler has not been content with merely giving
his support to its principles and candidates, but upon
the urgent demand of the citizens of old Chouteau
County to take a more aggressive part in securing for
the people of his adopted state the benefit of the ap-
plication of these principles as he interpreted them,
he entered the field of politics. He therefore became
the candidate of his party for the State Assembly
from old Chouteau County, and was elected in No-
vember, 1908. From the time he took his seat. Rev.
Christler made his influence felt and succeeded in
introducing and having passed the House Bill No.
191, known as the Greater Montana Bill, out of
HISTORY OF MONTANA
which developed the bureau of agriculture, labor
industry and publicity. To him is also due the credit
for the passage of House Bill No. 131, which pro-
vides for the sending of refractory girls and boys
to the House of the Good Shepherd or the Critten
Home, according to sex. In these homes the of-
fenders are given the benefit of home training and
practical educational advantages, so that when they
are released they are able to earn a living honestly
and become good citizens. In addition Rev. Christler
is responsible for several other bills, including House
Bill No. 252.
On October 7, 1914, Rev. Christler was married to
Anna Wadsworth, born at Auburn, New York, a
daughter of Hon. David and Mary (Cramer) Wads-
worth, both natives of New York State. Mrs.
Christler is the eldest of the three children born to
her parents. Mr. Wadsworth is a prominent man
and extensive manufacturer of Auburn, New York.
Prominent as a Mason, Rev. Christler belongs to
Homer Lodge No. 232, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons^ of Homer, New York; Washington Chap-
ter No. 17, Royal Arch Masons, of Homer, New
York; Salemtown Commandery, Knights Templar,
of Auburn, New York, and Zyara Temple, Mystic
Shrine, of Utica. New York. He is a member of
Auburn Lodge No, 474, Benevolent Protective Order
of Elks, and of Salemtown Chapter, Order of
Eastern Star, holding a life membership in both of
these organizations; of Havre Lodge No. 166, Fra-
ternal Order of Eagles, and Mizpah Lodge No. 64,
Knights of Pythias, and Assiniboine Lodge No.
56, Independent Order of Foresters, of Havre.
Possessing a personality that commands immediate
attention, Rev. Christler is also so humane, so genuine
and sympathetic that there are few men more pop-
ular with all classes than he. .\ thorough Ameri-
can, devoted to his country and to his church, it has
been his aim to raise humanity and bring about an
appreciation of the practical as well as spiritual
benefits of upright living. His wide experience and
broad sympathies enable him to understand men and
their motives as few can. and in dealing with them
he displays such truly Christian attributes that he
wins confidence and inspires the erring with an hon-
est determination to live more righteously, soberly
and Godly, no matter what the personal sacrifice
may be. Such men as he are the very salt of the
earth, and their value cannot be estimated in ordi-
nary terms. Only the future will spell out the ex-
tent of the debt this region owes to Rev. Christler
and it but imperfectly. As the result of the diversity
and bigness of the work in the !Milk River Valley
mission field and because of Rev. Christler's every-
day practical application of the Kingdom of God to
the needs of all sorts and conditions of men, he has
been styled the "Bishop of All-Out-Doors" by those
among whom he has ministered for fourteen years.
Montana, the Land of Majestic Shining Mountains
and the "Bishop of All-Out-Doors" are synonymous
terms.
James L. Johnston reached Montana about the
time the territory became a state, and for thirty
years has pursued an uninterrupted career of hard
work and good business management, chiefly in the
ranch industry. At one time he was one of the
large land owners in the state, and is still active as
a wool buyer at White Sulphur Springs, his home.
Mr. Johnston was born in Indiana County. Penn-
sylvania, October 27. 1868. son of Joseph M. and
Martha J. (Fleming) Johnston. His parents were
also natives of Indiana County, his father born
November 18, 1838, and his mother June 24, 1846.
His widowed mother is now living at Warm Springs,
Montana. Their five children are all living, James
L. being the oldest.
His father, who died November 28, 1897, was a
Union soldier during the Civil war, enlisting in the
spring of 1862 in Company A of the One Hundred
and Thirty-Fifth Regiment. Pennsylvania Infantry.
For about nine months his commander was G^n.
George B. McClellan. .^fter his honorable discharge
he resumed his career as a farmer in Indiana County
and spent practically all his active life on a farm.
He was active in local affairs, serving as school
director many years, as secretary and treasurer of a
local mutual fire insurance company, was affiliated
with the Grand Army of the Republic, and was a
democrat and a Presbyterian.
James L. Johnston was educated in the public
schools of Pennsylvania and lived on his father's
farm until he came to the Northwest, reaching
Townsend, Montana. November 8, 1888. A stage
took him from Townsend to White Sulphur Springs,
and he was soon employed riding the range as a
cowboy on Rock Creek. He came here practically
without capital and exercised both his industry and
good judgment to acquire a permanent stake in the
country. In 1897 he bought a squatter's right, and
for several years was associated with his brothers.
John and Frank, in the general merchandise business
at Valley Park and Crystal City. In 1913 he also
entered the merchandise business at White Sulphur
Springs under the name Anderson, Spencer & Com-
pany.
The most active part of his career as a rancher
was between 1899 and 191 1. He owned two ranches,
one of 6.800 acres and one of 4,650 acres He sold
the larger ranch in 1911 and at the same time dis-
posed of the bulk of his sheep. In April, 1919, he
sold his other ranch property. .\t times he ran
from 200 to 2,000 head of cattle, and from 2,000 to
6,000 head of sheep were under his ownership. He
was one of the organizers of the Clear Range Sheep
Company, and was a director and manager of that
company for two and a half years. Since 1912 Mr.
Johnston has been chiefly engaged in the buying
and shipping of wool, and through him immense
quantities of the staple has gone to eastern and
other markets.
_ Mr. Johnston has never been interested in poli-
tics or public ofiice. He is a past master of Diamond
City Lodge No.. 7, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, is afiiliated with Harlowton Chapter No.
822, Royal Arch Masons, is a member of Helena
Consistory of the Scottish Rite and Algeria Temple
of the Mystic Shrine, and with his wife is afiiliated
with Martha Chapter No. 11 of the Eastern Star.
For the past thirty-three years he has been a mem-
ber of Castle Mountain Lodge No. 16 of the Inde-
pendent Order of Odd Fellows, and is a past noble
grand. Former Governor Norris appointed Mr.
Johnston a member of the State Board of Stock
Commissioners, and he performed the duties of that
ofiice for six years, having been reappointed by Gov-
ernor Samuel B. Stewart.
January 24, 1912, Mr. Johnston married Dorothy
Cookson, a native of England. They have two chil-
dren, Isabel Mary and John Cartwright.
John H. Shober. A venerable, honored and
highly respected citizen of Helena, John H. Shober
won distinction not only as the pioneer attorney of
the city, but as one who in his active days kept
in touch with the living issues and affairs of the
day, and was prominently identified by membership
with the legislative bodies of three Middle Western
states, Minnesota, Dakota and Montana. Having
accomplished a satisfactory work, accumulating a
642
HISTORY OF MONTANA
competency, he is now living retired from his pro-
fessional labors, enjoying at his pleasant horne, II2
East Lawrence Street, all the comforts of life. A
son of George H. Shober, he was born January 5,
1832, in Loudoun County, Virginia, where his im-
migrant ancestor settled in colonial times on com-
ing to this country from his native country, Switzer-
land. His paternal grandfather, Simon Shober, was
born either in Maryland or Loudoun County, Vir-
ginia, where he spent the greater part of his life,
and where his death occurred.
Born in 1792 in Loudoun County, Virginia, George
H. Shober was there reared, educated and married.
He taught school as a young man and was later en-
gaged in agricultural pursuits, and was also a mill
owner. He was a veteran of the War of 1812, in
which he assisted in the defense of_ Washington,
District of Columbia. Subsequently" removing to
Ohio, he taught school and farmed in JefTerson
County for a time, and was later a resident of
Dodge County, Minnesota, his death occurring there
at Mantorville, in 1869. He was a democrat in poli-
tics, a member of the Ancient Free and Accepted
Order of Masons, and belonged to the German
Reformed Church.
George H. Shober married Susanna Sandbower
who was born in Loudoun County, Virginia, and
died in Mantorville, Minnesota. Six children were
born into the household thus established, as fol-
lows : Herod ; Sophia, who died in 1918 in South
Dakota; John H., the special subject of this sketch;
Elizabeth and Sarah, both of whom died in Kansas,
and Mary, whose death occurred at Mantorville,
Minnesota. Herod, the eldest child, born in Lou-
doun County, Virginia, was a farmer by occupa-
tion and followed his chosen work in Ohio, Minne-
sota and in Iowa, where he spent the last years of
his life. He married Melvina Scott, a life-long resi-
dent of Iowa, and they became the parents of four
children, one of whom, Hattie M. Shober, became
the wife of Col. Cornelius B. Nolan, a prominent
attorney of Helena.
John H. Shober, who makes his home with Colonel
and Mrs. Nolan, received his elementary education in
the rural schools of Greene County, Illinois, and
afterward read law at Jacksonville, Illinois, and in
Iowa and Minnesota. Going to the Territory of
Minnesota in 1854, he was there admitted to the bar
in 1857. Prior to that time, in 1855, he was appointed
clerk of Dodge County, and served in that capacity
for two years, at the same time being clerk of the
District Court, a position to which he was appointed
by Chief Justice Welch. The pioneer lawyer of
that county, he continued in practice there until
1858, when he settled in Bonhomme County, Dakota,
and as a lawyer met with success. Influential in
public afTairs, Mr. Shober was a member of the
First Territorial Legislature of Dakota, and presi-
dent of the council of that body, and as an active
member of the Second Territorial Legislature was
chairman of the judiciary committee.
Coming to Montana in 1864, Mr. Shober spent the
winter at Montana City and then engaged in mining
at Nelson Gulch, just outside of Helena. Locating
in Helena in September, 1865, he became one of the
foremost attorneys of Lewis and Clark County and
continued in the active practice of his profession
until 1917, when he retired from active business
cares. In 1865 and again in 1867 Mr. Shober was
elected district attorney for the Second District of
Montana, which at the first election included Edger-
ton, Jefferson, Chouteau and Gallatin counties, but
did not include the latter named county at the sec-
ond election. He also served in 1895 as a member
of the fourth session of the Montana State Legis-
lature.
During his earlier lif.e Mr. Shober was a democrat
in politics, but since 1896 has been independent, vot-
ing for the men and measures he deems best, re-
gardless of party restrictions. Fraternally he is a
member of Helena Lodge No. 3, Ancient Free and
Accepted Order of Masons, with which he united
at its formation in 1865, and of which he was the
first treasurer, serving in that capacity two years.
He is an ex-member of the State Bar Association,
the County Bar Association and the National Bar
Association. He has never married, but rnakes his
home, as above stated, with Colonel and Mrs. Nolan.
Hon. John A. Matthews, wlro became an as-
sociate justice of the Montana Supreme Court in
1919, possessed every qualification for his present
responsibilities based on long experience as a law-
yer and public official and former judge of the Dis-
trict Court.
Judge Matthews has spent most of his life in
Montana and knows the people and the state as a
native son. He was born at Mankato. Minnesota,
February i, 1876. He represents an old American
family, one that was transplanted from England to
Connecticut early in the seventeenth century. His
great-great-grandfather, Aaron Matthews, was a
civil engineer by profession and spent all his life at
Camden, New York. The great-grandfather, Ly-
man Matthews, also lived at Camden and followed
surveying and civil engineering as his vocation.
Judge Matthews' grandfather was Aaron Matthews,
born at Camden, New York, in 1800. He was the
third member of the Matthews family in as many
generations to follow the profession of civil engi-
neering. ' Some time before the Civil war he estab-
lished his family at Priest Church, Virginia, and
died there in 1876. His wife was a member of the
Hibbard family of New York State.
T. L. Matthews, father of Judge Matthews, was
born in Camden, New York, January i, 1847. He
spent his early life at his father's home at Priest
Church, near Washington, D. C. .A Northernerj
thoroughly identified in sympathy with the Union
cause, he left the uncongenial environment of North-
ern Virginia and went to Minnesota, where in 1861,
at the beginning of the war, he enlisted in the
Twenty-eighth Minnesota Infantry. He was a
gallant Union soldier throughout the war and par-
ticipated in the battles of Gettysburg and other
campaigns of the East. After the war he returned
to Minnesota and became a farmer at Mankato.
