William Schoof 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 762-764 Scan, OCR and editing by Maurice Krueger,mkrueger@iw.net, 1998. This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the SDGENWEB Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://usgwarchives.org/sd/sdfiles.htm WILLIAM SCHOOF, member of the firm of Schoof & Cambell, abstracters, is one of the well known business men of Potter county, and by his ability and enterprise has become a recognized leader in his community. He is a gentleman of good education and honest principles and is active in all matters pertaining to the general welfare of his county. His business interests are varied and he is an extensive grain raiser, operating as high as seven thousand acres of grain on shares in one season. He makes his home in Gettysburg, and handles real estate and collections. Mr. Schoof was born in the northern part of Germany, September 22, 1857. The family have been farmers for many generations, and his father, Henry Schoof, followed that calling, as did also his grandfather, Bartlet Schoof, and his great-grandfather, Henry Schoof. They have also been soldiers in the regular army as far back as can be traced, and the grandfather and great-grandfather served in the Danish King's Body Guard. The mother of our subject, Emelia (Dursen) Schoof, descended from a family of agriculturists. The brother of our subject, Earnest Schoof, is now a resident farmer of Germany, and has served four years in King William I's Body Guard. Our subject attended the public and private schools of his native land and at the age of nineteen years volunteered his services in the Thirteenth Dragoons, a cavalry regiment, and served in the army three years, and during the last year served as corporal. He came to America in 1879 and at once proceeded from New York to Bureau county, Illinois, and after a short stay traveled through Indian territory and Kansas. He made a visit to his native land in the fall of 1880 and the following year returned to Bureau county, Illinois, and began farming on rented land. He brought four men from Germany with him who worked for him two years on the farm, but the venture did not prove a success and he went to Dakota in the "boom" of 1883. He squatted on the southwest quarter of section 20, township 118, range 75, June 14 of that year. Gettysburg had been started but a few weeks and his land was located a mile and a half east of the village. He erected a sod house, 7 x 11, inside measurements, and six and a half feet high, and a sod barn for four horses, and held the land while farming in Spink county for three years, and during that time filed on a homestead and tree claim. In 1886 he began farming in Potter county. His labors did not bring satisfactory results and in the fall of 1887 he went to Gettysburg and was employed in the general store of W. C. Kelsey. May 22, 1888, he entered the employ of Schofield & Williams and was with them until October, 1889, when he began to work for Tillotson Brothers, general merchants, and the following summer left their employ to canvass as an independent candidate for county treasurer. From 1887 to the present time he has farmed extensively on shares, furnishing the seed, and, in many instances, also the land, but as yet he has not met with the success desired, but has much confidence in that branch of his interests and feels justified in hoping for good results in the future. In the fall of 1890 he established a real estate and collection business, and a secondhand business, and during the winter of that year taught a class of twenty to twenty-six pupils, composed of bankers, clerks, lawyers, and business men of all stations, to speak the German language. Our subject speaks several languages, and is a fluent conversationalist in low and high Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian and Danish. His real estate and collection business has prospered, and he has built a remunerative abstracting business in connection with it. The firm of abstracters is under the name of Schoof & Cambell, and our subject and John Cambell are the legalized members of the firm. His business extends over a wide area, and he is one of the best known business men of Potter county. When he located in that region twenty-six bachelor shanties could be counted from a knoll a few miles from his farm, mostly dugouts and sod houses, from 6 x 6 feet to larger size. During the time he spent in pioneering, from 1883 to 1886, he went forty-seven times over the road between Gettysburg and Doland, Spink county, a distance of over one hundred miles, and is well known at all the stopping places along the way. Our subject was married in 1891 to Miss Florence Knickerbocker. Mrs. Schoof was born near Flint, Michigan, of Dutch ancestry. The family came to America over two hundred years ago and settled at New Amsterdam, or New York. Her father, Andrew Knickerbocker, settled in Potter county, Dakota, in 1888, and is now a resident of Gettysburg, near where he owns and operates three farms. Four children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Schoof, of whom the following is a record: Henrietta, born October 13, 1892; John, born March 20, 1894, Maude, born January 20, 1896; and Bessie, born January 28, 1897. Our subject is a lifelong Republican and an active worker for his party. He has been called upon to serve in various offices of trust and is prominent and enjoys the respect of all. He ran as an independent in the fall of 1890 for the office of county treasurer, but the opposing factions defeated his election, and in 1896 he was elected register of deeds on the Republican ticket by a majority of about sixty over the opposing three candidates. In 1896 his name was again before the people for the same office as an independent free silver Republican, but he did not carry a majority.