Progressive men of the state of Montana, pt 2, Part 151

Author: Bowen, A.W., & Co., firm, publishers, Chicago
Publication date: [19-?]
Publisher: Chicago : A. W. Bowen & Co.
Number of Pages: 1092

USA > Montana > Progressive men of the state of Montana, pt 2 > Part 151

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In politics Mr. Reynolds is a stalwart Republi- can, and he has been an active worker in the local ranks of the party. Fraternally he is identified with the time-honored order of Free and Accepted Masons, being a member of the blue lodge at Chinook, and retaining his capitular membership in the chapter of Royal Arch Masons at Knox- ville, Ill. ; also is a member of the Modern Wood- men of the World. In 1891 Mr. Reynolds was united in marriage to Miss Mahala Adams, daugh- ter of Austin and Merbeah Adams, of. Stearns county, Minn. They are the parents of two chil- dren : Irene and Herbert.

JOHN M. RAAS, an American citizen of Euro- pean birth, who has prospered and accumu- lated property, and won regard and confidence in his Montana home, is a native of the grand duchy of Luxemburg, which adjoins Belgium on the east. He was born there on April 14, 1866. There also

his father was born, of a family that had lived in that country for many generations. The parents of our subject were Martin and Katharina (Ben- dles) Raas, the latter a native of Germany. The father was a farmer, who died in his native land in 1889. His wife had long preceded him, having died in 1873. Mr. Raas was educated in the schools of Luxemburg, and came to this country just after the death of his father in 1889, locating first at Great Falls, where he worked for a year in the silver smelter. In 1890 he removed to the Bear Paw mountains and took up a ranch of 320 acres on Clear creek, where he has since been engaged in farming and stockraising, having in addition to his own land an extensive free range for his cat- tle. He is recognized as one of the progressive citizens of his section, aiding in all worthy efforts for its improvement, and illustrating in his life, in a forcible way, the benefits of industry, thrift and skill. In politics he is a Republican, but not an active partisan.

L' ORENZO D. REYNOLDS .- When the rec- ord of Montana's redemption from wildness and development into a great and potential com- monwealth is fully made up, no class of her citi- zens will be entitled to higher credit or more general esteem for their work, than those who have freely given their time and substance to the advancement of her educational facilities. Of this class Lorenzo D. Reynolds, of near Florence, in Ravalli county, is a conspicuous member. He was born on November 1, 1849, in Knox county, Ill., the son of Edward B. and Mary W. (Gose) Rey- nolds, and Lorenzo D. was the earliest born of their eight children. He attended the public schools and Abingdon College, which is located in his native county, until he was eighteen, and then worked for three years on the farm of his father. Then going to Independence, Kan., he spent five years farming for himself, then crossed the continent to Oregon, where he engaged in farming. and freighting in the John Day valley for five years. He came to Montana in 1881, and, after teaming in the neighborhood of Helena for two years, went to the Bitter Root valley and took up a pre-emption and a homestead claim four miles east of Florence, on which he has since re- sided, engaged in ranching and stockraising, find- ing pleasure and profit in the business and grow-

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ing in the good opinion and esteem of his fellow citizens by the manly qualities he has ex- hibited in business and social circles, and the act- ive and beneficial services he has rendered in pub- lic affairs affecting the general community. He also has 160 acres nearer the town which is under cultivation and yielding profitable crops. Mr. Rey- nolds has taken constant and intelligent interest in the school system, and has devoted much of his time and energy to its advancement. He has served as trustee and clerk for many years, and has always been active in awakening, vitalizing and directing into proper channels public senti- ment on the subject of public education. In relig- ious affiliation he is identified with the Christian church, in which he is an elder, and in whose ser- vice he has been zealous and energetic. He was married at Grinnell, Iowa, in August, 1870, to Miss Frances Reynolds. They have had eight children, of whom six are living, namely: Mary, now Mrs. S. J. Tillmon; Kate, now Mrs. O. M. Tillmon ; Edward, Lulu, Maggie and Sarah. In political re- lations he holds with the Republican party, but has not been ambitious of political preferment for him- self, finding his home, his church and his family sufficient to occupy all his faculties.

