Fred H. Rugg Biography


	This biography appears on pages 587-588 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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				FRED H. RUGG.

	Business enterprise finds exemplification in the record of Fred 
H. Rugg, of Rapid City, who is president of the Rugg Lumber & Coal 
Company. He has made his home there since 1891, and has been closely 
connected with the development of that section of the state and with 
events which have shaped its history. Each step in his career has been 
a forward one and his powers have developed through the exercise of 
effort. He was born in Claremont, New Hampshire, June 2, 1856, a son of 
John H. Rugg, also a native of New Hampshire and a descendant of one of 
New England's earliest families. The original ancestor came to America 
in 1654, and was one of the first settlers of Lancaster, Massachusetts. 
His wife and children were victims of the Indian massacre which 
occurred in 1696. Daniel Rugg, the great-grandfather of Fred H. Rugg, 
was a soldier of the Revolutionary war. He enlisted on three different 
occasions, first becoming a member of the Middlesex Regiment under 
Colonel Samuel Bullard, afterward serving with Colonel Dikes' command 
during 1776 and 1777, and later under Colonel Ebner Perry in 1780. John 
H. Rugg, the father of Fred H. Rugg, was a soldier of the Civil war. He 
enlisted in the Ninth New Hampshire Volunteer Infantry, participated in 
the hotly contested battle of Antietam and was soon afterward honorably 
discharged because of physical disability. When he regained his health, 
however, he reenlisted in the Veterans Reserve Corps and served until 
the close of the war His wife, who bore the maiden name of Abigail 
Blanchard, was descended from early Scotch settlers of New England.  

	Fred H. Rugg was educated in the public schools of Claremont, New 
Hampshire, and also pursued an advanced course in the high school. In 
1876 he came to the west, and followed the profession of civil 
engineering in connection with various railways west of the Mississippi 
river, and was for a time located at Shoshone, Idaho. In 1883 he 
returned to the middle west, settling at Cedar Rapids, Nebraska, where 
he was employed as a bookkeeper in the office of a flour milling 
company and later in a bank conducted by his employers. In 1891 he came 
to Rapid City, where he was engaged in the survey of the Black Hills 
division of the Northwestern Railway. Six months later he entered the 
office of the Hulst & Price Lumber Company in the capacity of 
bookkeeper and was afterward advanced to the position of manager. In 
1905 he purchased all other interests and incorporated the business 
under the name of the Rugg lumber & Coal Company. He is now managing 
his interests under that name and is at the head of one of the 
important commercial enterprises of the city. He is also a director of 
the First National Life & Accident Insurance Company. 

	On the 15th of February, 1882, Mr. Rugg was united in marriage to 
Miss Susan M. Perkins, of Lynn, Massachusetts, a daughter of Captain A. 
N. Perkins, who for many years was the captain of whaling ships out of 
Nantucket. To Mr. and Mrs. Rugg have been born two children, but Fred 
C., the elder, is now deceased. The younger, Harold H., is a student of 
electrical engineering in the South Dakota State School of Mines.

	In politics Mr. Rugg is a republican of the progressive type. He 
served for four years as a member of the school board of Rapid City and 
during two years of the time was its president and for one year he was 
mayor of Rapid City. In 1912 he was the presidential elector on the 
progressive ticket. Fraternally he is a Mason. He has attained the 
Knight Templar degree in the York Rite, the thirty-second degree in the 
Scottish Rite and is a member of the Mystic Shrine. In 1914 he became 
grand junior warden of South Dakota. He has always been true to the 
beneficent spirit of the craft and the high standards of manhood and 
citizenship which it inculcates. There are indeed few features in his 
life which could awaken condemnation and the understanding he has 
displayed in the management of his business interests and his 
unremitting energy are features which any might well emulate.