Progressive men of the state of Montana, pt 2, Part 82

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 82

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When he left the army Mr. Rader took up his present ranch, which adjoins the reservation, and began raising cattle, horses and sheep. Here he has a fine ranch of 3,000 acres, Camas creek run- ning through it, and has several sections of leased land besides. He is quite an extensive breeder of all kinds of stock, having usually about 5,000 sheep and a large number of cattle and horses.

Mr. Rader was married March 14, 1869, to Miss Josephine Johnston, a native of Denmark, who in her childhood came to America with her par- ents and settled at Salt Lake City. They have eight children, namely: Henrietta, now Mrs. H. F. Paul; Keziah, now Mrs. Bonesteele, of Hel- ena ; Laura B., now Mrs. W. H. Seebohm, resid- ing in the Klondike ; Charles R., Josephine, Lester, Wilbur H. and Bessie. Mr. Rader is an enter- prising, progressive citizen, who has earned and

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secured the respect of all his fellows by his up- right life and public services. He has been school trustee, county assessor for two terms and sher- iff for eight years, besides filling acceptably several other offices. He is a member of the Masonic order, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Knights of Pythias and the Ancient Order of United Workmen, in all of which he takes an act- ive interest and is held in high esteem.

JOHN S. ROBERTSON .- Through hardships and arduous service in the Civil war, through privations and dangers on the frontiers of two states, through the horrors of Indian warfare when the Nez Perces were in revolt, and through a great variety of experiences in various lines of life, John S. Robertson, of near Stevensville, Ravalli county, one of the most successful and progressive ranchmen of the state, came to his present condition of comfort and affluence, and the firm footing which he has in the confidence and regard of the people who have the pleasure of knowing him.

He is a native of Henry county, Tenn., where his life began September 25, 1839. His parents were James and Ellen (Neese) Robertson, natives of North Carolina, who settled in Tennessee in early life. They removed to Greene county, Mo., in 1845, and here the father was a prominent farmer. Here also our subject, the second of their six children, attended the winter public and summer subscription schools until he was eighteen.

In 1861, at the breaking out of the Civil war, he enlisted in the Confederate army, where he saw active and severe service for twenty months, first as a private in the ranks and later as a ser- geant. At the end of his term he came west, ling- ering for a short time in Colorado and then con- ing on to Montana. He located first at Virginia City, but soon made his way into the Bitter Root valley, locating in 1864 on Burnt Fork, east of Stevensville. During the next year he removed to Squatter's Right, three miles southeast of the town, where he now lives in one of the best and finest residences in the valley, it being a ten-room, brick house, finished in excellent style and furn- ished with elegance, taste and every modern con- venience, all of which he delights in laying under tribute to the enjoyment of his friends, who are numbered by the hundred.

Mr. Robertson is a very wide-awake and pub- lic-spirited man. He is always at the front in

every movement which tends to the improvement or elevation of the community or in which its safety or welfare is involved. When the Nez Perces Indians were on the warpath, as has been noted, he went forward among the first to reduce them to subjection and protect life and property from their depredations. In civil affairs he has ungrudgingly borne his part in every way. He served as county commissioner when the whole end of the state in which he lives was in Mis- soula county. The office is a trying one at best, but when it covers a scope of country so enor- mous and with interests and needs so numerous and diverse, it is one of the most exacting and unpleasant known to the public service. In the matter of donations of time and substance to public improvements he has always been gener- ous and judicious. He is now (1902) serving on the building committee of the new training school at Stevensville, and has given liberally toward its erection. In politics he is a Democrat, but exer- cises his own judgment in voting. It goes almost without saying that a gentleman of his instincts and culture would find pleasure in the fraternal orders, especially the oldest and most illustrious of them all, Freemasonry, whose origin is lost in the twilight of fable. He has been a member of this order for more than forty years, and in that time has contributed essentially to its ad- vancement and success in many ways and places. He is on the charter roll of Missoula Lodge, which was organized in 1867, and is the only surviving charter member. In religious affiliation he belongs to the Methodist Episcopal church South.