From Minnesota he moved his home to Glendale,
Montana, in 1877. At Glendale he became a fore-
man in the smelters and was also assigned the
peculiarly hazardous responsibility of bringing to
Glendale the company payrolls of the Hecla Mining
Company from Bannock and Virginia City. These
duties as a special messenger he performed with
complete fidelity to his trust, though frequently ex-
posed to danger from the highwaymen who infested
the roads of Montana. In 1882 he removed to
Marysville, this state ; was in the hardware business
there until 1886, and then established his home and
business at Helena. For a time he had charge of
the hardware department of the Kleinschmidt
Brothers department store, and then engaged in
the retail meat business. His first market was on
Fifth Street at the corner of Rodney Street, and
eventually he had three successful markets operat-
ing, the other two being on Broadway and Main
Street, and these are still doing a private business
in the capital city. He also established another
^CMry^^ML{ is^^UfKjus^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
market on Park Avenue. T. L. Matthews remained
active in business at Helena until 1907, when he re-
tired and removed to Spokane, Washington, where
he died February 9, 1917. He was a republican
and a Baptist. T. L. Matthews married Kate W.
Pryse, who was born at Cincinnati, Ohio, and is now
living at Spokane. They were married in Minnesota.
Of their children only two are living: Edna and
Judge John A. Matthews. The former is the wife
of Henry G. Duerfeldt, a druggist at Spokane.
Judge Matthews was only an infant when his
parents came to Montana, and most of his boyhood
was spent in Helena, where he attended the public
schools, graduating from high school in 1896. He
pursued his law studies in the University of Mich-
igan, graduating LL. B. in 1899, and in the sarne
year returned to Helena and took his first cases in
law. He practiced at Helena one year, another
year at Butte, and then moved to Townsend, where
he maintained his home interests and looked after a
large and profitable law nractice until 1913. From
March, 1913, to December i, 1919, he served as judge
of the District Court for District No. 14, compris-
ing Broadwater, Meagher and Wheatland counties.
He was appointed to this office by Governor Stewart,
and it was Governor Stewart who also named him
as an associate justice of the Supreme Court to fill
out an unexpired term. Before going on the bench
Judge Matthews served almost continuously as
county attorney of Broadwater County from 1902 to
1913, the only interruption to his consecutive serv-
ice being the two years from 1910 to 1912. He was
elected five times to that ofiice. Judge Matthews
still owns a modern home in Townsend. He is a
member of the State and .\merican Bar associa-
tions, is active in the First Baptist Church of
Helena, and is afliliated with Valley Lodge No. 19,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Townsend ;
Townsend Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fel-
lows; Helena Lodge No. 193, Benevolent and Protec-
tive Order of Elks, and Townsend Camp No. 365,
Woodmen of the World.
At Helena in 1899 Judge Matthews married Mabel
Rollins, daughter of T. A. and Mary E. (Johnson)
Rollins, the latter a resident of Portland, Oregon.
Her father was a merchant and died at Helena.
Judge and Mrs. Matthews have a family of five
children: Persis, a graduate of the Townsend High
School: Thaddeus B., also a graduate of the high
school at Townsend and is remittance clerk in the
Union Bank at Helena; Winifred, a student in the
Townsend High School: John Norman and Mary
Elizabeth, attending the grammar schools of Town-
send, where the family still reside.
Philip Green.^x. A college education is no
prerequisite to success in business and public affairs
since there are any number of men, prominent and
successful from every standpoint whose acquaint-
ance with schools was of the briefest character. A
case in point is that of Philip Greenan, adjutant gen-
eral of the State of Montana, and long prominent
in politics, military affairs and in labor interests of
this state.
His first twelve years were spent in Ireland,
where his parents, Peter and Anne (Finnegan)
Greenan, lived all their lives in County Monaghan.
All the formal schooling Philip Greenan ever had
was in Ireland.
He came to America with some relatives, and as
there were no child labor laws in operation in 1881
he found employment in a rubber factory at Mill-
ville, Massachusetts. Three years later, in 1884. he
went West, and for another three years worked in
the smelters at Leadville, Colorado. The following
year he was in Denver and in 1888 came to Mon-
tana and was put on the payroll of the great smelter
at Anaconda. He was a resident of that city for
ten years, and enjoyed a growing popularity among
his fellow employes at the smelter.
His first active experience in military life came
in 1898, when he was a member of Company K from
Anaconda sent to the Philippines. He saw someof
the strenuous campaigning during the insurrection
and was wounded in a skirmish March 23,' 1899, but
soon left the hospital and rejoined his command.
He remained in service until mustered out at San
Francisco and then returned home to Anaconda
and resumed work at the smelter for a year.
Mr. Greenan was elected as a democratic candi-
date in 1900 to the office of clerk of Deer Lodge
County, and two years later was re-elected. When
his term of service expired in March, 1904, he re-
sumed his place at the smelters, and continued for
another five years at that occupation.
On March 4, 1909, Governor Norris called Philip
Greenan to the responsibilities of the state office of
adjutant general. Soon afterward he removed his
home to Helena and has served continuously as ad-
jutant general for ten years. He had many exact-
ing responsibilities during the period of the World
war, and great credit is due his department for its
aid in protecting Montana's quota of enlisted men
and other resources.
General Greenan's family consists of his wife,
Bridget Dorian Greenan and their one son, Philip
Gregory. The only other child died in infancy. Mrs.
Greenan was born in Wisconsin, coming to Montana
when a young girl. Mr. and Mrs. Greenan are mem-
bers of the Catholic Church and he is affiliated with
the Woodmen of the World.
General Greenan is one of the most popular of
the state officials and is a man of undoubted ability.
He has supplied the deficiencies of his early school
advantages by judicious reading and has made him-
self a real authority on military technique and or-
ganization.
Samuel C. W.^lker. Deeds are thoughts crys-
tallized, and according to their brilliancy do we
judge the worth of a man to the country which
produced him, and in his works we expect to find
the true index to his character. The study of the
life of the representative .American never fails to
offer much of pleasing interest and valuable instruc-
tion, developing a mastery of expedients which have
brought about most wonderful results. The subject
of this review is a worthy representative of that
type of .■\merican character and of that progressive
spirit which promotes public good in advancing in-
dividual prosperity and conserving popular inter-
ests.
Samuel C. Walker was born in Winchester, Fred-
erick County, Virginia, on September 27, 1842, and
is the son of Samuel and Elizabeth (Wilson) Walk-
er. Samuel Walker was a native of Pennsylvania,
born in 1808, and his death occurred in 1887, at the
age of seventy-nine years. His widow, who sur-
vived him a number of years, was born in Win-
chester, Virginia, in 1813, and died in 1898, at the
age of eighty-five years. Of the nine children born
to their union, but two now survive, the subject of
this sketch and Eva, who married William Smith,
of McGheyville, Virginia. Samuel Walker accom-
panied his parents on their removal from Pennsyl-
vania to \'irginia when he was a mere child, and
he secured his education in the schools of Virginia.
He pursued his studies along theological lines and
was ordained as a minister of the Baptist Church.
Though he was deeply interested in his church and
HISTORY OF MONTANA
religious matters, he never preached, as his services
were in constant demand in other lines of effort.
He was a millwright by trade and was also engaged
in the mercantile business at Fairmount, Virginia
(now West Virginia), where he remained until
1854, when he removed to Clarksburg, now in West
Virginia, and engaged in the hotel business, with
w^hich he was connected up to the time of his death.
Politically he was a supporter of the democratic
party.
Samuel C. Walker received his education in the
public schools of Clarksburg, Virginia, where he
was reared. He earned his first money in hoeing
corn, for which he was to receive thirty-seven and
a half cents a day, but up to the present time he
has not been paid for that work. At the age of
eighteen years his studies were interrupted by the
outbreak of the war between the states, and fie en-
listed in Company E, Twelfth Regiment, West Vir-
ginia Volunteer Infantry, with which he served until
the close of the war, receiving an honorable dis-
charge in July, 1865, at Wheeling, West Virginia, with
the rank of a lieutenant major. He had a noteworthy
military record, having participated in all the battles,
skirmishes and campaigns in which his regiment
had a part, including the first battle of Winchester,
Lynchburg, Cedar Creek, Opequon, Gettysburg, and
then, on July 6, 1864, was ordered back from Shen-
andoah Valley to rejoin the Army of the Potomac,
with which army he took part in the battle of
Hatcher's Run. It was there that General Grant
ordered General Sheridan to drive General Lee back,
thus preventing him from getting supplies. Sheri-
dan drove the Confederates back to Petersburg,
thence to Richmond and on to Appomattox Court
House, where Lee surrendered on April 9, 1865.
Grant was twenty-five miles away, but was sent for
and hurried to receive Lee's surrender. When he
arrived Lee said, "I presume you don't know me."
Grant replied, "I do ; we both served in the Mexican
war." Then followed a short conversation, con-
sisting principally of reminiscences of former days,
followed by General Lee tendering his sword to
General Grant. The latter generously declined to
receive it, adding also that Lee's officers could retain
their side arms. During the conversation Lee stated
that his men were totally without rations, when
Grant apologized for the delay and asked how many
rations were required — if 25,000 would be sufficient.
Lee replied that 12.000 would suffice. On the day
the Confederate army was disarmed Grant rode
over to Lee's headquarters, but, not being recog-
nized, he was denied admission and was compelled
to call for the officer of the day. Grant and Lee
then walked over to a nearby hill and engaged in con-
versation for over an hour. The incidents just re-
lated were all witnessed by the subject of this
sketch.
In the spring of 1866 Mr. Walker went to Balti-
more and entered the employ of a wholesale hard-
ware company as traveling salesman, in which ca-
pacity he served for fifteen years. In 1881 he en-
gaged in farming in Barbour County, West Virginia,
which occupied his attention up to 1893, when he
was appointed United States immigration inspector of
Chinese and kindred nationalities, being first located
in the Puget Sound District. State of Washington.
Later he was transferred for three years to Los
Angeles, California, but in November, 1906, was
assigned to duty as United States immigrant in-
spector at Havre, Montana, where he has remained
on duty for the past fourteen years.
Politically Mr. Walker gives his support to the
democratic party, though he is not in any sense a
seeker after the honors of public office. He is deeply
interested in fraternal affairs, being a member of
the Masonic Order and the Grand Army of the
Republic, his membership in the latter organization
being in Custer Post at Tacoma, Washington. In
1867 he was made a Master Mason in Acana Lodge
No. no and a Royal Arch Mason in Adiniram Chap-
ter, Baltimore, Maryland, holding his membership
in these two Masonic orders for a number of years
and then demitting and now holding membership in
Havre Lodge No. 55 and Royal Arch Chapter at
Havre, Montana.
In May, 1877, Mr. Walker was married to Emma
D. Pickens, a native of Barbour County, West Vir-
ginia, and to them have been born two children,
Anna and James P. The latter, who resides at
Richmond, Virginia, is a civil engineer in the em-
ploy of the Atlantic Coast Line Railway, and is
now in charge of extension work at Charleston,
South Carolina.
In every phase of life's activities in which he has
been engaged, Mr. Walker has endeavored to per-
form his full part, and because of his high personal
character, his industry and his success he has earned
and today enjoys to a marked degree the confidence
and good will of the people of his community.
The subject's eldest brother, Edward, was edu-
cated in Virginia, and in young manhood went west,
locating in Leavenworth, Kansas, where he engaged
with Majors Russell and Waddell as a freighter.
His route lay from there to Pike's Peak, with ox
teams, the long and tiresome overland journey be-
ing accompanied with constant danger from many
sources. He was freighting with this firm when
the Civil war came on, but he immediately quit work
and rode horseback througli Te.xas, Louisiana, Mis-
sissippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North
Carolina and Virginia to Winchester in the latter
state, where he enlisted in the Confederate army.
He was commissioned a first lieutenant in .^hbay's
Cavalry. He later died of yellow fever at Winches-
ter.
Another brother of the subject, Henry S. Walker,
became a man of considerable prominence in West
Virginia, serving that commonwealth two terms as
secretary of state. He was editor of the Wheeling
Register for many years and became the founder of
the Charleston Courier at Charleston, West Vir-
ginia.
Hon. William Lawson Holloway is now in the
eighteenth year of a consecutive service as an as-
sociate justice of the Supreme Court of Montana.
