Frank L. Boyce Biography

	This biography appears on pages 462-465 in "History of Minnehaha 
	County, South Dakota" by Dana R. Bailey and was scanned, OCRed 
	and edited by Joy Fisher, http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031
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BOYCE, FRANK L., was a native of Dane county, Wisconsin, and was born 
March 7, 1854.  He worked on a farm and attended district school until 
fourteen years of age, when he entered the University of Madison, 
Wisconsin, where he took a complete collegiate course and was graduated 
in 1873.  Immediately thereafter he entered the law department of this 
university, from which he graduated in 1874, and on the 20th day of 
June of that year was admitted to the bar by the supreme court of 
Wisconsin.  He then entered the law office of Baker, Buell & Wait of 
Chicago, where he remained until September, 1875, when he was admitted 
upon examination by the supreme court of Illinois to practice law in 
that state, which practice he pursued in Chicago until May, 1878.  At 
that time he went to Sioux Falls on a visit, remaining there about a 
month, and was so well pleased with Dakota and its future prospects 
that he concluded to make Sioux Falls his future home. He returned to 
Chicago, finished up his business there and removed to Sioux Falls and 
opened a law office the October following. In March, 1879, he formed a 
copartnership with John Bippus for the practice of law under the firm 
name of Bippus & Boyce, which partnership continued until August, 1881. 
He then practiced by himself until late in the year of 1883, when he 
took his brother Jesse W. Boyce in with him under the firm name of 
Boyce & Boyce.  In the spring of 1884 the firm of Boyce, Noyes & Boyce 
was established, which continued until January, 1886, when T. W. Noyes 
removed to Washington, D. C.  In 1879, Mr. Boyce was elected secretary 
of the Board of Education, and in 1883 was elected alderman from the 
third ward.  In 1894 he was elected senator from Minnehaha county upon 
the Republican ticket.

He is known as a most studious, painstaking, conservative lawyer, and 
has been connected in his professional capacity with some of the most 
important cases that have occupied the attention of the courts of the 
state.  His firm has had in charge the legal business of the B., C. R. 
& N. railroad at this place from the time it was built into Sioux 
Falls, and also that of the Northwestern Packing Company. As an 
official no one in the city has a more enviable reputation.  In the 
performance of his senatorial duties in the legislature of 1895, he was 
noted as being the most industrious member of that body, and no member 
brought to the discharge of his duties a more careful, conscientious 
regard for the welfare of the state than Frank L. Boyce of Sioux Falls.  
A man of this character is always a good neighbor and a respected 
citizen, and nothing good could be said of him in this respect that 
would not receive the unanimous indorsement of his wide circle of 
acquaintances.

The foregoing sketch was written in 1895.  During the summer of 1896, 
Mr. Boyce, being in feeble health, went to his old home in Wisconsin to 
visit his friends and take a much needed rest for a few weeks. Instead 
of recuperating, he became more enfeebled and on the 19th day of 
December, 1896, he died at the home of his parents. His remains were 
brought to Sioux Falls and interred in Mount Pleasant cemetery. Not 
only the legal fraternity with whom he had long been associated, but 
all who knew him, sincerely mourned his death.