On the 20th of June, 1869, Mr. Robertson was married to Miss Eva J. Price, daughter of Dr. Price, then living at Stevensville. The marriage was solemnized at Mr. Robertson's own home, where he and his wife now live. No children have blessed their union, but they have two whom they have adopted, Etta, aged seven, and John S., aged six. These little folks fill their house with glee, and charm away what might without them be almost insufferable loneliness, notwithstanding the genial and graceful hospitality which is there so bountifully dispensed.

DICHARD QUINN was born March 23, 1842, in County Tipperary, Ireland, where for gener- ations his family had lived and cultivated the soil. The same year that ushered him into being ended

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his father's life, and left his devoted mother a widow to face the bitter struggle of rearing her young family alone. She met the issue bravely, however, and lived to see her offspring all em- barked on life's uncertain sea on their own ac- count, and died at the age of sixty, in her native county, in 1880.

Mr. Quinn relieved the family of the respon- sibility and burden of his maintenance when he was thirteen years old by coming to the United States and hiring out as a farm hand for about eight years in Sangamon, Menard and in Logan counties, Ill. In 1863 he emigrated to Nevada and following mining for two years. In 1865 he re- moved to Montana and continued mining at Bear gulch, Cedar creek and Horse Plains until 1881. The next four years he spent near Fort McLeod, Canada, engaged in the stock business. In 1885 he bought a ranch on Spring creek, four miles from Choteau, where he was farming and stockrais- ing until 1890. In that year he located a home- stead in Pondera coulee, Choteau county, where he lived until 1899. He then sold the place, known on the map as Lucille postoffice, to J. W. Gladden, and in the fall of that year purchased his present ranch on the Teton river about half way between Fort Benton and Choteau. Here he has 520 acres devoted to raising horses and cattle.

In politics Mr. Quinn is a consistent Democrat, 'deeply interested in the welfare of his party, but taking no active part in its management. He was married at Fort McLeod, in 1882, to Mrs. Sarah (Standley) Haas, a lady born in Indiana, whose first husband died at Horse Plains in 1880. Both are held in high esteem where they live, and wherever they are known.

CAPT. JOHN T. SMITH was born near Knox- ville, Tenn., on February 25, 1813. About 1829 his parents, Josiah Smith and Martha ( Plexco) Smith, removed to Howard county, Mo. Be- ing the oldest son, Capt. Smith stayed with his father until he had arrived at the age of about twenty-one years, and then began a life of in- dustry and economy which soon enabled him to commence a business of merchandising in Kirks- ville, Mo., then but a small village and the county- seat of Adair county. In 1844 he was married, in Palmyra, Mo., to Miss Sarah Ann Goode, daughter of William Goode. William Goode had been reared

in Casey county, Ky., and represented that county in the Kentucky legislature for ten successive years. He afterwards removed to Greene county, Ill., which county he represented in the Illinois legisla- ture in about 1832, having as his associates from Greene county a Mr. Pierce and the renowned Rev. Peter Cartwright. During the session of the legislature the Rev. Cartwright's daughter eloped with the man of her choice, greatly outraging her father, but Mr. Goode smoothed matters over with a poem which gave him no little prominence as a literary man and made no little amusement for his associates. William Goode descended from John Goode, an immigrant, who was born at Whitley, Cornwall, England, in 1620, and who emigrated to Virginia. His genealogy is traced in "Our Vir- ginia Cousins," compiled by J. Brown Goode, late of Washington, D. C.

Capt. Smith, in 1850, conducted a company of freighters to California, where he was very success- ful in business, and within less than two years re- turned with a very comfortable fortune for a young man. He served in the Missouri legislature as a representative from Adair county, and in 1856 as- sisted in the organization and became president of the Branch Bank of the State of Missouri, located at Kirksville, Mo., the successor of which bank is still in operation and conducted by W. T. Baird at Kirksville at this time. Mr. Baird was a nephew of Mr. Smith by marriage, went into the bank on its organization, and is still (1902) its controlling spirit, having a goodly fortune and being one of the most liberal and progressive men in the state.

Capt. Smith was a Democrat in politics, and was a lifelong member of the Cumberland Presbyterian church, being a charter member of the church at Kirksville, Mo., of which he became the ruling elder on its organization and remained such until he removed to Montana.