JOHN REHWALDT was born in Niagara coun- ty, N. Y., February 12, 1845. His parents were Christian and Louisa Rehwaldt, the former a native of New York and the latter of Germany. The father was a prosperous farmer and died at the place of his nativity in 1846; the mother at the same place in 1889. Mr. Rehwaldt was educated in the schools of his native county, remaining at home until he was twenty-one years old, assist- ing in the management of the farm. In 1886 he went west and worked as a farm hand until 1871, finally going to Denver, Colo., and there engaging in farming and mining until 1876. In the fall and winter of 1876-7 he was prospecting in the Black Hills. In July, 1877, he came to Fort Cus- ter, Mont., and engaged in prospecting and mining two years. In 1881 he homesteaded a ranch near Park City, Yellowstone county, and later bought 160 acres of railroad land. On these tracts he has been successfully occupied in farming and raising fruit, his experience having demonstrated that apples, peaches, plums, pears and all sorts of small fruits can be raised in the Yellowstone val-

ley. He is also interested in stock. From 1894 to 1898 he handled sheep, but in the last year he sold them all and bought cattle, which he has since been handling. In politics he is a Democrat, and although not an active partisan, is warmly in- terested in the welfare of the party. He is a sin- gle man, highly esteemed in the community, and is a warmly welcomed addition to any social circle.

C OL. DAVID RICE .- This well-known gentle- man, who resides at Riceville, Cascade county, on a branch of the Great Northern Railway, has had a long and eventful experience. It has, how- ever, been an honorable career and one that has met success, the reward of diligence, integrity and attention to business. David Rice was born at Woodstock, Windsor county, Vt., on January 26, 1837. His parents were Luther and Lucia Rice, also Vermonters. In early life his father was a dyer of clothes and also a shoemaker, but later he became a successful farmer in the upper Con- necticut valley. The elder Rice was an oldline Whig up to the organization of the Republican party, when he became an active member of this organization. Fraternally he was a Mason, up to and through the Royal Arch degree, and was also a member of the Universalist church. He died in 1876. His wife, the mother of Mr. Rice, was a devout Congregationalist and passed away in 1873.

In early boyhood David Rice attended the district schools at such times as he could spare from labors on the homestead, and for three months he was a student in the high school. Until he was twenty- two years old he remained with his parents, and from fifteen, owing to his father's illness he as- sumed full charge of the farm. In 1859 he was employed in farm work for a year in New York, and in 1860 he removed to Amador county, Cal., where he was identified with placer and quartz mining as a mine foreman for six years. Follow- ing this he engaged in teaming on his own account and, later for eighteen months was in charge of an engine in a quartz mill. He returned east for a visit of three months, and afterward removed to Coles county, Ill., locating at Charleston, the county seat, where for a short period he engaged in merchandising. In the spring of 1870 he went to Arkansas, where for nine years he was engaged in cotton culture, in partnership with his brother, C. H. Rice. They also owned a steamboat running

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between Memphis and Little Rock. The business was very eminently successful, and Mr. Rice made money, and would doubtless have continued to do so had not a disastrous flood swept away 1,200 acres of cotton, their entire crop for the season, entaining a loss of $25,000. Misfortunes in the steamboat line caused other heavy losses and Mr. Rice became heavily handicaped financially. But he determined to remain on the ground until he had satisfied his creditors, and he remained in Arkansas until all were paid.

Mr. Rice then went to Leadville, Colo., where he followed mining, teaming and the making of charcoal. In the fall of 1882 he came to Butte, Mont., and in January, 1883, he went to Barker, crossing the Missouri at the mouth of Sun river where now stands the flourishing city of Great Falls, which was then a barren plain with not a house in sight. From here he walked to Belt. The solitary resident of that place was John K. Castner. Passing on Mr. Rice settled at Barker for one year, and built charcoal kilns and supplied the Clendennin Mining Company with charcoal. Thence he went to Neihart, purchased some mines and also erected kilns and burned charcoal until the closing down of the mines. In partnership with J. C. Wells he engaged in ranching where is now the town of Riceville. Cattle were scarce, and Mr. Rice made a trip to lowa where he purchased seventy head and brought them to Montana. For sixteen years this partnership continued before it was dissolved by mutual consent. The enterprise had been in every way successful, and Mr. Rice purchased the interest of his partner at a price which afforded him a handsome profit, and the Colonel's Riceville property is a beautiful and a valuable estate.

In 1865 Mr. Rice married Miss Elizabeth Han- ford, a native of Connecticut and daughter of Levi and Lucia Hanford, both of Connecticut. Her father was one of the 'forty-niners of California, where he was a merchant and banker. Her mother died in 1873, and Mr. Sanford is now a clerk in the United States pension office at Washington, D. C., being a stanch Republican and a member of the Methodist church. Mrs. Elizabeth Rice died in September, 1866, and on May 16, 1870, Mr. Rice was united to Mary E. Wright, a native of Ohio, and daughter of Robert B. and Matilda (Grove) Wright. Her mother was a Pennsylvanian and her father a native of Ohio. He was a member of the editorial profession of Ohio, editing papers at Mt.

