William Schoof Biography


	This biography appears on pages 1492-1493 in "History of South 
	Dakota" by Doane Robinson, Vol. II (1904) and was scanned, 
	OCRed and edited by Maurice Krueger, mkrueger@iw.net.

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	WILLIAM SCHOOF, one of the well-known and popular citizens of 
Gettysburg, Potter county, has had an eventful career, and is a man of 
broad experience. He has the distinction of being able to speak in both 
the high and low Dutch, Norwegian and the Danish languages, besides the 
English. 

	Mr. Schoof is a native of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where he 
was born on the 22d of September, 1857, being a son of Henry and Amelia 
(Dursen) Schoof. His father was a successful farmer, owning about three 
hundred acres of land in the province mentioned and being a man of 
prominence and influence in his community. He served in an office 
corresponding to the American justice of the peace for many years, and 
being an income tax payer was eligible for and elected to a number of 
more important offices than the one noted. In his family were seven 
children, of whom all are living at the present time, while three of the 
number are residents of the United States. 

	The subject of this sketch was reared to maturity in the 
fatherland, and received excellent educational advantages-in his youth, 
having attended the schools maintained by the national government and 
also private institutions and a technical school of agriculture. At the 
age of nineteen years he entered the cavalry arm of the national 
military service, in which he remained three years. He was promoted to 
the office of corporal, the highest rank attainable in the three years 
term of cavalry service, and during one year he was stationed with his 
command at Flensburg in his native province, and the remaining two years 
near the city of Metz, in the present German province of Alsace-
Lorraine, which had but a short time previously been taken from the 
French government, so that it was a position demanding strong 
governmental control and a place of marked strategic importance. After 
the expiration of his three-year term Mr. Schoof, in 1879, came to 
America, being twenty-one years of age at the time. He was on furlough 
at the time, being still considered as a member of the military reserve 
of his native land. He landed at New York and came west to Bureau 
county, Illinois, where he was an inmate of a family home for some time, 
his principal object being to acquire a knowledge of the English 
language, and the customs of the people. 

	After a trip through Kansas and the Indian territory, he returned to 
his native land for a visit, in 1880, remaining there during the winter of 
the year mentioned. In the spring of 1881 he returned to the United 
States and located in Bureau county, Illinois, where he engaged in 
farming on his own account, having received financial aid from his home. 
Lack of experience and unpropitious conditions caused a failure in this 
venture, and, as he himself states the case, at the end of two years his 
five hired men had the money while he had incidentally acquired a 
modicum of experience. He then became infused with the enthusiastic 
spirit which was animating those who were beginning to develop the 
resources of what is now the state of South Dakota, and on the 21st of 
March, 1883, find him located at Frankfort, Spink county. In this 
vicinity he rented a large farm, his resources being summed up in eight 
dollars in cash and three crippled horses so far as tangible evidences 
were concerned, but he had the better equipment of undefatigable energy 
and a determination to win. He devoted his attention to farming for the 
ensuing three years and was very successful in his efforts. In the 
meanwhile he had exercised the prerogatives of citizenship by taking up 
homestead, pre-emption and tree claims in Potter county, and here he has 
made his home consecutively since June 10, 1883, save for the time which 
he devoted to his farming interests in Spink county. In the spring of 
1886 he made a permanent location in Potter county, and the following 
year met with a success of decidedly negative order, so that in the fall 
of that year he was constrained to accept a clerkship in a mercantile 
establishment in Gettysburg. He was thus engaged until 1890, since which 
time he has been engaged in the furnishing of seed grain on shares 
throughout Potter and adjoining counties, having had at times as many as 
two hundred and sixty-eight customers and having supplied seed for seven 
thousand acres of land. In this somewhat unique line of enterprise Mr. 
Schoof has met with gratifying success, while he has gained the 
unqualified confidence and esteem of the persons with whom he has had 
dealings. He is also engaged in the real-estate and insurance business 
in Gettysburg, and is a popular auctioneer, his services in the line 
being in requisition throughout a wide radius of country. He never made 
a failure in any business venture save that of farming and his failure 
in that line was not due to mismanagement or want of ability, but to the 
elements. In politics Mr. Schoof is a staunch Democrat, and fraternally 
he is identified with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Ancient 
Order of United Workmen, the Modern Woodmen of America and other social 
organizations. In 1896 he was elected register of deeds of Potter 
county, retaining this office two years. 

	On the 30th of November, 1891, Mr. Schoof was united in marriage 
to Miss Florence Knickerbocker who was born in the state of Michigan, 
being a daughter of Andrew and Carrie (Mills) Knickerbocker, who are now 
prominent and honored residents of Gettysburg. Mr. and Mrs. Schoof have 
four children, namely: Henrietta, John, Maud and Bessie.