L. E.
Wilhite, who is now serving in the closing months of his second term as
county superintendent of schools of Macoupin county, was born near
Hornsby. He is a son of the late T. J. and Hannah Wilhite. The father
served in Company H, of the Sixth Missouri Volunteer Inlantry In the
Union army in the civil war.
L. E. Wilhite went to work in his
father's store which was also the post office, at early age. Arriving at
the age of seventeen, he re-entered school. When he had finished his
education he took up the profession of teaching. However he had decided
that he would become an attorney. With this in view he began the study
of law in the office of his brother, the late P. A. Wilhite. Upon the
death of the brother he continued to read law in the office of J. H.
Atterbury, of Litchfield. In the year 1907 he was admitted to the bar
and practiced in Gillespie. He served as city attorney under two
different mayors, namely, R. H. Isaacs and J. B. Bycroft.
The
practice of law becoming distasteful to him Mr. Wilhite re-entered the
teaching profession. He taught and supervised schools for twenty-two and
one-half years prior to his election to the office of county
superintendent of schools and was never employed more than eight miles
from the house in which he was born. The seven years immediately
preceding his election to the office of county superintendent, he was
superintendent of the Gillespie grade schools. Mr. Wilhite's record as a
teacher, which covers a period of more than a quarter of a century, has
given him unusual experience and opportunity to qualify him for the
position as head of the schools of this county. He is vested with much
authority, yet he has always approached each problem brought before him
with sympathy and understanding which has made him very popular with
pupils, officers, patrons and teachers of the county. He holds a life
state certificate. In politics Mr. Wilhite is a Republican, He was the
unopposed candidate in the April primary In 1934 of his party for
re-nomination to the office he now holds. He is a member of the
Methodist Episcopal church.
In 1909 Mr. Wilhite was united in
marriage with Etta Lockyer, of Hornsby. . They are the parents of three
children, namely, Thelma, who is teaching in the Springfield schools,
Mary Ellen and Louis, attending the Carlinville schools.
Extracted 15 Dec 2018 by Norma Hass from History of a Famous Courthouse, by W. B. Brown, published in 1934, page 40.
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