Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1896-05-08

First Negro Ever Sent From That State to
 National Convention-His Entrance
 Into PoIitics-Has Had a Checkered Ca-
 reer.
 For the first time in her history Min nesota is to be represented at national convention by colored man. Although it is several weeks since J. Frank Wheaton was elected alternate delegate from Minneapolis-th Fifth Minnesota congressional district-so little com ment has been made on his election that it is a question if more than a small part of the people of his own state know that he is colored man and of the most undoubted black too.
 The story of Wheaton's life would be the record of A series of successful strug gles against the bondage of race preju- dice. He was born in Maryland in 1866 and began to black shoes on the streets of Hagerstown before he was years old. At that early age he had fixed purpose to get an education, and the nickels and dimes which he earned i'll shining shoes were saved to pay the ex- penses of the schooling which the boy managed to get later in life. He attend ed successfully the Hagerstown public schools, the state normal school of West Virginia, the Dixon Business college, Dixon, Ills, and the Howard university, Washington.
 His first work after getting an edu- cation was as 8 schoolteacher, but he was soon drawn into politics. Before he was 9 he was elected delegate to Maryland Republican state convention. At the age of 21 he was elected to the Republican national convention in Chi cago ill 1888 as a delegate from the Sixth Maryland district. During the campaign of that year he showed great ability as public speaker and was em- ployed as a stump speaker by the Re publican national committee. After the election he secured clerkship in the house of representatives, which he held until the Fifty second congress replaced him with Democrat.
 Returning to his home i'll Maryland, Wheaton began stubborn and bitter fight for admission to the bar, having qualified himself by 8 careful course of study. Race prejudice was dominant ill his part of the state and his undertak ing was all up hill. He was finally al- lowed to take an examination, which he passed successfully. After that every obstacle was thrown i'll his way to pre- vent his admission to the bar. So de- termined were those who opposed him that it was only after ten months of persistent effort that Judge R. H. Alvey, now chief justice of the supreme court of appeals of the District of Go lumbia and member of the Venezuelan commission, admitted him. Wheaton'a victory IS all the more remarkable when it is remembered that at that time there was state law forbidding colored men to practice, and that he was the first negro admitted outside of the city of Baltimore and the fourth in the state
 In 1899 an Afro American convention elected him as delegate to the Repub= lican national convention in Minne- apolis but his credentials were not ac. cepted Firing of the continual struggle dBd1usb 0u0 ulsdufduldSSs 1ulpOSeu upon men of his color, Wheaton moved to Minneapolis in 1893. That he might be admitted to practice before the Mime sota courts he took two years law course at the University of Minnesota in one year. He was elected orator of the class and acquitted himself with distinction. He figured conspicuously in the campaign of 1894 and entered the lists as a candidate for the office of reading clerk in the lower house of the Minnesota legislature. After a hard contest he was beaten by one ballot. Subsequently he was elected as special clerk
 While acting as clerk his ejectment from 8 St. Paul restaurant caused a sensation. Wheaton sued the proprietor of the restaurant under the civil rights act, but the case was withdrawn when the proprietor publicly apologized.
 Wheaton is now deputy clerk of the municipal court Chicago Record.