For a number of years the decisions of the court
have largely reflected the sound scholarship, com-
prehensive view and liberal spirit of Judge Hollo-
way.
Judge Holloway began the practice of law during
the earl}' years of Montana's statehood, and was a
resident and lawyer of Bozeman until he went on
the Supreme bench.
He was born at Kirksville, Missouri, November
8, 1867. His ancestry is of sturdy English stock, and the
Holloways were colonial settlers in Virginia. One
member of the family was a delegate to the Federal
Constitutional Convention of 1787. Judge Holloway's
grandfather was John Holloway, who was born in
Virginia in 1805, and in early life crossed the moun-
tains into Kentucky, where he was a farmer, and later
moved to Monroe County, Missouri, where he lived on
a farm. He died at Moberly, Missouri, in 1895. Silas
N. Holloway, father of Judge Holloway, was born
in Kentucky, April 14, 1828. He lived there until
he was about twenty years of age, and in 1847 vol-
unteered for service in the Mexican war and joined
HISTORY OF MONTANA
645
the command of Gen. Phil Kearney. After his re-
turn from the Southwest he located in Monroe
County, Missouri, but soon afterward moved to
Adair County, near Kirksville, in Northeast Mis-
souri, and spent the rest of his active life as a
farmer. He exercised much influence in the com-
munity and for a number of times was honored by
his fellow citizens with the office of probate judge of
Adair County. He was a republican, for many
years was affiliated with 'the Masonic fraternity, and
was a member of the Christian Church. He died
at Kirksville, September 19, 1895. Judge Holloway's
mother bore the maiden name of Charlotte Aired.
She was born in Monroe County, Missouri, February
14. 1833. and died at Hurdland in Northeastern Mis-
souri, August 25, i8go. She was the mother of a
large family of children, Judge Holloway being
seventh among them. The oldest, Mary Ellen, born
December 9, 1850, is the wife of Newton Corbin, a
retired farmer at Kirksville, Missouri; Jennie, born
August 28, 1852, lives at Cleveland, Ohio, widow of
Dr. John A. Kerr, an osteopathic physician, who
died in 1919 ; Perry D., born August 12, 1854, is a
farm o\vner and minister of the Christian Church,
living at ]Milton, Iowa ; Thomas H., born October
25, 1856. is a farmer at Brashear, Missouri ; Rosa
B., born November 16, 1862, is the wife of E. E.
Earhart, employe of a mercantile firm at Bozeman ;
Andrew J., born July 18, 1865, is in business in
Indiana ; Olive, the next younger to Judge Hollo-
way, was born April 14, 1870, and is the wife of
Samuel Surrey, a farmer at Hurdland, Missouri ;
Alberta, born September 26, 1876, was a trained nurse
by profession and was acting as head of an orphan
school at Salt Lake City when she died August 28,
1918; Jesse, the youngest of the family, was born
November 21, 1874, and died while a student in the
University of Michigan at Ann Arbor October 28,
1896.
William Lawson Holloway spent his early life on
his father's farm in Northeast Missouri. The pri-
mary advantages afforded by the rural schools he
supplemented by attending a boarding school, and
afterward the Missouri State Normal at Kirksville,
from which he graduated in 1887. The next four
years he was principal of schools at Crystal City in
Jefferson County, Missouri. In 1891 he entered the
University of Michigan law department, and re-
ceived his LL. B. degree June 30, 1892. As the
scene of his professional career he chose the new
State of Montana, coming to Bozeman and opening
a law office, where he quickly earned a reputation as
an able lawyer and a man of force and energy in
the community. He practiced law at Bozeman eight
years, until 1900, when he was elected judge of the
Ninth Judicial District, comprising Gallatin, Meagher
and Broadway counties. He was chosen for the
regular term of four years, but resigned in the
middle of his term as a result of his election in the
fall of 1902 to the Supreme Court. Judge Hollo-
way was re-elected in 1908 and 1914, and his present
term expired December 31, 1920. In 1894 he was
elected county attorney of Gallatin County.
Judge Holloway is a republican in political affilia-
tion. He is a prominent member of the State and
American Bar assoc''iations, is a member of the
Christian Church, and is affiliated with Bozeman
Lodge No. 18, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons ;
Zona Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, at Bozeman ;
Bozeman Lodge No. 463, Benevolent and Protective
Order qi Elks, and Pythagoras Lodge No. 2, Knights
of Pythias. He is a member of the Country Club
of Helena. February 18, 1898, at Butte, he mar-
ried Miss Lalia Holmes, a daughter of Dr. L. E. and
Sarah (Hall) Holmes, both deceased. Her father
was a pioneer physician and surgeon of Montana,
and had been an army surgeon up to 1870, stationed
at various posts in the west. He practiced medicine
at Helena, Deer Lodge and Butte. Mrs. Holloway
is a graduate of the Butte High School, and com-
pleted her education in Wellesley College, Massa-
chusetts. Judge and Mrs. Holloway have three
children and have given them every incentive and
advantage both in home and school. Eleanor, the
oldest, born November 11, 1901, is now a student
in Vassar College ali Poughkeepsie, New York.
William L., born March 16, 1903, is attending the
Irving School at Tarrytown-on-the-Hudson. John,
born September 14, 1909, is in the Helena grammar
school.
A. J. Duncan. Among the men who. are repre-
senting their districts in offices of civic importance,
one who has a splendid record for public service is
A. J. Duncan, the clerk and recorder of Lewis and
Clark County. He has long been a leader in the
local ranks of the democratic party, and in various
other ways is an important factor in the life of his
city and county.
Mr. Duncan, who was born at Oak Grove in
Jackson County, Missouri, in December, 1876,
traces descent in the paternal line to Scotland, but
during colonial times the family became established
in the South, as did also his family on the maternal
side, who were originally from England. The father
of A. J. Duncan was Robert Duncan, born in No-
vember, 1834, near Frankfort, Kentucky, and died
at Helena, Montana, in October, 1918. The parents
of Robert Duncan removed to Jackson County, Mis-
souri, as early as 1840, where they were among the
pioneers, and where A. T. Duncan, the grandfather
of A. J., was a farmer for many years. He died
there shortly before the birth of his grandson. He
had served in the campaign against the Indians.
His wife bore the maiden name of Elizabeth By-
waters, and both she and her husband were born in
Kentucky.
Robert W. Duncan, a son of these Missouri pio-
neers, was reared, educated and married in Jack-
son County, and there for many years he followed
farming. In April, 1883, he came to Montana and
located in the Prickly Pear Valley near Helena,
where he resumed his farming operations and be-
came one of the community's influential citizens.
He finally retired from an active life and moved
into Helena in 1900, where for eighteen years or
until his death he lived in the enjoyment of the re-
wards of former toil. In 1854, during the days of
the California gold excitement, he crossed the plains
to that state and spent about eight years in placer
mining, returning then to his home in Jackson
County, Missouri. He upheld the principles and
policies of the democratic party, was a devout and
consistent member of the Baptist Church, and for
many years enjoyed affiliations witli the Masonic
fraternity. He joined the order when but twenty-
one years of age, and during the remainder of his
life retained an active interest in its work. When
trouble arose between the North and South he en-
listed for service in 1862 in the Confederate cause,
and continued a brave and valiant soldier until the
struggle ended, in the meantime having been taken
prisoner and later exchanged.
In his early life Robert W. Duncan married
Maria, Joyce, who survives him and resides at
Helena. She was born in Missouri in April, 1843.
The following children were born to this union; J.
M., a rancher in Richland County, Montana; Effie
B., the wife of Thomas Matthews, who came to
Montana with the pioneers of the '60s, and is now
HISTORY OF MONTANA.
a retired rancher living at Bozeman ; J. F., who is
engaged in ranching in Richland County, Montana,
near his brother J. M. ; Eldridge Hill, who died dur-
ing his youth ; Eugene Herbert, who also died when
young; A. J., of Helena; Lilborn, who died when
young; Lula, the wife of Charles Grant, a merchant
at Condon, Oregon ; and Leona C, who resides with
her mother in Helena, where she is serving as the
deputy county clerk and recorder. During 1913
and 1916 she served as the county superintendent
of schools for Sanders County.
After a training in the rural schools of Lewis and
Clark County A. J. Duncan entered the Montana
Wesleyan University in Prickly Pear Valley, now
known as the Montana Wesleyan College of Helena,
where he spent about four years. After attaining
his twentyffourth year lie left his father's ranch and
came to Helena and was appointed deputy clerk and
recorder of Lewis and Clark County in February,
IQOI. He filled that position for five years, or until
the spring of igo5, when he was elected the city
treasurer, taking office in May, 1906, and two years
later, in igo8, was reelected to the office and served
for four years. In the fall of 1910 he was defeated
for the office of county treasurer, and then engaged
in the real estate business. In November, 1912,
Mr. Duncan was elected the clerk and recorder of
Lewis and Clark County, assuming the duties of
the office January i, 1913, and during the years of
1914-16-18 was returned to the office and is the pres-
ent incumbent, having offices in the courthouse.
The home of Mr. Duncan is at 701 Si.xth Avenue.
Helena. He was married in 190;, in Bozeman, Mon-
tana, to Miss Esther Gullic, a daughter of F. B.
and Martha (Wallis) Gullic. The father, who was
a mine operator in California, died in that state,
and the mother is now living in Helena. The two
children of Mr. and Mrs. Duncan are Maria, born
in April, 1907, and Robert Wallace, born in June,
1910. Mr. Duncan is a member of the Masonic
Order, belonging to Morning Star Lodge No. S.
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Helena,
Helena Consistory No. 3, fourteenth degree, and he
is also a member of Helena Lodge No. 193, Benev-
olent Protective Order of Elks, of Helena Aerie
No. 16, Fraternal Order of Eagles, and of the
Woodmen of the World.
Percival D. Scott, who is conducting an abstract
and insurance business at White Sulphur Springs,
is one of the representative men of his calling in
Montana. Mr. Scott is a member of the American
Association of Title Men, the Montana Abstracters
Association and the Insurance Federation of Mon-
tana, and is prepared to furnish complete abstracts
to town lots, farm lands, water rights and mining
claims in Meagher County, and represents the Home,
Aetna, Lloyds, Niagara, Montana. Caledonian, Man-
chester, Rocky Mountain, Fire Association, American
Central, Law, Union and Rock, and Liverpool, Lon-
don and Globe Insurance companies.
Percival D. Scott was born on his father's farm
in Audubon County, Iowa, April 13, 1881, a son
of John H. and Elizabeth (Carper) Scott. John H.
Scott was born in Henry County, Iowa, July 31,
1854, and died on October 31. 1909. His widow was
born at Harpersburg, Virginia, December i, 1853,
and is now residing at Los Angeles, California.
They were married in Audubon County, Iowa, in
1880, and Percival D. Scott is their only child.
Completing his studies in the public schools of
Iowa during his boyhood, which was spent on the
farm, John H. Scott went into a merchandise busi-
ness at .\udubon. Iowa, and remained there until
l8g8, when he came to Montana and homesteaded
at Livingston, Park County, and also engaged in
a general merchandise business at Livingston with
his son, the two being associated together until his
death, which was caused by an accident. He became
county clerk and recorder in Audubon County, Iowa,
holding the office for two terms, and he was on the
school board of his district for many years. He was
made a Mason in Audubon Lodge No. 211, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, but demitted and became
a member of Livingston Lodge, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, and he also demitted from the
Chapter in Iowa to Livingston Chapter. Royal Arch
Masons. While in Iowa he served his lodge as
master. In politics he was a democrat.
Percival D. Scott attended the public schools of
Audubon County, the Audubon High School, and
the Montana Wesleyan University at Helena, Mon-
tana, follow-ing which he became a civil service
clerk in the postoffice at Livingston, Montana, leav-
ing that office to go into business with his father.
After the death of his father he continued this busi-
ness until January, 191 1, when he sold it and located
in Meagher County on a homestead, and at the same
time served as deputy clerk of the county court.
Later he was a deputy for two years in the sheriff's
office. Mr. Scott then embarked in his present busi-
ness, which he has made the largest agency in
Meagher County, and he has the only abstract office
in the county. In politics he is a republican.
