Conover, Simon Barclay, 1840-1908

Physician; United States Senator from Florida, 1873-1879; President, Board of Regents of the Agricultural College and School of Sciences of the State of Washington (later Washington State University).

Simon Barclay Conover was born September 23, 1840, in Cranbury, New Jersey. He studied medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and University of Nashville, after which he served briefly in the medical department of the Union Army in 1864. He served as a U.S. senator for Florida from 1873 to 1879. In 1880 he made an unsuccessful bid at the governorship of Florida, and in 1889 was appointed U.S. Surgeon at the quarantine station at Port Townsend, Washington. The next year he became president of the Board of Regents for the new Agricultural College and School of Sciences of the State of Washington, later renamed Washington State University, and served as a regent for about two years. He continued to practice medicine until his death on April 19, 1908.

Simon B. Conover was born in Middlesex County, New Jersey on September 23, 1840. During the Civil War he served in the Union Army as a surgeon at various locations. After the war he was assigned to duty in Lake City. Conover resigned from the army in 1868.

In 1868 Conover was elected to the Florida Constitutional Convention and appointed by Governor Harrison Reed to the position of State Treasurer. In 1873 he won election to the Florida House of Representatives, serving briefly as Speaker. On January 31, 1873, after twenty-two ballots, Conover was selected to serve in the United States Senate. He remained in the Senate for one term, leaving office in 1879. The following year he was an unsuccessful candidate for governor on the Republican ticket. In 1885 Conover was a delegate to the new Florida Constitutional Convention.

He left Florida in 1889, following appointment as United States Surgeon to Port Townsend, Washington. Conover held various positions in the state of Washington until his death on April 19, 1908.