Edwin Baruch Winans

Edwin Baruch Winans (May 16, 1826 – July 4, 1894) was a U.S. representative from and the 22nd governor of Michigan.

Early life in New York and Michigan Winans was born in Avon, New York, and moved with his parents, John and Eliza (née Way), to Livingston County, Michigan in 1834. There, they settled a farm in Unadilla Township. His father died when he was a child. Winans moved with his mother to Pettysville, also in Livingston County. There, Winans worked in a flour and wool carding mill. At the age of twenty, he attended Albion College, for two and a half years in preparation for entering the Law School of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.

California Gold Rush Before completing his studies, Winans was drawn by news of the California Gold Rush, and in March 1850 left for California by an overland route to seek his fortune. Arriving July 20, he engaged in mining first on the north branch of the North Yuba River near Placerville. He continued the same work with some varied success in different parts of the state. In 1853, he was one of the members of the Randolph Hill Mining Company in the town of Rough and Ready (now a town west of Grass Valley in Nevada County). He was a delegate to the state constitutional convention of May 15, 1867. He was supervisor of Hamburg Township from 1872 to 1873 and probate judge of Livingston County from 1877 to 1881.

Winans was elected as on the Democrat-Greenback Fusion ticket and seated with the Democrats in the United States House of Representatives for the Forty-eighth and Forty-ninth Congresses, serving from March 4, 1883, to March 3, 1887. He served as Governor of Michigan from 1891 to 1893. During his tenure, several election reform bills were sanctioned, the most significant of which was the secret Australian ballot. His son, George, acted as his private secretary.