Capt. John Harrison Hauser Biography


	This biography appears on pages 810-812 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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				CAPTAIN JOHN HARRISON HAUSER. 

	Captain John Harrison Hauser was one of the honored veterans of 
the Civil war and a well known and valued member of the bar of 
Aberdeen, South Dakota, in which city he passed away June 29, 1911. His 
ability as a lawyer was perhaps most apparent when upon the bench he 
was called upon to give just and equitable decisions upon litigated 
interests that came up for settlement. 

	Captain Hauser was born in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, September 
2, 1836, a son of Jacob L. and Frances (Butts) Hauser. In 1850 the 
family removed to Wisconsin and settled at Delavan, where the son spent 
two years in assisting his father on a farm. Prior to 1860 he had 
acquired only a common-school education, but he was ambitious to enjoy 
better advantages in that direction and during that year he entered the 
preparatory department of Lawrence University, now called Lawrence 
College, at Appleton, Wisconsin, and in 1861 became a member of the 
freshman class of the university. In his junior year he raised a 
company of students and as its captain joined the Fortieth Regiment of 
Wisconsin Volunteers, who had enlisted to serve for one hundred days. 
Upon his return to Appleton he became a member of the senior class in 
college in October, 1864, but in February following he reenlisted for 
three years, service, or until the close of the war. He raised a 
company in eight days and as its captain joined the Forty-ninth 
Wisconsin Regiment. The members of the faculty were unwilling that he 
should return to the war and, although he promised to continue his 
studies and to faithfully fill out the requirements of the curriculum, 
they at first voted that they could not graduate him. After he had gone 
to the south they reconsidered the matter and decided that he might 
graduate provided he would pass an examination in all of his studies 
and not be a candidate for honors, although he was entitled to the 
valedictory and highest honors of his class. Having his books with him, 
he prepared for examination in seven studies while among the 
bushwhackers of Missouri. The faculty sent written questions to the 
colonel of his regiment for him to answer and he passed a creditable 
examination and was graduated in June, 1865, with the degree of 
Bachelor of Arts. Three years later the Master of Arts degree was 
conferred upon him. In November, 1865, his regiment was mustered out of 
the service and he spent a term at the law school in Ann Arbor, 
Michigan. Later he continued his legal studies with J. H. Carpenter, of 
Madison, Wisconsin, and was admitted to the bar in November, 1866. 

	After practicing a short time in Independence, Iowa, Captain 
Hauser settled in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, in 1867, and there for ten 
years continued in law practice with a large clientage and a growing 
reputation. On the 26th of March, 1877, he was appointed postmaster at 
Fond du Lac and not long after the expiration of his term in that 
office removed to South Dakota, then the territory of Dakota, arriving 
in Aberdeen, May 30, 1882. He at once opened a law and land office, 
filed upon a preemption and helped survey and plat much of the land 
between Aberdeen and the Missouri river. He was one of the pioneers of 
Aberdeen and Brown county, arriving there when the buildings on the 
city's site could be counted upon the fingers of one hand. For more 
than sixteen years he was identified with every public movement, 
continually acting in the public service without emolument or hope of 
reward other than the satisfaction that comes from doing one's duty 
well. The only public office that he consented to fill was in the 
direct path of his profession. He served for three terms as city 
attorney and was chosen for the bench as county or probate judge of 
Brown county.- While engaged in the active practice of law he probably 
did more hard work for persons in needy circumstances, absolutely 
without compensation, than any other lawyer in the northwest. The 
oppressed never appealed to him in vain; injured innocence never lacked 
a champion while he was at liberty to take the case. In dozens of 
instances that might be enumerated he has been the defender of the 
widow and of the orphan. In 1898 he was elected county judge and at the 
close of his first term, in 1900, when he was a candidate for 
reelection the News of Aberdeen said editorially. 

	"Captain J. H. Hauser, who was elected to this position two years 
ago and unanimously renominated this year, is known personally to every 
resident of the county. He has made a just and upright judge, and his 
decisions have invariably been sustained. This office is continually 
becoming more important and has now reached a stage when it should be 
filled by none but a competent, practicing attorney —the kind of an 
attorney the voter would be willing to hire if he had a case in circuit 
or supreme court. A mere certificate of admission to the bar is not 
sufficient. Captain Hauser fills the most rigid requirements. His 
decisions and findings will stand the test of the highest courts, now 
and in the future. Titles resting upon his decisions will stand the 
test in the future, as they have in the past. As an attorney he is 
preeminently qualified; and as a man he is entitled to everybody's 
support. With a heart large enough to sympathize with the woes of a 
child or the weakest unfortunate, he would give and has given the food 
from his table to relieve distress. Charitable to a fault, generous as 
the sun, loving not wealth, but looking upon the regard of his fellow 
man as the true riches, he has gone through life scattering sunshine, 
conveying messages of encouragement. No man has ever heard him relate a 
story reflecting adversely upon the character of any other man. On the 
other hand, he has returned good for evil, has prayed for those who 
despitefully used him, has all his life played the part of a Good 
Samaritan. When he is gathered to his reward it should be written on 
his stone, 'He loved his neighbor as himself.' Want has never appealed 
to him in vain, whether for defense at the bar of justice, or for the 
relief of physical needs. It should be a delight to vote for such a man 
and the News has sufficient confidence in human nature to believe that 
a large majority of the electors of Brown county will so consider it." 

