life was spent on the farm at a period when school advantages were at best
but crude and imperfect. Ha derived his education in the common schools
of that State and labored industriously to secure a foundation for the pro-
fession he had resolved to enter as a means of livelihood. He read law and
was admitted to the bar in the Supreme Court of the State of New York,
at Rochester, during the March term of 1851. He practiced law at Tona-
wanda and Buffalo, New York, until the spring of 1862, when he immigrated
to Oregon. He settled in Benton cormty, where he went into partnership
in the practice of law with his brother, Hon. A. J. Thayer, afterwards Judge
of the Second Judicial District, who died in 1873. Governor Thayer re-
mained in Benton county until the summer of 1863, when he w'eut to Lew--
iston, Idaho Territory, where he stayed until 1867. He was a member of
the Territorial Legislature of Idaho in the winter of 1866-7. He was elected
District Attorney of the Third Judicial District of that Territory in 1866,
which position he resigned in 1867, when he removed to Portland, where he
again entered upon the active practice of his profession, and where he has
resided ever since, having built up a practice both lucrative and honorable.
In 1878, when the Democratic party was casting about for a candidate to
succeed Governor Chadwick as the Chief Executive of the State, the name
of Hon. W. W. Thayer was proposed and it resulted in his nomination and
election. He was inaugvirated as Governor September 11, 1878, and at once
set about correcting certain abuses of public trust and introducing in all
departments under his immediate control much needed reforms. His ap-
pointments were made with a ^-iew to the fitness of the applicant, and his
entire administration was characterized by an economical management of
public affairs and an evident desire to make all things subservient to the
best interests of the State at large. He was very popular as Governor, be-
ing one of those plain, every-day sort of men who are always the same
wherever you meet them and having a kindly greeting for all. He took
especial pride in the economical management of the Penitentiary, which
institution was under his complete control, and in the judicious administra-
tion of other State matters he was ably assisted by his associates in office.
Personally he is social, courteous and genial, and never fails to make
friends with all with whom he comes in contact. The Governor was mar-
ried November 11, 1852, to Miss Samantha C. Vincent, of I'onawanda, New
York, their family consisting of one son, now a ijrominent attorney of Tilla-
mook county. Since the Governors retirement from office he has resumed
the active practice of his profession at Portland.
WILLIAM REID, ESQ., The well-known banker and capitalist of Portland, although a nat- uralized citizen of the United States, was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1842, and is consequently forty years of age at the present time. He was traiwed for the legal profession and educated at the Scottish University of Glasgow, being admitted in 1867 as an attorney of t])e Scotch courts at Edin- burgh, and afterwards practiced his profession at Dundee until 1874. In 1869, upon the recommendation of Mrs. Marv Lincoln, widow of President
