BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES

Joseph Daniel Mitchell

Joseph Daniel Mitchell, son of Isaac and Mary (Kerr) Mitchell, was born in Calhoun County, Texas, on October 22, 1848.  He attended schools at Galveston, San Antonio, and Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.  A rancher in Calhoun County from 1867 to 1887, he married Agnes Ward in 1871.

Interested in natural science, Mitchell was an entomologist for the United States Department of Agriculture and sent collections of Indian relics, mineral specimens, birds' eggs, and reptiles to the Smithsonian Institute.  He contributed articles to the Texas Academy of Science and the Farmers Bulletin.  His main interest was in conchology.

A member of the city council of Victoria, he also represented the Eighty-third District in the House of the Twenty-fourth Legislature.  He was one of the authors of the law creating the state Fish, Oyster, and Game Commission.

Mitchell died on February 27, 1922, in Victoria.  

Source: Transcription from the book, The Handbook of Texas, volume II, edited by Walter Prescott Webb, published in 1952; located on the website, Hathitrust Digital Library (http://www.hathitrust.org), accessed on 8 March 2023.