Ed C. Hill, the present efficient postmaster at Burr Oak, was born in Iowa county, Wisconsin, May 27, 1859. He is a son of Sylvester and Eliza (Billington) Hill. Sylvester Hill was a native of Crawford county, Pennsylvania, and came west with his parents when a child. He was a son of Jonathan Hill, who was a native of Connecticut, and one of the original settlers in that portion of Ohio known as the Western Reserve. He was the first settler in what is now Hartsgrove township, Lake county, Ohio. After a residence of several years there he went west and while on the way to Iowa county, Wisconsin, he was taken sick, and died at Fond du Lac, that State. The family continued on to Iowa county, where Sylvester Hill resided for eighteen years, when he removed to Fayette county, Iowa, and in 1872 came to Jewell county, Kansas, with his family, consisting of his wife and five children, namely: Elbridge (deceased); W. R. (deceased); Maria, married Oscar Follette, Fairmont, Minn.; Ed C., subject, and George A., Smith, Center. The father and mother spent the remainder of their lives in Jewell county, where the father died in 1898, aged seventy-one, and the mother departed this life in 1906, at a similar age. Sylvester Hill served through the Civil war as a member of Company A, Forty-ninth regiment, Wisconsin volunteer infantry. When the Hill family settled in Highland township, Jewell county, where the father homesteaded a claim, there were very few settlers in the county. Like most of the early comers they endured many hardships, common to the lot of the hardy pioneers of the times. The plains abounded in large game, such as buffalo, deer, antelope and elk.

Ed Hill was educated in the public schools and later took a course in bookkeeping. He remained on the farm until he was twenty-one years of age, when he entered the employ of Mann & Gilbert, at Burr Oak, as a clerk, and later became their bookkeeper, remaining with them eight years. He then went to Esbon, Jewell county, where he engaged in the general mercantile business and was appointed postmaster during President Harrison's administration. When Cleveland was elected President, Mr. Hill resigned the postmastership at Esbon and returning to Burr Oak entered the employ of Gilbert Bros. He was with that concern a little over a year when he resigned to close up the affairs of his brother who had recently died, and who had been in the harness business several years at Burr Oak. Later Mr. Hill organized the Gilbert Mercantile Company, of that town. On December 24, 1897, he was again appointed postmaster, this time at Burr Oak, and has held that position ever since, receiving his last commission in the spring of 1912. Mr. Hill was united in marriage, April 11, 1882, to Miss Margaret Johnson, of Concordia, Kan. They have one son, William R., assistant postmaster at Burr Oak. Mr. Hill has served two terms as mayor of Burr Oak and is a Republican. He is a member of the Knights of Pythias, Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Modern Woodmen of America. He is one of the substantial and highly respected citizens of Jewell county.