Leonidas Merritt was an American prospector and discoverer.
Background
Leonidas Merritt was born on February 20, 1844, on a farm in Chautauqua County, New York. His parents, Lewis Howell and Hepzibeth (Jewett) Merritt, later moved their family to Warren County, Pennsylvania, then to Ohio, and finally, in 1856, shortly after the opening of the canal at Sault Ste. Marie, to Duluth, Minnesota. They settled on a homestead claim at Oneonta, a suburb of Duluth, where the father worked at his trade of millwright and sawyer. Of the ten children, eight sons survived to maturity and of these Alfred, Napoleon, Louis, and Cassius were actively associated with Leonidas in his iron-mining exploits.
Education
Although Leonidas, in his later years, was fond of writing narrative poems in the meter made popular by Longfellow's "Hiawatha, " his formal education seems to have been limited to attendance upon the common-schools afforded by the frontier community and a brief term at Grand River Institute, Ashtabula, Ohio. In his late teens, he enlisted in the Minnesota cavalry for service in the Civil War and remained in the army through some of the Indian campaigns that followed.
Career
From 1856 until 1890 the family was engaged in the usual pioneer ways of making a living, chiefly in connection with the lumbering industry, though Leonidas and Alfred built a sloop to engage in the carrying trade, wrecked it, worked as lumberman to pay off debts incurred, and built a schooner and operated it. Their most profitable adventures were in timber lands and at times they possessed considerable funds. After the first discovery of rich iron-ore fields in the Lake Superior region, nearly everyone who traversed the woods hoped to discover iron ore and thereby achieve a fortune. Lewis H. Merritt was early convinced that the Mesabi region was rich in iron-ore. Beginning in the seventies, it was repeatedly investigated, but without success, because the explorers supposed its deposits would exhibit the same characteristics as those previously discovered, which were found in bold outcrops, whereas they were actually quite different, lying flat, buried beneath the surface. In 1887 the Merritts, who in connection with their work as "timber cruisers" had several times explored the field, made another survey, "running diagonals across the formation and mapping the lines of attraction with a dip-needle". Their map conforms closely to later maps of the deposits. Leonidas Merritt filed claims for the land thus located, and in July 1890 the brothers organized the Mountain Iron Company to exploit the Mesabi range. On November 16 of that year, J. A. Nicols, who with a gang of men was working for Leonidas and Alfred Merritt in depressions, discovered high-grade ore at the bottom of a test pit. Other discoveries followed, and the Merritt family embarked on a program of mining and railroad and ore-dock building that required more capital than their local associates could provide. They therefore sought and secured the participation of John D. Rockefeller, who was shrewd enough to safeguard his own interests carefully, while the Merritts, engaging in enterprises that were of a magnitude entirely beyond their business and financial ability, were not so astute. As a result of the financial crisis of 1893, they lost their control of the mining and transportation enterprises they had initiated. Litigation ensued (1895), and, ultimately (1912), a congressional investigation. Leonidas apparently suffered a mental breakdown, at any rate he was not able to give the congressional committee any clear statement of what happened or even clearly to remember how and why, in 1897, he and some other members of the family transferred their holdings to Mr. Rockefeller for something over $500, 000 in order to meet their other obligations. Louis Merritt took advantage of Mr. Rockefeller's offer to permit them to buy back their holdings at the price he paid, plus interest and became very wealthy through their subsequent appreciation. During his later years, Leonidas was commissioner of public utilities (1914 - 17) and commissioner of finance (1921 - 25) for the city of Duluth. He died there in May 1926, aged eighty-two years.
Achievements
Merritt is known as one of the "Seven Iron Men" of the Merritt Family who were the first to discover iron ore in the Mesabi Range.
Connections
On May 8, 1873, Merritt had married Elizabeth E. Wheeler of Oneota, Minn. Three children survived him.