In 1864 Capt. Smith conducted a train, consisting of wagons and ox teams, from Kirksville, Mo., to Gallatin county, Mont., a history of which expedi- tion he published some years ago in the Bozeman Chronicle. After leaving the Platte river he fol- lowed immediately in the wake of the train of Mr. Bozeman, and by agreement they camped in sup- porting distance of each other, the Indians being quite hostile, and Capt. Smith was of great assist- ance to Mr. Bozeman in spying out the new route.

On account of the continued hostility of the In- dians, Capt. Smith did not remove his family to Montana, as he expected to do, but returned to

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Kirksville, Mo., in 1869 and remained there until his children were educated. In 1879 he and his wife removed to Gallatin county, Mont., where she died on the 21st day of December, 1899. Capt. Smith continued to reside at Central Park, Mont., until his death, on the 29th day of June, 1896. The remains of the two rest in the Bozeman cemetery beside those of their son-in-law, Vardaman Cock- rill, late of Gallatin county. There were eight children born to the marriage of Capt. Smith and Miss Goode, four of whom survive. Robert Cabell Smith, now living near Livingston, Mont .; John T. Sınith, who is practicing law at Livingston, Mont .; Marthena W., now the widow of the late Vardaman Cockrill, residing at Bozeman, and Mrs. Wilmothi E. Richards, widow of the late Hon. David D. Richards, who departed this life at Brookfield, Mo., in the year 1889.

Mr. Richards was a prominent figure in politics in his adopted state, Missouri. He was born at Dalois, South Wales, March 21, 1855, and came with his parents to Bevier, Mo., in 1862, where he resided until shortly before his death. He was for a long time engaged in the mercantile business in Missouri, and was elected to the Missouri legis- lature in 1884, as a Democrat, and became conspicu- ous as an active worker and able debater in the legislative assembly of that state. When he re- turned from the legislature he was honored with the gift of an elegant gold watch, and his admiring friends have erected a costly monument over his remains at Bevier, where he was buried in the family graveyard at that place. He was prominent in Masonic circles, and held high rank in the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows. He was a member of the Presbyterian church, to which his widow also belongs. Their children are Marthena E. and Howell. Since his death Mrs. Richards has made her home in the Gallatin valley, Mont. She was postmistress at Central Park for six years and in 1899 moved to Bozeman, where she still lives .

F "RED. H. SCOTT .- One of the prominent and successful ranchmen and stockraisers of Cho- teau county, is an accomplished musician, draughts- man, penman, surveyor, civil engineer, lawyer and politician, an ideal host, an entertaining compan- ion and a firm and faithful friend. He is, in ad- dition, an excellent business man who has eyes to see and faculties to use to good advantage any

opportunity that comes his way. It follows that he has achieved success in life in whatever he has , undertaken, and stands hign in the regard of his fellow citizens of his community and all others who have come under the witchery of his agree- able company. He was born near Elgin, Ill., Jan- uary 8, 1862. His father, William Scott, was a native of Medina county, Ohio, but removed to Illinois while yet a young man. There he was mar- ried to Miss Sarah A. Sutfin, a native of the state, who is still living within its borders. Her hus- band died there in 1873.

Mr. Scott, the subject of our sketch, was edu- cated in the public schools of his native state at Dundee and Chicago, and finished at the Bryant & Stratton Commercial College in the latter city. Leaving school in 1878, he came at once to Mon- tana, settling in Beaverhead county, where he worked on a ranch near Dillon for two years. In 1880-81-82 he was foreman of the Butte Hard- ware Company, and during the following two years fireman and engineer at the Parrott smelter in Butte. In 1884 he went to the Bitter Root valley and accepted a place as foreman on the stock farm of Col. G. W. Morse, which he continued to fill for six years. At the end of that time he formed a partnership with H. I. Nash and together they took up two ranches in the Bear Paw mountains, on Clear creek, and for five years engaged in stock- raising. The firm was dissolved in 1895, and Mr. Scott took as his portion of the partnership prop- erty the ranch which he now occupies, located on the middle fork of Clear creek, about forty miles south of Havre and Chinook, in the heart of an ideal stock country, where there is abundance of well watered grazing land and valleys which pro- duce grain and hay in good measure. His ranch comprises about 500 acres, and is highly improved with substantial and commodious buildings and equipped with all the necessary appliances for its purposes. He devotes his attention to the pro- duction of superior breeds of cattle and horses, gradually raising the standard from year to year and prospering in the business in proportion. Pre- vious to taking up his ranch in 1890, he always put in the winters working in some store or mine, and the summers, when not doing anything else, working on ranches.

