Hon. John F. Sophy (b. 1846, Prescott, Ontario) was a prominent businessman and politician in Garretson, South Dakota. After moving to Iowa in 1854, he worked in agriculture before homesteading in Plymouth County in 1871. In 1889, Sophy relocated to Garretson, where he established a successful business in lumber, coal, grain, and livestock. By 1896, he focused solely on grain and livestock, alongside managing a 280-acre farm. Elected to the South Dakota legislature in 1899 as a Democrat, he also served multiple terms as Garretson’s mayor. Sophy married Anna O. Meara in 1869, and they had two sons, John F. and Myron J.
Hon. John F. Sophy, one of the leading businessmen and popular citizens of the thriving city of Garretson, is a native of Ontario, Canada, born December 13, 1846, near the town of Prescott. His early life on his father’s farm was devoid of any particular interest, having been spent after the usual manner of country lads, working in the fields in the summertime and attending the public schools in the winter seasons. When about eight years old, he was taken by his parents to Clinton County, Iowa, where the family settled in the fall of 1854, and from that time until 1869, he devoted his attention to agriculture and grew to manhood well qualified to cope with the varied problems which the future might present. Subsequently, in the fall of 1871, he took up a homestead in Plymouth County, Iowa, and, addressing himself to the task of improvement, soon had a goodly portion of the land under cultivation and well stocked with cattle. Mr. Sophy continued to live in Plymouth and Woodbury counties until 1889, at which time he disposed of his interest in the above state and came to Garretson, South Dakota, where he found a favorable opening for a lumber and coal yard.
After devoting his attention for one year to these lines of business, he added grain and livestock and in due time built up a large and lucrative patronage, supplying the local market with lumber and coal, and shipping vast quantities of grain and a great many cattle to various eastern points. Later he disposed of his lumber and coal interests and since 1896 has given his attention exclusively to the handling of grain and livestock, in the buying and selling of which he has a large and far-reaching business. In addition to his regular business in Garretson, Mr. Sophy owns and personally manages a valuable farm of two hundred and eighty acres a short distance from the town, in which he pastures many fine cattle and from which he derives no small part of his income. In many respects, he is a typical western man, in that he is energetic, wide-awake, and fully abreast of the times, taking broad views of men and things, and manifesting a lively concern in whatever makes for the material prosperity of his city, county, and state.
In 1899 he was elected on the Democratic ticket to the state legislature, where he achieved honorable distinction as a lawmaker, and he has also served several terms as mayor of Garretson, during which he administered the municipal government in a straightforward, business-like manner that won the confidence of the people of all parties and shades of political opinion. His personal relations are of the most pleasant and agreeable character, he being sociable and companionable to an eminent degree, and few men in the city of his residence enjoy to as marked a degree the esteem and confidence of the community.
Miss Anna O. Meara, who, on November 24, 1869, became the wife of Mr. Sophy, was born August 17, 1851; she has presented him with two sons, whose names are John F. and Myron J.
Source: Robinson, Doane, History of South Dakota: together with mention of Citizens of South Dakota, [Logansport? IN] : B. F. Bowen, 1904.