Biographical Sketches

GEORGE A. DOUGLAS

GEORGE A. DOUGLAS has won success on his valuable and finely equipped ranch in Jefferson county near Boulder.  He was born in Franklin county, N. Y., March 7, 1831, the son of Augustus and Sophia (Sylvester) Douglas, and the father was a farmer.  On the homestead farm, and receiving instruction in the public schools, George A. Douglas passed his boyhood youth and in 1854, at the age of twenty-three, he removed to Madison, Wis.  There he at first engaged as a fireman on the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railroad and within a year he removed to Nebraska, where he was employed in carpenter work and then he interested himself in farming.  But it soon became evident that he was not far enough west to reap the benefits available to an enterprising young man, and in 1864 he made the journey to Montana.  Contrary to the course of the vast majority of the pilgrims of that day Mr. Douglas engaged in farming and as all kinds of produce were bringing high prices, he did well and later located near the Little Boulder stage station, and engaged in stockraising and general farming.

In 1861 Mr. Douglas was married to Miss Calista Allen, daughter of James F. Allen.  They have seven living children and have buried two.  The survivors are: Mary E., now Mrs. Frank Cook, of Como; Clara M., now Mrs. Temple Grady, of Hamilton; Elma A., now at Galop, Mont.; Arthur W., telegrapher on the Great Northern, now in Iowa; George A., Jr., now mining at Republic, Wash.; John F. and Pearl.  For a number of years Mr. Douglas has been a school trustee.  Mr. and Mrs. Douglas are veterans in temperance work and are probably the oldest Good Templars residing in Montana.  They have been very active workers in this order, having filled nearly all the offices in their lodges and been sent several times as representatives to the grand lodge.  For two years Mr. Douglas was grand chief templar.  They are now affiliated with Star Lodge No. 1.  In the community in which they reside they are highly esteemed, and the hospitality of their house is as wide and free as the unbounded western plains.  In 1892 Mr. Douglas and his two sons cast their first presidential votes in Montana for Benjamin Harrison, the territory having been admitted as a state in 1889.

Source: Transcription from the book, Progressive Men of the State of Montana, author and publication date unknown; located on the website, Internet Archive (http://archive.org), accessed 14 June 2022.

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