On .'\pril 7, 1910, Mr. Scott was married to Jose-
phine Rader, a daughter of Charles T. and Jose-
phine (Johnson) Rader, he born in Greene County,
Indiana, March 30, 1842, and she in Copenhagen,
Denmark, April 37, 1853. They were married at
Salt Lake City, Utah, March 14, 1869, and had eight
children, all of whom are living, Mrs. Scott being
the fifth in order of birth. Mr. Rader was educated
in Indiana, and enlisted from that state for service
during the war between the North and the South,
in the One Hundred and Forty-third Infantry, and
took part in all the engagements of his regiment,
and at the close of the war re-enlisted in Company
G, Thirty-sixth Infantry, United States Regulars,
and was sent to Camp Douglas, Utah. Later his
command was consolidated with the Seventh, and
he was quartermaster sergeant from the time he
re-enlisted. On February 12. 1872, Mr. Rader was
discharged at Camp Baker, Montana Territory. He
then embarked in the sheep business on Camas Creek,
his property being known as Rader's Ranch. Later
he branched out and handled cattle and horses until
his retirement in 1913. For several years he was
sheriff of Meagher County, and also served as as-
sessor for some time. He belonged to Washa Lodge,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Salt Lake
City, Utah, but demitted and became a member of
Diamond Lodge No. 7, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons. He also belonged to Helena Lodge, Benev-
olent Protective Order of Elks, the Odd Fellows
and the Grand Army of the Republic. In politics
he was a strong republican. Mr. Rader died on
August II, 1915.
Jack E. Soden. The people of the country are
awakening to the necessity for good roads, and the
various localities are making the building of them
part of their community work. Montana has taken
a progressive stand on this class of improvement,
and its citizens have on foot some very extensive
plans for further extending the scope of the move-
ment. One of the men who is making possible the
construction of excellent country roads at a rea-
sonable price is Jack E. Soden of White Sulphur
Springs, who is also engaged in a real estate and
loan business.
HISTORY OF AIONTANA.
647
Jack E. Soden was born in Brockings County,
South Dakota, November 4, 1880, a son of Francis
and Julia (Finch) Soden. Francis Soden was born
at Rockford, Illinois, on December 25, 184S, and
died in 1917, while his wife was born in Philadel-
phia, Pennsylvania, on September 8, 1848, and died
in 1916. They w-ere married at Brooklyn, New
York, and eleven children were born to them, nine
of whom are still living. Jack E. Soden being sixth
in order of birth.
With the outbreak of hostilities between the
North and the South, Francis Soden enlisted in
the Union army at Springfield, Illinois, as a mem-
ber of Company H, One Hundred and Nineteenth
Illinois Volunteer Infantry, in 1801, and took part
in nutnerous battles and skirmishes. He was
wounded on the battlefield in the right thigh, and
during that engagement was cited by his superior
officer for bravery. After spending about three
months in the hospital because of his wound he
rejoined his regiment, with which he remained until
the close of the war. In spite of the fact that he
continued in the service he never fully recovered,
and during the remainder of his life was a sufiferer
on account of this disability, as were so many of
the survivors of that great conflict. In 1870 he
came west to Kingsbury County, South Dakota, prior
to the division of Dakota, and homesteaded, but
later moved to Brockings County of the same state,
and took up a tree claim and pre-empted land, con-
tinuing to farm until within three years of his death,
when increasing disability, resulting from his old
wound, forced him to retire. From its organiza-
tion he took a deep interest in the Grand Army
of the Republic, and belonged to the local post.
The Methodist Episcopal Church had in him an
earnest and active member. Like so many of the
old soldiers, he supported the principles of the re-
publican party.
Jack E. Soden attended the public schools of
South Dakota, and found ample opportunity to be
useful on his father's farm until he was twenty
years old. At that time he left home and went to
Grant County, South Dakota, and spent five years
still continuing to farm, and then moved to Meeker
County, Minnesota, where he not only was engaged
in farming, but conducted a dairy for a year. Once
more he made a change, going to Monona County,
Iowa, for a year, agriculture still having in him an
active exponent. Mr. Soden then came to Montana
and homesteaded in Fergus County, near Garneill,
but later moved to Judith Gap, and embarked in a
real estate business and also handled farm imple-
ments, remaining there until 1913, when he located
permanently at White Sulphur Springs, where, under
the firm name of Soden & Heyn, he is engaged in
building country roads. This firm had the contract
for building the first road in Meagher County.
Under the name of the Northwest Loan & Realty
Company, Mr. Soden is handling stock ranches, ir-
rigated farms and wheat lands, and making loans,
and is doing a very large business in this line as
well. Fraternally he is active as a member of Lew-
istown Lodge No. 654, Benevolent Protective Order
of Elks. Brought up in the faith of the republican
party, Mr. Soden has always given it his hearty
support.
On December 16, 1902, Mr. Soden was united in
marriage with Gertrude M. Jones, born at Charles-
ton, West Virginia, a daughter of Thomas F. and
Marian (Galbreath) Jones, both of whom are na-
tives of West Virginia. They became the parents of
ten children, nine of whom survive, and Mrs.
Soden is the eldest of the family. Mr. Jones is
■ engaged in farming in South Dakota, where he and
his excellent wife are now living. Mr. and Mrs.
Soden have two children, namely: Archibald C.
and Grace. Mr. Soden is a man who has always
realized that the future in Montana looms large
with economic problems, which in his opinion can
be satisfactorily solved by continuing to develop the
rural regions so that more solid and reliable people
will be encouraged to join those already here and
aid in giving prestige to the great state of whom
all fortunate enough to have interests here are so
proud.
J.\MEs CuRsiE AuLD. It would be interesting to
make a list of the early settlers in Montana and to
note what a large percentage of them came orig-
inally from the Dominion of Canada. Certainly no
country has done so much for us, having sent her
best blood into the wilderness of the Treasure State
to clear it up and make room for advancing civiliza-
tion. That they have done their work well goes
without saying, and to be convinced of this one
has only to take a cursory glance over the fine, well-
improved farms and ranches throughout the state
and at our splendid public buildings, for, while
laboring for their own advancement, they have also
helped the public enterprises in a general way.
Among the successful and enterprising farmers of
Montana who hail from the neighboring country
just over the line, specific mention should be made
of James C. Auld, of Hill County, who as a farmer
and stock raiser has achieved a splendid success and
is numbered among the representative men of his
section of the state.
James Currie .'^uld was born on his father's farm
in Canada on March 8, 1851. His parents, James
West and Isabella (Currie) Auld, were natives of
Scotland, but both are now deceased, the father dy-
ing in 1884, at the age of sixty-one years, and the
mother in 1885, at the same age. They were mar-
ried in Dumfree County, Canada, and James C.
is the fourth child in order of birth of the nine chil-
dren born to them. Seven of the children, four sons
and tliree daughters, are still living. James West
Auld left his native country in young manhood and
came to Canada, the trip being made by sailmg ves-
sel, which required six weeks to complete the voy-
age. They landed at Quebec. In his native land
he had learned the trades of plasterer and stone
mason, also that of tailor, and it is related that he
made all the clothing for his children for a while.
Eventually he was employed at his other trades
in connection with building operations. In 1861 he
located in the County of Huron, Canada, of which
he was literally a pioneer, and there he and his sons
bravely went to work to create a home, which meant
the cutting of the dense timber growth and the
clearing and breaking of the land. Eventually their
efTorts were rewarded in the realization of a good
farm, where the father pursued his cultivation of the
soil and the raising of live stock, in which he made
a specialty of shorthorn cattle. He was a member
of the Presbyterian Church and a man of fine per-
sonal qualities of character.
James C. Auld secured his education in the public
schools of Canada and as soon as old enough he
helped his father clear the land and otherwise im-
prove the new home in Huron County, Canada. He
broke oxen, chopped cordwood and performed such
other tasks as were cliaracteristic of pioneer life in
any community in those days. When twentj'-four
years of age Mr. Auld began farming on his own
account, which he continued there until 1881, going
then to Saskatchewan and taking up homestead
and pre-emption claims. At that time the Riel re-
bellion was under way in Canada, and up to 1885
HISTORY OF MONTANA
he served in the transport service of the Canadian
Government. In 1887 he came to Montana and en-
gaged vifith the N-Bar-N Cattle Company as a range
rider or cowboy, but in the fall of that year he
returned to Regina, Canada, riding the entire dis-
tance horseback. Returning, he brought his family
with him. bringing also teams and two cows, and
they located at Hinsdale, Chouteau County, but
which is now in Dawson County. Shortly afterward
they removed to where Toledo, Hill County, now
stands, and there the family lived in a section house
for five years, Mr. Auld having secured employment
as section foreman on the Great Northern Railroad.
He was the oldest employe of the company between
Minot and Great Falls, and he ran the first section
car into Havre. He finally resigned the position in
order to "squat" on a tract of Indian reservation
land, this being right after the Indian reservation
land was opened for settlement. In the spring of
1889 Mr. Auld started in the cattle business, his
start having been made with the two cows which
he brought from Canada. Later he bought a car-
load of cattle, and increased his business from
time to time until he had between 300 and 400 head
of cattle. His favorite brand has been the White-
face. He has also given considerable attention to the
breeding and raising of Percheron horses, in which
he has been successful. In the spring of 1919 he
sold a team of horses which weighed 3,400 pounds.
In 1914, just prior to the outbreak of the World
war, he imported from France a fine Percheron
stallion. He has been careful, prudent and discrimi-
nating in his operations and has prospered in all his
undertakings, so that today he is numbered among
the successful men of his community.
On February 24, 1876, Mr. .Auld was married to
Mary Ross, who was born in Zora, Canada, the
daughter of William and Willena Ross. Her parents
were both born in Scotland and in 1909 c<ime to
Havre from Canada and there they lived until their
deaths, which occurred when they were ninety-two
years of age. Mrs. Auld was the fourth in order
of birth of their seven children. To Mr. and Mrs.
Auld were born seven children, five daughters and
two sons, as follows: William James, who was mar-
ried to Ada Lawrence ; John, who was married to
Ethel Sprague; Margaret H., the wife of Thomas
W. McKenzie, postmaster of Havre; Marion, who
is the wife of John F. Lindhe, received a good col-
lege education and is now assistant cashier in the
Security State Bank of Havre, with which she has
been connected for four years, Mr. Lindhe being
engaged in the mercantile business at Glacier Park,
Montana ; Mary, who received a teacher's certificate
from the state superintendent of public instruction
before she was eighteen years of age and who
taught school for several years, is the wife of J. D.
Kelly, .of Havre, and they have a daughter, Vir-
ginia; Lillian is the wife of Harry B. Atkinson, a
railroad conductor living at Havre, and they have
two daughters and one son, Edith, Marion and
James; Hazel is the wife of Clarence Reasman.
During the recent World war he was in the United
States aerial service, being in camp in Texas. He
is now a traveling salesman for the Armour Pack-
ing Company of Chicago, with headquarters in
Boise, Idaho. During 1918 Mrs. Reasman was em-
ployed as clerk and stenographer in the office of
the clerk and recorder of Hill County at Havre.
Politically Mr. Auld is a stanch supporter of the
democratic party, and for many years has rendered
his community good service as a member of the
school board. He was one of the first aldermen
elected in Havre, representing the First Ward. Mr.
Auld has always been of a progressive type of busi-
ness manj taking the lead in improvements. In the
fall of 1891 he built the first livery stable in Havre,
and in many ways has shown himself to be a man
of value to his community, a man of lofty character,
sturdy integrity and unswerving honesty. During
the pioneer period in this section of the state he
shared fully the trials and difficulties known to the
early settlers of a new country. He was one of the
sturdy figures upon which the burdens of the new
community fell, and he bore his part in the general
upbuilding of the same manfully and well.
George Fowlie has given fifteen years of consecu-
tive service in the courthouse at White Sulphur
Springs, most of the time as county clerk and re-
corder of Meagher County. His home has been in
Montana for thirty years, a residence dignified and
made notable by many services, as school teacher, as
a miner, public official and rancher.
Mr. Fowlie was born on his father's farm in
Waupaca County, Wisconsin, March 11, 1866, son
of James and Margaret (Whyte) Fowlie. His
father, who was born in Scotland, came to this coun-
try at the age of eighteen. A brother had proposed
to make the voyage with him, but turned back at the
last moment. James Fowlie came on alone, and
was on a sailing vessel six weeks, being thus de-
layed by storms, the ship losing its sails and drift-
ing back for about 200 miles. He landed at Quebec,
and operated a threshing outfit in Canada for sev-
eral years. Moving to Waupaca County, Wisconsin,
he played the part of a pioneer and hewed a farm
from tile wilderness. He died there in 1880, at the
age of fifty-six. For four years he served as town-
ship clerk in Wisconsin and in politics was a
republican. His wife was born in Quebec and died
at the age of sixty. • Of their eleven children George
was next to the youngest, and six sons and one
daughter are still living.
