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 242-243.

	Scan and OCR by Joy Fisher, 1997. This file may be copied for non-profit 
	purposes. All other rights reserved. 

COL. ABEL B. SMEDLEY lives on section 34, Melrose township, Grant county, where 
he is operating one of the fine estates of that township. He was born in 
Jefferson county, in the Empire State, September 21, 1825.

	His father, Joseph Smedley, was a Methodist minister, and his mother bore 
the maiden name of Miss Mary Jones. The former was of English descent and his 
ancestors were among the early settlers of New England, and from there many of 
them moved to New York, and later drifted to the western states.

	Colonel Smedley, the subject of our sketch, spent his boyhood in the state 
of his nativity, and was educated at Williamstown, Massachusetts. He was later 
educated for a master machinist at Fulton, New York. In 1840 he moved from New 
York state to Wisconsin, and was engaged in the iron foundry business at Oshkosh 
until the breaking out of the Civil war. In 1862 he entered the military service 
in the capacity of major of the Thirty-second Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, and 
in June of the following year he was promoted to the office of lieutenant-
colonel. In 1864 he was obliged to return to his home on the account of 
sickness, but in the course of three months he returned to the service of the 
government in the capacity of lieutenant-colonel of the Forty-sixth Wisconsin, 
and was mustered out in October, 1865.

	In 1868 Colonel Smedley then located in the then new town of Cresco, Iowa, 
and purchased a large tract of land in the vicinity of the town and conducted a 
farm on strictly scientific principles. He was considered one of the most 
thorough and practical farmers in the state of Iowa. He always had a large herd 
of cattle on the place, and was one of the first to adopt the new and modern 
method of dairy practice. He also engaged extensively in the raising of fruit of 
all kinds, and his home was one of the most beautiful and attractive in Iowa. On 
New Year's night, 1878, this home was destroyed by fire, and with it, the 
Colonel's large and valuable library and many fine paintings in oil around which 
clustered many fond memories of friendship and love.

	The Colonel was one of the prime movers in the organization of the Grange 
in the state of Iowa, and soon became one of the foremost members, not only of 
Iowa, but of the National lodge. He organized the local lodge at Cresco and was 
its master in 1872, and at the same time acting as overseer of the state grange 
from 1873 to 1876. For two years thereafter he was the lecturer of the National 
Grange, traveling and working in all the states in the Union except the Pacific 
slope, and is probably the best informed man in the Grange in the United States. 
He is the author of several works, among them the "Patron Monitor" and a "Manual 
of Jurisprudence and Cooperation." He also wrote one hundred pages of the "Foot 
Prints of Time," and has probably written more Grange books than any other man. 
He has written a great deal on agriculture and horticulture for various papers, 
periodicals, etc., and is authority on fruit-growing, butter-making, stock-
raising, and all kindred branches of rural industry.

	On the 10th day of September, 1867, Mr. Smedley was joined in wedlock to 
Mrs. Jennie Sherman, an artist of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and their home has been 
blessed by the advent of one child, Augustus, who is still living with his 
parents. Mrs. Smedley was born May 20, 1826, in Oneida county, New York, a 
daughter of Nathaniel Tompkins, who moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1849, and 
located on a farm in that vicinity, where he made his home until his death, 
which occurred in 1868. He was quite a prominent man in the business affairs of 
the city of Milwaukee. Mrs. Smedley bore the maiden name of Miss Sarah J. 
Tompkins, and was educated at De Lancy Institute, near Clinton, New York. She 
was first married to Henry Sherman, of Bridgeport, Connecticut, in 1853, and 
lived with him three years. To this union was born one child, Bertie, who was 
educated in the Iowa Agricultural college and the senior class of the Milwaukee 
college, graduating from the latter June 21, 1876. She is now married to James 
C. Drake, and is living at Tacoma, Washington. Mrs. Smedley has from her 
childhood shown a decided aptitude to the art of painting, and has now become so 
skilled in that art that some of the finest oil paintings in the state of Iowa 
are the result of her handiwork. Since 1862 she has devoted herself entirely to 
her profession. Her studio in Milwaukee was an excellent one, and will long be 
remembered for its rare collection of the works of art. Although Mrs. Smedley 
devotes much time to her profession and is an enthusiast in horticulture and 
floriculture, her ability and fitness for public life have taken nothing from 
her charm as a wife and mother, and she is a true helpmate to her husband. She 
is a living example of the fact that a woman who has the ability and devotes a 
portion of her time and talent to the elevation of her sex and humanity can at 
the same time be a wife and mother in the highest sense of the word. Mrs. 
Smedley's paternal grandmother, Sarah Tompkins, helped to organize the first M. 
E. church west of Albany, in New York.

	Since moving to Grant county, in the fall of 1879, our subject has taken 
an active part in the up-building and development of the interests of his 
adopted county in every respect. He filed a soldier's claim to the southwest 
quarter of section thirty-four, Melrose township, where he still resides, and 
has a pleasant and well-improved farm. Politically he is a Republican and was 
chairman of the township board for ten years. From 1885 until 1887 he was a 
member of the territorial council, and, in that capacity, served as chairman of 
the committee on railroads and drafted and introduced the first law in the 
territory that pertains to railways, which is yet upon the statute books. He has 
always been enthusiastic in educational matters and was a member of the state 
board of regents for ten years and up to March, 1897, and has taken an active 
part in the drafting and introducing of bills in behalf of educational 
institutions of the state. He was one of the instigators and moving spirits in 
the establishment of the Agricultural school at Brookings. While he has devoted 
much time and interest to all of the colleges and schools, supported in whole or 
in part by the state, he has devoted much of the ten years of his official life 
to the establishment and building up of the Agricultural college and 
experimental station at Brookings, South Dakota. Being an enthusiast in the 
cause of practical education he has watched, aided and guided the growth of this 
most useful state institution, and in fact he is well known and often referred 
to as the "Father of the Agricultural College."