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ILLIAM BOYD ALLISON, lawyer, statesman, senior United States senator from Iowa, was born on a farm near Ashland, Ohio, March 2, 1829. He removed to Iowa in 1857, making his home in the city of Dubuque, where he has maintained a legal residence until the present time. He is descended from Scotch-Irish ancestors who first settled in Pennsylvania, but his father removed to Ohio about 1823, where he purchased a tract of unimproved land, in what was then Wayne county, improved it for habitation and built upon it the log house in which the future senator was born.

In this frontier house he suffered the privations, shared the labors, and bore the burdens incident to provincial life. In the winter he pursued the usual studies at a common school in the forest, two miles away, and there received the rudiments of an education, as well as some wholesome lessons in discipline. Through the common toil of the family the farm became more prosperous, and was enlarged. His father was glad to yield to the boy's wishes for a better education, and sent him for two years to the academy at Wooster, Ohio, his vacations being occupied with work on the farm. After this he spent a year at Allegheny college, at Meadville, Pennsylvania, and another year at Western Reserve college, at Hudson, Ohio. By persevering effort and by husbanding economically his personal earnings he was enabled to read law. This he did in the office of Hemphill & Turner of Wooster, while spending a part of his time in the service of the county auditor to defray his expenses. In two years he was admitted to the bar, and opened an office at Ashland, the county seat of a newly created adjoining county, and at the same time he began to take part in the political movements of the day, in support of Scott and Fremont, and of liberty against slavery.

But fortune did not sufficiently favor the young lawyer in a community where too many experienced men competed with the younger ones, and the frontier blood in his veins impelled him