Oshea A. Fowler Biography


	This biography appears on pages 529-531 in "History of Minnehaha
	County, South Dakota" by Dana R. Bailey and was scanned, OCRed
	and edited by Joy Fisher, http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031
.

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FOWLER, OSHEA A., was born in Pownal, Vermont, April 25, 1851.  His parents 
removed to Illinois when he was only three years old, and to Rochester, 
Minnesota, in 1865.  He was reared on a farm, attended district schools and 
graduated from the Rochester high school in 1869.  He then worked on a farm 
until he went to Sioux Falls, where he arrived on the 22d day of December, 
1870.  He remained in Sioux Falls until 1876, engaged in all sorts of 
employment; taught school in the old barracks during the winter of 1871,and 
eight miles north the following winter, in what was called the John Nelson 
district.  After leaving Sioux Falls he clerked in a hotel at Sibley, Iowa, 
for one year, and then traveled in the nursery business until the fall of 
1880, when he located at Aberdeen and built the first building there.  He 
knew the Milwaukee road would soon be there, and this building was erected 
for hotel purposes and called the Alpha House.  The following spring he sold 
this building and in company with a man by the name of Hazzard built the 
Hazzard House, but sold out his interest in the fall. His first son was born 
September 3, 1881, at Aberdeen, and was the first child born at that place. 
After having sold his hotel interest he commenced the study of law with M. S. 
Gordon and remained with him for about two years.  His next venture was the 
opening of a land and loan office at Frederick, in Brown county, and the 
establishing of the Frederick Herald, the first newspaper at that place.  
This plant he sold after having conducted it for a few months.  In 1884 he 
was admitted to the bar; started another newspaper, but disposed of it in a 
short time and gave his attention to the practice of law.  In 1886 he came to 
Sioux Falls and became the attorney for the Insurance Company of Dakota.  
This relation existed for a few months, when he entered the employment of 
the firm of Summers & Van Horn, of Sioux Falls, as their attorney and collector.  
After a few months he again went to work for the Insurance Company of Dakota and 
remained with the company until it ceased to exist.  He then resumed the 
practice of law, but devoted the greater portion of his time to collections 
until April, 1896, when he was elected police justice of the city of Sioux Falls 
for the term of two years and was reelected for a second term. Everybody in the 
county knows O. A. Fowler, and his list of friends foot up about the same as 
the population.