George Fowlie acquired a thorough education, at-
tending public schools in Waupaca County, Milton
College and the University of Wisconsin. His
higher education was paid for largely through his
earnings as a teacher. He taught his first term of
school at the age of fifteen. He was engaged in
that work for seven years in Wisconsin, and in
1888 came to Montana. His first location was at
Castle in Meagher County. Most of his time for
ten years was spent in silver mining, and he then
resumed the occupation of teaching for three years.
Mr. Fowlie has the distinction of having taught the
first school at Harlowton, now the county seat of
Wheatland Count)'. He was also in the hotel busi-
ness at Harlowton about a year. Mr. Fowlie was
elected county -treasurer of Meagher County in the
fall of 1904, and by re-election in 1906 completed two
terms in that office. Then in 1908 came his election
to the office of county clerk and recorder, and he
has been administrative head of that office now for
twelve years, being reelected in 1910, 1912, 1914,
1916 and 1918.
In the meantime he has acquired many valuable
property interest, serving to permanently and influ-
entially identify him with this part of Montana. He
homesteaded in 1908 a claim four miles northwest
of White Sulphur Springs. To that original. home-
stead he has added other lands until he has about
1,000 acres, and in normal years runs between 100
and 145 head of cattle and also a number of horses.
He has also been interested in mining projects and
since January, 1919, has been a director in the
Central State Bank of White Sulphur Springs.,
Mr. Fowlie is affiliated with Carbonate Lodge No.
HISTORY OF MONTANA
649
39, Independent Order of Odd Fellows at Harlow-
ton, Lodge No. 27 of the Knights of Pythias at
Twodot, and politically is a democrat.
In 1887 he married Miss Millie I. Chambers, also
a native of Waupaca County, Wisconsin. Seven
children were born to their marriage : Eva, George,
James, Sadie, Freda, Frances and Mary. Eva is the
wife of Harry C. Klock and the mother of three
children. George enlisted in June. 1917, in the
Marines and was on duty at Mare Island. California,
and later at Galveston, Te.xas, and served until after
the signing of the armistice. The son James also
entered the service in 1917 in the Hospital Corps,
received his early training at Camp Lee, Virginia,
and less than si.xty days after enlisting was sent
overseas to France. He returned to the United
States and received his discharge at New York in
July, 1919. The daughter Sadie is the wife of
Arthur F. Ford and is employed in Mr. Fowlie's
county office. The daughter Freda is the wife of
Prince Dimmitt.
George Benxett N agues, who has served three
elective terms as sheriff of Meagher County, has
spent most of his life in Montana, is the son of
a Montana pioneer, and is widely and favorably
known over this section of the state both for his
business and official service.
His father was the late James Nagues, who died
at his home in Missoula February 15, 1917, at the
age of seventy-nine. James Nagues was born in
Cornwall, England, in June, 1838, and about two
years later his parents, John and Priscilla Nagues,
came to America. The family home was in North-
western Illinois and Southwestern Wisconsin.
About 1852 the Nagues family home was visited by
the epidemic of cholera, and in a few days the
parents and two of the children were taken away.
James was fourteen years old at that- time, and
after that he had to rely upon his own energy
to establish his position among men. He had only
a common school education, and he learned the
trade of harness maker. On .A.pril 19, 1861, he vol-
unteered and was mustered into Company I of the
Third Wisconsin Infantry. He saw more than three
years of strenuous service. He was with the Fed-
eral armies around Washington, took part in the
Shenandoah Valley campaign of 1862, was at
Cedar Mountain and the second battle of Bull Run,
at South Mountain and Antietam. and in the terrific
campaign that culminated in the great battle of Chan-
cellorsville. Being disabled, he was in a hospital at
Annapolis, Maryland, for nine months, and before
he could rejoin the army his term expired and he
was honorably discharged at Atlanta July 22, 1864,
with the rank of corporal.
During an interval of his army service he had
returned to Wisconsin and married, and on April
4, 1865, he started for Montana, making the trip
with mule teams and incurring several skirmishes
with the Indians. He reached Virginia City in July,
and for the next two years did some mining in
Last Chance Gulch at Helena. Returning to Wis-
consin, he remained in that state three years, and
subsequently engaged in the butcher business at
Hampton, Iowa, in LaSalle County, Illinois, was on
a farm in Kansas a year, was attracted to the min-
ing regions of Colorado, and spent several other
years in Iowa and Illinois. He was one of the gold
seekers attracted by the discoveries in the Black
Hills District in the Dakotas in 1876, and after some
more or less profitable venture there came on across
the country to Helena, where he engaged in the
harness business. In the summer of 1877 his wife
and three children followed him to the West, making
the journey by steamboat up the Missouri River to
Cow Island, thence overland to Fort Benton and by
stage to Helena. For two seasons James Nagues
tried placer mining in Cave Gulch, and in 1881 re-
moved from Helena to White Sulphur Springs.
The next seven years he conducted a dairy ranch,
and in 1888 moved to the Musselshell River and
established a cattle ranch, where in association with
his son George he continued active in business until
1910. It was as a rancher that he laid the basis
of his modest fortune in Montana, and when he sold
out in 1910 he retired and lived at Missoula until
his death. He voted as a republican, had become
a Mason in Illinois, and later demitted and became
a member of Diamond City Lodge No. 7, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons.
March 15, 1864, James Nagues married Amelia
Jane Rule, a native of Wisconsin and of English
ancestry. She is still living at Missoula, at the age
of seventy-six. Of five children, four are living;
Emeline E., George B., Minnie and Jesse R.
George Bennett Nagues was born at Darlington,
Wisconsin, March 12, 1868, and his early memories
are associated with the family home in Illinois, Iowa,
and Helena, Montana. He completed his education
at White Sulphur Springs, and for about a quarter
of a century was actively identified with his father
in the cattle industry. After retiring from the
ranch business Mr. Nagues locatM at White Sul-
phur Springs and took up contracting and building,
an industry he prosecuted with much success and
with a complete and adequate organization for sev-
eral years, excepting a period of about three months
when he was -in San Diego, California. In the fall
of 1912 he was appointed under sheriff of Meagher
County, held that post of responsibility for a year
and a half in connection with his other business,
and was then appointed to fill out an unexpired
term as sheriff for six months. In 1914 he was
duly elected sheriff, and re-elected in 1916 and 1918
and has been retained at this post of duty and
has given a most satisfactory record of his office
for over si.x years. He had previously served by
election as county commissioner of Meagher County
in 1908. Mr. Nagues is one of the men most deeply
interested in and associated with the welfare and
progress of White Sulphur Springs. For over
twenty years he has served as a member of the
school board there, and for six years, two terms,
was a member of the city council. Fraternally he
is affiliated with Diamond City Lodge No. 7, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, of which he is a past
master, with Harlowton Chapter No. 22, Royal
Arch Masons, Helena Consistory of the Scottish
Rite. Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine, and he
and his wife and their two daughters are members
of Martha Chapter No. 11 of the Eastern Star,
which he has served as worthy patron.
June 28, 1892, Mr. Nagues married Stella May
Smith, who was born in Illinois. They have si.x
children: Ella A., wife of Trevell DeLarhue, of
The Dalles, Oregon ; Maud May, wife of Steven H.
Smith, a rancher near White Sulphur Springs ; Ray-
mond C, Madeline J., Beatrice M. and James Field-
ing. The son Raymond, who was educated in the
schools of White Sulphur Springs, enlisted June 10,
1918, at Helena in the Marines, was mustered in
June 2ist at Mare Island, California, and was trans-
ferred to Galveston, Texas. He received his honor-
able discharge January 29, 1919. The son is affiliated
with Diamond City Lodge No. 7 of the Masons.
Charles W. Cook, now an octogenarian at White
Sulphur Springs, was a member of one of the first
important exploration parties to visit the Upper
650
HISTORY OF MONTANA.
Yellowstone and the magnificent country now known
as Yellowstone National Park. He was one of the
first big sheep men in Montana, and for years his
herds and flocks ran by the thousands over the
country around White Sulphur Springs. Among
the survivors of the original Montanans his is a
name that stands conspicuous by reason of many
experiences and achievements.
Mr. Cook was born on his father's farm in Unity
Township, Waldo County. Maine, February 24, 1839,
son of Daniel and Elizabeth (Hussey) Cook. His
father was a native of Kennebeck County and his
mother of Waldo County, Maine, and the former
died in 1880, at the age of seventj'-five, and the lat-
ter in 1889, aged eighty-nine. Daniel Cook was a
ship carpenter and joiner, a contractor and builder,
and also had a farm where he . indulged his taste
for good horses. For many years he served as
treasurer of his home township, was a whig and
republican in politics, and a member of the Quaker
Church. In the family were six sons, five of whom
reached mature years, three now living, Charles W.
being the fourth in age.
Charles W. Cook acquired a public school educa-
tion in Waldo County, attended the Oak Grove Semi-
nary in Kennebeck County, and at different times
was a student of the Friends School at Providence,
Rhode Island. Subsequent years Charles W. Cook
spent on his father's farm to the age of twenty.
He taught school one year and then moved to Provi-
dence, Rhode Island, where he was superintendent
of grounds for the Friends School and again entered
there as a student, continuing his studies two years.
The beginning of his life of adventure in the great
West came April 15, 1864, when he left home for
the West, traveling by railroad as far as St. Joseph,
Missouri, then the terminus of railway lines on the
Missouri River. A steamboat carried him up the
Missouri to Omaha, where he met an old schoolmate,
Henry Kizer. They bought teams of horses and
with another man started overland for Denver.
They made the trip unmolested though danger
from Indians threatened. June 20. 1864, they
joined a caravan of six wagons with 125 head of
herd cattle besides the work cattle, Mr. Cook being
employed as cattle driver and started overland for
Virginia City, Montana, reaching that point Sep-
tember 20th. On the way they were held up by a
party of Indians, but were permitted to resume
their march after giving the Indians a steer. Reach-
ing Montana, Mr. Cook participated in the usual
activity of mining, soon went to Frenchtown and
bought a load of flour, and secured a supply of
potatoes at Hamilton. He paid $6 a sack for the
flour, which he later sold at $1.25 per pound. The
spring of 1865 found him at Diamond City, where
he did mining and was also superintendent of the
Boulder Ditch Company. The supply of water
reaching the mines through the system owned by
this company brought in a revenue of $10,000 a
week, and Mr. Cook had the handling of many
thousands of dollars worth of gold, and also the
responsibility of supervising a force of men twenty-
four hours a day, twenty men working in the day
shift and twenty men in the night shift. He handled
this office until 1869, and for the following two years
was receiver for the Old Gallatin Flour Mill.
A number of historical connections contains a
pamphlet entitled 'The Folsom-Cook Exploration
of the Upper Yellowstone in the year 1869." embrac-
ing an account of the expedition written by one of
its members, David E. Folsom, whose article was
published in Chicago in July, 1870. this pamphlet
being a reprint of that article with a preface by
Nathaniel P. Langford, who was the first collector
of internal revenue of the Territory of Montana.
The article is an historic document in the annals of
Montana and the history of Yellowstone National
Park. In his preface Mr. Langford says: "The
wonders of the Yellowstone National Park were first
brought to the knowledge of the people of Montana
by David E. Folsom and C. W. Cook. Mr. Folsom
had often heard vague and uncertain rumors of
the strange phenomena to be seen near the head-
waters of the Yellowstone and Fire Hole rivers. He
was told by an occasional trapper that the Indians,
taking counsel of their superstitious fears, believed
that region to be the abode of evil spirits, and in
their nomadic journeyings carefully avoided all near
approach to it. This story, gathering in volume and
embellishment as it was circulated throughout the
mining camps of Montana, so wrought upon his
curiosity that in September, 1869, he and Mr. Cook
made a partial exploration of the region to solve
their doubts. Bewildered and astounded at the mar-
vels they beheld, they were, on their return, un-
willing to risk their reputations for veracity by
a full recital of them to a small company whom their
friends had assembled to hear the account of their
explorations. Mr. Folsom. however, published a
careful account of his expedition in the Chicago
Western Monthly for July, 1870, and this, with such
information as could be gleaned from him, led to the
organization of the Washburn exploring expedition."
