From History of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin - 1881, Volume 1, Page 539-540

WADE H. RICHARDSON, Principal of the Twelfth District School, was born in Georgia in December, 1846.  His early life was spent in Alabama, where his parents now reside.  His relatives are staunch Unionists and were sufferers in the cause of patriotic principle.  At the age of sixteen, rather than enter the Confederate Army under conscript law, he, with a single companion traversed by night the swamps and marshes of Southern Alabama and Florida to the Union lines at Fort Pickens, a distance of 275 miles.  Recovering from an attack of yellow fever, he taught private school three months in a little kitchen with fifteen pupils; tuition was two dollars each month.  He paid for board twenty dollars.  Enlisted January 1, 1863, in the Florida Cavalry Volunteers. Served as clerk and Quarter-Master Sergeant in Company A, till the close of the war.  In January, 1866, he entered the East Alabama Male College, at Auburn.  In this place the Union and Northern men were socially ostracized, and he left college in May of that year.  Came to McLean County, Ill., and taught in that county for the school years of 1866-7.  In the Fall of 1867 he entered the Normal University at Normal, Ill., and graduated in the class of 1870, having in mean time taught six months in a private school in Kankakee.  After graduating, he taught two years in Illinois.  In October, 1872, he was appointed Principal of the Fourth District School in Milwaukee, and resigned in July, 1876, because of ill-health.  Spent one year in the South, and returned in September, 1877.  Was elected Principal of the Twelfth District School, in which position he is still retained.  Was married in 1870 to Miss Lydia CORBERT, who died October, 1878, leaving two children.  He organized and was first President of the "Utile Dulci Club," on the South Side.  Is a member of the State Board of Visitors of the Platteville Normal School. Has been an active worker in the State Teachers' Association. Is an Episcopalian. Was married to his second wife, Mary HAWLEY, of Chicago, August, 1880.  His assistant teachers are Normal graduates and heartily cooperate in his methods.  He is a practical mathematician and a systematic organizer.

Submitted by Carol