DeWitt C. Booth Biography


	This biography appears on pages 583-584 in "History of Dakota 
	Territory" by George W. Kingsbury, Vol. V (1915) and was 
	scanned, OCRed and edited by Maurice Krueger, mkrueger@iw.net.

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				DeWITT C. BOOTH. 

	A native of New York, DeWitt C. Booth was born in the Mohawk 
valley, August 5, 1867, the youngest of a family of six children, four 
sons and two daughters, born to George and Ellen (Fearon) Booth. Mr. 
Booth's paternal grandparents were William and Elizabeth Booth, of 
English ancestry, while his maternal grandparents were Edward and 
Nellie (Prentis) Fearon, of Scotch-Irish ancestry. The subject of this 
sketch attended the public schools of New York state and later pursued 
a course at Colgate Academy, Hamilton, New York, one of the most 
thorough schools in the east. While a young man, Mr. Booth's parents 
located in Chicago which thereafter was their home. After some business 
experience in the head office of one of the leading railway systems in 
Chicago, Mr. Booth was appointed to a position in the United States 
treasury department with headquarters at Chicago. During the Columbian 
Exposition at Chicago, he was detailed to the customs division which 
had full charge of all the foreign exhibits and was therefore in close 
touch with the most interesting features of the World's Fair, an 
experience not only unique but of rare educational value. 

	Although the treasury department of the government is looked upon 
as the most desirable in the service, the out-of-door life as well as 
the interesting and valuable work of the fish commission, now the 
bureau of fisheries, department of commerce, appealed more strongly 
than routine office work and therefore Mr. Booth sought and obtained a 
position in that service After considerable experience in the 
commercial fisheries of the Great Lakes, the marine varieties along the 
Atlantic coast and the Salmonidae of the western states, Mr. Booth was 
appointed superintendent of the new fish cultural station then under 
construction at Spearfish, South Dakota, in 1899, being the youngest 
superintendent in the entire service. The territory covered by the fish 
cultural station at Spearfish is probably more extensive than any other 
in the country None but the coarser varieties of fish were native to 
the waters throughout the whole section and the excellent fishing at 
present is due to the results of artificial fish culture. As the 
pioneer in fish culture in this section of the northwest, Mr. Booth had 
necessarily to meet at first hand and solve many new problems along his 
line of work. The natural fish cultural conditions in Yellowstone 
National Park were in many respects very similar to those of the Black 
Hills and acting under departmental orders Mr. Booth investigated the 
fish cultural possibilities there during the early spring of 1901. He 
soon thereafter started the first fish hatchery in the history of the 
park and stocked with several varieties of trout all suitable waters 
throughout that scenic wonderland. In the development of the fish 
cultural station there Mr. Booth made thirteen annual trips to and 
spent ten summers in Yellowstone National Park and built up the largest 
trout egg collecting station in the world. Probably no two places in 
the country today offer greater attractions to the disciples of Izaak 
Walton than Yellowstone National Park, the wonderland of Wyoming, and 
the Black Hills, the wonderland of the Dakotas. When, however, it is 
understood that the waters of both these places were practically 
without fish life under natural conditions the success of artificial 
fish culture is fully demonstrated. The Spearfish fish cultural station 
is engaged in the propagation of the Salmonidae exclusively and the 
following varieties are handled, brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis), 
Loch Leven trout (Salmo trutta levenensis), rainbow trout (Salmo 
irideus), black-spotted trout (Salmo mykiss lewisii), steelhead or 
salmon trout (Salmo gairdneri), lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) and 
landlocked salmon (Salmo salar sebago). Since the establishment of the 
fish cultural station at Spearfish many millions of fish and eyed fish 
eggs have been distributed from that point, shipments having been made 
to seventeen different states besides those forwarded to the British 
isles, Alaska and Yellowstone National Park. In the line of enhancing 
the natural resources of the country, Mr. Booth has therefore been a 
prominent factor in the upbuilding of the northwest. 

	During 1901, Mr. Booth was united in marriage to Miss Ruby 
Elizabeth Hine, a daughter of Senator James W. and Emma (Barnum) Hine, 
of Detroit, Michigan, and they have two children, Edward Fearon and 
Katharine Barnum Booth now attending the training school of the South 
Dakota State Normal at Spearfish. 

	Mr. Booth is a thirty-second degree Mason, a Knight Templar, a 
Shriner and a past master and a past high priest, having received the 
Master Mason degree in New York in 1897. Mr. Booth is well versed in 
the scientific as well as the practical phases of his line and his 
opinions on fish cultural problems, especially those relating to the 
Salmonidae are widely accepted as authority.