	On the 15th of September, 1868, the Rev. Phineas B. Pease, at 
that time pastor of the Grand Avenue Methodist Episcopal church in 
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, performed a marriage ceremony that united the 
destinies of Captain Hauser and Miss Louise M. Pease, who was graduated 
from the Milwaukee Female College in June, 1865. She taught in the 
seventh ward grammar school of Milwaukee for one year and in the Dover 
Academy at Dover, Illinois, for a year. To Captain and Mrs. Hauser were 
born six children: Fanny; Carl Pease, who died in infancy; Percy, who 
married Irene Bates, of Lafayette, Indiana; J. P., who married Gold 
Corwin, of Mitchell, South Dakota; Cornelia Louise, the wife of J. E. 
Hauter. of Duluth, Minnesota; and Scott P., who is a student in the 
School of Theology of the Boston University. 

	Captain Hauser was a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, to 
which Mrs. Hauser still belongs. In all church and charitable work they 
were in deep sympathy. Mrs. Hauser is a prominent member of the Woman's 
Relief Corps and has served for one year as department president. She 
was also conference secretary of the Women's Foreign Missionary Society 
for thirteen years and its treasurer for three years. Captain Hauser 
furthered the interests and work of the church in every possible way 
and gave generously to its support. In politics he was always a 
republican, worked untiringly for the party, and in campaigns made 
speeches in nearly every town in South Dakota. He had the loyalty and 
patriotism not only for the average citizen, but of the soldier who 
knows what it means to fight for his country,s flag. Fraternally he was 
a Mason and attained the Knight Templar degree, and also became a 
member of Yelduz Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Aberdeen. At different 
times he held many offices in the Masonic organization. He belonged to 
the Aberdeen Commercial Club, to the Brown County Bar Association and 
to the Brown County Pioneer Society. He was frequently called upon to 
address public gatherings, one of the most notable occasions being that 
on which, in behalf of the citizens of Aberdeen, he presented a flag to 
Company F, which had enlisted for service in the Spanish-American war. 
One of the local papers said: 

	"The eloquent, white haired veteran and orator never appeared to 
better advantage, and never made a more eloquent or impressive address. 
His own experience of years ago and the thrilling scenes of the hour 
seemed to inspire him with more than his usual power as an orator. He 
was frequently interrupted by enthusiastic applause and was deeply 
affected. He spoke with great feeling of a time thirty-seven years ago 
v. hen another flag was presented to a company of which he was the 
head, and reviewed briefly the events of the war which followed, 
detailing incidents calculated to inspire the young soldiers to whom he 
was talking with valor and confidence. He deeply impressed them with 
the thought that there is something more than physical prowess 
necessary to make the soldierly soldier and the gallant fighter, and 
that is a full possession of the trinity of love —love of mother, of 
country and of God. He presented the beautiful silken banner to them as 
the flag of Washington —the same flag that was at Buena Vista, at the 
City of Mexico, at New Orleans, at Gettysburg, at Lookout Mountain and 
at all the seven hundred battles that ended with Appomatox —and gave it 
them in charge to keep it untarnished and unspotted with dishonor, and 
to return with it pure in this respect, though it might be torn and 
tattered by the missiles of the enemy." 

	Perhaps no better summary of the life and character of Captain 
Hauser can be given than in the words of the Daily News of September 
22, 1898, which said: "Probably no man in South Dakota, certainly no 
man in Aberdeen, has given so much of his time and talent to the public 
as Captain Hauser. Necessity has never appealed to him in vain. No 
client with a just cause has ever been turned from his door on account 
of poverty. Whenever an orator has been wanted to extol the resources 
of the country, the blessings of liberty, the glory of the flag, the 
beauties of the constitution, he teas been invariably selected. 
Whenever an orator has been wanted to speak words of encouragement and 
to sow the seeds of patriotism in the breasts of the young, the captain 
has been drawn upon. And never once, no matter at what personal 
inconvenience or loss to himself, has he failed to respond. To lay up 
wealth has never been his desire —such men exist for the good of others 
—and now that the people of the county have an opportunity to give him 
something with a small salary attached, it is believed they will not 
refuse the small token of appreciation. His neighbor's distress has 
always been his concern; the poor have been his clients. To scatter 
sunshine has been his mission in life. When storm clouds gather he 
thinks not of their frowning faces, but of their silver linings, and no 
man can talk with him when assailed with doubts without experiencing 
relief. The world would be better if there were more like him —there 
would be less grasping, less distrust, more brightness, more enjoyment 
of the good things that lie about unappreciated; the command to 'love 
thy neighbor' and the golden rule would be generally observed."