Page 302 - PGM Compendium

Thomas Minor became a leader in the Republican party, regularly attending the party’s territorial
conventions and representing the territory at national conventions in 1876, 1880, and 1888. In
1880 he was elected (by 98 votes out of 107 total) to the largely ornamental post of Mayor of Port
Townsend. He was re-elected the following year to a second one-year term.

Minor married Sarah Montgomery on August 20, 1872, in Oregon. Sarah (born May 21, 1840, in
Pennsylvania; died June 11, 1931, in Seattle) was the daughter of William Montgomery and Eliza
Moorhead. Thomas and Sarah were the parents of two daughters: Elizabeth Montgomery Minor,
born on May 14, 1874, in Port Townsend, Washington; died November 24, 1958, in Seattle; and
Judith Strong Minor, born December 2, 1876, Port Townsend; died July 19, 1959, Philadelphia.

In 1883, he moved his family and medical practice to the larger city. The Minors immediately
became as active in Seattle civic life as they had been in Port Townsend. Sarah Minor, whom he
married on August 20,1872, was a co-founder of the Ladies Relief Society and Thomas Minor
became a leader in Seattle’s recently established Chamber of Commerce.

In 1886, Minor was part of a group of conservative Seattle business and civic leaders who
organized a "law and order" party known as the Loyal League in response to the labor unrest and
anti-Chinese riots of 1885-1886 and the city’s depressed economic condition. Their candidate for
mayor, Seattle founder Arthur A. Denny (1822-1899), was defeated in the 1886 election. In the
following year’s election, the Loyal League supported Minor, who won the mayor’s office with a
substantial majority. Minor’s one- year term as mayor appears to have been successful, helped no
doubt by the fact that Seattle was on its way to economic recovery.

In addition to his term as mayor, Minor served three terms as president of the Seattle school board.
He presided over the start of a major school-building program and initiated reforms in school
management.

With Washington territory preparing to become a state in 1889, Minor spent the summer as a
delegate to the convention that drafted the new state’s constitution. He was touted as a likely
candidate for statewide office. However, soon after the statehood celebrations in November 1889,
Minor and his companions set out on their ill-fated duck hunting trip.

Minor, his friend Morris Haller (son of M⸫W⸫ Granville Haller), and Haller’s brother-in-law
Lewis Cox hunted near Stanwood for several days without much success, so on December 2, 1889,
they decided to cross Saratoga Passage to Brann’s Point on Whidbey Island, a distance of 12 miles.
Not finding a sailboat to tow their canoes across, the three hunters set out across the often-
treacherous passage paddling a large Indian cedar canoe and a smaller canvas one. They were not
seen alive again. Search parties set out when they had not returned within a few days.

Once the empty canoes were found washed up on a Whidbey Island beach, it was apparent the
men had drowned. Seattle came to a standstill on Sunday, December 15, as huge memorial services
and a procession were held in honor of Minor and Haller. Morris Haller’s body was found on
January 4, 1890, and Lewis Cox’s body a month later. Minor was never found.