ramatic triumph. It
produced a strong impression on the public mind and gave Powell a
national reputation which was afterwards of great service, although
based on an adventurous episode by no means essential to his career
as an investigator." The qualities which enabled him so splendidly
to perform his many self-imposed tasks were an inheritance from his
parents, who possessed more than ordinary intelligence. Joseph Powell,
his father, had a strong will, deep earnestness, and indomitable
courage, while his mother, Mary Dean, with similar traits possessed also
remarkable tact and practicality. Both were English born, the mother
well educated, and were always leaders in the social and educational
life of every community where they dwelt. Especially were they prominent
in religious circles, the father being a licensed exhorter in the
Methodist Episcopal Church. Both were intensely American in their love
and admiration of the civil institutions of the United States and both
were strenuously opposed to slavery, which was flourishing in America
when they arrived in 1830. For a time they remained in New York City and
then removed to the village of Palmyra whence they went to Mount Morris,
Livingston County, New York, where, on March 24, 1834, the fourth of
their nine children, John Wesley, was born. Because of the slavery
question Joseph Powell left the Methodist Episcopal Church on the
organisation of the Wesleyan Methodist Church and became a regularly
ordained preacher in the latter. It was in this atmosphere of social,
educational, political, and religious fervor that the future explorer
grew up. When he was four or five years old the family moved to Jackson,
Ohio, and then, in 1846, went on westward to South Grove, Walworth
County, Wisconsin, where a farm was purchased. They were in prosperous
circumstances, and the boy was active in the management of affairs,
early exhibiting his trait for doing things well. His ploughing,
stack-building, and business ability in disposing advantageously of the
farm products and in purchasing supplies at the lake ports received the
commendation of the countryside.

*I am indebted to Major Powell's brother-in-law, Prof. A. H.
Thompson, for many of the facts herein stated, and for revision of dates
to his brother Prof. W. B. Powell.

** October 10, 1902.

His early education was such as the country schools provided. He later
studied at Janesville, Wisconsin, earning his boa