Joseph Wayman 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 748-751

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

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JOSEPH WAYMAN, the pioneer sheep raiser and the owner of one of the 
finest cattle ranches in Hanson county, watered by the James river and 
its tributary, Enemy creek, has built his home in Rosedale township, 
just below the bluffs in the valley of the James river. 

Mr. Wayman is a native of Cambridgeshire, England, born October 9, 
1849, the youngest of the family of three children born to Berry and 
Mary Ann (Graves) Wayman. The father died in 1851, and the mother 
remarried. The second family consisted of three children. When thirteen 
years of age, our subject began to learn the trade of wagon making, but 
he received such ill treatment that he ran away and was engaged in farm 
work and working in a warehouse up to the year 1870, when he decided to 
go to America and join his brother in Illinois. He had saved money for 
several years and had enough to carry him as far as Lockport, New York, 
but there he was obliged to work for six months before he could 
continue his journey to Barrington, Illinois. He spent one year on a 
farm at the last named place, and then went to Chicago, arriving in 
that city the day following the breaking out of the great fire. In the 
city, he worked for a short time in a saw mill, and then secured a 
position at teaming. Then for more than a year, he worked as coachman 
for C. E. Cook and about February, 1874, he heard of the Army and Navy 
Colony which was said to be located on the James river, with Rockport 
as their headquarters. This colony was represented as consisting of 
four hundred persons, and all well located. Twenty dollars must be paid 
to join the colony, and five dollars of it must be paid at the time of 
entering. 

Mr. Wayman purchased a team and drove through to Yankton from Chicago, 
being a month en route, but when he arrived he found no flourishing 
company as represented, so he came back to his present location and 
filed his claim at Springfield. This location was chosen on account of 
its adaptability to stock raising, and he at once began this business 
by investing in a flock of sheep. Our subject's first domicile was a 
dugout in a hillside, covered with willow poles and hay. Here, with his 
wife, he began his pioneer life, while toads hopped under foot and 
lizards watched from the burrows in the side walls as they dined on 
such luxuries as the country afforded, while snakes frequented the 
thatching above, drawn thither by the warmth. But the only real 
inconvenience was experienced on rainy days when the thatched roof 
dripped in dismal streams and all the available milk pans were placed 
about the floor to catch the dirty, hay-stained water. Finally Mr. 
Wayman was persuaded by his wife to start a small room in front of the 
dugout, and with a monkey-wrench, a buck saw and an ax as his only 
tools, he made a willow frame, hauled boards from Yankton for the sides 
and roof and grouted between the willow rafters with mud, and finally 
completed a toad, snake and lizard proof home. In the year 1890, on 
account of failing health, Mrs. Wayman took a trip to her old home in 
England, and, though she had many years longed for the old country 
surroundings, when she finally got there, she decided that muddy, 
smoky, densely-populated England after all was not so pleasant as her 
pioneer home, and she not only made her visit short, but persuaded many 
of her friends to return with her and take up their abode on the 
prairies of South Dakota. Mr. Wayman followed his wife to England and 
accompanied her home. Politically our subject is a Republican, and 
voices prohibition and equal suffrage. He is a member of the 
Presbyterian church and also of the Ancient Order of United Workmen 
fraternity. He has put forth every effort to upbuild the public schools 
and to provide his children with the educational advantages of which he 
himself was deprived. 

Mrs. Wayman, prior to her marriage, was Miss Mary A. Smith. She is also 
a native of England, and was born in the year 1844. She came to America 
in 1872, made. her home for a time with her cousin in Chicago, and 
there made the acquaintance of Mr. Wayman. She joined our subject at 
Yankton, South Dakota, soon after his arrival in that state, and they 
were there married, and four children, three of whom are now living, 
have been born to them, viz.: Grace, who died in the midst of her 
college work at the age of twenty-one years; John B., a teacher; Frank 
G., a university student, and Eben, at home. Portraits of Mr. and Mrs. 
Wayman will be found on another page of this volume. Mr. Wayman has a 
farm well adapted for grazing purposes, upon which he has a fine herd 
of milch cows, and at times as many as five hundred sheep of the 
Shropshire Down variety.