Peters Genealogy

Benedict Miller 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 443-444

BENEDICT MILLER, of Grovena township, is one of the well-known and
successful farmers of Moody county. He is a native of Switzerland, born
October 21, 1842, a son of Benedict and Magdalena (Schenk) Miller.
Benedict Miller, Sr., came to America in 1856, and located in Fayette
county, Iowa, on a farm. In Switzerland he was a contractor and
builder by occupation, and was also an officer in the Swiss army and
participated in the war of 1847. He died in Moody county, South
Dakota, in 1894, at the age of eighty-one years, nine months. His
faithful wife died in 1880 at the age of sixty-six years. They were
the parents of six children, five of whom are now living, viz.: John
F., Clermont, Iowa; Benedict; Christian, Clermont, Iowa; Magdalena
Frautschy, Elgin, Iowa; and Esther Callender, Clarion, Iowa.

Our subject was educated and grew to thirteen years of age in
Switzerland. He then moved to America with his parents and aided his
father in clearing and subduing a timber farm in Iowa, and worked at
hauling wood in winter, and at the age of twenty-one began life for
himself. During the Civil war he followed the army for a time, but not
as a soldier, and subsequently worked on a steamboat on the Mississippi
river.

In 1863 Mr. Miller was united in marriage to Miss Elizabeth Isely, a
native of Switzerland, and daughter of Jacob and Ann (Marty) Isely, who
came to America in 1846 and located in New Philadelphia, Ohio, where
they lived seven years. The mother died in 1852, and the family then
moved to Fayette county, Iowa, where the father died in 1885. Mrs.
Miller was born March 30, 1845.

From Iowa, Mr. and Mrs. Miller moved in January, 1867, to Green county,
Wisconsin, where he followed farming and cheese-making until the spring
of 1882, when he came to Dakota and settled on the farm on which he
still resides. A small house had been erected on the farm he bought
and sixty acres had been broken, and Mr. Miller at once began farming,
at which he has since been very successful. At one time he owned one
thousand six hundred acres of farm land which he has apportioned among
his children. In addition to farming Mr. Miller has given special
attention to stock raising, and has a fine line of high grade stock.
His farm is well-improved, furnished with a comfortable and commodious
residence and fine barn and outbuildings, and ranks among the best
grain and stock farms in Grovena township. Politically Mr. Miller is a
reformer, and has always taken a leading part in all matters that in
his judgment were for the good of the public and his adopted country.
He has been an officer in the school district ever since coming to the
state until last fall, when his son, C. B., took his place. His
children are all well educated, some of them graduates from the
commercial college at LeMars, Iowa. While in Wisconsin he was a leader
in the Grange movement, and also in the movement of the Reform party in
that state against railroad domination. He also took a leading part in
the organization of the American or Greenback party, and was also one
of the organizers of the Independent party in South Dakota and later
the Populist party. He has invariably been a delegate to the county
conventions and has held many of the township offices, was one of its
organizers and helped to name it. He is a member of the judicial
committee and has been manager of the Farmers' Elevator Company, of
Egan, South Dakota. He is vice-president of the Moody County Bank at
Flandreau, treasurer of the Moody County Pioneer Society and treasurer
of the Farmers' Insurance Company, of Moody county. He is a gentleman
of the highest character, possessed of an excellent education and a
wide knowledge of men and the world. No man in the county has taken a
more prominent place in general matters than has the subject of this
sketch.

Mr. and Mrs. Miller are the happy parents of a bright and interesting
family of eight children, as follows: Rosina E. Waxdahl, Matilda
Kohler, Christian B., John W., Charles F., Edmond J., Emma M. and Otto
P. The parents are members of the German Reformed church, but attend
the Methodist church.