George A. Mathews

George Arthur Mathews (June 4, 1852–April 19, 1941) was an American lawyer of Brookings, South Dakota. He was active in the government of the Dakota Territory, and was a territorial delegate to the United States House of Representatives.

Mathews was born in Potsdam, St. Lawrence County, New York, and studied law at Upper Iowa University, Fayette, Iowa and the University of Iowa at Iowa City. He was admitted to the bar in 1878 and commenced practice in Corning, Iowa.

He moved to Brookings, Dakota Territory (now South Dakota) in 1879. In 1884 he became prosecuting attorney of the fifth judicial circuit for the Territory of Dakota. This automatically made him a member of the Territorial council, and he was its President in 1887 and 1888. In 1888 he was elected as a Republican to be the Territorial delegate to the U.S. House, but served only from March 4, 1889 until November 2, 1889, when North and South Dakota were admitted into the Union.

Mathews returned home to the private practice of law, although he did serve as mayor of the city of Brookings from 1897–1903. In 1910 he retired and moved to Los Angeles, California. When he died there in 1914 he was cremated and his ashes deposited in Greenwood Cemetery at Brookings, South Dakota.

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