OF THE SPARKMAN FAMILY


 (8) Frances Eugenia, unmarried.
 (9) Nathaniel Keightley, unmarried.
 Stephen M. Sparkman presents in his life another of th
 many instances that have occurred in American history of pub
 lic men rising to distinction from the farm. He was born on a
 farm in Hernando County and remained there, assisting in the
 homely tasks incident to agricultural life, until he was eight-
 een years of age. He was educated in the common schools of \
 South Florida, at the last in Tampa, where after leaving school
 he entered the law office of Hon. Henry Laurens Mitchell, after-
jwards governor and justice of the supreme court of Florida, as
Sa student. He was admitted to the bar in Tampa in October, 1872.
ISuccess in his profession and distinction in political life
came to him soon, and honors followed each other thick and fast.
 He was appointed state's attorney for the Sixth judicial
circuit in 1878, and he held the position until 1887. He wa?
a member of the Democratic congressional executive committee Ifor
the first district of Florida from 1890 to 1894, being chairman
for the first two years; he was a member and chairman of the
state Democ-atic executive committee from 1872 to 1896; he was
elected to represent the First district in the Fifty-fourth con-
gress, and has been re-elected to every congress since, inclid-
ing the Sixty-fourth, without exception, and it is probable
that his tenure of this office will have no limit save his odn
refusal to stand for re-election.
 Stephen M. Sparkman is a strong man-not only politically
 and as a candidate before the people, in committee and upon the
 floor of congress, but also at the bar of the courts in the
 practice of the profession to which he,has devoted his best
 years. His long service in congress, his consequent intimate
 acquaintance with the problems of national affairs brought about
 not only by experience, but by the immense grasp of his intel-
 lect, have made him one of the most valuable members of the
 national law-making body to the country at large and especially
 to the district that has so often honored him by re-election.
 The state of Florida, the First congressional district and thi
 city of Tampa owe him a deep debt of gratitude for the innume
 able and inestimable services he has performed in their beha.
 Elijah Byrd Sparkman came to Florida with his parents
 1824, at the age of five years, as he was born in 1819. .hen
 he was twenty-six years old, in 18451 he came to Hillsborough
 County and made his home in the neighborhood where he passed
 the remainder of his days, a short distance north of the present
 station of Dover on the Atlantic Coast Line railroad. He eng g-
 ed in farming and stock raising, and was so successful that hI
 accumulated a comfortable fortune. He died in 1903.