George Briggs Aiton

George Briggs Aiton is generally recognized as the "Father of Secondary Schools" in Minnesota. He traveled the state as an inspector for the school system. He was also a botanist and taxonomist, naming most of the native flora in Itasca State Park, MN (source of the Mississippi River). For this there is a prominence in the Park named "Aiton's Heights". He was also an editor for a variety of school books and classics, including the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, The Lady of the Lake, and others. My grandmother, until her death in the late 1980s was still receiving royalties from his work (though not a great deal of money).

George Briggs Aiton, in his later years, was a banker, and quite successful until the bank collapse, at which time, he personally guaranteed all his depositors, and lost his fortune as a result. He was able to keep a 40 acre parcel on Pokegama Lake, seven miles south of Grand Rapids, MN, which is still preserved as a summer cabin for our family.