Obit: Pradt, Louis A. (1851 - 1924)

Contact: Crystal

Email: crystal@wiclarkcountyhistory.org

Surnames: Pradt, McKinley, Roosevelt, Genrich, Brown, Atwater, Smith

----Source: The Sheboygan Press (Sheboygan, Wis.) Wednesday, 27 June 1924, p 6, c

Former School Teacher In County Dies at Wausau Home

Wausau, Wis. – Louis A. Pradt, 82, former assistant attorney general of the United States under Presidents McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt and at one time a Sheboygan County resident an school teacher, died here of a heart attack shortly before noon yesterday while sitting in a chair reading at the family home.

Mr. Pradt had been active in legal and other affairs right up to the time of his death and was widely known in legal circles throughout this state and many others.

Born in Coudersport, Pa, November 13, 1851, he came to Wisconsin early in life with his family and located at Plymouth, Wis., where his father, Charles A. Pradt, developed a farm and joined the Fourteenth regiment of Wisconsin Infantry at the start of the Civil War.

Educated in Sheboygan County

The son acquire4d his early education in the schools of Sheboygan County and in 1872, with his family went to a farm in Marathon County. Later he attended Racine College and the University of Wisconsin, where he took his law degree.

When he was sixteen he began teaching school and taught for twelve years in Sheboygan and Marathon Counties. In 1897 he was appointed assistant attorney in charge of court claims in which capacity he served until 1906 when he resigned. While in Washington, he became one of the incorporators of the American Red Cross and served as the organization’s first counsel.

One of his early law partners was the last Neal Brown, widely known lawyer, philosopher and writer, and for many years Mr. Pradt was a member of the law firm of Brown Pradt and Genrich of Wausau from which he withdrew in 1932 to practice with his son, Louis A. Pradt, Jr.

He is survived by his widow the former, Charlotte Atwater of newton, Iowa, whom he married in 1890, two sons, Louis, Jr., of Wausau and Alan A. of Menasha; and one daughter, Mrs. Marshall Smith of Menasha.

Mr. Pradt was staunch republican all his life and was founder and first president of the Wausau Country Club.