James W. Guhin Biography


	This biography is from "Memorial and biographical record; an illustrated
 	compendium of biography, containing a compendium of local biography,
	including biographical sketches of prominent old settlers and 
	representative citizens of South Dakota..." Published by G. A. Ogle & 
	Co., Chicago, 1899. Pages 352-353

	Scan, OCR and editing by Maurice Krueger,mkrueger@iw.net, 1998. 

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JAMES W. GUHIN, an enterprising and wide-awake business man of Eureka, 
South Dakota, is a native of Wisconsin, his birth having occurred in 
Manitowoc county, June 17, 1863. His father, Patrick Guhin, a farmer by 
occupation, was born in Ireland and came to this country in 1849 during 
the famine in his native land. He married Miss Kelly, who was also born 
and reared on the Emerald Isle, and is a daughter of James Kelly, a 
prominent early settler and county official of Manitowoc county, 
Wisconsin. To them were born eleven children, nine sons and two 
daughters, of whom our subject is the second in order of birth. 

James W. Guhin remained on the home farm and attended the country 
school until fourteen years of age, when he entered the high school of 
Manitowoc, from which he was graduated two years later. He then 
successfully engaged in teaching school in Manitowoc for three years. 
On the 21st of April, 1883, he removed to Edmunds county, South Dakota, 
becoming one of the very earliest settlers of Rosette township, and he 
helped move the first building to Ipswich from Freeport. He and a 
partner, F. J. Tracy, took up government land, on which they lived 
alone for ten months until they proved up their pre-emption. In 
November, 1883, they located in Ipswich, where Mr. Tracy took charge of 
the railroad station and our subject clerked in the office. At the same 
time they were engaged in the coal and machinery business at that 
place. In 1884 Mr. Guhin was elected the first city clerk, the town 
being organized that summer and he held the office for three years, at 
the same time continuing his connection with the railroad company. In 
the fall of 1886 he removed to Bowdle, where he embarked in the land, 
loan and insurance business, and the same fall he was the Democratic 
nominee for register of deeds in Edmunds county. On the 27th of July, 
1887, he took up his residence on the present site of Eureka as its 
first settler and opened up the railroad station for the Chicago, 
Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, the office being in a box car. He served 
as station agent here for nine years; during which time he also filled 
the office of justice of the peace for six years, and as clerk of the 
board of education for seven years. Leaving the employ of the railroad 
in 1896, he bought out the Eureka Elevator Company, of which F. W. 
Boettcher was proprietor, coming into possession of their coal shed and 
a part of their grain business, which he has since most successfully 
conducted. He is also general manager of the Eureka Telephone Company, 
of which he is a stockholder. As a Democrat, he takes quite an active 
and influential part in state and county politics, and is at present a 
member of the state central committee from McPherson county. 

In October, 1887, was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Guhin and Miss 
Maggie Doyle, who was the first bride in the town of Eureka. She is of 
Irish descent, but the family have made their home in America for many 
years. She was reared in Lawler, Iowa, and is a daughter of John Doyle, 
one of the earliest settlers west of Aberdeen, South Dakota, who has 
been engaged in the hotel business at that place and in Ipswich for the 
past twenty years. Mr. and Mrs. Guhin have an interesting family of 
seven children, namely: William; James; Frank; Clement; George; 
Reginald; and Mary Alice, a baby girl, who is the pride of the 
household.