San Diego County Biographies
 
R. D. BUTLER

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm


San Diego.�The school work of San Diego County is well and ably managed by its 
superintendent, Mr. R. D. Butler, whose entire life has been given to 
educational purposes and principles. Mr. Butler was born in Springfield, 
Missouri, on the 27th day of March, 1851, being the youngest in a family of four 
children. On account of the failing health of his father they left Missouri in 
1856, and with a mule team they crossed the plains by the old emigrant route. 
After experiencing the usual delays and annoyances of that mode of traveling 
they arrived safely in California, first stopping at Marysville and then 
locating in Napa County, where our subject's father bought a farm and carried on 
general farming, and was physically benefited by the outdoor life. After five 
years of labor in improving and beautifying, they lost all through the injustice 
of one of those " floating grants" which swallowed up their property. The loss 
of property limited Mr. Butler's educational facilities, but by stern 
perserverance and much hard labor he acquired the education he so eagerly 
sought, and fitted himself for teaching, beginning at Santa Rita, Monterey 
County, in 1879, in the district schools, and later in the public schools of 
that county. In 1881 failing health brought him to San Diego and its genial 
climate, and for two years he taught at Old Town. In the fall of 1882 he was 
elected Superintendent of the county schools and was re-elected in 1886, the 
term of office being four years. Mr. Butler has charge of the schools of the 
county and visits each district at least once a year. There are 110 districts 
and they employ 200 teachers in the city and county.
        He was married at Salinas, Monterey County, in 1878, to Miss Ida Morgan. 
This union has been blessed by two children, one only of whom survives.
 
SOURCE:  An Illustrated History of Southern California:  Embracing the Counties 
of San Diego, San Bernardino, Los Angeles and Orange, and the Peninsula of Lower 
California� Chicago:  The Lewis Publishing Company, 1890.  p.-  372-373