ALBERT D.
BETHARD, who throughout his entire life
has been connected with railroad service
and has advanced through successive
promotions to the position of
superintendent of transportation of the
Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad
system, with headquarters at Denison, is a
native son of Illinois, his birth having
occurred in that state in 1858. His
parents were D. M.
and Louisa Melvin Bethard.
The Bethards were early settlers of Ohio,
in which state D. M. Bethard was born. In
early life he removed to Illinois,
becoming one of the pioneer residents
there. He followed stock raising in
Illinois, but his wife died in 1870. In
their family were two sons and a daughter,
Albert D., Flora,
and William J.
Albert D. Bethard
was reared to manhood in the state of his
nativity and entered railroad service in
the employ of the Rockford, Rock Island
& St. Louis Railroad Company as
telegraph operator at Astoria, Illinois.
That road is now a part of the Chicago,
Burlington & Quincy system. Later he
was with the same road as train dispatcher
at Rock Island and afterward became train
dispatcher for the Iron Mountain Railroad
at St. Louis, Missouri. His next promotion
made him train-master and superintendent
of telegraph for the Richmond &
Allegheny Railroad at Richmond, Virginia,
and he was next made superintendent of
transportation of that road.
In 1888 he came
to Denison, Texas, as chief dispatcher and
train-master and also superintendent of
the Dallas & Fort Worth division of
the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad
Company, with headquarters at Denison. He
is now superintendent of transportation
for the same road. Thus he has been
advanced from one position to another
until his place is now one of much
prominence and responsibility.
In politics Mr.
Bethard is a Democrat. In 1880, in
Missouri, he married Miss
Jennie Goodwin, of Illinois.
[Source: B. B.
Paddock, History and
Biographical Record of North and West
Texas (Chicago: Lewis Publishing
Co., 1906), Vol. I, p. 625.]
