Page:Pen Pictures of Representative Men of Oregon.djvu/231

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

Linn county in 1870, and re-elected in 1872, in which year he took charge of the Albany public schools. In 1876 he was elected County Clerk of Linn county, running over one hundred ahead of his ticket, and in 1880 was the Democratic candidate for State Superintendent of Public Instruction, and was defeated by but seventy votes. He served four years as Private Secre- tary to Gov. Thayer, during which time he read Jaw and was admitted to the bar in July, 1880. He has recently purchased a half interest in the Al- bany "Democrat," and will hereafter devote his attention to journalism. He was married in 1868 to Miss M. J. Martin, of Harrisburg, and they have two children living. Mr. Stites is a member of the L O. O. F. and of the A. O. XJ. W., having occupied positions of trust in each. Mr. Stites is of rather more than medium height, slim and sharp featured, with heavj- hair and beard, in which we find a silver thread quite frequently. He is not handsome, but passes well in a crowd. He has a host of warm personal friends, and feels more at home in old Linn than elsewhere.* We may ex- pect a lively paper in the "Democrat" during ensuing political campaigns.


JOHN ROOK,

Editor and proprietor of the Oregon City "Enterprise," is one of the rising men of Oregon. He Avas born at Barnstaple, England, in December, 1848. He received his education in the schools and academy of his native city, and afterwards at the Wesleyan College, Taunton. He then went to Les Aude- lys, France, where he studied for some time longer. He returned to England and entered a merchant's office in Swansea, South Wales. He next em- barked in business at home, and shortly after we find him a clerk in a Lon- don railroad office. Mr. Rock's father had lived in America for some years, and his glowing accounts of the country, together with the reading of American newspapers, fired the young man's mind with the idea of coming to the United States. He landed in New York City, in 1870. After a very brief stay in western New York he drifted to Illinois and thence to Iowa. He reached Oregon in 1872, and the conviction resolutely settled itself upon his mind that he struck the desired spot. After teaching school for six years in various parts of this State, he settled at Oregon City and for a brief while was engaged in buying wheat. All his life, since early manhood he had been a scribbler for one paper or another. In 1878 he visited Eurojje, and upon his return he astsumed the editor's chair of the "Enterprise," which he has ably filled. Mr. Rock is a Republican in politics, and his editorial utterances are carefully read by most of the leading men in the State.


MAJOR ENOCH G. ADAMS,

Nothing can be found in the pages of this book that will prove more in- teresting than the genealogy of the historic family from which Major Enoch G. Adams has descended. As we trace his lineage back to Revolutionary times, we find that each son has proven to be a worthy successor to a valiant sire, and that the noble blood which flowed through the veins of Major Adams' ancestors has not lost any of its patriotic purity or been degenerated