Gilead and Urbana, and during the Civil war con- ducted a paper at Wapakoneta, that became noted for its strong southern sympathies. He was an Odd Fellow, and in many ways a man of great ability. Of the six children of Col. Rice three, Minnie, William and Edward are dead. The living ones are Charles. T., James W. and Nellie. Col. Rice is a Knight Templar Freemason and in poli- tics he is an Independent. In 1889 he was elected assessor of Cascade county for a term of three years, which position he most acceptably filled. He is still heavily interested in silver mining in Neihart and in Colorado. His home town was named in his honor, and his wife holds the commis- sion of postmistress of Riceville postoffice.

CHARLES E. RICHTER. - The pleasing function of catering to the appetites of men has been the lifework of Charles E. Richter, of Forsyth, as it was that of his father before him. He was born 'in New York city on January 13, 1849, the son of Theodore and Conston (Metzer) Richter, the former a native of Strasburg, Ger- many, and the latter of France. They came to the United States in 1848, and the father was employed at Delmonico's in New York until his death in 1886. His widow is now living in New York.

After receiving a common school education in New York Mr. Richter worked at Delmonico's for three years, and in 1866 removed to Platts- mouth, Neb., and there worked with a government survey party for a short time. Later he opened an eating house at Creston, Iowa, but after a short time went to Canada and conducted eating houses along the line of the Canadian Pacific Railroad until the fall of 1877, when he removed to Duluth, Minn., and had charge of boarding cars and eating houses along the Northern Pacific Railroad during its construction until 1880. He was a pioneer set- tler of Jamestown, N. D., and conducted a restaur- ant there for a period of seven years. In 1887 he located at Miles City, Mont., and carried on a res- taurant in that town for seven years. In 1894 he removed to Forsyth, Mont., and has since made that place his home. There he owns a handsome residence and a number of dwelling houses which are occupied by tenants. He has been proprietor of the Northern Pacific lunch counter at Forsyth since 1894, and is also a director and president of the Forsyth Live Stock Company, which is ex- tensively engaged in the sheep business.

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In politics Mr. Richter is a Democrat ; frater- nally, is connected with the Odd Fellows and the Knights of Pythias, holding membership in the lodges of these orders at Forsyth. In 1892, at Miles City, he was united in marriage with Miss Hannah Margaret Holm, who was born in Sweden in 1872. They have one child-Emily Margaret Mildred, aged four years.

H ARVEY D. RIEGLE, one of the represent- ative men of Choteau county, with whose in- dustrial interests he has been conspicuously iden- tified, is one of those progressive and reliable citi- zens who have contributed well to the develop- ment and advancement of the state. Mr. Riegle is a native of the old Buckeye state, having been born in Pickaway county, Ohio, on January 31, 1838, a son of Solomon and Mary M. (Dunkle) Riegle, natives of Berks county, Pa., and repre- sentatives of fine old Pennsylvania Dutch stock. The grandfather of our subject, George Reigle, removed from Pennsylvania to Fairfield county, Ohio, in an early day, becoming one of the pio- neers of that state, and where he passed the resi- due of his life in agricultural pursuits. His son, Solomon, father of our subject, was reared on the parental homestead in Fairfield county until he attained his legal majority, when he removed to Pickaway county, about 1850, locating near Adel- phia, where he successfully engaged in mining, operating a sawmill and conducting a general store, and was identified with these enterprises until the time of his death, in 1891, when he passed away, full of years and well earned honors ; his wife survived him less than a year, as her death oc- curred in 1892. He was a man of inflexible integ- rity in all the relations of life, and was deeply inter- ested in religious work, being a devoted member and elder of the German Reformed church for a long term of years. Solomon and Mary M. Riegle became the parents of four sons and four daugh- ters, our subject being the second.

