South Dakota teacher Lorna Herseth served as her state’s First Lady, and later as the South Dakota Secretary of State. Photo credit: South Dakota State Historical Society

Many fine classroom teachers have also served as excellent politicians. This is certainly true of Lorna Buntrock Herseth, a teacher and politician from South Dakota.

Lorna Buntrock was born in Columbia, South Dakota, on April 5, 1909, the youngest of 11 children born to immigrants from Germany. As a young woman, she attended Northern State Teachers College in Aberdeen, South Dakota, where she earned both her Bachelor’s degree and her teaching credential.

Once she completed her education, Lorna taught in public schools in Brown County. In 1936. she was elected to the position of Brown County Superintendent of Schools. She later served on the Selby School Board. She taught in both rural and urban schools around the state.

In 1937, Lorna married her college sweetheart, Ralph Herseth, after having dated for many years. The couple farmed a ranch on the east side of Sand Lake near the town of Houghton for nearly 30 years. On this farm they raised wheat, corn, and Aberdeen Angus cattle. During these years, Ralph served as a South Dakota State Senator and in 1958-1960, was South Dakota’s 21st Governor and Lorna served as the state’s First Lady from 1959 to 1961. While Ralph was Governor, the first state-wide teachers’ retirement benefit program was established.

After Ralph’s death in 1969, Lorna continued her career in politics when she was elected on the Democratic ticket to serve as the South Dakota Secretary of State. She served two terms in this position, from 1973 to 1979. As if all this were not enough, Lorna also served on the Board of Directors for the Brown County Red Cross. She also served as the State Director of the Easter Seal Society.

Lorna passed away on September 8, 1994, at the age of 85. She is interred in Houghton Cemetery in Brown County, South Dakota.

Former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was born into an aristocratic family, yet she worked as a teacher when she was a young woman and all her life she championed education for the underprivileged. Photo credit: National First Ladies Library

It is common knowledge that Eleanor Roosevelt was a popular First Lady who served our county during the presidency of her husband, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He served during the Great Depression and World War II. During that period, Eleanor worked tirelessly to advance her husband’s social and political agenda. But did you know that this great lady was a teacher before her marriage to FDR?

Eleanor Roosevelt was born into an aristocratic family in New York city. Her mother died when Eleanor was quite young, and her father was an alcoholic. As a child, she was socially and physically awkward and starved for attention. When her father also passed away, young Eleanor became a ward of her maternal grandmother.

Eleanor was educated by private tutors until she was 15 years old. Then her grandmother sent her to private finishing school, the Allenswood Academy, in England. There Eleanor flourished under the guidance of the school’s headmistress, Marie Souvestre, who encouraged social responsibility and independence for young women. When Eleanor completed her formal education at age 18, she returned to New York City. There she made her social debut in 1902, according to the customs of her social class.

After Eleanor’s debut, she shunned the social life of a debutante that her family expected her to follow. Instead, she turned her boundless energy into progressive projects that helped improve the lives and working conditions of immigrants and those living in poverty. She joined an organization known as the Junior League, and helped established a community center known as the Rivington Street Settlement House on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. The center specialized in teaching life skills and vocational skills. Many of the center’s clients were children who worked long hours in the confined spaces of sweat shops. These children did not have many opportunities to engage in physical exercise and movement. To help them improve their health, Eleanor worked as a dance teacher and calisthenics instructor.

Because of her work at the Junior League, Eleanor Roosevelt found her voice as a social activist long before she became First lady. Her work at there was the start of a career in public service that extended even after she left the White House.

To learn more about this amazing historical figure, see this link at the National First Ladies Library.

President William McKinley was a country schoolhouse teacher when he was a young man. Photo credit: Public domain

In my research about former residents of the White House who have also been teachers. I have been very surprised to learn just how many of them there are. For example, did you know that President William McKinley was once a teacher?

William McKinley was born in Niles, Ohio, and was raised in Poland, Ohio. When he was a youngster, education was very important to William, and he studied diligently at  the school he attended that was run by the Methodist seminary in his hometown.

After William graduated from high school, he briefly attended Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania. However, he had to drop out because of health and financial difficulties. As the seventh child in a large family, he needed to go to work to help support his family. Like two sisters, William decided to go into teaching. He inaugurated his career as an educator as a teacher at a one-room country schoolhouse not far from the home of his parents.

In his classroom, the 17-year-old William taught 50 students of all ages and skill levels. For this work he earned $25 a month. According to the custom of the day, the neophyte educator boarded with the families of his students, although at times he walked several miles to and from school to stay at home with his parents.

William hoped to eventually earn enough money to return to college but, when the Civil War broke out in 1861, he decided to enlist in the army on the Northern side. He fought in the Twenty-third Ohio Volunteer Infantry, where he rose to the rank of Second Lieutenant.

Once the war was over, William moved to Canton, Ohio, and returned to the classroom. Later, he shifted careers and went into the practiced of law. Eventually, the former teacher became the governor of Ohio, and then, in 1896, he was elected the 25th President of the United States.

“How priceless is a liberal education!” President McKinley once declared. “Our hope is in the public schools and in the university. Let us fervently pray that they may always be generously supported,” he concluded. To read more about this Chalkboard Champion, see this link provided by the Miller Center at the University of Virginia.