Courtesy of Merv McConnel
Fred H. McConnel (1877-1963) and Ellen Harmon McConnel (1879-1973), circa 1940
(from "The History of Idaho" by Hiram T. French, Vol. III, pg. 1023. Lewis Publishing Co., 1914.)
"A worthy representative of the energetic younger and native generation of Idaho is Fred H. McConnell, now serving as surveyor and engineer of Canyon County. His claim as a native son of Idaho is something of a distinction, for as yet the professional, business and industrial ranks of the state are largely filled with foreign workers, contributions from other of the great commonwealths of the Union. He is a young man of merit and high character and is distinctly an Idaho product, for he was not only born and reared here, but he was educated in its leading institution of learning, the University of Idaho, and thus far has spent his professional and business career in the vicinity of his birth.
"After completing his high school education in Caldwell, Fred H. McConnell became a student in the University of Idaho at Moscow, from which institution he was graduated in June, 1902, as a Bachelor of Science. Here he has also qualified as a Civil engineer. After his graduation he became deputy clerk and recorder of Canyon County, serving two years, and following that he entered the United States Reclamation Service, with which he remained identified a year. In 1906 he became city engineer of Caldwell and served four years; then in 1910 he entered into private practice as a Civil engineer and surveyor in connection with his duties as county surveyor, to which office he was elected in November, 1908, and which he has since filled. In political views he is a Republican and while he takes a lively interest in party affairs he has not becorne active enough to be termed a politician. His religious tenets are those of the Methodist Episcopal Church and he also affiliates with the Phi Delta Theta college fraternity and with the Caldwell Commercial club."
Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. - Thomas Jefferson