Charles Matthew Dilger Biography


	This biography appears on pages 183-184 in "History of Dakota Territory" 
	by George W. Kingsbury, Vol. IV (1915) and was scanned, 
	OCRed and edited by Maurice Krueger, mkrueger@iw.net.

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				CHARLES MATTHEW DILGER.  

	Charles Matthew Dilger, alert and energetic, is successfully 
managing a store in Rapid City, where he is well known as a leading 
merchant. He was born in Dubuque, Iowa, October 23, 1854, a son of 
Felix and Christine Dilger, both of whom were natives of Germany, 
whence they came to America at the ages of seventeen and thirteen years 
respectively. They were married at Potosi, Wisconsin, and afterward 
removed to Iowa, where the father worked at the millwrights trade, 
which he had previously learned. They had a large family of thirteen 
children, of whom Charles Matthew of this review was the second. Six 
sons and four daughters of the family survive.  

	Charles M. Dilger was educated in the public schools, passing 
through consecutive grades until he became a high-school pupil. He 
afterward learned the millwright,s trade and for a time was located at 
Annaton, Wisconsin. Still later he began the manufacture of flour, 
starting flour mills at various points in the west, including Canton, 
Rockford, Wolf Creek and Burleigh, South Dakota, and one at Paragon, 
Nebraska. From 1873 until 1875 Mr. Dilger was engaged in fur trading on 
the Missouri river, and that brought him into close connection with 
many pioneer experiences and incidents in that section of the country. 
In 1880 he settled in Rapid City, where he opened an office as a fire-
insurance agent. Three years later he became associated with the G. S. 
Congdon Hardware Company and continued in that connection for a number 
of years. In 1907 he organized a stock company under the name of the 
Rapid City Implement Company, and assumed the control of the business, 
since which time he has had the active management of the store, which 
now enjoys a liberal patronage, its trade growing year by year. Into 
other fields Mr. Dilger has also extended his efforts and in every 
connection has proved himself a resourceful business man. He was one of 
the promoters of the North Rapid addition to the city, and he has 
considerable holdings in farm lands, is a stockholder in various 
business projects and was one of the promoters and stockholders in the 
Dakota Plaster Company. His plans are well formulated.  

	In 1880 Mr. Dilger was united in marriage to Miss Mary A. 
Clausse, a daughter of Francis and Julia (Remilliard) Clausse, both of 
whom were natives of Canada and of French extraction. They became 
pioneer settlers of Vermilion, South Dakota. To Mr. and Mrs. Dilger has 
been born a daughter, Lucile.  

	In politics Mr. Dilger is a stalwart republican and for some 
years represented his ward in the city council. He has ever been 
actively interested in local movements looking to the city's betterment 
and cooperates in all those projects which are a matter of civic virtue 
and civic pride. He was reared in the faith of the Lutheran church and 
he has membership with the Elks, the Odd Fellows and the United 
Workmen. He is one of the city's prosperous and substantial business 
men, his record covering over thirty years of good citizenship there.