L. W. Housel

Lorenzo W. (L.W.) Housel (December 30, 1873 - September 15, 1935) was a Connecticut state legislator who later ran for Congress and statewide office in Iowa. Running as a Democrat in an era in which Republicans dominated Iowa politics, Housel was unsuccessful in each of his Iowa races.

L.W. Housel was born in VanEttenville, New York, to a veteran of the Civil War and his wife. The better portion of his young life was spent in Nichols, New York. After attending rural schools in New York and working on farms and in lumber camps, he was admitted to Yale University. While at Yale, he worked his way through college as a newspaper reporter for the New Haven Journal-Courier. After receiving his undergraduate degree from Yale in 1897, he then attended Yale Law School, receiving his law degree in 1900.

In November of the same year in which Housel graduated from law school, he was elected as a Democrat to the Connecticut House of Representatives, where he represented a district in New Haven. He was the youngest member of the House. In his first term as representative, he drafted and presented the bill to limit the length of the working day to eight hours. Although Democratic House members were outnumbered four to one by Republicans, his bill received good support, but did not pass.

Instead of running for a second term in the Connecticut House, he moved to Iowa. In June 1902 he married Mina Finch, daughter of Iowa lawyer and State Senator Parley Finch, prompting him to move from Connecticut to Humboldt, Iowa, and to enter into private practice with his new father-in-law.

Housel and his wife became the parents of Delphine Housel Christensen and William Parley Housel.

For Housel’s first thirty years in Iowa (from 1902 to 1932), Republicans dominated the General Assembly and governorship, and the Iowa congressional delegation. Humboldt County and the congressional district in which it was then located (Iowa's 10th congressional district) were overwhelmingly Republican. Nevertheless, Housel and his family remained in Humboldt and he repeatedly ran for elective office as a Democrat. Three times he ran for election to the Iowa House of Representatives (in 1910, 1912, and 1920), but was defeated each time in the general election. In 1914, he ran in the Democratic primary for Congress for the Tenth District, but was defeated by D.M. Kelleher of more populous Fort Dodge, who was in turn defeated in the general election by Republican Frank P. Woods.

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