St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-03-24
SCHOOL OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES.
BELLE SAMPSON sPURR,

BELLE SAMPSON SPUR,
county superintendent of schools of
Barnes county, was born in Stratford,
Ont, Canada, in 1859. She went with
her parents to Jackson, Mich, in 1870,
where she was at school till 1879, when
her family came to Dakota, county
of Barnes, where she has since resided.
She has been married twice. was four
years widow, during which time she
farmed $50 acres with more success than
the average man, as her contemporaries
bear witness. and yet she is not in favor
of wOman's suffrage. She was elected
county superintendent in the fall of
1856 and vice president of the North
Dakota Educational association last fall.
MISS ELFIE BENJAMIN,
superintendent of the Clark county
schools, is native of Mclean county,
Illinois. She is niece of Judge Ben
jamin, one of the early residents of
Bloomington, and dean of the law fac
ulty of the Wesleyan university, located
in that city. Most of her education was
received at Falley seminary, Fulton, N.
Y. During the six years previous to
her accession to the Office which she
now holds, she was engaged in teaching
in her native county and in Clark
county, Dakota. She is experiencing
her first term of official life, but is an
ardent advocate of the 1.-TWO terms' pol
icy. Moreover. she is firm believer
that ladies in general, and single ladies
in particular, can eXpOund school law
in more lucid manner. and can arrive
at more just conclusions in regard to
the records and work of school ma'ams,
than the masculine portion of the genus
homo.
II. L. BRAS
was born i'm 1862 in Louisa county. Iowa:
moved to Illinois in 1869; educated in
New Boston High school, and received
normal training at State Normal Uni
versity of Illinois. Taught three years in
Illinois: moved to Dakota, in June, 1888.
Taught high school at Mt. Vernon three
years, and was elected county superin-
tendent of Dawson county in the fall of
1887. He has been continuous in the
school business.
FRANCIS RICHMOND,
superintendent of Bon HOmme
county, was born near the pres
ent site of the city of Olympia,
on Puget sound, w. t., lat that time en-
braced in Oregon territory in Febru-
airy, 1912, being the first white male
child born west of the Rocky mountains
dliNl IOl Ill VI tllC NOlulllOld llNCls LID
parents moved from there to the Sand
wich Islands and from thence to Hi
noIs in 1S4S, where he resided with them
until June, 1859, when he entered the
United States military academy at West
Point. Leaving the academy in 1868,
he entered the army, where he remained
until June, 1867. During the years
from 1867 to 1878 the time was spent
in teaching in the states of
Illinois and Missouri. In 1878 he emf
grated to Bon H0mme county, Dakota,
where he has remained ever since. He
is now serving his fourth term as super
Mr.. Richmond is pro-
nOunced Democrat. but the county is
safely two-thirds Republican on straight
issues.
HOMER A. DYE,
the superintendent of Buffalo county,
Dakota, was born on farm at Leon. To-,
and is twenty-seven years of age. Dur
ing his boyhood he assisted on his
fathers farm until eighteen years of
age, when he spent two years in the
mining regions of Colorado. His school
days ended during the winter of 1882
at the University of DeS MOines. The
summer of 1888 found him located on
in Buffalo county, Dakota,
which place he held down alone during
the autumn of that year. The solitude
of his little shanty, surrounded by the
big wide prairies, with the blue and
clOudless skies of Dakota hanging over
them, awOke in his bosom yearning for
a companion with whom to bask in the
glad sunshine that falls on the big
Territory which raised &C, 900, 600 bushels
of wheat last SumWer. He returned to
Iowa and was married in the spring of
1884 to Maria l.. Gassett, at Leon, To-.
his first love, an early schoolmate and
the incest girl in the state, he believes.
Since then he has been engaged at his
home in Dakota as buckwheat pro-
moter, school teacher and candidate for
Office. He has written acceptable ar
ticleS for the Western press, taught the
first school in his township in Dakota
and delivered the first public address to
q popular gathering in Buffalo county,
July 4, 1884. In religion he is Mug
wump, and in in politics, Republican
"a bloody-shirt Republican.
WILLIS G. BOWER
Was born in Dane county, Wisconsin,
in 1854. His bOyhOod days were spent
on farm until he had attained his fif-
tenth year, when, with his parents, he
moved to Lodi, Wis, where he received
a high school education. At the age of
nineteen he came West and located in
Clay county, Dakota, where he taught
several terms of school, after which he
was elected probate judge and ap-
pointed clerk of the district court of
Clay county. during which time he be-
gan the study of law, and in 1879 was
admitted to practice. Resigning both
of the said offices, he accepted the posi-
ton as postal clerk in the railway mail
service, in which he served with eff
fciency for four years, or during the
administration ending in
1884. He then resumed teaching, and
in 1886 emigrated to the Black Hills,
and during that school year was princi-
pal of the public schools of Custer City,
the county seat of Custer county. Mr..
Bower has been actively engaged in the
educational work Of the territory.
He was the secretary of the
first territorial teachers institute
that was ever held in Dakota, which
convened in YanktOn in 1875. County