BIOGRAPHIES:  Richard T. FARR, Eau Claire, Eau Claire Co., WI 

====================================================================
USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information 
on the Internet, data may be used by non-commercial entities, as long as 
this message remains on all copied material. These electronic pages may 
NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or for presentation by other 
persons or organizations.

Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for purposes 
other than stated above must obtain the written consent of the file 
contributor, or the legal representative of the contributor, and contact 
the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent.   The submitter 
has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently 
for free access.

This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by:  
Nance Sampson, Eau Claire Co. WIGenWeb CC on 16 October 2004
====================================================================


** Posted for informational purposes only - poster is not related to the 
subject of this biography and has no further information.

Richard T. Farr (deceased) was probably one of the most successful
business men who ever engaged in the lumber trade of the Chippewa
Valley.  He entered the pineries of northern Wisconsin in 1879,
making his home at Phillips, Price county, and passed most of the
time up to 1885 in this occupation.  In 1881 he preempted a piece of
pine land and also located several good claims for other parties, and
during the following year logged the claim preempted, clearing
therefrom $1,000.  During the next three years he had a varied
experience, scaling logs during the winter and looking up lands in
the summer, a part of the time for himself and at other times for
other lumbermen, working either by the day or for an interest in the
land located.  At the same time he picked up several state and
government "forties" which he paid for with is wages.  In 1885, while
chopping in the woods, Mr. Farr conceived the thought, the
consummation of which afterward made him so successful.  He
remembered that he had a verbal option on a piece of pine land, and
believing himself destined for a more prominent career than that of a
copper, he left his ax in the tree he was chopping, procured a
written option and turned his face toward the setting sun, starting
on the road to fame and fortune.  The next day he sold the land at an
advance of $1,600.  From this time until his death Mr. Farr made his
home at Eau Claire and having achieved success by making deals, the
profits from which amounted to from $10,000 to $40,000 each, he soon
became associated with many of the leading lumbermen of that section,
who trusted him implicitly to attend the sales of the state and
government lands at Madison.  He purchased for them any pine land he
saw fit to buy and at whatever price he deemed proper to pay.

It is from this standpoint that Mr. Farr was considered so
successful, rather than his accumulation of any immense fortune in a
few years such as had characterized certain men during the oil
excitement in Pennsylvania.  For it was there, in Bradford county,
that Mr. Farr was born, April 8, 1862.  In 1869 his parents moved to
Marquette county, Wis., where he received a common-school education,
and at the age of fifteen years held a third-grade certificate.  The
next year he left home to begin life for himself, and up to the time
of his death, which occurred December 29, 1890, he had accumulated a
fortune of about $200,000.  Although Mr. Farr attended strictly to
business, he was ever mindful of the fact that he had four sisters,
and after their mother's death in 1886, he furnished three of them
with means to support themselves and attend the Sister's Convent at
St. Paul, Minn.  Mr. Farr was a man of strict integrity, and honesty
of purpose, whose word was his bond.  He was buried at Montells, Wis.
It is believed by the friends of the deceased that a will had been
made, leaving his large fortune to his sisters.  If, however, such
was the case, the instrument has been covered up, and his fortune,
according to the law of Wisconsin, fell into the hands of his father
(for whom his hatred was intense), who, together with his two
brothers, divided his property as soon as he had been laid to rest.

-Transcribed from the "Historical and Biographical Album of the
Chippewa Valley Wisconsin, 1891-2," pages 433-434

© All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm