54 THE PORTRAIT GALLERY 



THE FOUNDER OF ARBOR DAY 



16. The second Secretary of Agriculture was J. Sterling Mor- 

 ton, Nebraska City, Nebr. A practical farmer throughout the 

 major portion of his life, he was a man of deep idealism and 

 powerful instincts. His conception of "Arbor Day," which ulti- 

 mately became a national institution, resulted in the beautifica- 

 tion of thousands of rural and urban homes, and tens of thou- 

 sands of flourishing groves where once only the woodless prairies 

 spread. 



Secretary Morton was bom April 22, 1832, in Adams, N. Y., 

 from a line of paternal ancestors whose Americanization dated 

 back to the "Little Ann," first ship to land after the Mayflower. 

 When two years old, his parents emigrated to Monroe, Mich., at 

 which place he received his common school education. In 1846 

 he was sent to a Methodist seminary at Albion, Mich., to prepare 

 for the state university, but while he spent most of his time at 

 Ann Arbor, he ultimately received his degree at Union College 

 in 1854. The following fall he married Caroline Joy French 

 of Detroit and removed with her to Bellevue in the then territory 

 of Nebraska. The situation did not prove successful, however, 

 and after a few months he located near the site of what is now 

 Nebraska City. He became a member of the town company, and 

 took up a claim of a quarter section bordering on the townsite. 

 Arbor Lodge, as the estate was called, was his home continuously 

 thereafter. 



Mr. Morton was an original member of the Nebraska Terri- 

 torial Board of Agriculture, and of the Territorial Horticultural 

 Society. He was a charter member of the Nebraska State His- 

 torical Society and at one time its president. In 1889 he was 

 one of the American Commissioners to the Paris Exposition, 

 and was always prominent in Nebraska political life. He was 

 appointed secretary of the Nebraska Territory in 1858 and 

 under the law became its acting governor on the resignation of 