Elsewhere in the preface Mr. Langford says : "We
trace the creation of the park from the Folsom-
Cook expedition of 1869 to the Washburn expedi-
tion of 1870, and thence to the Hayden expedition
CU. S. Geological Survey) of 1871. Not to one of
these expeditions more than to another do we owe
the legislation which set apart this pleasure ground
for the benefit and enjoyment of the people."
While this expedition was an important one it
took only thirty-six days from the busy life of Mr.
Cook. In the spring of 1871 he left Montana, going
overland to California and Oregon, where lie bought
up a number of bands of sheep and had them driven
through into Montana, wintering at old Gallatin
City and in the spring of 1872 continuing the drive
of about 1500 sheep into the Smith River Valley,
southwest of where White Sulphur Spring now
stands. He was the first to bring sheep in any num-
ber into this locality, and it is claimed that he was
one of the first three men to engage in the sheep
industry in Montana. Later he added cattle and
horses, and at one time his holdings were repre-
sented by the ownership in fee of 6.000 acres, besides
4,000 acres leased lands, and he ran as high as
10.000 head of sheep. 400 hea'd of cattle and ,-?oo head
of horses.
Mr. Cook, who retired from ranching in 1900.
was one of the organizers of the Central State Bank
of White Sulphur Springs, and has been its presi-
dent since January 9. IQI/. He has served as mayor
of his town and' for one term was county com-
missioner of Meagher County. Politically he is a
republican. Mr. Cook is one of the oldest Masons
in Montana, having held affiliations with Diamond
Lodge No. 7. Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at
Diamond City since August, 1867. He retains his
Royal Arch affiliation with Dunlap Chapter No. 12
at China. Maine, is a member of Lewistown Com-
mandery No. 18. Knights Templar, and .Algeria Tem-
ple of the Mystic Shrine at Helena. Both he and
his wife are members of Martha Chapter No. 11 of
the Eastern Star. Mrs. Cook has served as chaplain
several times. She is a member of the Presbyterian
Church.
At Helena. Montana. June 26. 1880. Mr. Cook
married Miss Abbie W. Kennicott. She was born
HISTORY OF MONTANA
651
at Mayfield, New York, a daughter of James H. and
Abbie (WellsJ Kennicott. Her father was a native
of Rhode Island and died in 1880, at the age of
eighty-six, and her mother was born in Connecticut
and died in 1894, aged eighty-nine. Airs. Cook was
one of twins, the last born in a family of three
daughters and three sons, two of whom are still
living. Her father was a blacksmith, and in 1859
moved to the frontier country of Nebraska, where
he spent his last years. The Kennicotts were Meth-
odists in religion. Mr. and Mrs. Cook had three
children : Mary Elizabeth, who died at the age of
twenty-one; Josephine, who is the wife of Oscar O.
Mueller, a lawyer at Lewistown; and Donald H.,
who married Ruth Bronson, and is now a professor
in the State Agricultural College at New Mexico.
Capt. John Potter, of White Sulphur Springs,
would be a conspicuous figure in any group of sur-
viving pioneers of the '60s. For upwards of half
a century he went about his business, as a miner,
merchant, and rancher in various parts of the old
territory, though his activities have been chiefly iden-
tified with the region around White Sulphur Springs.
Captain Potter, who is further honored by his
distinguished service as a Union soldier during the
Civil war, and who had a son in the World war,
was born on his father's farm in Onondaga County, '
New York, February 18, 1844, son of Heart and.
Polly (Everingham) Potter. His parents were also
natives of Onondaga County, and Captain John was
the seventh in a family of eight children, only
two of whom are still living. The father, a farmer,
moved to Illinois and was one of the early settlers
in LaSalle County, where he bought land at $2.50
an acre. He developed a farm and stock ranch
mustered in at old Camp Douglas in Cliicago, and
there and later continued in the same industry in
DeKalb County, Illinois. He was never concerned
with public office, contenting himself with casting
an intelligent vote, first as a whig and later as a
republican. He died at the age of eighty-four and
his wife at seventy-eight.
Capt. John Potter was nine years of age when he
removed to Illinois, finished his education in public
and private schools and at the age of seventeen
answered Lincoln's first call for three months troops
to put down the rebellion. In April, 1861, he joined
Company C of the Tenth Illinois Infantry, bemg
mustered in at old Camp Douglas in Chicago, and
during his brief enlistment performing guard duty
at Cairo, Illinois. He was discharged at the end of
three months and in October of the same year
re-enlisted at Ottawa, Illinois, in Company F of the
Fifty-third Illinois Infantry. From St. Louis the
regiment was sent down the Missouri River, and he
took part in the Battle of Shiloh, was all through the
Vicksburg campaign, and after the surrender of that
city on July 3, 1863, moved East and was in the bat-
tles at Jackson, Mississippi. July 12, 1863, he was
wounded by a grape shot in the right leg, and
after being in the hospital was granted a thirty
days' leave, subsequently extended to sixty days.
He rejoined his regiment at Natchez, Mississippi,
was again at Pittsburg, participated in the raid
around Meridian, Mississippi, was at Florence, Ala-
bama, at Rome, Georgia, and saw many phases of
the Atlanta campaign. He was made second lieu-
tenant of Company F of the Fifty-third Illinois,
was promoted to first lieutenant November 18, 1862,
and on June 29, 1863, was appointed captain of
Company F. At Altoona Pass he was detailed quar-
termaster of the Second Brigade, Fourth Division,
Seventeenth Army Corps, and later served as provost
marshal of the brigade and also as ordnance officer.
Captain Potter after more than three years of
service as a Union soldier and officer was mustered
out August 5, 1864, and then became associated
with his brother H. S. Potter in buying horses and
mules for the United States Government. Thus he
continued to serve the Government until the close
of the war. Following that he was in the livery
business at Aurora, Illinois, until November, i868,
at which time the western chapters of his life
history began to be written.
From Omaha he traveled to Utah, and until the
spring of 1869 was employed as a tie inspector by
the Union Pacific Railway. He then made a trip
to the Wind River mines at South Pass, Wyoming.
Subsequently from Granger Station on the Union
Pacific he started overland with mule teams bound
for old Fort Ellis, Bozeman, Montana, where he
arrived in September, 1869, with a four-mule team.
He left there in company with some soldiers of the
Seventh United States Cavalry, going to Camp
Baker in Smith River Valley, and was associated
with the United States Post Trader from November,
1869, until June, 1872. At the establishment of old
Fort Logan he was in business at that fort for two
years -and then bought a store at the Thompson
Gulch Mining Camp, where he sold goods for about
two years.
After disposing of his stock of merchandise Cap-
tain Potter made his first venture as a sheep rancher,
his location being five miles south of the present site
of White Sulphur Springs. Four years later he
sold out and returning to Illinois for the winter
busied himself with the purchase of 300 head of full-
blood sheep, which the ne.xt spring he shipped to Fort
Benton at Sioux City, Iowa, and drove them across
the country from Fort Benton to White Sulphur
Springs, where he found ready sale for his flock to
sheep men for breeding purposes. He repeated this
enterprise the following year, and made another
shipment of 300 head over the same route. His third
shipment was made in 1883, and in addition to sheep
he also brought five head of pure-blood Hereford
cattle, these being the first high grade white-faced
cattle brought into the locality of White Sulphur
Springs.
In company with James H. Moe, Captain Potter
established the Bank of Meagher County at White
Sulphur Springs, and served as its president three
years. The bank was tben reorganized as the First
National Bank, and Captain Potter continued as
its president until 1896. He resigned from its man-
agement to become associated with other men in
the purchase of a large sheep ranch known as the
Clendennin property at the fork of the Musselshell
River, near Martinsdale. For ten years Captain
Potter remained as manager of this sheep ranch, the
company owning and leasing about 24,000 acres for
their purpose. When he disposed of his interest
in that enterprise he retired from active business,
and has since enjoyed a well earned retirement at
White Sulphur Springs.
Captain Potter has carefully kept his name from
all political tickets as a candidate for office. He
has been affiliated with Diamond City Lodge No. 7
of the Masonic Order since 1869, is a member of the
Grand Army of the Republic and the Loyal Legion,
and in voting cast his ballot as a republican.
In April, 1883, at Sandwich, Illinois, he married
Kate Vermilye, a native of that town. Their two
children are John V. and Laura B. The son, John,
was educated at White Sulphur Springs and in
the Montana. Agricultural College at Bozeman, from
which he was graduated as electrical engineer. He
took special technical training at the beginning of
the World war with the Westinghouse Company at
HISTORY OF MONTANA.
Springfield, Massachusetts, and in 1917 was com-
missioned a first lieutenant in the ordnance depart-
ment. He was on dutj' at Baltimore and Wash-
ington as stores manager of the First Ordnance dis-
trict, with jurisdiction over four states. Later he
was sent for ofiicial service to Detroit, Michigan,
and in March, 1920, was mustered out of service
and now lives in White Sulphur Springs. Laura
B. was born in White Sulphur Springs October 8,
1896, and lives at home. She graduated as a sten-
ographer in Quincy, Illinois, and is now in the office
of Ford & Linn, attorneys at law, of White Sulphur
Springs.
Jefferson D. Doggett. No community can be any
greater than its banking institutions, nor can it
make any appreciable progress until it has located
in its midst one or more financial concerns, backed
by the substantial men of the region. Much of the
advancement of Townsend therefore dates back to
1899, when the State Bank of Townsend was in-
corporated. This bank has the distinction of not
only being one of the most reliable in this section,
but it is the oldest in Broadwater County, and one
of the dependable men connected with it is Jefjerson
D. Doggett, its vice president.
JeflFerson D. Doggett, familiarly known as "Jeff."
was born at Virginia City, Montana, on October 31,
1863. a son of Moses Doggett, who was born at
Louisville, Kentucky, in 1831, and died on his ranch
near Townsend in 1896. His parents moved from
Louisville to Indiana and later to Iowa, where they
continued to live until claimed by death. In 1859
Moses Doggett. who had in the meanwhile been
married at Blakesburg. Iowa, went to Colorado, be-
coming one of the pioneers of California Gulch,
and also of the mining region on which the present
city' of Leadville is now located, in both places
being engaged in mining with considerable success.
In the fall of 1862 he returned to Iowa, and spent a
short time with his parents at Blakesburg.
In the summer of the following year he crossed the
plains with an o.x team, arriving at Virginia City,
Montana, in August. 1863, and was engaged in placer
mining at Alder Gulch for a few months. In 1864
he went to Helena and continued placer mining,
working extensively at Last Chance Gulch, remov-
ing from there to the Missouri Valley in the fall
of 1865, and entered a claim for a homestead near
the present site of Townsend, being one of the
very earliest pioneers of Broadwater County. From
then on until his death he was engaged in ranching
and stock raising. He was a real Jeffersonian demo-
crat, and a strong believer in free trade. For a num-
ber of years he held the office of justice of the peace.
By his first marriage he had two children, namely :
Duane, who is a rancher living near Townsend. and
LaFayette, who is a farmer of Nebraska. Moses
Doggett was married secondly to Susan Rose, who
survives him and lives near Valentine, Montana,
with her daughter, Mrs. Ida Lyng. Mrs. Doggett
was born in Indiana in 1838. She and her husband
had the following children : Charles B., who is a
rancher in the neighborhood of Townsend, served
as sheriff for eight years, and also as assessor, be-
ing elected on the democratic ticket ; Jefferson D.,
whose name heads this review ; James S., who is a
rancher and stock raiser in the neighborhood of
Fort Logan, Montana ; L. R.. who went to the ."Mas-
kan gold fields in the early daj's, has remained there
and is regarded as one of the successful miners of
that territory ; Ida. who married Frank Lyng. a
ranchman of Valentine. Montana ; Robert, who is a
merchant of Helena, Montana, and Lillian, who was
a public school teacher of Helena, died in that city
when she was thirty-five years of age.
Jefferson D. Doggett, who was the first white
child born at Virginia City, was reared in what was
^leagher County, but is now Broadwater County,
attending its rural schools and remaining on his
father's ranch until he was twenty years of age.