In politics Mr. Scott is a Republican, always zealous in the service of his party, but not in any sense a bitter or offensive partisan. He has been a United States commissioner for the district of

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Montana since 1895, and a notary public for the last twelve years. He is also clerk of school dis- trict No. 34, in his county, of which he was the principal organizer, and takes a deep and constant interest in all educational and literary matters. He has in his office a practical law library, and in connection with his other business carries on a considerable law practice. In addition to his other attainments, he is an artistic draughtsman and pen- man, a good surveyor and civil engineer, and an accomplished musician. He lays all his gifts and acquirements under tribute to the enjoyment of his numerous friends, who make his house a much frequented resort, finding there always a cor- dial welcome, a genial hospitality, good company and profitable entertainment.

Mr. Scott has been married twice. His first wife was Miss Alice Rundell, of Butte, to whom he was united in 1883. The present wife, whom he mar- ried in 1899 at Havre, was Miss Emma B. McMil- lan, an accomplished musician and teacher who is a native of Michigan and of Scotch ancestry. She adds grace and dignity to his home and contributes largely to the pleasure of his guests.

NATHANIEL SCOTT, a well known and popu- lar lumber manufacturer and rancher of the northern part of the Flathead valley, who by his many personal good qualities has impressed himself pleasantly upon a wide range of acquaintances, is of Scotch-Irish stock, one of the seven children of John and Susan (Henry) Scott, of County Armagh, Ireland, where he was born February 16, 1855. His paternal grandfather, Alexander Scott, a success- ful millwright of County Armagh, acquired a re- spectable estate of fifty acres of arable land, was a yeoman of consequence in his community and long an elder of the Presbyterian church. He was a man of very large frame, possessed great strength and was withal a tremendous worker. Both he and his wife lived to a great age and died within six months of each other about 1876. His age was ninety-five and that of his wife not far from ninety. She had no use for spectacles in her later years, as she acquired her second eyesight when about seventy-five or eighty years of age. The Henrys were of the yeoman class, as were the Scotts, but had not the same strength of will, resolution or physical powers. John Scott inherited much of the character and personality of his father and, like

him, was well liked and useful in local affairs. Nathaniel passed his youth until his eighteenth year in diligent labor, never until this age going farther than twelve miles from the paternal acres. He had and faithfully improved the advantages of national schools until he was twelve years old. His elder brothers, John and Alexander, had emigrated to America, and in 1873, with characteristic decision, he determined to cut loose from all that bound him to his native land and join them in the new world, where he deemed were better conditions for pros- perity and the establishment of a home after his somewhat exalted ideas. Acting at once on this decision he soon joined his brothers in Philadelphia, where he at once secured a clerkship in the whole- sale grocery store of Jonathan Graham & Co., one of the large mercantile houses of that city. Not liking the business, at the end of six weeks he went to Chicago, after paying his fare thither having but $9.00 in money. From Chicago he walked into the country in pursuit of employment on a farm, not an easy thing to do, for, although thoroughly acquainted with Irish farming, he knew absolutely nothing of American ways of working. At Aurora, Ill., however, he went to work for a Mr. Read and stayed until Christmas when he returned to Phila- delphia, fully satisfied to remain a grocer's clerk, if he could secure his former position. In this he was fortunate, and with this firm he remained in various capacities for four years. In 1877 he de- sired to know more about this great country and went to California and Oregon, finally locating at ·Grand Ronde, in east Oregon, where he worked on a farm. The Nez Perces outbreak, under the com- mand of the notorious Chief Joseph, soon occurred and there was a hasty flight of the settlers to places of security. With others he went to Uniontown, Le Grande and Summerville, making a midnight ride on horseback of nine miles in an hour to Union- town. Peace returning, he and his brother Alex- ander located a claim twenty miles south of the Dalles, which he sold a year later and came to Montana. After rambling over the state for some time looking for a satisfactory location, during which period he worked for awhile in the copper mines of Butte as a miner, he found his way into Flathead county, and in July, 1884, located on a pre- emption of 160 acres, the northeast quarter of section thirty-three, north of range twenty. This pre-emption he sold to Thomas A. Churchill, and returned for one year to the mines at Butte. In 1886 he returned to the Flathead valley and settled

