Samuel Rinnah Van Sant

Samuel Van Sant (May 11, 1844 – October 3, 1936) was an American politician.

Born in Rock Island, Illinois, he served in the Minnesota House of Representatives from January 1893 to January 1897 and served as Speaker of the House. Van Sant served as the 15th Governor of Minnesota from January 7, 1901 to January 4, 1905, the first to serve a four-year term. He was a member of the Republican party.

He was a proud Civil War veteran with service in the, and was commander in chief of the Grand Army of the Republic for a year, 1909–1910. He was known to his friends as "Captain Sam." He died in 1936 aged 92 in Attica, Indiana.

Famous quotes containing the word van:

    His reversed body gracefully curved, his brown legs hoisted like a Tarentine sail, his joined ankles tacking, Van gripped with splayed hands the brow of gravity, and moved to and fro, veering and sidestepping, opening his mouth the wrong way, and blinking in the odd bilboquet fashion peculiar to eyelids in his abnormal position. Even more extraordinary than the variety and velocity of the movements he made in imitation of animal hind legs was the effortlessness of his stance.
    Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)