Edwards, Rev. Jonathan.  "An Illustrated History of Spokane County, State of
Washington."  San Francisco: W. H. Lever, 1900.  p. 326.
 
PROF. WILLIAM BEECHER TURNER

     principal of the State Normal School at Cheney, was born February 17, 1858,
in Honolulu, where his parents were missionaries. They now reside on a farm in
the vicinity of Salteese Lake, Spokane county. Both have been prominent for many
years in the ministerial and educational work of the Pacific coast, the father
having been president of Napa College, California, for a long time. The mother
was also an early graduate of the State Normal School at Albany, New York, and a
prominent teacher.   She is a scion of the noted Beecher family. Principal
Turner was brought by his parents to California in his early infancy, and there
he was educated, graduating from Napa College, from which he has since received
the degree of M. A. For a number of years subsequent he pursued the dual
occupation of teaching and journalism in the Golden state, but in 1885 he came
to Washington territory and accepted the principalship of the public schools at
Palouse City. He afterward served as principal of the Spokane high school and
city superintendent for some years. He then withdrew from the profession
temporarily, and engaged in the lumber trade, a business in which he was very
successful for several years. In 1890, however, he returned to educational work,
being elected superintendent of schools for Spokane county, an office which he
filled very creditably for four years. On November 20, 1892, Principal Turner
was married to Miss Rose M. Rice, a daughter of Kentucky's noted lawyer. Judge
Milton L. Rice, and one of the pioneer teachers of Spokane. Previous to her
marriage she had also been principal of the training department and critic
teacher in the State Normal School at Ellensburg, and she now holds a like
position in the Cheney Normal School. They have one child, Catherine. After
retiring from the county superintendency. Principal Turner was high school
principal at Sprague and Wanatchee; also spent a year in journalism at Kaslo,
British Columbia. In 1898 he and Mrs. Turner were asked to reopen the State
Normal School at Cheney, which had been closed by gubernatorial veto of its
maintenance fund. Though they would have to trust for expenses entirely
to tuition fees and private subscriptions, they undertook the work and soon
enlisted an energetic faculty and over a hundred students. Principal Turner has
since succeeded in getting the school restored to state aid. His services as a
lecturer and institute worker are everywhere in demand, and his reputation as an
educator is more than state wide. He is considered a specialist in psychology
and history, on both of which subjects he has published monographs.


*******************

Submitted to the Washington Biographies Project in March 2008 by Diana Smith.
Submitter has no additional information about the person(s) or family mentioned
above.