Linda Slaughter

Linda Slaughter (February 1, 1843 – July 3, 1911) or Linda Warfel Slaughter was an American historian, journalist, educator, and women's rights activist. She was known for her works on interracial and intercultural encounters in the nineteenth-century Midwest.

Early life and education Slaughter was born in Cadiz, Ohio on February 1, 1843. Her parents, Charles and Maria Boyd Warfel, believed in education and particularly supported educating women, which allowed Slaughter to complete high school and attend the Oberlin College. Charles, who was a merchant and a veteran of the Mexican-American War, was an abolitionist and influenced Slaughter's early views on the subject. At one point, she departed from the abolitionist view, particularly during a point when she called for wars of extermination against the Indians.

Slaughter and her husband settled in Bismarck in 1872. She was an active member of the community and wrote about her experiences there. She began writing for The Bismarck Tribune, where she contributed a regular fiction that also included social commentary covering the military as well as the Indian campaigns. Slaughter was also the vice president of the Woman's National Press Association sometime in the late 1880s and participated in the International Council of Women meeting held in 1888. and was a close acquaintance of the politician Belva Ann Lockwood. She held the post several more times until 1882. Slaughter also became the Dakota Territory's deputy superintendent of public instruction in 1876. In the year 1873, she also established Bismarck's first school called Bismarck Academy, employing her sister Aidee Warfel as the teacher.

Personal life Slaughter married the physician Benjamin Franklin Slaughter on August 20, 1868. She met her husband, who was a son of a slave-holding planter, at the western district of Kentucky and Tennessee in 1868 while working as a missionary supervisor after the American Civil War. Franklin served in the Union Army during the war and reenlisted in 1870 as an officer.

She died on July 3, 1911, in St. Cloud Minnesota.