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DEMPSEY WINTHROP. There is perhaps no man in Perry county possessing a wider acquaintance or a greater popularity than Dempsey Winthrop, for ten years identified with the public affairs of the county and a resident of this section of the country since his birth. His first public office was that of deputy sheriff of Perry county, in 1902, and since that time his ascent in political fields has been rapid and continuous.

Dempsey Winthrop was born on a farm near Tamaroa, Illinois, on July 10, 1878, in which community his forefathers had established this old and honored family in previous generations. He is the son of Henry Rogers Winthrop, who, like his son, has been endorsed by the citizens of Perry county for public office and given worthy service in the office of which he has been incumbent in years past. He is now retired from public life and is passing the evening of his life on his farm near Tamaroa, in the vicinity of his birth. The founder of the family in this county was Charles E. R. Winthrop, who came here from New York state, and, settling near Tamaroa, passed his life as a public official of Perry county and as a farmer. He filled the offices of county judge, county superintendent of schools and county commissioner, in every instance rendering valuable service to the county and establishing a record for efficient public service that the ensuing generations have lived up to in a worthy manner. The paternal ancestors of the subject were among the descendants of Governor John Winthrop, of the Colony of Massachusetts, thus branding the family as Americans of the purest

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type, with an ancestry of which they may well be proud. Charles E. E. Winthrop was a Whig and later a Republican, and a member of the Missionary Baptist church. He married Miss Delilah Lipe, and both ended their lives in or near Tamaroa and there are buried. They were the parents of seven children, named as follows: John; Delilah, who married Richard Hampleman; Ellen, who became the wife of Zebeded Hampleman; Henry Rogers, the father of Dempsey Winthrop; Charles; Esther, deceased, who was the wife of W. D. Eaton; and Susan, who afterwards became the second wife of Mr. Eaton.

Henry R. Winthrop's life has been one round of activity as a farmer, save for one term spent as sheriff of Perry county. He served in that capacity from 1902 to 1906, since which time none but matters of a private nature have claimed his attention. He was married to Miss Martha Hutson, a daughter of Chamberlain Hutson, residents of the country about Tamaros, and the following children have been born to them: Carrie E., who is unmarried; Dempsey, of Pinckneyville; Hanlan R., a farmer near Tamaroa and married to Grace Hampleman; Elsie E.; Sylvia L.; Henry B.; and Claud H.

Dempsey Winthrop was educated in the country and public schools of Tamaroa. He attended the Northern Indiana Normal University and finished a commercial course in that institution. He left the home farm in 1902 to take a deputyship under his father, who was elected sheriff of Perry county, and while in that office he acquitted himself in such a manner that the Republicans of the county recognized in him valuable timber for the party, and they made him their candidate for the office in 1906, electing him by a pleasing majority. This term of service completed, he won the nomination of his party for representative to the general assembly and was elected in 1910, together with Messrs. Etherton and Stevenson, representing the forty-fourth senatorial district comprising the counties of Monroe, Randolph, Perry, Jackson and Washington. Mr. Winthrop took part in the forty-seventh general assembly, was chairman of the committee on Federal relations, and a member of the committee on appropriations, building, loan and homestead associations, enrolled and engrossed bills, horticulture, penal and reformatory institutions, and railroads and bridges. He was also a member of special committees for the inspection and investigation of the State's Eye and Ear Infirmary at Chicago, and for the investigation of the Industrial Home for the Blind. It will be seen that his activities while a member of the assembly were of a wide and varied nature, as becomes a man of his ability and character. Mr. Winthrop is a director of the Murphy-Wall Bank and Trust Company of Pinckneyville, one of the strong financial institutions of the county and of Southern Illinois, and is a member of the Odd Fellow lodge and is a Master Mason.

Mr. Winthrop took for his wife Miss Bess May Williams, a daughter of the late Ralph G. Williams, an ex-county clerk and ex-sheriff of Perry county, and one of the oldest settlers of this section of the state. His wife was Miss Emily T. Goodrich, and they are the parents of seven daughters. They are: Anna, the wife of A. S. Marlow, now deceased; Alta, who married Henry Duckworth; Florence, now Mrs. Elias Kane; Viola, who married E. R. Hineke; Lizzie, the wife of A. W. McCants; Iantha; and Mrs. Winthrop.