Harmon L. Remmel

They came first to New York state, where Harmon was born in 1852 in the rural town of Stratford near the southern edge of the modern Adirondack Park.

In 1871 he and his older brother Augustus Caleb Remmel (1847–1883) went to Fort Wayne, Indiana and engaged in several enterprises, ending up in the lumber business.

[1] In 1896 Remmel left the lumber business and moved to Little Rock, where he became the Arkansas general manager for the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York, a post he held until 1922.

In 1886 he was elected as a Republican to be a state representative for Jackson County, due in part to the Democratic vote being split by a candidate from the Agricultural Wheel.

He was the Republican candidate for governor in 1894, 1896, and 1900, losing to James Paul Clarke, Daniel W. Jones, and Jeff Davis.

Remmel became one of the most important lieutenants of former governor and Senator Powell Clayton (1833–1914), the boss of the Arkansas Republican party.

In 1916 he was the Republican candidate in a special election to replace United States Senator James P. Clarke, losing to Democrat William F. Kirby.

His political influence lasted right to the end of his life; one of his few visitors there was Herbert Hoover, whom Remmel subsequently endorsed for president.