During 1884 Mr. Doggett was in the stampede to
Coeur d'Alene, and remained there for the re-
mainder of that year, being engaged in placer min-
ing, but in 1885 he ran a pack train from Thomp-
son Falls, Montana, to Murray. Idaho. In the fall
of 1885 he returned to the Smith River Valley, and
was engaged in ranching and the livestock business
near White Sulphur Springs until 1898. Mr. Dog-
gett then moved to his ranch on Duck Creek, fifteen
miles northeast of Townsend, and still owns this
valuable property of 7,000 acres, on which he car-
ries on sheep raising upon an extensive scale. He
also owns a ranch of 5,000 acres at Fort Logan,
Montana, and a modern residence at Townsend.
In his political sentiments Mr. Doggett is a re-
publican and was representative from Broadwater to
the State Assembly during the Thirteenth Session in
1913, and is now chairman of the water board of
Townsend, proving himself an upright and capable
official, and one who is fully equal to any duties
■ assigned him.
For some time Mr. Doggett has been a member of
the board of directors of the Montana Life Insur-
ance Compan}', but his most important connection
with the financial and commercial life of his com-
munity is that of vice president of the Townsend
State Bank. .According to the last statement of the
bank its capital is $100,000; its surnlus and undi-
vided profits, $17,011.81, and its deposits $696,544.35.
The officials of the bank are as follows : J. P.
Kearns, president ; J. D. Doggett, vice president ;
N. O. Bowman, vice president ; P. H. Murphy,
cashier, and J. W. Seibold. assistant cashier. The
board of directors is as follows: D. J. McCarthy,
John Hines, Sr., Con Sweeney. Jeff Doggett. N. O.
Bowman, J. P. Kearns and P. H. Murphy, all men
of high standing in Broadwater County.
In 1896 Mr. Doggett was married at Diamond
City. Montana, to Miss Amelia Schreiber, a daugh-
ter of Philip and Mary (Yochum) Schreiber, both
of whom are now deceased. Mr. Schreiber was a
successful merchant at Pomeroy. Ohio, where he
located after coming to the United States from
Germany, where he was born. His advent into this
country occurred when he was quite young, and he
had the advantage of being reared here. He was
not spared to live very long after his marriage.
Mrs. Doggett is a graduate of the Pomeroy
High School. Mr. and Mrs. Doggett became the
parents of one son, Howard J., who was born on
January 27. 1903, attended the Townsend High
School for two years and is now a student of the
high school at Long Beach, California.
Well known in Masonry, Mr. Doggett belongs to
Valley Lodge No. 21. Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, of Townsend ; Helena Consistory, No. 3,
Scottish Rite, in which he has been made a Thirty-
second Degree Mason, and Algeria Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, of
Helena. Montana. He is also a member of Helena
Lodge No. 193. Benevolent and Protective Order of
Elks, the Montana Club of Helena and the Town-
send Commercial Club.
During the late war Mr. Doggett took a very
active part in all local war activities, and was chair-
man of the War Savings drives, and helped to put
all of them over the top. A man of genial person-
HISTORY OF MONTANA.
653
ality, he is one of the most popular men in Broad-
water County, and is recognized as one of the
region's best types of American citizenry, one who
can be depended upon to respond quickly and gen-
erously to any call made upon his sympathies or
patriotism, and to influence others to follow his ex-
cellent example. Mr. Doggett is a product of the
West and is very proud of the fact, as he has
every reason to be, and his fellow citizens are proud
of him and what he has accomplished for them and
for this section.
S.\MUEL K. Campbell, M. D. The community of
Harlowton, which has had Doctor Campbell as a
residence since 1907, has been fortunate not only in
the skill he has exemplified in his profession, but
in the energetic responsiveness he has exhibited to
all the interests and welfare of the people and the
city.
Doctor Campbell spent his early life in the state
of Missouri. He was born in Johnson County De-
cember I, 1880. His parents, Robert Lee and Lydia
(HufT) Campbell, were natives of the same state.
His father was for many years a farmer and later
engaged in banking at Warrensburg.
Samuel K. Campbell was the oldest of six chil-
dren, and grew up on his father's farm in Henry
County, Missouri. He acquired a substantial edu-
cation, at first in the district schools, and subse-
quently graduated from the high school at War-
rensburg and the Missouri State Normal School of
that city. Though he had some experience as a
merchandise clerk, his mind was set on a profes-
sional career, and he acquired his first knowledge
of medicine while at home. He then entered the
medical department of St. Louis University, grad-
uating in 1905. A few months later he came to
Montana and practiced at Bozeman fifteen months
before he moved to Harlowton on April 19, 1907.
Since then his name has become synonymous with the
very best abilities as a physician and surgeon. He
served as local surgeon at Harlowton for the Mil-
waukee Railway, and has been health officer of
Wheatland County since the county was organized.
He was a member of the Wheatland County Ex-
emption Board from May 17, 1917, until the close of
the war, and gave much of his time to the exam-
ination of the county's quota of men for the army
service. Doctor Campbell was appointed a member
of Governor Stewart's staff as surgeon, general in
1913 and served until 1917. He is a member of
the Montana Medical Society and the American
Medical Association, and is also a member of the
United States Public Health Association.
A busy man in his profession, he has yet found
time to perform a wide routine of duty in his home
■ city. For the past ten years he has held the offices
of city clerk and city treasurer of Harlowton, and
for eight years has been chairman of the City School
Board. Doctor Campbell is a democrat, and is re-
garded as one of the party leaders in his section of
the state. He has some extensive farming and cattle
raising interests in Wheatland County, on Hopley
Creek.
Doctor Campbell is a member of the Kappa Sigma
and Phi Beta Pi college fraternities, and is affiliated
with Musselshell Lodge No. 69, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons ; Harlowton Chapter No. 22, Royal
Arch Masons ; Palestine Commandery No. 18, Knights
Templar; Algeria Temple of the Mystic Shrine at
Helena, and Bozeman Lodge No. 463 of the Elks.
He is a member of the Christian Church, while Mrs.
Campbell is a Presbyterian. Doctor Campbell has
been able to do a great deal of hard, concentrated
work in his life, and he owes that ability partly
to the sound constitution he developed as a farm
boy, and also to his later avocations, which have
taken him much out of doors. He has hunted and
fished, is a follower of outdoor sports, and an en-
thusiastic motorist.
October 12, 1910, Doctor Campbell married Miss
Laura Foote, of Redwing, Minnesota. They have
three children : Robert Edwin, Samuel K., Jr., and
Jean Catherine.
William C. Husband, city attorney of Harlow-
ton, organizer of the Farmers' National Bank of this
city, and one of the best attorneys of Wheatland
County, is widely and favorably known throughout
this part of the state. He was born at Guelph, On-
tario, Canada, on February 23, 1882, a son of Wil-
liam N. and Agnes (McLagan) Husband, the for-
mer of whom was born atk, Hamilton, On-
tario, Canada, m 1848, and the latter at Mitchell,
Ontario, Canada, in 1854. Of their ten children
nine survive, and William C. Husband is the sec-
ond in order of birth. William N. Husband was
a merchant tailor at Guelph, Ontario, Canada, where
he lived until 1889, and then came to the United
States and located at Hensel, North Dakota, where
he was engaged in farming. Subsequently he went
into a grain and agricultural implement business at
Hensel, North Dakota, and conducted it until his
retirement in 1918. In politics he is a republican,
and he served as county drainage commissioner for
some time, making an excellent record in that office.
In 1913 he was elected to the Lower House of the
State Assembly, and re-elected in 1915, serving for
two terms, and being connected with the introduc-
tion and passage of some important legislation.
William C. Husband attended the public schools
of Pembina County, North Dakota, and the uni-
versity of that state, from which he was graduated
in 1907, having taken the legal course. That same
year he was admitted to practice in the courts of
North Dakota, and was engaged for a time in prac-
tice at Grand Forks. In the fall of igo8 he was ad-
mitted to the bar in Montana, and came to Harlow-
ton in December of that year, since which time he
has become one of the leading members of his pro-
fession in Wheatland County. Prior to the organi-
zation of Wheatland County Mr. Husband served as
deputy county attorney of Meagher County for
seven years, and is now serving his fourth consecu-
tive term as city attorney of Harlowton. A repub-
lican, he has been extremely effective in the party
organization, and was a delegate to the Republican
National Convention at Chicago in igi2. A booster
for Harlowton, he has been president of the Com-
mercial Club for two terms, and did and is doing
much for the industrial and financial development of
the city. For two years he was in executive charge
of the Meagher County Fair Association, and largely
responsible for the successful conduct of these ex-
hibitions, which in his opinion are strong factors in
promcKting the community welfare and arousing
local pride. There are few measures which come
before the public in which Mr. Husband does not
take an effective interest, for he is very public spir-
ited and advanced in his ideas. The Odd Fellows
and Knights of Pythias hold his membership and
receive his fraternal fealty.
On June 12, 1910, Mr. Husband was married to
Miss Eva May Stevens, born at Russell, Ontario,
Canada. Mr. and Mrs. Husband have three chil-
dren, namely: Gordon R., Jean Campbell and Evelyn
Agnes.
As a lawyer Mr. Husband displays deep powers of
thinking, and a thorough knowledge of the well-
founded principles of law, drawing his deductions
654
HISTORY OF MONTANA
logically from his premises. He treats law as a
science, founded upon established principles, and
because of his methods he receives a large share of
the legal business of this region, for his clients
know that their interests will be handled ably and
fairly, and his uniform dignified procedure inspires
the respect of his associates in the profession.
Mr. Husband has a wide and most favorable repu-
tation as a trial lawyer ; in fact, a large proportion
of his business is devoted to that branch of the law.
This, however, would necessarily follow in line with
his splendid abilities as an orator and public speaker,
possessing as he does a forceful and at the same time
time a convincing personality on any subject he has
in hand.
Benjamin T. Stevens. Upon the roll of repre-
sentative citizens and prominent and influential busi-
ness men of the southern part of Montana con-
sistently appears the name of Benjamin T. Stevens,
of Harlowton. He is one of those sturdy spirits who
have contributed largely to the material welfare of
the locality in which he resides. He has been a
resident of this community for a number of years,
during which time he has gradually won his way
into the affections of the people, for he possesses
those sterling qualities of character which commend
themselves to persons of intelligence and the highest
morality.
Benjamin T. Stevens was born in Waldo County,
Maine, on October 28, 1864, and is the son of
Shelito and Mary (Reckleiff) Stevens. Both parents
were also natives of Waldo County, the former born
in 1830 and the latter in 1840, and both are deceased,
the father dying in 1914, at the age of eighty-four
years, and the mother in 1886, at the age of forty-
six years. Of the ten children born to these worthy
parents six are still living. Shelito Stevens taught
school in his younger days, but eventually engaged
in the lumber business. He hewed a farm out of
the wilderness in Waldo County and became a suc-
cessful general farmer and stock raiser. He was a
lover of horses and owned a number of standard
bred animals, and also blooded cattle. He was a
Quaker in his religious belief and in politics was a
democrat, though not an aspirant for public office.
Benjamin T. Stevens spent his boyhood days on
the paternal farmstead in "old rock-ribbed Maine,"
working for his father during the summer and
attending the district school during the winter time.
Later he spent his summers in sawmill work until
seventeen years old, when, being ambitious to strike
out for himself, he came to White Sulphur Springs,
Montana, the journey being made by rail to Butte,
thence by stage to White Sulphur Springs, where he
arrived in the spring of 1882. Here he obtained
employment on a sheep ranch, where he rode the
range for a time. Later he engaged in mining in
Thompson Gulch, but a year later he returned to
his former occupation on a sheep and cattle ranch.
In 1898 Mr. Stevens went to Alaska, where he spent
three years in prospecting and mining, then for a
similar period he was engaged in the mercantile
business at Coldfoot. At the end of that period he
disposed of his holdings there and returned to Mon-
tana and became associated with the Winnecook Live
Stock Company in the capacity of manager. Two
years later he became identified with the Urner
Merchandise Company, with whom he remained
until 1915. He remained connected in a financial
way with the Winnecook Company up to 1917. In
February, 1915, Mr. Stevens engaged in the real
estate business at Harlowton under the name of the
Stevens Realty Company, and during the subsequent
years he has handled an enormous quantity of city
and farm land. Careful and methodical in his deals,
he has been a safe and sound advisor in matters re-
lating to property and his opinion on values is
sidered authoritative.
Mr. Stevens has taken a keen interest in every-
thing looking to the upbuilding of this section and
is a stockholder in the Continental Bank and Trust
Company and a stockholder in the T. J. Donnellen
Live Stock Compaiiy, which does a big business in
the buying and selling of cattle. He has taken a
deep interest in educational matters and has served
as a member of the school board during the past
five years. He has also served three terms, 1914-
16-18, as alderman from the Third Ward, and has
consistently stood for the best things for the com-
munity.
