DAVID
BUTLER, first governor of the state of Nebraska, was
born in the state of Indiana near Bloomington, Monroe
County, December, 1829. On the death of his father he
assumed charge of a large family and an embarrassed
estate. He landed in Nebraska in 1858, still a young man,
and engaged in mercantile pursuits in Pawnee City and in
raising and dealing in live stock. Prior to his
nomination for governor he had served three years in the
legislature. On the Fourth of July, 1866 the first
message of the first governor of the state of Nebraska
was delivered to the legislature. Governor Butler, a
republican, was elected in 1866 but did not enter upon
the duties of the office until the admission of the state
into the union. He served from February 21, 1867 to March
4, 1871, when an article of impeachment was presented
against him.
ROBERT W. FURNAS
is one of the men whose life history is inseparably
interwoven with the development of his state, and the
establishment of its industrial greatness. He was born on
a farm near Troy, Ohio, May 5, 1824. His parents were
both Quakers from England. At the age of sixteen he
learned the printers trade at Covington, Kentucky. He was
married in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1845 to May E. Comas, and
eight children were born to them. In 1856 he came to
Brownville, this state, and edited the Nebraska
Advertiser. He was a member of the council branch of the
territorial legislature from 1857 to 1861. In 1861, under
a special commission from President Lincoln, as colonel
of the United States Army, he recruited and commanded
three regiments of Indians in southern Kansas and the
Indian territory, and served in the war of the borders in
the southwest. Resigning from the regular service, he
came to Nebraska with a commission from Jim Lane to
recruit. He assisted in recruiting the Second Nebraska
Cavalry, was by Gov. A. Saunders appointed its colonel,
and served under General Sully against the northern
Indians near the line of the British possessions. After
being mustered out, he was appointed agent of the Omaha,
Ponca, and Winnebago Indians. In 1872 he was elected
governor of Nebraska. He has been president and is now
secretary of the State Board of Agriculture, having held
one of those offices since its organization.
SILAS GARBER was
thirty-seven years of age at the time he became a citizen
of Nebraska. He was born in Logan County, Ohio, in 1833.
His education was principally acquired before reaching
his seventeenth year; subsequent to which time he removed
to Clayton County, Iowa. He served with distinction all
through the Civil War and spent four years in California.
An early settler of Webster county, he represented
Webster, Nuckolls and Jefferson Counties in the
Legislature and was also probate judge. For one year was
Register of the United States Land Office at Lincoln,
Nebraska and was then promoted to the governorship,
assuming the duties of the office January 12, 1875. His
term of office expired January 9. 1879.
ALBINUS NANCE
was born in March, 1848, at Lafayette, Stark County,
Illinois. At the age of sixteen he was a soldier in the
Civil War and passed through the war and was mustered out
with his regiment. He studied at Knox College, Galesburg,
Illinois, where the foundation for his professional life
was established and where he was admitted to the bar in
1870. Soon thereafter he came to Nebraska and was in the
State Legislature from 1874 to 1878, serving as speaker
of the house of representatives during his last term. In
1876 he was chairman of the state delegation to the
Republican National Convention at Cincinnati. From
January 9, 1879 to January 4, 1883 he occupied the
gubernatorial chair.
JAMES W. DAWES,
the fifth governor of Nebraska, was born at
McConnellsville, Morgan County, Ohio, January 8, 1845,
where the