The early life of Harvey D. Riegle was passed in Pickaway county, Ohio, where he secured his educational training in the public schools. As a youth he was employed by his father in the saw- mill, and eventually leased the property and oper- ated the mill successfully for a number of years. His acquaintance with the west was initiated on April 10, 1862, when he started on the perilous

overland trip to California. On his arrival in the Golden state he engaged in the operation of saw- mills in various sections of the state for several years and also devoted some attention to placer mining. In 1869 he returned to Pickaway county, Ohio, where he remained for ten years, devoting his attention to the sawmill business. In 1890 Mr. Riegle came to Montana, locating on Wind creek, in Bear Paw mountains, and there engaging in the sawmill and lumbering business until 1894, when he removed his plant and business headquarters to the Little Rockies, and there continued operations until February 6, 1901. He had established his home in the village of Chinook in 1896. He pur- chased a hay and grain ranch, located two miles west of the town ; a ranch of equal area ten miles east, in the Milk River valley, well adapted to the raising of hay; and a third tract of twenty acres for pasturage lying one mile southeast of Chinook. Since retiring from the lumbering business Mr. Riegle has devoted his attention principally to the development and cultivation of his ranches and to the raising of live stock. He has valuable interests aside from these properties, and is one of the sub- stantial men of Choteau county, where he is held in the highest esteem by reason of his rectitude of character and ability as a business man. For long years his life has been an open book for the people to read and it has been a good record.

In politics Mr. Riegle gives allegiance to the Republican party ; his religious faith was originally that of the German Reformed church, with whicli he identified himself at the age of seventeen years. In 1891, however, there being no church of that denomination in this locality he became a member of the Methodist church of Chinook, serving for a number of years as a member of its board of trustees. He is a man of broad information and strong mentality, and at all times maintains a live- ly interest in whatever concerns the welfare of his county and state, doing all in his power to promote the best interests of the community in religious, educational and industrial lines. In December, 1869, Mr. Riegle was united in marriage to Miss Matilda Hedges, daughter of Joseplı and Elizabethı (Hamlin) Hedges, of Fairfield county, Ohio, and they became the parents of eight children : Elmer E., Charles E., Harley, deceased; Anna G., wife of H. A. Burrell, of Chinook ; Edith B., wife of Hi- ram Witherby, of Fort Benton ; Mabel II., wife of H. L. Rohne, of Chinook; Leafy M., and one who died in infancy.

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G EORGE J. RINGWALD .- We here enter a brief review of the life history of another of the successful business men of Choteau county, he now having charge of the Curry cafe at Harlem. In the beautiful old "city of the straits" and metrop- olis of Michigan, Detroit, Mr. Ringwald was born on November 7, 1853. His father, William Ring- ·wald, was born in Germany about 1821, and emi- grated to America with his wife a year or so after his marriage, locating in Detroit, where he was engaged in the grocery business and there passed the residue of his life, his death occurring in 1883. His wife, whose maiden name was Anna C. Walz, was born in the historic duchy of Baden, Germany, in 1819, where she resided until she came to Amer- ica with her husband. She now maintains her home in St. Paul.

George J. Ringwald received his early education in an excellent German-English school in his native city, and after the death of his father accompanied his mother to St. Paul, Minn., where he continued his studies in a business college. On leaving school he served a three-years apprenticeship at trunk manufacturing in the establishment of Wolfe Bros., in Detroit, and thereafter entered the employ of Crippen & Upton, in St. Paul, with whom he fol- lowed his trade for eighteen months, passing the next two years in the employ of Perkins & Belt, engaged in the sheet-iron roofing business in the same city. In 1877 Mr. Ringwald came to Mon- tana and served for six months in the quarter- master's department at Fort Custer, after which he joined a government surveying party from St. Paul, with which he assisted in surveying the channel of the Missouri river as far down its course as Doniphan Rapids, Mont. In 1879 he was at Fort Assinniboine, Mont., when the post buildings were in course of erection, and there conducted a res- taurant in company . with his brother-in-law, Stephen Spitzley, until the fall of that year, when he removed to Helena and opened a jewelry, pawn and railway ticket brokerage establishment, which he successfully conducted until 1891.

In the fall of that year Mr. Ringwald removed to Neihart, Meagher county, where he was en- gaged in the jewelry business and in mining until 1897. He was then employed by the Boston & Mon- tana Company, in Great Falls for one year, while for the next six months he traveled through the state as salesman for a jewelry house. In the win- ter of 1898 he was appointed receiver of the busi- ness of L. Minngh, of Harlem, and the 6th of

January of the following year he took charge of his present business and has since maintained his home in Harlem. He gives his support to the Republican party and is identified with the Knights of Pythias at Helena and the lodge of the Ancient Order of United Workmen at Neihart. In the capital city of the state, on December 13, 1881, Mr. Ringwald was united in marriage to Mrs. L. E. Schultz, who was born in Coblenz, Germany, in 1843. She emigrated to America in 1848, locating with her parents in Detroit, Mich., and coming to Montana in 1867. Her first husband, Conrad Schultz, was in the jewelry business in Helena, where he died in 1871, leaving four children : Al- fred J., now a successful stockgrower of Choteau county ; May, now wife of Herbert Holloway, who was formerly state veterinarian and is now en- gaged in the sheep business in the Musselshell dis- trict ; Kemna, an architect of Butte, and Edwin H., who remains at the parental home in Harlem.