Politically Mr. Stevens is a stanch supporter of
the republican party, while, fraternally he was a
member of Star of the West Lodge No. 38, Ancient
Free and Accepted Masons, but demitted and be-
came a charter member of Musselshell Lodge No.
69, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Harlow-
ton.
On February 5, 1908, Mr. Stevens was married to
Elizabeth E. Ring, nee Doran, a native of Illinois,
and they are the parents of one son, Edwin Shelito.
Mr. Stevens is a man of pleasing personal address
and enjoys the friendship of all who know him.
J.\coB H. Karnop, one of the substantial business
men of Harlowton, has had a somewhat varied ex-
perience and has brought out of it ample means
and a good knowledge of men and their motives.
His garage and supply business is one of the best
in the county, and he holds the confidence and re-
spect of his associates and competitors.
Jacob H. Karnop was born on his father's farm
in Cravi-ford County, Wisconsin, January 17, 1866, a
son of Fred and Wilhelmina Karnop, both of whom
are deceased. They were natives of Germany, who
came to the United States at an early day and be-
came pioneers of Wisconsin. Of their six children
but two are now living, and of them all Jacob H
was the third in order of birth. All of the efforts
of Fred Karnop were devoted to farming, and he
became a successful man in his calling. Growing
up in his native county, Jacob H. Karnop learned
to be a good farmer, and at the same time attended
school in the rural districts. In 1876 he came to
Deerlodge County, Montana, making the trip over-
land with pack horses, and later to what was then
the Musselshell Valley in Meagher County, but now
included in Wheatland County. For some years
thereafter he rode the range as a cowboy, and then
in 1891 invested his savings in a ranch and embarked
in the cattle business, in which he continued until
1907, when he sold it and located at Harlowton.
Realizing that there was a good opening for a first
class garage and supply business, in 191 1 he went
into that line, and has built up an excellent trade.
He is also the agent for this section of the Ford
cars. Mr. Karnop has been very prominent as an
official, serving as city marshal for several terms,
deputy sheriff for several terms, and has been deputy
stock inspector for a number of years. In politics
he is an independent. Fraternally he belongs to the
Odd Fellows and Modern Woodmen of America.
On March 9, 1895, Mr. Karnop was married to
Ida Smith, a native of Missouri, and they became
the parents of six children, namely : Katherine,
Frelda, Herman, Hubert, Lucile, and one who died
in infancy. A hardworking man, Mr. Karnop has
always sought to do his full duty in whatever posi-
tion iie was placed, and when the enforcement of law
and order was in his capable hands he proved him-
;^
HISTORY OF MONTANA
655
self worthy of the^ confidence reposed in him by
his courageousiiess in pursuing the wrongdoer and
insisting that there be no infringement of the law
so far as lay in his power.
William H. Cheney. One of the chief figures in
all the region about Sidney is William H. Cheney,
whose life has been given to the Northwest, and
more especially to Montana, where his interests have
been centered for more than fifty-five years. He is
now a farmer, cultivating one of the fertile tracts
of the locality around Sidney, and Richland- num-
bers him among her highly respected citizens. Al-
though so long identified with the interests of Mon-
tana and the Northwest, Air. Clieney is a native son
of Ohio, born in Harrison County August i, iS^'S.
and he grew up in the home of a successful farmer
there and in Iowa, to which latter commonwealth his
parents had moved in 1844. His father, Elzy Cheney,
was born in Maryland, and he was a son of Elzy
Cheney, of Pennsylvania birth, but who subsequently
settled in Maryland, where he became a drover and
farrner. He was the father of several children, in-
cluding Joshua and Elzy, and he died in Harrison
County, Ohio. Elzy Cheney, the son, married
Susanna McDaniel, a daughter of Joseph McDaniel,
a Scotchman. Mrs. Cheney died at Sublett, Missouri,
at the home of her son, Alfred. Her children who
attained \-ears of maturity comprised three sons and
three daughters, namely : Hannah and Mary, who
married brothers, Thomas and Robert Henry, and
all lived in Harrison County. Ohio; Alfred, who died
in Sublett, Missouri; William Henry, of Sidney,
Montana ; Elzy, who died near Bentonsport, Iowa ;
Sarah, who became the wife of John Harrison and
died at Grays Harbor, Washington. Mrs. Harri-
son at her death left the following children : Wil-
liam, of Abilene, Kansas; Mary, who married
George Hodge, of Springfield, Missouri; Elzy, of
.Aberdeen, Washington ; Reason, of Los Angeles,
California; Martin, of .Aberdeen, Washington^ and
Susie, who is the housekeeper for her uncle, Wil-
liam H. Cheney.
When the family located in Iowa they established
their hoine in Lee County, on Honey Creek, eight
miles west of West Point, where the father died
within a month, leaving his widow with four small
children to rear and provide for. William was the
second child in age, and with his brothers he did
some successful small farming for a year or two,
and then joined Billy Criswell in the purchase of
one of the first threshing machines brought into that
country. During the two years the partners fol-
lowed threshing they made money, and William
Cheney gained a capital of Si.ooo or $2,000
before he attained the years of maturity. But pre-
vious to taking up this enterprise he had worked
in a coal bank for wages, and by this means as well
as by farming he created the capital wiiich enabled
him to buy the threshing outfit. When the machine
was sold after the second year the partners sepa-
rated, Mr. Criswell going to California and Mr.
Cheney decided to cast in his lot with the West.
Soon afterward with some companions he went to
Leavenworth, Kansas, where he purchased two yoke
of cattle from Billie Waddell. the junior member of
the firm of Russell, Majors & Waddell, and equipped
himself for the long and hazardous trip to Cali-
fornia. His companions soon became disheartened
and discouraged and returned home on an early boat,
and Mr. Cheney then sold his oxen to Mr. Waddell
and hired to Jones & Cartwright, a sub-contracting
firm under Russell, Majors & Waddell.
Mr. Cheney's first freighting trip was to Denver in
1859, which was accomplished without Indian
Vol 11—42
troubles, and on reaching their destination the goods
were unloaded in the company's warehouse, and he
returned to Leavenworth with the same train. The
chief incident of the journey was the tremendous
hail storm wOiich struck them and turned over a
wagon, but although their damage was slight, the
storm almost destroyed a wagon train of pilgrim
emigrants a day behind them and rendered them
helpless.
Mr. Cheney's second trip into the West was be-
gun at Nebraska City and the same outfit took goo^
to Fort Laramie, where Mr. Cheney spent the win-
ter engaged in herding the company's cattle, his
companion being known as "Old Pat, the Irishman."
It was while at Fort Laramie that he heard of the
outbreak of the rebellion, and in the spring with
Hillie Comstock he was ordered to Fort Pierre,
South Dakota, with dispatches from the Government
to General Harney, ordering that general to Santa
Fe. But after starting he was turned back with
orders to go to Leavenworth, and the dragoons under
his command almost all went south, deserting the
army, and taking possessisn of a boat on the Mis-
souri, iiiirrol thr Confederate .^ervice. At Leaven-
wui til -Mr. Lheney was given a Government team and
ordered to Fort Scott, Kansas, with a train of
wagons, and spending the winter there he returned
to Leavenworth in the following spring, where he
was engaged in herding mules for two months and
was then made wagon master of a train of twenty-
five wagons and ordered to join other outfits and
proceed to Santa Fe, New Mexico, with quarter-
master stores. On the return trip a prairie fire in-
tercepted them, and one train was entirely destroyed
by the fire and another run through by a herd' of
bufi^alo running from the fire. Reaching Leaven-
worth, Mr. Cheney \yas transferred to Kansas City,
to Gen. Tom Ewing'^ CMnini.iml. where he was en-
gaged in gathering ^uI>plil s diiniin the winter, cache-
ing them at Kansas (. iiy. was ^nt back to Leaven-
worth the following spring, and was then sent upon
Government orders to Fort Smith, .Arkansas, and
assumed charge of his company's transportation de-
partment as master of transportation. From there
he was ordered to St. Louis to assume charge of
transportation for General Sully, who had been
ordered to fit out an expedition up the Missouri
River to cope with the Sioux uprisings occurring in
this region. The trip up the Missouri began at St.
Joe, five loaded wagons comprising the train out-
fit for the expedition, and at Sioux City they found
the Sixth and Seventh Iowa and Major Brackett's
Cavalry, and the entire outfit journeyed overland. to
Montana, reaching the Yellowstone River at Searss
Crossing, and proceeded down stream to Fort Union
crossing the river there. The Sixth Iowa was dropped
at the first ferry to guard it, while the other troops
followed on to Fort Union. They were then in the
country of the hostiles, and the Indians followed
them down the river, but on the other side, and at
the same time the opposite hills were covered with
the red skins, waiting the opportunity to strike, but
fortunately for the troops the opportune time never
arrixcd. Tlie train proceeded eastward to Bismarck,
and .Mr. Clieni \^ Imilt the bridge across Apple Creek
over which the train proceeded to Fort Rice, where
they joined the cavalry they had left there, also the
Thirtieth Wisconsin, which had helped construct
that fort.
In 1865 Mr. Cheney's train was ordered on the
Devil's Lake trip into Dakota under General
Sully, and several months were spent on this trip.
In 1866 he made a trip into Montana, this time by
boat from Fort Pierre and under the command of
Colonel Reeves. They proceeded up the Missouri
HISTORY OF MONTANA
River to Camp Cook, above the mouth of Judith
River, where the needed supplies for the camp were
left with the quartermaster, the troops immediately
returning to Fort Rice to bring back the wives of
the soldiers to Fort Buford. from whence they again
went down the old Missouri for the last time. At
Omaha in i856 Mr. Cheney turned over everything,
men. teams and supplies, and was ordered back to
Fort Sully to assist in the construction of that
fort, remaining there four years, when he was trans-
ferred to St. Paul, and there came under the com-
mand of General Hollabird. chief quartermaster of
the army. During his service, Mr. Cheney hauled
the first lumber for the building of Fort Pembina
on the Red River of the North, loading the lumber
at Anoka, on the Mississippi River, 2,000 feet to the
load, and at the expiration of his year's service he
bought teams of condemned mules and engaged in
the teaming business for himself, spending two win-
ters in Winnipeg, and during the course of his work
there hauled the lumber for the building of one
wing of the new penitentiary. His next employment
was with Mr. Rideout, tl»e American contractor for
timbers for the Canadian Pacific Railroad. He had
fourteen teams engaged in this work, but the work
proved disastrous to him financially, as he lost all his
teams but one in the epidemic of epizootic then pre-
vailing.
Returning in the following year to Montana, Mr.
Cheney went back into the locality where he had
made his frontier friends, first stopping near the
present site of Sidney and for two or three years
follovying furnished wood for fuel for boats on
the Yellowstone, and when he finally abandoned this
business he located in section 12 in the valley north
of Sidney, following the Government survey. After
a time he removed to section 10, subsequently enter-
ing a quarter of the section, and he has since been
a permanent resident of the locality. For thirty
years he has continued his residence on his. ranch
in section 10, participating in the development of
this fertile valley and associating in its business and
civic affairs. His half section is devoted to alfalfa
and the improvements on the place represent the
work of his hands or have been done under his com-
mand, and his pasture lands back in the hills are
splendidly watered. His cattle brand is known as
"VC" and the extent of his cattle industry placed
him among the prominent shippers of the region.
His first home in section 10 was a log shack of
two rooms, which in time gave place to his present
home of six rooms, and his barns and sheds are
ample for the housing of his stock.
Mr. Cheney cast his first presidential ballot for
Abraham Lincoln in Missouri in i860 and throughout
his life he has been a consistent supporter of repub-
lican principles. His father was a supporter of the
old-time whig party. Mr. Cheney has never mar-
ried.
On December 13, 1920, Mr. Cheney died suddenly
at .Mbuquerque, New Mexico, of apoplexy. Tem-
porary interment was at Lxjs Angeles, California,
December 27, 1920.
^ if
'^^m^
V
i
1,
^' ■%...
^1.
5'*
;n.
.1 '-^^S-
ff
. ¥^
^^. *\
^.
%^^-
-^' r^
Live Music Archive
Librivox Free Audio
Metropolitan Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Internet Arcade
Console Living Room
Books to Borrow
Open Library
TV News
Understanding 9/11