Eminent Farmer
County: Hanson
Albert Hill was born in Vermillion County, Illinois, in 1869.
As a young man he worked in the railway mail service for three years. Then he entered the implement business with his brother, W. S. Hill, in Alexandria, South Dakota.
Although the implement business gave him direct touch with agriculture, he felt that he wanted to be a farmer himself, so in 1899 he bought a farm near Alexandria. He decided to go into the purebred cattle business and purchased registered Herefords. The raising and selling of purebred Hereford cattle became his chief business.
Hill took a keen interest in the livestock industry of the state. He acted as superintendent of the cattle department of the state fair, and had much to do with establishment of standard desirable types, especially in connection with Hereford cattle.
In 1905 he won the grand championship at the state fair on herd sire and get of sire, and the following year won the grand championship again on his herd sire.
Hill sold nearly 100 purebred calves and 30 bulls in 1930. In 1929 and 1930 Hill raised one hundred per cent calf crops, a record seldom equaled by any breeders.
Hill was married in 1897 to Erma Bond, who was born in Genesee County, New York, and who went to Alexandria in 1892. Associated with Hill in raising cattle and the managing of the home farm of 480 acres were three sons, one daughter.
Hill was never a candidate for public office in his life, but in 1930 he was elected president of the Farmers Mutual Insurance Company of Hanson County.