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on his present homestead four miles from Columbia Falls, then unsurveyed. This was not properly surveyed and opened for settlement until 1893, and Mr. Scott did not "prove up" until 1897. From that time he has devoted himself to the development of his land, and in the proper season runs a thresh- ing machine outfit. He put in a sawmill on his home place in 1897, which has a capacity of 25,000 feet daily, run by a ninety-horsepower engine. With this he has cut about 3,000,000 feet of lum- ber, practically all being pine boards. This he has shipped to Havre, Benton, Great Falls, and as far east as North Dakota points. He has much in- creased his landed estate and has recently con- structed one of the finest residences of the entire valley. By his diligence, good business judgment and thrift he has prospered, and deservedly so. He is broad and liberal in his ideas, a reader of good books, and a thinker on good lines of philosophy and political economy. He is independent in poli- tics, favoring at different times the Republi- can, Populist and Democratic tickets. With him the man is more to be looked at than the platform on which he stands. He is a Baptist in religious preference and is affiliated fraternally with the Yeo- men and the Modern Woodmen of America.

On his first visit to Ireland after an absence of fifteen years, on March 13, 1889, Mr. Scott was united in marriage, at Kings Mills church, County Armagh, with Miss Mary Whitten, a native of the locality, whose Scotch Presbyterian parents resided only three miles from those of Mr. Scott. She has adapted herself to the conditions of pioneer life . with an easy grace and says that she has never passed one homesick day in America. This worthy pair have three children: Henrietta, born January 22, 1890; Emily, born December 9, 1890, and John Winfield Scott, born March 1, 1894.

PETER C. WEYDERT .- The subject of this sketch is one of the representative stockgrow- er sof Fergus county, where he has passed practi- cally his entire life, having been brought to Mon- tana in infancy by his parents, who were early pio- neers of the state and of Fergus county, where the father continued his residence for many years, and up to his death. He was held in the highest confi- dence and esteem, standing as one of the sterling pioneers of the great commonwealth of which he figured as one of the founders and builders.

Peter C. Weydert was born in Scott county, Minn., on the 8th of April, 1864, being a son of Paul and Anna M. Weydert, natives of Germany, the former of the grand duchy of Luxemburg and the latter of Prussia. Paul Weydert came to the United States in 1852, and his wife two years later. Paul Weydert first located in Cook county, Ill., and engaged in the manufacture of wagons and carriages until 1864, the year of his arrival in Montana. He made the long journey with ox teams, starting in May and arriving in Helena in September. Here he engaged in mining, also working at his trade, until 1882, when he came to the Judith basin, Fergus county, locating two miles west of the present Lewistown, where he be- came the owner of a fine property and devoted his attention to stockraising until his death, which re- sulted from an accident caused by a runaway team, and occurred on the 2d of October, 1901. In poli- tics he was a Republican, and his religious faith was that of the Catholic church, of which his widow also is a devoted member. They became the par- ents of seven children, of whom three are deceased -Susan A., Theodore and Augusta E. The four children who survive their honored father are Peter C., Lena, Anna and Albert.

Peter C. Weydert, who ably maintains the busi- ness and personal prestige gained by his father, received his educational discipline in the public schools of Montana during the pioneer epoch, thus laying the foundation for the broad fund of in- formation which he has gained by reading, obser- vation and active association with practical affairs. From the age of eighteen Mr. Weydert has de- voted his attention to agricultural pursuits in Fer- gus county, engaged, however, more particularly in the raising of horses and cattle until 1892, when he embarked in the sheep business, in which he has since continued, carrying it on extensively and be- ing recognized as one of the leading sheepgrowers of this section of the state. He is a part owner and manager of the McDonald Creek Sheep Com- pany, in corporated in 1892, owning and running a herd of from 8,000 to 12,000 sheep, mostly thor- oughbreds, and representing a capital of $50,000. The headquarters of this business is on McDonald creek, seventeen miles from Lewistown. He is the owner of a fine ranch property of 8,000 acres, while he leases 600 acres additional, so that he has ample facilities for the conduct of his personal ex- tensive business. Here he runs 4,500 head of his own. His ranch is eligibly located two miles west

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Progressive men of the state of Montana, pt 2, Part 82

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