Progressive Men of Minnesota

Minneapolis Journal 1897

WILLIAM EDWIN LEE president of the Bank of Long Prairie, is better known to the people of Minnesota as an active public man and as the efficient superintendent of the State Reformatory at St. Cloud. During the spring and summer of 1896 he has been brought into special prominence as a candidate before the state Republican convention for the nomination for governor. Mr.  Lee is of English origin, though born in this country just after his parents settled here.

His father Samuel Lee came to America with his wife (who was Miss Jane Green), from Bridgewater, Somersetshire England, in 1851. Mr.  Lee was a contractor and builder and a millwright by trade. During the financial panic of 1856 he suffered losses at Alton, Illinois, where he first established himself, he came to Minnesota in June, 1856, and settled at Little Falls. He served in Company E, of Hatch’s Battalion, Minnesota Volunteers, during the war. Mr. and Mrs. Lee are still living at Long Prairie.

Their son William was born at Alton on January 8, 1852. He received his education in the public schools and from private instructors after leaving school.  While a boy he worked on a farm and with his father at the millwright trade. During his experience in this trade he invented a wheat cleaning machine, known as Lee’s wheat and cockle separator. Mr. Lee was unable to manufacture the machine and put it on the market, but, although he held a patent, a Milwaukee concern commenced the manufacture and placed the machines in nearly every flour mill in the world where spring wheat is ground. After many unsuccessful attempts to secure a settlement, Mr.  Lee commenced suit against users of his machine.  which were prosecuted successfully and became famous among patent litigation.

In company with R. H. Harkens, Mr. Lee, when a young man, started a small country store at Burnhamville, Todd County, which was afterwards removed to Long Prairie and became one of the leading mercantile establishments of the county.  In January, 1882. he established the Bank of Long Prairie, which was the first bank in Todd County.

Mr. Lee’s political service began in 1875, when he was elected justice of the peace.  Two years later he was elected register of deeds of Todd County and held the office for four years. In 1885 he represented Todd County in the legislature and took an active part in the railroad and warehouse legislation of that year the first important legislation of the kind in Minnesota. He was re-elected to the legislature in 1887 and again in 1893, when he was chosen speaker of the house. For twenty years he has been actively identified with the public affairs of northern Minnesota. Though of a democratic family he has been from the time he cast his first vote, an enthusiastic Republican.

In 1894 Mr. Lee was surprised by being tendered the post of superintendent of the State Reformatory at St. Cloud. During the nineteen months of his term of service at the head of this institution its affairs were economically managed and many improvements in the methods and management of the reformatory were introduced. During the winter of 1896 the stockholders of the Bank of Long Prairie, desiring to organize the institution into a National Bank, urged Mr. Lee to accept the presidency of the reorganized concern, and he accordingly resigned his position as superintendent of the reformatory and returned to Long Prairie.

In 1875 Mr. Lee was married to Miss Eva A. Gibson, daughter of Ambrose H. Gibson.  They have three sons, Rudolph A. Lee, a student at the state university; Harry W. Lee and Raymond A. Lee, students at the St. Cloud Normal school. Mr. Lee has taken an active interest in educational matters and served six years on the state normal school board. He has been actively identified with the building up of the village of Long Prairie, where he has been engaged in the banking, mercantile and real estate business.