Donald C. Macdonald Papers

"Funeral services for Donald Chester Macdonald, 78, long active in political circles, will be held at the Grand Forks Norman Funeral Home at 11 a.m. Saturday, with Rev. Frederick T. Gillette of St. Paul's Episcopal Church officiating. Mr. Macdonald died at his home here Tuesday. The body will lie in state Friday afternoon and evening at the funeral home where a Masonic service will be conducted at 8 p.m. Palllbearers will be Ralph E. Anderson, John Scott Jr., Donald Bruce MacDonald, Henry Kennedy, Sam Burdick and George Hawkes. Military honors will be accorded here by members of Grand Forks American Legion Post 6,  with burial at Hannah, N.D. Mr. Macdonald was born July 26, 1891, at Hannah where he first became active in politics with the 1916 birth of the Nonpartisan League. Although he never won elective public office, he was a candidate for the State Legislature in 1924 and for Congress in 1926. He later held many positions in the Nonpartisan League, and the Republican Party He was secretary of the Grand Forks County NPL from 1928 to 1938 and was chairman of the Langer for Governor movement in 1932. In 1933 he was appointed a member of the Republican Sate Central Committee, serving through 1936. From 1934-36 he was Grand Forks County Republican chairman Prior to the United State entry in World War II he organized the North Dakota chapter of America First, a political group of which former Sen. Gerald P. Nye of North Dakota was secretary. He was a long political associate of Nye, as well as of former Senators Lynn Frazier and William Langer. From 1933 through 1936 he was district inspector for the State Regulatory Department and since 1951 he had been district inspector for the attorney general's Licensing Department. A veteran of World War I, Mr. Macdonald later attended and graduated from the University of North Dakota. He was married to Evelyn J. Salt her Sept. 25, 1928, and they made their home here continuously from that time. Mrs. Macdonald survives as do two sons, John W. of Bangkok, Thailand, and Neil C. of Aspen, Colo., and a daughter Mrs. Ralph Anderson, Richfield, Minn. A brother, Colon Macdonald, Grand Forks, and eight grandchildren also survive. Mr. Macdonald was an insurance agent here from 1925 through 1943 and reportedly wrote the first group hospital insurance program in the country in 1926. From 1922 though 1940, Mr. Macdonald was correspondent for the United Press for northern Minnesota and North Dakota. He was active in scouting and a Mason, a Shriner and an American Legionnaire. He was to have received recognition next year for 50-year memberships in each of those organizations. He was president of the Grand Forks Chess Club for many years and from 1949 until the early 1960s was on the board of directors for the U.S. Chess Federation." Source: Grand Forks Herald , 11 December 1969

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