Henry Port 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, 1898. Pages 440-443

	Scan, OCR and editing by Joy Fisher, jfisher@sdgenweb.com, 1999.

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HENRY PORT, farmer and stockraiser, living on the northwest quarter of 
section 4, Adams township, Grant county, South Dakota, was born in 
Hessen Darmstadt, Germany, May 26, 1835.  A portrait of Mr. Port will 
be found on another page of this volume.

Mr. Port's father, John Port, was also born in Hessen Darmstadt, in 
1806.  He was a weaver by occupation.  He~migrated from his native 
country to America in an early day and bought a farm in Green Lake 
county, Wisconsin, where he resided until 1868, removing thence to 
Cleveland, Ohio. In 1882 he went to Grant county, South Dakota, and 
made his home with our subject and his brother until his death, which 
occurred in 1884.  He was married in Germany, in 1834, to Miss 
Elizabeth Damer, and they were the parents of four children, of whom 
three are now living, and of whom our subject is the oldest.  Elizabeth 
Damer was born in 1810, the youngest of a family of five children, 
three of whom were girls. Her father was a chief of police in 
Napoleonic war times, and. he and his wife were both over seventy years 
of age at the time of their deaths, the latter dying in 1874.

The subject of this sketch, in 1861, left the parental roof and began 
farming in Wisconsin, where he made his home until 1879, although for 
ten years during that time he rented his farm and was an agent for a 
machine company, and in connection with same he represented an 
insurance company In 1879 he moved to Grant county, South Dakota, 
taking his present place of residence as a homestead, and shortly 
afterward added to it by the purchase of three hundred and sixty acres 
of railroad land.  About one hundred and twenty-five acres of the 
homestead is now under cultivation.  He had a flowing well on the farm, 
but a neighbor, in sinking a shaft for water struck the same vein which 
supplied Mr. Port and thereby affecting his well to the extent that it 
ceased to flow, but by pump mg there is still an inexhaustible supply 
The house in which Mr. Port lives is 24 x 24 feet, two stones high, and 
a cupola barn 40 x 44 feet including granaries and machine sheds, is 
among the improvements of the farm.   The place is well stocked with -
horses, cattle, hogs, poultry, etc.

In 1861, our subject was married to Miss Minnie Hein, of Wisconsin, and 
they are now the parents of a family of six children, viz.:  Matilda 
died in 1864; Sophia died when three or four years old; Elizabeth, 
married in the fall of 1887 to Carl Zuehlke of Grant county, South 
Dakota. They have five children: Philip, married in December, 1889, to 
Miss Mary Brodoel, of Renville county, Minnesota, now a farmer in Grant 
county.  They have three children; Henry died in infancy; and William, 
still living at home.  Until the time of the breaking out of the Civil 
war Mr. Port was a Democrat but at that time he became convinced that 
he was politically in the wrong and consequently cast his vote for the 
Republican nominees and has since been identified with that party, and 
has become a power in the politics of the township in which he lives. 
He has held nearly all the offices in the township and was the first 
assessor and treasurer of the township.  He has also 'served on the 
board of supervisors of the township.  In 1890 he received the 
nomination for the state senatorship to voice the sentiments of the 
Republicans of Grant county in the session of 1891 of the South Dakota 
legislature.  Mr. Port was brought up in the Lutheran faith and was a 
member of that denomination until twenty-seven years of age, and after 
severing his connection with that church was a member in good standing 
of the Evangelical church Association until seven years ago, when he 
demanded and received his discharge on account of the dispute between 
the bishops of the church.

While engaged by the insurance company in Wisconsin Mr. Port received 
for a premium for averaging three hundred thousand dollars worth of 
risks in three hundred days, a watch with a silver case, on the inner 
case of which was engraved "Presented to Henry Port by Farmers' 
Insurance Company, 1872."  In the first year of his residence in the 
township, owing to the low prices of wheat, Mr. Port called a meeting 
of the farmers in the community and addressed them on three different 
occasions with the result that a farmers' elevator company was formed 
and an elevator built at Revillo, and of this association Mr. Port was 
made president, which position he held for four years, with honor to 
himself and profit to the association.  Finally, upon the advice of Mr. 
Port, the elevator was sold, which proved to be a wise move, as the 
town of Albee soon started on the Great Northern railroad, only a few 
miles distant from Revillo, on the M. & St. L. line. Mr. Port attended 
school in Germany every day for eight years and, owing to the thorough 
method of teaching in the German schools, has an excellent education.  
He learns new languages very readily and reads with ease English and 
German, also some Latin, Greek and Hebrew.