DEV. F. A. RIGGAN, A. M., now of Browning, Teton county, is not only one of the most dis- tinguished divines in Montana, but his service in the ministerial field antedates all Protestant preach- ers in the regular ministry now residing in the state and in the boundaries of the Rocky Mountain conference in Wyoming, Idaho and Montana. His long, honorable and useful career has ever made for the betterment of his fellow men and the de- velopment of practical Christianity. He was born at Baltimore, Md., on September 7, 1848. His father, Israel Riggin, also a native of Baltimore and of Swiss ancestry, was born in 1816. He was a prominent ship builder of the famous seaport of his birth, where he died in 1861. The wife and mother, Emily (Lee) Riggin, a close relative of the eminent Gen. Robert E. Lee, was born in Mary- land of English descent. She crossed the unseen boundary of earth at Baltimore in 1865, four years after the death of her husband. The foundation of the superior education of Rev. F. A. Riggin was laid in the public and high schools of Baltimore and this was supplemented by a course at the Clin- ton Institute. He was then matriculated at Dickin- son College, Carlisle, Pa., from which he was graduated in 1871, taking the degrees of A. B. and A. M. in the classical course, and sharing the hon- ors of his class in the delivery of the Latin salut- atory address. The same year he entered the Phila-

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delphia Methodist Episcopal conference at Harris- burg, Pa., and was assigned to Fifth street church, thence going to the Minnesota conference. In 1872 he became a member of the Rocky Mountain con- ference and was stationed at Evanston, Wyo., com- pleting there the church edifice, and in the autumn of 1873 he came to Virginia City, Mont., where he built Grace Methodist church, also completed the church at Sheridan and built one at Salmon City, Idaho. At this busy period his circuit embraced a radius of from 300 to 400 miles, which he traversed on horseback, associated with Rev. W. W. Van Orsdel, a young local preacher from Pennsylvania. On July 20th, in 1876, at Fish Creek, Mont., Rev. F. A. Riggin was united in marriage with Miss Ida Isabel Jordan, daughter of Hon. Harrison and Catherine Jordan, who crossed the plains to Cali- fornia in 1862, and came thence to Montana in 1864, locating at Virginia City. Mr. Jordan, one of the earliest of Montana pioneers, was a member of the First territorial legislature and he for a num- ber of years was a 'commissioner of Jefferson county, of which he is still a highly esteemed and . honored citizen, residing near Whitehall. The fam- ily of the Rev. Mr. Riggin consists of three sons, Harrison Van Orsdel, born on September 16, 1877; Guy Asbury, born on July 16, 1882, and Kent Orville, born on January 7, 1885.

During Rev. Mr. Riggin's pastorate in Montana he has accomplished a vast amount of exceedingly hard labor. In 1876 he was the presiding elder of the Helena district, in 1877 of the district of Butte, and was also pastor at Butte from 1877 to 1880, when he built the Mountain View Methodist Episcopal church, which stood on the site of the present elaborate structure. He was superintendent of the Montana Mission until 1887 and traversed its boundaries from Pocatello to the Canadian bound- ary. He organized the first Methodist church in Butte with three members. As presiding elder he planned the church work in all parts of the state and in eastern Idaho from 1876 until 1887, pur- chasing sites for church buildings and occupying fields of Christian work in Montana and the por- tion of Idaho north of Pocatello. In 1880 he served as delegate to the general conference from the Montana conference, and organized the North Mon- tana mission, having previously, in association with Rev. Van Orsdel, inaugurated the church work in northern Montana. For four years he officiated as pastor of the First Methodist church of Great Falls, Mont., during which period he organized both the

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Progressive men of the state of Montana, pt 2, Part 151

Author: Bowen, A.W., & Co., firm, publishers, Chicago Publication date: [19-?] Publisher: Chicago : A. W. Bowen & Co. Number of Pages: 1092

Author: Bowen, A.W., & Co., firm, publishers, Chicago
Publication date: [19-?]
Publisher: Chicago : A. W. Bowen & Co.
Number of Pages: 1092